In addition to letting you know about important occasions when you turn on your Mac, you can also be reminded of them shortly before they start with a small pop-up window and optionally a sound. Pop-up alerts are only available if Remember? Extension has been installed in the Extensions folder.
NOTE: There appears to be an incompatibility between Remember?'s pop-up alerts and several Graphics Accelerator extensions. If pop-up alerts appear as text only with no background then you must remove any graphics accelerator extensions present in the system Extensions folder. This will be corrected in the next release.
How to Specify an Alert
First of all, you must enter both a start time and an alert time for the occasion. Pop-up alerts are not displayed for occasions with no specific time (this may change in the future).
Also, the occasion's type must allow pop-up alert windows and sounds. Trivia is an example of a type that does not. There are also master switches in Preferences to turn off all alerts.
You actually get two alerts for each occasion: one at the alert time and a second at the exact start time. The second can be turned off via pref: Pop-Up Alerts • Display pop-up alerts at.
the Alert Hot Key
Press this keyboard combination to see the next scheduled alert. The default is command-option-` (backquote) which is strange but should not conflict with any application. You can select a more convenient hot key using pref: Pop-Up Alerts • Define the hot key. Unfortunately, System 7 uses this particular combination to terminate the current application on keyboards with no esc key so you must select a different hot key on those machines.
The hot key must use the command key and you can also include the shift, option and control keys as well. Pick something unusual since it is intercepted by "Remember?" whenever you press it.
Press the hot key a second time to hide the alert window.
the Pop-up Alert Window
 
This is the bland black and white rendition of an alert window, it looks a lot better in color. There are many preferences to customize the appearance and placement of the alert window.
The top line is the current date and time. The bottom is the start time and description for the occasion that triggered the alert, or the next alert if you pressed the hot key.
The icon at the left is animated to attract your attention and drawn in the color for the occasion's type. Click on it for a menu of useful commands:
Close Alert Window
Removes the pop-up alert window from the screen.
Launch Remember?
Open the application and display the special Alert window set if it exists.
Edit This Occasion
Open the application and an Occasion window so you can change the alert occasion.
New Occasion
Open the application and a new Occasion window pre-set to today's date and time.
Anything of Interest?
Open the application and check for any occasions that require your attention. Automatically quit if there are none.
You will notice that each item has a command key shortcut. They are only available while the alert window is visible and you must also press the same modifier keys (command, shift, option, control) that are used for the hot key. This is intentional to avoid conflicts with application shortcuts.
Special Messages
You may see a few special messages in the alert window:
Nothing Happening Today or Tomorrow.
There are no alert occasions for the next two days which is the current limit for pop-up alerts.
You've turned off alerts.
You turned off all pop-up alerts in Preferences.
No occasion files.
Your active occasion file list is empty (see: Occasion Files).
Can't access "Remember?'s Settings."
The settings file is missing or damaged. Restart to see if the problem disappears. Try restoring your settings file from the last backup copy (you *did* make a backup, right?) This may appear momentarily during upgrades from previous versions. It should go away when you access the application then Restart.
You might also see a message that reads "(Mac error code -X)". The number given is an internal Mac error code. The alert may or may not be correct. Try opening the application. It may give you a better description of the problem.
Alert Sounds & Speech
When an alert appears, the sound associated with its type is played to attract your attention. It repeats if the alert remains on the screen for a while, just in case you stepped away.
You can also choose to speak the text of an alert if Apple's Plaintalk Speech Manager is installed.
Screen Savers
Their goal in life is to blank the screen to keep the image from getting burned into the phosphorus (Yeah, sure. And toasters really do fly). They also prevent applications from drawing on the screen while it is blanked.
When an alert appears I try to unblank the screen if a saver is active. The saver may kick in again later and hide the alert but you will still hear the alert sound. The window is redrawn when you deactivate the saver by moving the mouse or hitting a key.
