webOS Software

[#1]

Most of the time I create calendar events using Google Calendar instead of creating them on the phone. In gCal, my default reminder is an SMS message sent 10 minutes before the scheduled event.

Whether the event is synced to my Pre or not, the SMS reminder is sent to my Pre (as it should) but, after the event syncs to the phone I expect to see that a reminder is set when I look at the event's details. Instead, there is "No Reminder" in the Reminder field. Is this a bug?

When I create an event on the Pre the reminder shows up on the phone and in gCal.

[#2]

Not sure if its a bug. But it is confusing and I fooled around some with it now. Not sure if I got it figured out or not yet. Here goes, test out some yourself to see if you get same.  On the web gcal if you do not have a default reminder notification set up for your calendar, new events created on the PRE with reminders will not show any reminder online. Its phone only. Now if you do have default reminders set up at gcal, like SMS then events created on the PRE with a reminder will show up with an SMS reminder that will be set to the same as the one you set on the PRE regardless of what your default SMS time is set at on the web gcal. Whew, still with me? New events created on the web gcal from what I can tell must have a Pop up reminder created when the event is created in order for the reminder to transfer over to the Pre. If you go back to edit a gcal event with no reminder and add the popup it will not reflect on the Pre, it must be created when the event is created.

Basically its confusing as heck. But, for what I think you might want this should work. On the web gcal I assume you have in the calendar settings have set up a default SMS 10 min reminder for all events? Add another default below that to say Popup and for the same time 10 minutes. What this will do is give you sms, and the pop-up default will transfer to the Pre's and show up under reminders. Now when the reminder time is up you will get a notification twice on the phone, whatever your alarm notification is set at (vibrate,System Sound,Ringtone, Mute) along with the SMS message.

Whew, hope some of that makes any sense. If not I dont blame ya, just read it myself again and not sure I get it lol. So to answer the question is it a bug? I have no idea. But you can get it to work doing the above and adding a pop-up default notification on the web gcal.

[#3]

Wow...had to read it twice but I think I got it! It makes sense.

I switched from default pop-ups after I enabled SMS reminders on gCal's "Mobile Setup" settings tab. Based on your suggestion, I think the thing for me to do is to go back to using pop-up notifications because I really want to be able to see that I have a reminder set. (I don't want stealth reminders!) If that's what works then that's how I'll configure the settings.

My only question is: If I change to pop-up reminders as the gCal default, will it only effect events that I create from this point forward? Meaning, will existing events in my gCal calendars continue to send SMS reminders? I don't know, but I'll mess around with it for a day or so and see what happens. This is confusing...

Thanks.

[#4]

I don't think it will change events already entered. But you can also add more then one notification default if you want. So if you wanted to some reason keep sms and have the pre show the reminder add both sms and popup. Although that would be overkill, basically having 2 reminders on same device for 1 event.

[#5]

There is trade-off that I'm trying to reconcile with respect to how reminders are displayed on the Pre. An SMS reminder is very non-intrusive. It sounds the alert (once) and it shows up in the notification area. I can leave it there or swipe it away.

Calendar reminders demand a little more attention. I have to decide whether to dimiss or snooze the reminder. (Before the 1.4 update I was stuck with the default system sound…that I found kind of annoying.) If I ignore a Calendar reminder it sounds the alert (twice) and assumes "snooze" behavoir when I continue whatever I was doing before the reminder appeared. It also takes about 3 times the screen real estate as compared to an SMS reminder. Repeat in 5 minutes.

Having to deal with two default reminders (SMS and Calendar) on each event would drive me nuts! That solution isn't going to work for me. So, I've decided to continue what I've been doing all along: using SMS reminders, but now with the understanding that I will not be able to see that an SMS reminder is set for events created via gCal. I'll also submit feedback to Palm with the hope of seeing this capability in a future update to webOS.