Hello there Paul,

Thanks so much for your kind comments, and for your thoughtful questions as you are getting started with the software. We're glad to help.

For those daily routine tasks, you may want to set the lead time a bit longer to give yourself a more generous window of time when they will be visible before they are due. For a daily task, you may find that 4 or even 8 hours works better for you in practice than setting it for 2 hours.

We don't currently have a particular time when a new day starts, although that could be useful in some circumstances. Instead, a routine item will be rescheduled based on when you check it off. So, you can think about it this way, setting an ample lead time smooths out the variation of when you check it off. In Life Balance, "Routine" items are intended to be tasks where you can be flexible, (things like laundry) that can vary without harm if you don't do them at that exact date and time, that establishes a pattern without it being rigidly set at 2pm each day. There are tasks that you might think of as being routine, that really do need to happen on a particular date and time (like Trash) which may be better to schedule by the calendar or by Due Date. Those dates and times are not flexible, even though we sometimes wish they were. :-)

Remember too, that a routine task could be something that happens every 3 months, with a lead time of say 2 weeks (imagine a task like calling a friend to schedule a night out). Routine can be for other kinds of repeating patterns, not just daily.

Another pattern that can be helpful is something that I jokingly call the "perpetual motion" machine, where you set the lead time to be half the interval. This will put the task back on the list again immediately after you check the task off. I find that helpful for catching up on a project with multiple steps.

Example:

Study for Physics class <- (set up daily, with a lead time of 12 hours, with complete subtasks in order)
- Do reading in H&R
- Do Physics problem set for Mechanics

This will show up as "Do reading in H&R." When you check that off, the physics problem set appears. When you check that off, the Study for Physics class appears, and you can get credit for doing one session of the work. When you check that off, the cycle will repeat, so if you are behind, the next round of reading is up next! You can even use the notes as a simple bookmark for where you left off. Helpful if you fall asleep before you are completely caught up. :-)

The balance screen shows your accomplishments over time, and how they add up. :-) The routine items will uncheck themselves according to the lead time settings, and then the task will temporarily go away from the balance screen.

Having another view that shows what you got done on each day is an interesting idea which has come up before. I don't know when we'll add that, but it is pretty reasonable to want that. :-)

On the particular task that you have on your list, if you set the lead time to be more generous, does the task show up in the To do list as expected? Because it could be that there is another setting that is filtering the task off of the To do list view, and there are some other suggestions I can make if that is the case.

Thanks again, and let me know if that helps.

--Catherine--*
Catherine E. White
President
www.llamagraphics.com
Creators of Life Balance software
for Palm OS, Macintosh and Windows.