Table of Contents
Contents for Above & Beyond Help

Welcome to Above & Beyond

Time Management

Product Information

Installation

Using Above & Beyond

Workgroup Use

Menu Reference Section

Technical Support


Welcome to Above & Beyond

Above & Beyond is a powerful Personal Information Manager (PIM) for planning, managing, and tracking your active business and personal life.  Innovative dynamic schedules manage workflow effectively.  All types of recurring activities need be entered just once.  You can print schedules to take your plans wherever you go.  Above & Beyond also includes pop-up calendars, alarms, task and event timers, week and month at a glance, contact databases, project tracking, group scheduling, E-mail, company-wide phonebooks, and much more.

Above & Beyond is for everyone who has a lot to do and wants to do it!

"If you use Windows and have any kind of schedule to manage, this is the program to get! I recommend it highly. "

- Michael Callahan, Editor, Shareware Magazine

The more you accomplish each day, the sooner you'll reach your goals, and the more successful you'll be. This is why we created Above & Beyond for you.

The key to accomplishing more is planning ahead. You need a plan that allocates time for the things you want to do that will bring you the greatest return. The order and timing of tasks affect how quickly they can be accomplished. As your work is streamlined, your productivity will soar.

Dynamic Scheduling

Above & Beyond gives you the power to create personal schedules quickly and effectively. It automatically calculates timing, as you juggle the order of tasks by sliding them with your mouse. Want to defer something to another day? That's easy. Just click the right mouse button on a day in the pop-up calendar.

Above & Beyond is the PIM for success.

There are many Personal Information Managers, but Above & Beyond is the only one that makes it so easy to plan your time. Other PIMs consign your tasks to to-do lists, separate from your schedule. This makes planning difficult. They'll let you convert a task into an appointment, but the begin time is fixed. Above & Beyond solves this problem brilliantly. Everything you want to do appears in one place, where you can arrange your plans quickly and easily. The time you plan to begin a task will float, automatically updating as your schedule changes.  Above & Beyond creates time for your tasks based on everything you're doing, in the order you've arranged. No other PIM can do this. Above & Beyond is the first PIM with Dynamic Scheduling.

Save Time & Money with Above & Beyond

Many Above & Beyond users who've switched from other PIMs are now saving 1 to 2 hours each day. The main reason is this: Above & Beyond creates and adjusts your plans so easily, that the schedules you work from are optimal, letting you accomplish hours of additional items each day in the same amount of time. Remember, the key to accomplishing more is planning ahead.

Putting Above & Beyond to use can save you an hour or more each day. In an average workday, that translates to a boost of 10-20%. Imagine your annual income jumping 10-20%. With Above & Beyond you could realize a gain of $2,000, $5,000, or $10,000 per year.

Think of how this could benefit your entire department, or even your whole company. Imagine if you showed the CEO of your company Above & Beyond and it was adopted corporate-wide for everyone to use. If that's 10 or 10,000 people, you could be responsible for additional profits every year of between 100 thousand and 100 million dollars.

Register Above & Beyond

We invite you to use the on-line help to learn all about Above & Beyond and start putting it to work for you.  When you're convinced it will save you substantial time and money, register.  The price per user is only $99.  For information on how to register, see Registration/Ordering a License.

For any questions, including special pricing for workgroup systems of five or more users, call us at (541) 822-6000 or fax to (541) 822-3300.  System prices are posted on our web-site at http://www.1Soft.com.

Comments from Users

Companies using Above & Beyond

Above & Beyond is International

Above & Beyond is developed and published by 1Soft Corporation.

"1Soft is serious about helping you get the most out of your time."

- PC Magazine

Software Categories

Windows Applications

Personal Information Managers (PIM)

Group Schedulers/Calendars

Organizers/Time Planners


Comments from Users

The most important component of any PIM is its scheduling module... Above & Beyond is in a class by itself due to its automatic, or dynamic, scheduling. It's the only program that takes a unified approach to scheduling by letting you enter all events -- to-do list items and appointments -- on one calendar.

- Steve Gilliland and Kathy Yakal, PIM comparisons in PC Sources, July 1992

Above & Beyond is the most useful scheduling/todo/project management software I have ever used (tried all the rest...big bloated, glossy electronically simulated paper systems).

Above & Beyond appears to have been developed to address a need; rather than to have a product to sell.

- Dwayne Hedrick

Above & Beyond is the best application Ive ever seen for real life, day-in-and-day-out, pound-on-it-every-minute users.

- Clark Wilson

I have been comparing Above & Beyond against another product of similar nature. They just don't compare! My other program has proved to be nothing but trouble, missed appointments, compatibility problems, etc. Above & Beyond is exactly what I've been looking for and I am ecstatic about it.

- Len Zigante, President, Vantage Point Services, British Columbia

My enthusiasm for Above & Beyond is unbounded. It's head and shoulders above any other PIM on the market.

- Lee S. Jones

Once you start using Above & Beyond, you'll wonder how you managed without it.

- Clive Aldred, PC User Magazine.

That dynamic scheduling is worth its weight in gold.

- Robert Puttcamp

Above & Beyond is the greatest and most valuable piece of business software I have ever had.

- Hilary B. Miller, Esq.

Above & Beyond is an excellent program that's been carefully thought out. This is the handiest PIM I've ever used and I find it invaluable in keeping my schedule manageable.

- Michael Callahan, Editor, Shareware Magazine

Above & Beyond is GREAT! A marvelous time-saver!

- Bob Haussmann

I have loved this software since day 1.

- Ivan Druez


Companies Using Above & Beyond

The world's leading companies use Above & Beyond on LANs and personal workstations.

Hewlett-Packard, Intel, Martin Marietta, GTE, Kidder Peabody, Telecom Australia, Yale University, Ziff-Davis, NASA, Allied-Signal Aerospace, AT&T Bell Labs, NCR, Goodyear, ABC News, Whirlpool, Arthur Andersen, American Airlines, Borland, Carnegie-Mellon University, CIGNA, Compaq, Discovery Channel, DuPont, Goldman Sachs, Honeywell, IBM, Lotus, Merrill Lynch, Union Bank of Switzerland, Volvo, Microsoft, Westin Hotels, AMD, Salomon Brothers, Seagate, Novell, Siemens, and thousands of others.


Above & Beyond is International

Registered Above & Beyond users hail from 33 nations around the world:

United States, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, United Kingdom, Ireland, Germany, Netherlands, Spain, France, Belgium, Norway, Finland, Sweden, Denmark, Luxembourg, Portugal, Italy, Austria, Switzerland, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Tanzania, South Africa, Australia, New Zealand, Philippines, Japan, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore, Thailand, and Malaysia.


Company Background

1Soft Corporation was founded in 1990 to bring Above & Beyond to all those who could benefit from using it. It is a company with a single product, a single focus: helping you make the most of your time.

1Soft headquarters is located near Eugene, Oregon.


Time Management

Conventional Methods

Dynamic Scheduling

Advantages of Schedules over To-do Lists


Conventional Methods

People have traditionally used four common reminder systems. There are some drawbacks to each of these methods, but fortunately today we have a solution that improves on all of them.

1. Physical view. Leaving items to work on in physical view is the simplest system, but has limited effectiveness. Offices and desks soon become cluttered and stacked so high with objects, that some become hidden, and easily missed. Further, focusing on the current task is impaired because of the surrounding distractions. Also, there is no record of when tasks were completed.

2. In-baskets and action folders. These work well for certain types of tasks, but only as far as they are uniform in priority, duration, and deadline. You have to physically view each document individually. There is no summary list of items which you could prioritize. There's a danger that time-critical items may not be dealt with at the right time. Review is a problem. There is no record of when things were completed.

3. Appointment calendars. These work fine for appointments, but not general work load. They are ineffective for the hundreds of tasks you want to accomplish each week, because tasks frequently need to be juggled from day to day and hour to hour. Appointment calendars with their fixed-length slots do not accomodate tasks well, nor make it easy to shift them.

4. To-do lists. Listing tasks is a good way to remember them, but doesn't create a clear plan for effectively doing them. Unstructured to-do lists can quickly become lengthy, making copying tasks, and scanning items take considerable time.

The next section explains the long awaited time management breakthrough: Dynamic Scheduling.


Dynamic Scheduling

Above & Beyond harnesses the power of your PC to create a system that works for you.

There's an innovative technology in Above & Beyond called Dynamic Scheduling. You can quickly enter any tasks you want to do. Then, take your mouse and move items around on-screen for instant planning. As you juggle items, each day's plan updates automatically.

Choose explicit times and dates only for appointments and events. For tasks, Above & Beyond will calculate a planned begin time automatically, based on everything you have to do. For the bigger picture, you'll see the workload level of upcoming days or weeks in a pop-up month calendar. You can prioritize the items and even use workload balancing to have everything refitted automatically. This keeps your schedules from being too heavy or too light. Choose exactly the workload level you desire.

Above & Beyond frees you from the manual labor of conventional time management methods. You can do what you do best: make decisions about what's important to you, and focus on doing what you want to do. It frees your mind from the clutter of remembering everything, and the stress of constantly figuring and refiguring whether everything is going to be done by deadline. With Above & Beyond  you have a clear sight on exactly where you're going, and when you're going to get there.

Above & Beyond is today's most effective planning system for day-to-day management. With your workload prioritized and effectively streamlined, your productivity can soar.

Above & Beyond serves you in all three perspectives:  Planning, Prompting and Reviewing. You plan on-screen -- easily juggling items as schedules recalculate instantly. Use the generated schedules as a guide for prompting throughout the day. And everything completed is available for review.


Advantages of Schedules over To-do Lists

A to-do list is a prioritized list of items. A schedule is a chronologically ordered, prioritized list of items in the structure of a time-based plan. With Above & Beyond you can prioritize your to-do list on-screen and then have your workload automatically flow into schedules. There are several advantages in schedules:

1. Because time is allocated for each task, a schedule clearly shows what can be accomplished on a given day. This helps you budget your time. Basic to-do lists give you no indication of how much time they represent. A schedule gives you a plan for the day. You can start to visualize what you'll be doing, and be prepared when the time arrives.

2. Schedules serve as a guide. A well-planned schedule can be followed smoothly. To-do lists require frequent stops to read the list and decide what to do next. With a lengthy to-do list and no schedule, each stop can take from 2-5 minutes. Over the course of a day with 30 items or 30 stops, using a schedule instead of a to-do list can save you between 60 minutes and 2 and 1/2 hours.

You may be wondering, "but don't schedules take a long time to compose?" Not anymore. Above & Beyond does the work of creating each day's schedule for you instantly.


Product Information

Key Features of Above & Beyond

Registration/Ordering a License

Comments Welcome

Share the Benefits

Legal Requirements


Key Features of Above & Beyond

All the features you need for reaching your potential.

- Dynamic Scheduling with state-of-the-art interface for clear and easy on-screen planning

- A full-range of recurring item scheduling choices and carry-over options

- Exceptions to recurring Items; modify/cancel one or all occurrences

- Special item colors for 8 user defined item Statuses.

- Any number of color coded user defined Projects to which items can be assigned.

- Project reports showing total time spent on each project.

- Prioritization w/ deadlines and postponements

- Floating and Fluid tasks

- Workload Balancing

- LAN/Group scheduling, E-mail and Meeting Maker with RSVP.

- Password protection (3 levels), private items

- Mobile computing, supporting file exchange with portable PCs

- Phone/Address/Note books

- Auto-dialing

- Pop-up rate-based timer for phone call tracking or billing

- Item timers

- Agents (automated launching of applications and batch files at preset times)

- Choice of  all TrueType fonts on screen, and in reports

- Dozens of report options: Day, Week, Month, Range, Priority List, portrait/landscape, more

- Date and time entry short-cuts, eg. "today", "Sa", "10" days from now.

- Logging of all completed items for later recall.

- Automatic follow-ups.

- Perpetual calendar through the year 2068

- Alarms with snooze option

- Plenty of room for item descriptions

- Notes attached to items, huge capacity, copy/paste to/from other applications

- Optional conflict checking

- Carry-over of undone items

- Automatic, background file-saving

- Week at a glance in variety of screen layouts

- Month at a glance with item descriptions

- Pop-up color utilization calendar, showing relative workload across entire month

- World time-zone clocks

- Import and export

- Choice of page sizes for printed schedules (DayTimer, Filofax, etc)

- Small datafile size (eg. a heavy workload of 300 items consumes less than 50K disk space)

- A clean interface, without screen clutter for clear, unconstrained views


Registration/Ordering a License

You can order an Above & Beyond license directly from 1Soft by mail, phone, or fax with a check or credit card (VISA/MC/Amex). The program will generate an order form for you. From the Options menu, select Order an Above & Beyond License. In return, we'll send you the complete package, including a printed user's guide, a disk containing the latest version, and your personal user ID.

If you're outside the U.S. you can order with a credit card, check, or International Money Order.  Checks and Money Orders must be in U.S. dollars.

This copy of Above & Beyond is the complete program; there is nothing held back. You can start using it immediately to plan your schedules: entering appointments, tasks to do, recurring items, etc.  When you register, you'll receive a user ID which enables you to continue to use the program, retaining all the data you've entered.

As a registered user you'll also be entitled to substantial discounts on future upgrades.


Send your Comments and Requests

Your questions, comments and requests for enhancements are welcome. Email to 71240.1625@compuserve.com or fax to (541) 822-3300. By postal mail, please address your comments to:

1Soft Corporation

Product Comments

Post Office Box 401

Blue River, OR 97413


Share the Benefits

Many people you know could benefit from using Above & Beyond.  Fortunately, this program is authorized for shareware distribution.  Shareware means you can freely copy our software to evaluate it.  It's a try-before-you-buy method.  We encourage you to make copies of Above & Beyond, and give them to others to evaluate.

Please feel free to upload Above & Beyond to any of your favorite BBS's, To make it simple we've included a DOS batch file, ZIP.BAT to create AB.ZIP with the right files.  A program description is in the file FILE_ID.DIZ.

Shareware

We provide Above & Beyond as shareware. As a user, you pay us only if you intend to use it beyond evaluation. The process of purchasing a license is also known as registering.

1Soft Corp. is a member of the Association of Shareware Professionals (ASP). ASP wants to make sure that the shareware principle works for you. If you are unable to resolve a shareware-related problem with an ASP member by contacting the member directly, ASP may be able to help. The ASP Ombudsman can help you resolve a dispute or problem with an ASP member, but does not provide technical support for members' products. Please write to the ASP Ombudsman at 545 Grover Road, Muskegon, MI 49442 or send a CompuServe message via CompuServe Mail to ASP Ombdusman 70007, 3536.


Legal Requirements

You are authorized to make only exact copies of Above & Beyond files to give to others for evaluation purposes. Modifying the program files in any way is strictly prohibited.

Only individuals licensed by 1Soft Corporation are authorized to use Above & Beyond files on a continuing basis. Continued active use without registration is prohibited. Various shareware distributors have been authorized to sell disks containing Above & Beyond. They are selling disks and a distribution service only. They are not selling Above & Beyond licenses.

Liability Disclaimer

1Soft Corporation specifically disclaims any warranty of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. With respect to defects in its programs and supporting materials and service, in no event shall 1Soft Corporation be liable for any loss of profit or any other commercial damage, including but not limited to special, incidental, consequential, or other damages. Use this program at your own risk.

Copyright/Trademark Information

The software files that comprise Above & Beyond are Copyright © 1996 by 1Soft Corporation.  All rights reserved.  Unauthorized use is a violation of U.S. and international copyright laws.  1Soft and Above & Beyond are trademarks of 1Soft Corporation.


Installing Above & Beyond

Single User Installation

LAN Workgroup Installation


Single User Installation

The installation process allows you to select where you would like to put Above & Beyond files.  The directory you name will be created if it doesn't already exist; and the files will be copied from the diskette to this target directory.  Some files are in compressed form on the diskette and will be automatically uncompressed as they are installed.

Step 1:	Insert the Above & Beyond diskette into drive A.

Step 2:	From the Windows Program Manager, select File: Run and type:

A:INSTALL

You will be prompted to specify the name of a directory in which to install the files.  You may overtype or accept the default shown.  You will also be asked if you'd like an Above & Beyond icon created.  Answer "yes" if installing for the first time.

Note: If you have schedule data from a previous version of Above & Beyond, install the new version into the old directory and your data will be automatically loaded into the new version.  If you wish to save the old version of A&B.exe, copy that one file to another directory before installing the new verison.

Step 3:  Start Above & Beyond by double-clicking on the icon.


Installing for a LAN Workgroup
Installing Above & Beyond for a LAN Workgroup

1. Install Above & Beyond on each PC as described in the section on single user installation.

Note: Although you can install the program file AB.exe in a shareable directory on the server, and have your workstations access it there, it will run faster if installed locally. This is because Windows will not have to repeatedly access the server hard drive to read parts of the program code into memory. If installed on the local workstation, Above & Beyond will not only load quicker, but it will also operate at a faster, more responsive pace. This is true for all Windows applications.

2. Designate a sub-directory on the server's hard drive specifically for each user. Their datafiles, notes, and email will be stored here.

3. If J: is the name of your server drive, then the Above & Beyond icon command line on a typical workstation could be as follows:

C:\AB\A&B.exe  J:\Bill

Note: This will create a Timedata.pak file in J:\Bill. If the directory does not yet exist it will automatically be created when Above & Beyond is run.

See the Schedules Menu section for information on setting up access to the schedules of other workgroup members.


Using Above & Beyond

Schedules...

Notation

Selecting

Items

Views

Notes

Reports

Data Saving and Backups

Schedule Archiving

The Toolbar

Advanced Use


Schedule Notation

At the top of each schedule is the following information: the day and date of the schedule, the number of items in that day's schedule, the amount of time taken up by the items in the schedule, and the amount of time left unscheduled in that day (open or free time).  If there are "conflicting" items -- items that are scheduled for the same time period -- the total overlap time is displayed.  On past schedules, the number of undone items will also be reported in the banner line.

If the schedule being viewed is the one for the current day, an asterisk (*) will appear after the date in the banner line.  If there are undone items on a previous day(s), a <- symbol will appear to the left of the first seven items to remind you of the undone items.  Otherwise, the first seven undone items will be preceded by the numbers 1-7.  This is called the Batting Order feature, and is designed to quickly alert you to whats next to do.

A slash (/) appearing before an item's text on today's schedule indicates the item cannot be done right now, because its earliest begin time has not yet arrived. This way you can scan today's schedule and know that you can begin now any item that doesn't have a slash before it.

If the schedule being viewed is not the schedule for the present date, a number will appear after the date in the banner line preceded by a plus (+) or a minus (-).  A number preceded with a plus indicates that the schedule being displayed is that number of days in advance, or in the future, of the present date.  A number preceded by a minus indicates that the schedule shown is that number of days behind, or in the past from, the present date.

An arrow (>) will appear before the title of the item that is scheduled for the current time. Black dots before (or between) items indicate the relative duration of the item (or time between items.)  Larger dots indicate a longer duration.  Schedule statistics will change as items are added, deleted from or modified in a schedule or as schedules for different days are selected.  Related topics: Red Begin Time and International Time & Date Formats

There are some indicators that appear beside item descriptions in the schedules:

-r 	a standard instance of a recurring item.

-rx 	an exception to a recurring item

-a	alarm set

-ax	alarm has already gone off today

-ar	alarm already gone off today, but will repeat later ("snooze").

A small digital clock will appear on screen whenever Above & Beyond is running (unless you have selected Options:Clock Off).  When it is on, you can switch back to Above & Beyond from any other application simply by clicking once on the clock.  You can drag the clock to any screen position you desire.


Red Begin Time

On today's schedule, item start times will appear red if the begin (or latest begin) time has already past.  Also, if you move an item to a place where it conflicts with another item or goes outside of the time bounds you designated, the time will appear red; warning you of the conflict.  Keep this in mind when juggling items.


International Time & Date Formats

Above & Beyond supports world-wide date and time formats.  Use the Windows Control Panel to select your choice of time and date format.  For example:

  3:00	mm/dd/yy	United States, Taiwan

15:00	dd/mm/yy	Australia, United Kingdom, Belgium, Brazil

15:00	dd/mm/yy	Italy, Netherlands, Iceland, Spain, New Zealand

15:00	dd.mm.yy	France, Germany, Norway

15.00	dd-mm-yy	Denmark

15.00	dd.mm.yy	Finland

15,00	dd.mm.yy	Switzerland

  3:00	dd/mm/yy	Mexico, Canada (English)

  3:00	yy.mm.dd	South Korea

15.00	yy-mm-dd	Sweden

15:00	yy-mm-dd	Austria, Portugal, Canada (French)


Selecting Schedules

To display the schedule for a desired day, click on the date on the pop-up calendar.  If using only a keyboard, see The Select Menu.

There are several methods for moving between schedule days.  You may move ahead or back by days, weeks, months, or years.  These methods are explained in the sections that follow.  Remember that no matter how far you go ahead or back in time, you can always return to today's schedule by simply pressing the HOME key.

Selecting a Specific Date

Selecting a Day at a Time

Selecting a Week at a Time

Selecting a Month at a Time

Selecting a Year at a Time


Selecting a Specific Date

To select a schedule for a specific date, simply click on the desired date on the pop-up calendar. Or press F9 and type in the date.

Dates may be entered as "mm/dd/yy" using slashes, hyphens, spaces or periods.  Often the year may be omitted.  See Entering Item Date for information on when the year may be omitted and for many other shortcuts for entering dates in Above & Beyond.


Selecting a Day at a Time

There are shortcuts to selecting the schedule for date one day earlier or later than the one being displayed:

To advance the viewed schedule one day, press the gray PLUS (+) key on the numeric key pad, or click the right arrow toolbar icon.

To go back one day, press the MINUS (-) key on the numeric key pad, or click the left arrow toolbar icon.


Selecting a Week at a Time

There are shortcuts to selecting schedules weeks apart:

To view the day one week earlier, press F7, or click the double left arrow toolbar

icon.

To view the day one week later, press F8, or click the double right arrow toolbar icon.


Selecting a Month at a Time

The pop-up calendar can be used to quickly move the display ahead or back a month at a time.

To advance the calendar one month, click on the scroll-bar up-arrow to the right of the pop-up calendar.  Then, click on the desired date in the calendar and that schedule will be displayed.  To go back one month, click on the scroll-bar down-arrow.  When the calendar has the focus, you may also use the up and down arrow keys to move a month at a time.


Selecting a Year at a Time

When the pop-up calendar has the focus, you may move ahead or back one year at a time with the PageUp and PageDown keys .

Alternatively, you may use the vertical scroll-bar to the right of the pop-up calendar as follows: To advance one year, click in the gray area in the top half of the scroll-bar. Then, click on the desired date in the calendar and that schedule will be displayed. To go back one year, click in the gray area in the bottom half of the scroll bar.


Schedule Items

Inserting

Recurring

Editing

Deleting

Marking Done

Carrying Over

Juggling

Highlighting


Inserting Items Into a Schedule
Inserting Items

Press INSERT,  or double-click on any open space on the schedule screen (not on a existing item).  A dialog box will appear for entering the item's definition.

Entering Title

Entering Duration

Entering Memos

Entering Date

Scheduled / Unscheduled

Begin Time and Floating / Fixed

Firm / Fluid

Time Bounds

Setting Alarms

Projects

Automatic Follow-ups


Entering Item Title
Entering Title

The title (description) of your item can be up to 365 characters.  Ctrl+Enter can be used to limit the amount of description text that appears on the schedule.  Text following the Ctrl+Enter will be denoted by an ellipsis, and can be viewed by pressing Shift+V.


Entering Item Duration
Entering Duration

The duration is the amount of time you plan to spend on the item. If you are uncertain of the duration, your best estimate will still be helpful for planning.

You may enter complete times like "2:00" for two hours or "1:45" for 1 hour and 45 minutes, or you may use the following shortcuts:  The numbers 1 through 99 are interpreted as minutes, while 100 through 2359 will be assumed to be hours and minutes.  For example, "145" is assumed to be 1:45.  You may enter durations of up to 24 hours.

Note that a period can be used in place of the colon.  This European format is easier to type because the shift key is not required.  The quickest way to enter two hours is 2.


Entering Memos

A "memo" is an unscheduled item with duration zero.  Memo items appear at the top of your schedule with the word "memo" in place of the begin time.

To enter a memo into your schedule, press Alt+Insert or select "Edit: Insert Memo Item".


Entering Item Date
Entering Date

This is the date on which your item is to appear.  The default is the date of the viewed schedule.

Dates may be entered as "month/day/year" using slashes, hyphens, spaces, or periods as separators.

Examples:	9/23/92      9-23-92      9 23 92       9.23.92

You need use only two digits to specify the year.  Specifying values between "90" and the "99" are assumed to be years between 1990  and 1999.  Specifying values from "00" to "68" are assumed to be years between 2000 and 2068.  If you omit the year, (e.g. 9/23) the year will be assumed to be the next occurrence of the date.  The exception to this is if the date is within six months in the past.  In this case the date is assumed to be the past date rather than the next (future) occurrence of the date.

To specify "n days from now" type a number "n".  To specify "n days ago" type "-n".

To specify one week from now, type "1w".  For two weeks ago, type "-2w".  For two months ago, type "-2m".  For two years from now, type "2y".

For weekdays, you may use abbreviations such as "M", "Tu", "W", "Th", "F", "Sa", or "Su".  To select next Monday, type in "M".  For one week from next Monday type "M1".  For two weeks from next Tuesday, type "Tu2".  Upper or lowercase are accepted.

See also International Date and Time Formats.


Scheduled/Unscheduled Items
Scheduled / Unscheduled

When an item is inserted into a schedule, the default setting is "Scheduled" which means it will be considered in time management operations such as Workload Balancing and calculating daily totals.

You can toggle an item between scheduled and unscheduled with F4.  Generally, the only unscheduled items you will have will be memos.


Begin Time and Floating / Fixed

When you leave the "Begin time" field empty, an item is considered to be "Floating".  This means your item can take place over the range of time specified in Options:Settings:New Item Defaults.  The item will be inserted into the schedule at the earliest open time, taking into account the duration, other items already scheduled, and the bounds you specified in New Item Defaults.

You can change the sequence of items by dragging them up or down (or using the commands in the Juggle menu).

The dynamic scheduler  will do much of the scheduling work for you. To maximize the power of dynamic scheduling, omit the begin time for all those items which have a flexible start time.  Enter a time in the "Begin Time" box only if an item must begin at a specific time, such as a lunch date or meeting.  To convert a "Fixed" item to Floating, press Alt+F2.

In 12-hour format, times may be entered as "945a" for 9:45 am or "330p" for 3:30 pm.  If the "a" (am) or "p" (pm) is omitted, it will automatically appear between 8:00am and 7:59pm.

In 24-hour format enter "500" (or "0500") for 5:00 am and "1708" for 5:08 pm.  Use the Windows Control Panel to select 12/24-hour and international time and date formats.


Firm / Fluid

If an item is not required to be done on a particular day, make it "Fluid" by pressing F2 or removing the "x" from the "Firm" check box.  "Fluid" items can be prioritized, and can flow (forward or backward) between days when the Balance Workload command is selected. Balance Workload will reschedule Fluid items based on their priority and the best fit into the available free time.

You may specify weekdays and/or a date range within which a Fluid item may flow.  This is done in the "Flow" area of the Insert/Change item dialog.  The item will be scheduled after the "Postpone" date and before the "Deadline".

For an in-depth discussion of Fluid items, see the section titled Workload Balancing.


Time Bounds

For Floating items, you may select a time range in which you would like to have the item scheduled.  For example, if you need to make a phone call to a colleague who will only be in his office between 9:00 and 11:30am tomorrow, enter these times in the boxes labeled "Earliest" and "Latest".  The dynamic scheduler will do the rest.

If the bounds boxes are left empty,  the bounds used will be those you have specified in Options:Settings:New Item Defaults.  In addition to saving keystrokes, this method has the additional benefit that you may later "globally" adjust the bounds of all floating items by simply changing the bounds in Options:Settings:New Item Defaults.

For "fixed" items (items with a fixed begin time) the "Bounds" boxes will be seen in gray and will be inactive.


Setting Alarms

Alarms may be set on any scheduled item.  When the alarm sounds, a message will pop up alerting you to the start or end time of the item.  You may choose to have the alarm remind you again in a specified number of minutes.

To set an alarm, click on the "Alarm" button in the Insert/Change item dialog. To disable the alarm, remove the "x" from the Alarm button check box.

When an alarm is set, the item will appear on your schedule with "-a" after it.  An item followed by "-ar" indicates that the alarm has gone off and has been set to repeat again later today.  An "-ax" indicates that the alarm has gone off and will not be repeated today.

If you prefer that alarms appear on screen but with no sound, click on "Set Sound" and select "None".  The alarm sound may also be set in Options:Settings:Alarm Sound.  If you have a Windows sound driver installed, you may specify a wave (.wav) file to replace the default alarm sound.


Projects

If you have set up Projects, you may categorize the current item by selecting one of the projects in the drop-down list-box. For for more on Projects see View: Projects in the Menu Reference section.


Automatic Follow-Up

When you wish to follow-up on an item some time after it has been done, check the Follow-Up box in the Insert/Change Item dialog. When the item is marked done, a duplicate of the item is automatically created. Choose a date for the duplicate item (or make other refinements) then click "OK".


Recurring Items

To make an item recurring, click "Recurring" in the Insert/Change Item dialog.

Choose from the many options: daily, every so many days, weekly, every so many weeks, monthly, every so many months, annually, or every so many years.  A starting date is required, and is initially set to the currently viewed date.  An ending date is optional.  If the ending date is left blank, the item will be scheduled indefinitely.  For weekly and monthly, if all boxes are left unchecked, occurrences are based on the starting date.

You can later choose to delete one or all occurrences. See Edit: Delete Item or Edit: Delete All Occurrences.

Cardinal Month Days

Ordinal Weekdays

4-4-5 Quarterly Calendar

Entering Birthdays

Entering Multiday Activities

Recurring to Non-recurring

Delete All Occurrences

Exceptions to Recurring Items

Carry Over Options


Cardinal Month Days

A recurring item can be scheduled to appear on particular days of the month. To schedule an item for the last day of every month (even those with fewer than 31 days), choose 31.

Suppose you want an item to appear on the Friday nearest the 15th of the month.  Select 15 and Nearest and select Friday on the weekdays list above.  Select On/Before to have the item appear on the selected weekday (eg. Friday) on or before the 15th.  Select On/After to have the item appear on the selected weekday on or after the 15th.


Recurring on Ordinal Weekdays
Ordinal Weekdays

Use this option to schedule your item on a certain day each month; for example, the first Friday and the second Wednesday of every month.


4-4-5 Quarterly Calendar

While the traditional quarter begins on the first day of the first month of the quarter, in the 4-4-5 system, the quarter begins on the first day of the first week of the quarter. The first month of the quarter always has 4 weeks, the second month 4 weeks, and the third 5 weeks. 4-4-5 quarterly calendars are popular because of their uniformity.

Many companies make frequent use of the 4-4-5 system to schedule recurring meetings. Here are a few examples:

1)  Meeting on the 4th Wednesday of each month

2)  Meeting on the 2nd Tuesday of each quarter

3)  Meeting on the 7th Friday of each quarter.

1)  Use as a starting date the first day of the first quarter you want to schedule it. Then choose every month, 4th Wednesday.

2)  Use as a starting date the first day of the first quarter you want to schedule it. Then choose every 3 months, 2nd Tuesday.

3)  Use as a starting date the first day of the second month of the first quarter you want to schedule it. Then choose every 3 months, 3rd Friday.

If you don't know the first day of a particular 4-4-5 month or quarter , you can simply enter the first day of the corresponding traditional month and it will be converted.

To have Month at a Glance, the pop-up Calendar, and the Extended Outlook (13 week printout) appear in 4-4-5 format, select Options: Calendar: 4-4-5.  To toggle this option off, simply select it again.

In addition, with the 4-4-5 calendar option selected, the following information is displayed on each Sunday in Month-at-a-Glance:  The number of the week (1-52) is shown in parenthesis.  Then the month and number of the week within that 4-4-5 month is shown.  For example:  "(50) Dec:3" indicates that  the week is the 50th week of the year; and the third week of the 4-4-5 month of December.


Entering Birthdays

From the Recurring dialog box, choose "Annually".  Specify "Starting Date" as the next occurrence of the birthday; not the actual date the person was born.  The reason for this is that  the actual day they were born may be outside of the range of Above & Beyond dates.

Alternatively, you may want to enter birthdays two weeks prior to the next occurrence of the birthday and have it read e.g. "Mary's birthday: mm/dd/yy."  This will allow you time to send a card, plan a surprise party, etc.


Entering Multiday Events

If you wish to block off several days for a special event, set up a daily recurring item using the date range of the event.  To block off the entire day, set a begin time and use a duration that spans the whole day.  You may also want to highlight the item so it will appear on the month view.


Recurring to Non-recurring

To change a recurring item to non-recurring, remove the "x" from the "Recurring" check box in the Insert/Change Item dialog.  All occurrences of the item will be deleted with the exception of the one instance that is selected.


Delete All Occurrences

To remove all occurrences of a recurring item, select any occurrence of the item on any schedule, then select "Delete All Occurrences" from the Edit menu.

Alternatively, choose View:Alphabetical List, select the recurring item, and press the DELETE key.


Exceptions to Recurring Items

Perhaps a meeting which is normally scheduled to take place on the first Monday of every month will be moved to the following Tuesday because of a holiday that Monday.  Or perhaps on Friday, your daily lunch, normally from 12:00 to 1:00 needs to be moved to 12:30 and extended to 90 minutes.  These exceptions are easily handled  in Above & Beyond.

When you bring up the Insert/Change Item dialog to edit a recurring item, the "Exception" button is automatically selected.  This indicates that this is an exception to the normal recurring definition for this item.  If you want this definition to become the new standard, click on "Standard"  To simply cancel one occurrence of the item click on "Cancel".

You can also create an exception simply by dragging or moving a standard instance to another day.


Carry Over Options

You may flag specific recurring items so that they will not be carried forward in the normal fashion but instead be deleted or shifted.  These options are selected in the Carry Over Options section of the recurring item dialog box.

Carry Over Options: Delete

When you select Carry Over Undone Items, any undone items with the delete option will be deleted rather than carried forward. Use the delete option if you have a recurring item that you dont want carried forward if undone.  An example of this might be a daily item such as lunch.  Because lunch is a daily item, there will already be a new occurrence of lunch each day. Without the delete option, it would be carried over and thus appear twice.

Carry Over Options: Shift

Suppose you have a recurring item called "Mow the lawn" set for every 7 days.  If not done on a particular day, you want all occurrences of the item to be shifted ahead so that there is still a 7 day span before the next occurrence.  In Carry Over Options, select "Shift".  Now, whenever you issue the Carry Over Undone Items command, all future occurrences will be shifted ahead.

Note: The Shift feature simply updates the "start date" of the recurring item with the date of the day you are carrying over to.  It is designed for items that occur every n number of days, weeks, months or years. For this reason it will work only for recurring items where no specific weekday or month day is selected.  For example, select "Weekly" and type in the desired start date; but do not use the particular check boxes "M", "W", etc.  Similarly with Monthly items.


Editing Items

To change attributes of any item, double-click on the item (or select the item and press ENTER).

To change all instances of a selected recurring item, press Ctrl+Enter.  Changes will affect all standard instances of the item.  Exceptions will not be affected.


Deleting Items

To delete a selected item, press the DELETE key.


Done Items

When a selected item is "done", press the SPACEBAR.  A line will appear through it indicating it is a "done" item.  See Edit: Item Done for more on done items.


Carry Over Undone Items

To move undone items ahead to present day or a selected future day, press F12, or click on the suitcase icon in the toolbar.  If the viewed schedule is today or a past day, all undone items will be moved to today. If the viewed schedule is a future day, the items will be moved to that future day.

See also Carry Over Options in the Recurring Items section.


Highlighting an Item

For emphasis, you may wish to "highlight" certain items on your schedule. Highlighted items appear in the schedule as underlined.  F3 or Edit:Highlight Item will underline the currently selected item.  Press F3 again to remove the underline.

The Month-at-Glance view and certain reports include only highlighted items.  See Reports in the Menu Reference section.


Juggling Items

Once an item is inserted into your schedule, you may easily move it to a different position within that schedule or move it to the schedule of a different day.

Click to select the item you wish to move, then simply drag the item up or down within the schedule. When you move a "Floating" item up or down in the schedule, the begin time will adjust automatically. You may also drag "Fixed" items, however the begin time you specified remains the same.

If you move an item to a spot where it conflicts with another item or goes outside of the time bounds you designated, the time will appear red warning you of the conflict.

To move a selected item to another date, click with the right mouse button on the desired target date in the pop-up calendar. This is the quickest and easiest way to re-schedule an undone item to another day.  While viewing multiple schedules, you may drag the selected the item from one schedule window to another.

See The Juggle Menu for a list of keyboard shortcuts for moving items.


On Screen Views
Views

One to seven schedules can be viewed on screen simultaneously.  The schedules may be tiled vertically or horizontally.  You may also view a list of all items ordered by priority, or alphabetized on item title.  These view options and others such as Month-at-a-Glance are selected in the View menu.  Month-at-a-Glance shows all highlighted items for the month. For more information on views, see The View Menu in the Menu Reference Section.


Printed Schedules

You may print a variety of reports from Above & Beyond.  For details, see Reports in the Menu Reference section.

Printed schedules have vertical spacing proportional to time span.  This makes it easier to see the relative durations of each item.  Items of longer duration will have more blank space below the row they appear on, than those of shorter duration.


Notes

Notes of varying lengths can be attached to items. They may also be printed.  For more information on notes, see Edit:Notes in the Menu Reference Section.


Data Saving and Backups

To minimize data loss from unexpected natural disasters such as power interruptions, schedule changes are automatically saved every 60 seconds in your data file which has the .PAK extension.  As an added precaution,  a backup file (with the extension .BAK) is maintained which contains your previously saved scheduling data.

Your data is vital, especially the scheduling data you rely on to plan your future and to track your accomplishments.  ON A DAILY BASIS, MAKE BACKUPS of all the data files in your Above & Beyond directory and subdirectories. These backups should be made on reliable media and stored in a safe place.

You may have an Agent do these backups automatically.  For details, see Agents.


Schedule Archiving

A schedule will be "archived" when all items on that day have been either marked done, rescheduled, carried forward, or deleted, and the day is past.  In other words, when all items remaining on the past day are done. Archived schedules are stored in "x-files" that have an extension determined by their year. For example, 1996 archived schedules are stored in Timedata.x96. These files are encrypted and are written and read by the program itself when displaying and updating past days' schedules.

In addition to x-files, there are "log" files which contain a month of done items, and are named for the month, eg. Jan97.log. They are text files that can be read into a spreadsheet program for analysis, or simply viewed or printed. A log file is appended when a schedule within that month is archived; and rewritten if a previously archived schedule within that month is updated. Therefore if you want to annotate a log file, you'll probably want to first make a copy of it, as the original will be overwritten if you make a change to any past schedule in that month in Above & Beyond.

To view the log file for a particular month from within Above & Beyond, select any schedule in the month; then choose View: History for Month.  The log file will be displayed in Windows notepad. Log files are formatted with tab-separated values so they can also be read as text files by spreadsheets such as Microsoft Excel and Lotus 1-2-3.  To make it simpler for your calculation formulas, durations are in minutes.

Log files also contain a four or five digit number indicating the project to which an item is assigned.  For a list of project names and numbers, use File: Reports: List: Report.


The Toolbar

Just below the Above & Beyond menus is a toolbar which contains icons for quickly accessing a variety of commonly used commands. To remove the toolbar from view, click on the small icon just above the vertical scroll bar.  To restore the toolbar, click again.  You may also toggle Toolbar Off in the Options menu.

Select: Prior Week

Select: Prior Day

Select: Today's Schedule

Select: Next Day

Select: Next Week

View: Single Schedule Window

View: Week at a Glance

View: Month at a Glance

View: Alphabetical List

View: Priority List

Select: Find

Options: Calendar: Open

Worktools: Timer

Worktools: Autodial

View: Browse Notes

Edit: Notes

Edit: Start Item

Edit: Item Done

Edit: Delete Item

Juggle: Carry Over Undone Items

Juggle: Balance Workload

File: Print: Standard Report

Zoom In

Zoom Out

Zoom In and Zoom Out

The last two toolbar icons allow you to quickly increase or decrease the size of normal text or headings on your screen. To increase the text size, click the large magnifying glass icon. To reduce, click the small magnifying glass icon.  To adjust schedule headings, hold the Control key while clicking on the Zoom In or Zoom Out icon.

You have the added flexibility of different text sizes for different views.  For example, you can increase the size of the text in Month-at-a-Glance without affecting the text size in Single Schedule view.


Advanced Features
Advanced Use

Projects

Item Status/Color

Accounting for Time

Workload Balancing

Night Owl Support

Agents

Macros


Projects

For information on Projects see View: Projects in the Menu Reference section.


Item Status/Color

Schedule items may be one of eight user definable statuses.  Items with a particular status can appear in any color you choose.  The "status" of an item may be easily set by clicking on the item with the RIGHT mouse button (or by pressing Ctrl+F3).  For more information on setting item status/color, see Options:Settings:Statuses.

Regardless of status, you may choose special colors for Fluid items and/or Unscheduled items.  These colors are choosen in Options:Settings:Colors.


Accounting for Time

Above & Beyond includes several commands for time tracking.  You can indicate that you've started working on a task by issuing the Start Item command.  This starts a task-timer running and shows on-screen how long you've been working on it.  When you complete the task, marking it done, the actual time in the timer will be recorded as the duration of that item.

If you decide later you want to resume working on that task, select it and issue the Start Item command again.  A second instance of the item will be created and a task-timer will be started.

To start the timer if you've already started working on the item, use Alt+F5.  This starts the timer and sets the begin time to the end time of the item last completed.

Even if you don't Start an item you can have the actual duration logged when you mark it done.  Instead of pressing Spacebar, press Shift+Spacebar (shortcut for Edit: Item Done, Fit to Gap).  The task will be given a duration that fills the intervening span of time.

Insert Done Item is a useful command when you're tracking your time.  This is for recording any unplanned items that you accomplished.  It's a handy command because the begin time is automatically initialized to the end time of the previous task.


Workload Balancing

Workload Balancing is an advanced feature that enables you to automate the scheduling of your undone tasks based on their priority and other requirements.  Any tasks that don't have to be tied to a particular date can be designated as "Fluid" items and carry a priority and, optionally, a deadline. When you issue the Balance Workload command, Above & Beyond will reschedule all of your fluid tasks in a few seconds. This enables you to have priority-ordered schedules that smooth out lulls or crunches to produce optimized plans on demand.

How Workload Balancing Saves You Time

Workload Balancing relieves you of the work of manually rescheduling/postponing tasks when the schedules for the near term are overloaded with items. For most people the near term being overloaded is an everyday occurrence. But you can change that with Workload Balancing. Automated balancing of the workload is fast, and takes into account all priorities and deadlines.

Priorities

Fluid items each have a relative priority based on their position in the Priority List. When you issue the Balance Workload command, all Fluid items are rescheduled dynamically. Precedence is given to the items in their order of priority. This means that all things being equal, higher priority items will be scheduled earlier than lower priority items. The priority 1 item may be scheduled today, for example, and the priority 145 item may not come up until next month.  See also, the section below titled Changing Priorities.

Earliest / Latest Dates And Weekdays

There are additional properties that fluid items have. The earliest date is known as the Postpone date. It is the earliest possible date you would want the item scheduled. The Deadline date serves as a latest date. It's the latest possible date for it to be scheduled. For tasks that you would only want scheduled on particular days of the week, you can indicate with the weekday check boxes. For example, you might designate just Saturday, or maybe only Monday through Friday. These properties can be set on the Edit item dialog box. The Postpone date, Deadline date, and Weekdays are all optional.

How To Create A Fluid Item

In the "Insert/Change Item" dialog, click on (to remove the x from) the Firm checkbox. This will switch off the Firm setting, making the item Fluid. If you are inserting an item from the Priority Ordered List view, the box will automatically be switched off to give you a Fluid item initially.

To toggle an item between Fluid and Firm press F2, or choose "Fluid Item" in the Edit menu.  Recurring items are normally not Fluid, but you can make an exception. If you press F2 on one instance of a recurring item, it will change it to an Exception and make it Fluid.

Changing Priorities

The top priority item has a priority value of 1, the next 2, etc.  You can view all the Fluid items by selecting View: Priority List. The priority of an item can easily be changed in several ways. You can slide the item up or down in the Priority List to raise or lower its priority. Or you can edit the item and change the priority value by typing in a new value; or using the scroll bar to quickly move it up or down.

The Balance Workload Command

Simply press Alt+F8 (or select Juggle: Balance Workload) and Above & Beyond will adjust item scheduling on all future days.  The priority, duration, and begin time (if any) is taken into consideration.  Higher priority items are given precedence, but there are exceptions. Items of shorter duration, for example, are easier to find time for, and may be scheduled before a long duration item of higher priority.

If time cannot be found for the item before its deadline, a warning message will appear, and you'll have an opportunity to make changes, such as increasing its priority or extending its deadline.  When no messages appear you will know that all tasks have been scheduled before their deadlines.

Using The Pop-up Calendar With Fluid Items

The pop-up calendar, so useful in quickly rescheduling Firm items, also has benefits in juggling Fluid items.  If you want to postpone a Fluid item to next week, click the right mouse button on the date to which you'd like to postpone it.  Don't worry about postponing past the deadline, because Above & Beyond will check deadlines and warn you before you exceed one.  You can then chose to not postpone the item, or have the deadline extended.  When you postpone an item it will not be scheduled prior to that date.  If you later decide you want to move it up, you can do so by clicking on an earlier date on the calendar.  The Postpone and Deadline dates can also be changed in the Insert/Change Item dialog box.

Make Whatever You Can Fluid

To get the greatest gain out of Workload Balancing, designate as many items as you can as Fluid. Ask yourself, "Can this be done on other than one particular date?"  Events and appointments are normally Firm (not Fluid) items. But many things, perhaps 30-60% of your items could be Fluid. The more fluidity you have in your schedules, the easier it is to balance your workload.

How To Handle The Unexpected

If your work and lifestyle often has unexpected items that need to be handled that same day, set workload balancing to allow a certain amount of free time in the day.  Otherwise, it will completely fill each day's schedule with planned items.  To specify the amount of free time to reserve, select Options: Settings: Workload Balancing.


Night-Owl Support

For users who work past midnight, midnight can be "postponed" until you are finished working. In other words, items scheduled or completed after 12:00am are considered to be part of the previous days schedule.

To activate Night Owl Support, select Options:Settings:New Item Defaults and enter the latest time after 12:00am that you would work.


Agents

You can schedule an Agent to launch a batch file or application at a precise time.  You can have the agent prompt you before it launches the program; or you can have it launch automatically without asking permission.

Agents are activated by either of the two keywords, "Exec" or "Autoexec" appearing in the item title.  You may also specify parameters which will be passed to the program.  Windows and DOS programs, batch and command files can be run using Exec or Autoexec.

When the keyword "Exec" is used, and the scheduled begin time for that item is reached, an agent will display the current time and the message, "Ready to Exec <program name>?"  At that time, choose "yes" to run the program, or choose "no" to cancel the process.

When the keyword "Autoexec" is used, and the scheduled begin time for that item is reached, the program will automatically be run without waiting for you to reply to a prompt.

At launch time, the agent can either mark the item done, or "start" (timing) the item; depending on your preference.  Use "Exec" or "Autoexec" (in mixed case) and the agent will mark the item done.  Use all lower case ("exec" or "autoexec") and the item will be "started".  For details on "starting" items see Edit: Started in the Menu Reference Section.

You can manually launch an Exec or Autoexec item prior to its designated begin time.  Simply select the item, then press F5 (or use Edit: Start Item).  If the item is Floating, you will have to launch it manually, since a begin time is required for automatic launch.

Note: Unless you specify the path explicitly (e.g.  Exec  c:\mydir\backup.bat),  the PATH statement in your Autoexec.Bat file must include the directory in which the program or file is to be found.

The format for an Exec or Autoexec item title is:

<Description>  <Keyword>  <Program name>  <Parameters>

<Description> is any text.  <Keyword> is either  Exec, exec, Autoexec, or autoexec.

<Program name> is the  name of the program or executable file you want Above & Beyond to load and run.  Programs or executable files must end in .EXE, .BAT, .COM, or .PIF.

<Parameters> are any information that the program needs to perform.

All of the four parts above are optional.  For example, you may want to use the keyword "Autoexec" with no program name to simply have an item automatically marked done.

The description, keyword, program name and parameters are all typed into the Title line in the Insert/Change item dialog box, and they will be displayed on the schedule in the normal fashion.  The keyword, program name and all parameters must be separated from each other by (only) one space.

Exec Sample Item:

Backup notebook files  Exec C:\ab\backup.bat

In this example, the description of the function you want to accomplish is "Backup notebook files".  The keyword Exec instructs Above & Beyond to prompt you before it loads and runs the batch file backup.bat.  This will give you time to put a blank diskette into drive A if, for example, Backup.bat contained the command "Copy  C:\ab\*.nbk  A:".

Autoexec Example:

Meet with Bob Autoexec

In this example, the descriptive text is "Meet with Bob".  You chose the keyword  Autoexe because you want this item to be marked done automatically without prompting you first.


Macros

There are two macros available for use: Rotate and Last Done.

Use the Last Done macro to have Above & Beyond automatically show the date the item was last done. To activate this macro, add "{last done}" to the item description. For clarity you may want to add: "(Last done: {last done})". The result of this would be, for example, "(Last done: 7/15/96)"

Use the Rotate macro anywhere in the description of a recurring item to alternate between a set of text strings for each instance of the item. For example, let's say you have four recurring items as follows: "Run backup: tape A", "Run backup: tape B", "Run backup: tape C", and "Run backup: tape D". You could instead have one item with description as follows: "Run backup: tape {A|B|C|D}". The text for each instance of the recurring item will rotate through the choices of substrings "A", "B", "C", "D" in order, and then repeat from "A". In this example, instead of having 4 separate items defined to recur every 4 weeks, you need just one weekly item using the Rotate macro syntax.


Workgroup Use

Above & Beyond is a big boost for workgroups.  Where workstations are connected via a LAN (local area network), managers can send balance the work-load of staff members, send E-mail, assign new items, prioritize work, and check task completion status without interrupting on-going work. Above & Beyond automates the process of arranging meetings for group members, posting meeting notices to all attendee's schedules. Secretaries can post phone messages for calls to be returned, and monitor multiple schedules to know who is where when.

"Above & Beyond makes group scheduling easier than you ever thought possible... This is the way group scheduling should work."

- PC Magazine

Summary of Features

E-mail

Opening Schedules

Workload Management

Status Query

Passwords

Set LAN Directory

Meeting Maker

Alarms and Agents Off


Summary of Workgroup Features

1.  E-mail among Above & Beyond users.

2.  View and update the schedules of other Above & Beyond users.  Password protection is also available as an option.

3.  Delegate items to co-workers.

4.  Check on the status of items being performed by others in the group.  If the item is completed you'll see it marked done; if it is coming up, youll when the person plans to get to it.

5.  Schedule meetings when everyone in a group is available.

6.  Share a company phone book. If the company phone numbers are stored in a cardfile named "phone.crd" then simply add the following entry to each user's Worktools list:

Co. Phone Book	nb.exe phone.crd

There must be exactly one tab (no spaces) before the nb and one space after exe.


E-mail

For details on this feature, see Edit: Send E-mail and View: E-mail in the Menu Reference Section.


Opening Schedules

In order to look at or update the schedules of others, you must first "open" the user; which means that their schedules will appear on your screen.  A list of the "open" users is displayed in the Schedules menu.  For instructions on how to "open" users, see the section on The Schedules Menu .


Workload Management

Supervisors who assign work can monitor and adjust the workload and priorities of each worker in a precise way.  Above & Beyond schedules show clearly the workload on each day, in percentages, amounts, and even graphically with use of color on the pop-up calendar.

Supervisors know ahead of time when a worker is running out of things to do, or on the other hand, if too much work is piling up.  Supervisors can see when workers will be getting to particular items, and shift the work sequence based on new priorities.


Status Query

Supervisors can check the completion status of any item at any time, without interrupting the worker. The worker doesn't even have to be available, which is important if they are working at another location, at lunch, on the phone, out sick, or on another shift. This is an enormous time saver. If the supervisor finds the item has not been completed, he can also see when the worker has planned to get to it.


Passwords

Users can be restricted for viewing and/or editing the schedules of other users.  This is done by setting passwords for the various levels of access.  For more information See Options: Settings: Passwords in the Menu Reference section.


Set LAN Directory

The network administrator can now maintain a common user list (User.Lst) file that everyone's Above & Beyond will access. Specify the location of this file in Schedules:Set LAN Directory.

The More.. entry in the Schedules menu will bring up a list box with users who are listed in the User.Lst file in the LAN Dierctory.


Meeting Maker

Meetings for Above & Beyond users can be planned easily. The cost of trying to find out when everyone in the group is free is normally quite high, because of the amount of time it takes to query each person in the group, have them check their schedules, and recheck their schedules for alternate slots. Those steps are eliminated with the Meeting Maker because anyone can plan a meeting that is conflict-free.  Common blocks of free time will be found and you can pick the best one.  Then click on "Send Invitations" and an E-mail meeting notice is sent to all prospective attendees.  Each user can then add the meeting to their schedule, or reply to the E-mail saying that they can't make it.

To access the Meeting Maker, select Schedules: Arrange a Meeting.  Enter the title of the meeting, the location, and the ideal begin and end time for the meeting.  Next, click on "Choose Attendees".  After you have chosen attendees, click "OK".

From the original Meeting Maker dialog, click on "Find Time".  In this dialog, select time and weekday constraints if any.  Next, click on "Search" and the Meeting Maker will search for common blocks of free time in the schedules of all required attendees.

Choose the best time from the Meeting Times box and click "OK".  Lastly, click on "Send Invitations" to have an E-mail meeting notice sent to all prospective attendees.

For the purpose of telephone or video conference calls between parties in differing time zones, Multiple Time Zones are supported.  When this box is checked (in the Choose Attendees dialog), the Meeting Maker considers which time zone users are in and compensates accordingly.  It should normally not be checked; in case some users have not set their timezone or set it incorrectly. In which case they would receive incorrect meeting time information.


The Alarms Off Option
Alarms and Agents Off

When running in a LAN environment and viewing someone else's schedule, select "Alarms and Agents Off" in the Options menu.  This will prevent their alarms and E-mail notices from popping-up on your screen.  Also, this will insure that their Autoexec items will not launch events on your PC.  Your alarms and Autoexec items will function normally.

Note: The setting you select for this option on their Above & Beyond schedule affects only your viewing of their schedule.  Alarms will still pop-up during their Above & Beyond sessions.  This setting is remembered between sessions, so you need only issue this command once.


Menu Reference Section

The File Menu

The Edit Menu

Notes

The Select Menu

The Juggle Menu

The View Menu

The Surprise Menu

The Worktools Menu

AutoDial

Timer

The Schedules Menu

Arrange a Meeting

The Options Menu


The File Menu

Reports

Transfer...

Mobile Computing

Archive E-mail

Import

Export

Save

Save As

Name...

Note File

Data File

Exit

Exit All


File: Reports

Daily Schedule...

Today's Schedule

Viewed Schedule

Range of Schedules

Outlook...

Week

Month

3 Month

Range

Notes...

Open Notes

Viewed Schedule Notes

List...

Priority

Alphabetical

Chronological

Project

Project Report

Standard Report...

Print

Setup

Filter

Page Setup


File: Reports: Today's Schedule

This command will print the current day's schedule.  Note: Fluid items are preceded by a tilde (~) for easy recognition.


File: Reports: Viewed Schedule

This command will print the schedule currently being viewed on the screen.


File: Reports: Range of Schedules

This command will print a number of schedules between the dates you specify.  You may also specify the number of days you would like to appear on each sheet of paper.


File: Reports: Week Outlook
File: Reports: Outlook: Week

This printout includes all schedule items for the current week.  To print an outlook for a week other than the current week, select Reports: Outlook: Range


File: Reports: Month Outlook
File: Reports: Outlook: Month

This printout includes all highlighted schedule items for the current month.  To print an outlook for a different month, select Reports: Outlook: Range.


File: Reports: 3 Month Outlooks
File: Reports: Outlook: 3 Month

This printout includes all highlighted schedule items for the next 90 days.  To print an outlook for a different time period, select Reports: Outlook: Range.


File: Reports: Range of Outlooks
File: Reports: Outlook: Range

Use this command to print an outlook for a period of time other than the current week/month.


File: Reports: Open Notes
File: Reports: Notes: Open Notes

This command will print all notes that are currently "open."  There are several ways to open a note for a selected item:

Click on the toolbar note icon.

Press Ctrl+E

Choose Edit Notes from the Edit menu.

In the Insert/Change item dialog click on the Notes button.

Once a note has been added, it can also be accessed by double clicking on the note icon that appears at the extreme left of the schedule item.

To close a note, double click on the control bar in the upper left hand corner of the note window.


File: Reports: Viewed Schedule Notes
File: Reports: Notes: Viewed Schedule Notes

This command will print all notes (open or not) on the currently viewed schedule.


File: Reports: Priority List
File: Reports: List: Priority

This printout includes a list of fluid items ordered by priority.  Select "First Page" to print just the highest priority items.  Select "All Pages" to print the entire list.


File: Reports: Alphabetical List
File: Reports: List: Alphabetical

This printout lists all schedule items sorted alphabetically on the item description.


File: Reports: Chronological List
File: Reports: List: Chronological

This printout includes a list of highlighted items for the next 90 days.


File: Reports: Project List
File: Reports: List: Project

This printout includes a list of all projects and their internal number generated by Above & Beyond.  This number is also included in the log file so you can see the assigned project for each done item.  The Report List will be a handy reference.


File: Reports: Project Report

This command will create a Project Report showing duration totals by project for a given date range.  The report is written to a file so it can be viewed in a spreadsheet application for custom analysis, formatting and printing.


Standard Report: Print

This command prints the report(s) you have selected in File: Reports: Standard Report: Setup.  A shortcut for this command is Ctrl+P, or clicking on the toolbar printer icon.


Standard Report Setup
Standard Report: Setup

Use this command to specify which reports will be printed when you click on the toolbar printer icon, press Ctrl+P. Portrait/landscape and other report attributes are set here.

Notes "Interleaved" indicates that you want the attached note (if any) to be printed immediatly following each item description.  Choose "At End" to print all items, then all notes.


Standard Report Filter
Report: Filter

Use this dialog to specify that items of certain statuses be included or excluded from printouts.


Reports: Standard Report: Page Setup
Report: Page Setup

Use Page Setup to select from a variety of  page height and width options.  For example, for Daytimer's appointment books, use 6.75" by 3.75".  Select "Extra Wide Left Margins" when using paper with pre-punched holes along that margin.  Select "Centered" when using non-standard sized paper in the manual feed slot of printers such as Laserjets.

If you choose "Full", the settings from the current printer setup are used.  These are selected in the Windows Control Panel.


Mobile Computing
File: Transfer: Mobile Computing

Check-Out will copy your Above & Beyond data files to a floppy (A: or B: drive) for using Above & Beyond at another location.

Check-In over-writes the Above & Beyond data files on the PC with the data files from the floppy disk.  For this reason, you should not make changes to a schedule on the hard disk that is checked-out.  When a checked-out schedule is loaded, a message will remind you to Check-In before making changes.


File: Transfer: Archive E-mail

Archive E-mail moves E-mail messages older than 7 days from the EMAIL\SAVED directory to the EMAIL\ARCHIVED directory. Use this command if loading of old E-mail becomes slow. That is, when clicking on Previous in the View: E-mail dialog.


File: Transfer: Import

Schedule items can be imported from the file IMPORT.TXT into Above & Beyond.  Each line of the file should be in the following format:

<date>  <begin time>  <duration>  <title>

Use one space (no tabs) between the four parts.  Everything but the title is optional.

For the many acceptable formats for date, begin time, duration, and title, refer to Inserting Items Into a Schedule.  For date format see Entering Item Date.  For begin time format see Begin Time and Floating Fixed.  For duration format see Entering Item Duration.  For title format see Entering Item Title.


File: Transfer: Export

Use this command to export a schedule, or range of schedules, to a file entitled EXPORT.TXT in the current directory.  To easily view this file select View: Export File.


File: Transfer: Save

Save Data will save current changes to disk.  Since changes are saved in the background automatically every ten seconds and when exiting, use of this command is not required.


File: Transfer: Save As

This feature allows one to return to using a previous version of Above & Beyond after having loaded schedule data into the current version.  Save As will save your .Pak file in the format of the previous version of your choice.  After using Save As select File: Exit.


File: Note File Name
File: Name: Note File

This command will display the filename for the note that is attached to the selected schedule item.  You may need this information to import the text of a note into a non-Windows application.  To copy the text of a note into another Windows application, use the Windows Copy and Paste commands: Ctrl+C to copy; Ctrl+V to paste.


File: Data File Name
File: Name: Data File

This command will display the name of the file where the schedule information is stored. This is helpful when you have the schedules of several users active on the screen at one time. Using this command, you will be able to verify whose schedule you are looking at in cases where the person has not entered their name in the banner line.


File: Exit

This command will save current changes and exit Above & Beyond.


File: Exit All

This command will save current changes and exit all Above & Beyond sessions.


The Edit Menu

Insert Item

Insert Memo

Change Item

Delete Item

Recurring...

Change All Occurrences

Delete All Occurrences

Edit Notes

Send E-mail

Done

Fluid Item

Highlighted

Private

Scheduled

Started

Cut

Copy

Paste

Advanced Commands...

Duplicate Item

Start Item After Last

Append Time & Date Stamp

Item Done Now

Item Done, Fit To Gap

Set Status

Insert Done Item

Handle Interruption


Edit: Insert New Item
Edit: Insert Item

To add a new item to your schedule, press the Insert key; or double-click on any free area on the schedule.  A dialog box will appear in which you enter specific information about the item.  When you have completed your session in the Insert/Change dialog box, select OK and the item will be inserted into the schedule.

For more about the Insert/Change dialog box, see Inserting Items into a Schedule.


Edit: Insert Memo Item
Edit: Insert Memo

To add a "memo" item to your schedule, press Alt+Insert.  This will bring up the "insert" dialog box.  Enter the text of the memo and select "OK".  The item will be labeled "memo" and will not conflict with scheduled items; nor will it be calculated into the workload by the color utilization calendar.


Edit: Change Item

To change previously entered information for an item, double-click on the item; or, if the item is already selected, you may simply press Enter.  Make the desired changes, then click OK.

Note: If the item changed is a recurring item, this one instance is now an "Exception" to the "Standard" recurring definition.  To define a new standard, use Edit: Change All Occurrences.


Edit: Change All Occurrences

Use this command to change all occurrences of the selected recurring item.

Note: If you wish to change just one instance of a recurring item, use Edit: Change Item.


Edit: Delete Item

To remove the selected item from the schedule, press the Delete key.

If the selected item is a recurring item, only the selected instance will be deleted.  To remove all occurrences of a recurring item, press Ctrl+Delete.


Edit: Delete All Occurrences

To remove all occurrences of a recurring item, press Ctrl+Delete.


Edit: Notes

There are several methods to attach a note to a schedule item.  If you are in the "Insert Item" dialog, click on View Notes in the upper left hand corner of the dialog.  At any other time, press Ctrl+E or click on the toolbar note icon.  Once a note has been created a note icon will appear to the right of the item's description on screen.  To view or edit the note, double-click on the note icon, or click (once) on the toolbar note icon.

Navigating in a note is fast and easy. You can use the keyboard exclusively, or use your mouse as well.  To move to the end of a note, use Ctrl+End.  To move to the beginning of a note, use Ctrl+Home.  Any areas of text can be selected, cut, copied and pasted to any other Windows application.  You can also paste text from other Windows applications.

If you wish to delete the entire text of a note, select the text and then press "Delete".  (To select the entire text, place the cursor at the beginning of the text and press "Shift+Ctrl+End").

Time and Date Stamp as well as Word and Character Count is available in the note window Edit menu.  If some portion of text is selected, the count will be for the selected portion.

"Open" notes many be printed by selecting File: Reports: Notes.  Notes are "open" until they are closed by pressing Alt+F4, or by selecting "Close" in the note window control menu.  Use View: Browse Notes to automatically open the note window for each item as it is selected.  This enables you to move quickly from item to item; viewing the notes associated with each item.

Sharing Notes

Sometimes you may wish to share a note between two items. If you duplicate an item, the duplicate item references the same note.  This is very convenient for many purposes, such as notes in preparation for a phone call. Insert a schedule item for making the first call, then create a duplicate item and reschedule it for the follow-up.  The follow-up call item will automatically reference the notes made in preparation for the first call, plus any results that you noted there.

Separate Notes

Normally, each instance of a recurring item will share a common note.  Items created using the Edit: Duplicate Item command will also share a common note.  If you would like to attach a separate note to either of these type of items, choose Separate Notes form the Note window File menu.  This will create a separate note for a selected item that previously had a shared note.

Where Your Notes Are Stored

You may not care to know where your notes are stored, because they are so easily accessed from Above & Beyond. But here are the details if it interests you.

Notes are stored in a Notes subdirectory from the directory that contains your data (.Pak) file. Each note has a filename created from a 3 letter prefix and 5 digit number. The prefix will be the same for each note you create for any given data file. The note file prefix is generated randomly when a new data file is created.


Edit: Send E-mail

Use this command to send E-mail to one or more Above & Beyond users across a network.

First, enter your message and a descriptive subject.  Next, choose the recipient in the To: list.  An additional recipient may be specified in the CC: list.  Click on Send and your E-mail will be sent.  The list of users appearing in the To: and CC: list boxes is drawn from the file User.Lst which is maintained and viewed in the Schedules menu.

If you wish to broadcast your message to more than two users, click on Broadcast.  In the broadcast dialog, you may choose the users to be included in this mailing.  For each recipient, you may click on To: or CC: to indicate if the message is "To" them or theyre getting a complimentary copy.  When finished click OK and then click Send.

To view E-mail that you have sent or recieved, choose View: E-mail.


Edit: Item Done
Edit: Done

To indicate that the selected item has been "done", press the Spacebar.  A done item appears with a line through it.  The begin time is set to immediately follow the end time of the previously done item.  To change the item back to undone, press the Spacebar again.

Items on future days cannot be marked done.  Instead, move the item to the day it was actually done, and then mark it done.

The following day after all items on a given day have been marked done, the schedule is "archived" (written) to a log file.  For more on the log files, see Schedule Archiving.

See also, the Edit menu commands Item Done Now and Item Done, Fit To Gap.


Edit: Fluid Item
Edit: Fluid

This command (or Alt+F2) will toggle an item from Fluid to Firm, and vise versa.  For a brief summary of Fluid items, see the section titled Firm / Fluid.  For an in-depth discussion of Fluid and Firm items, see the section titled Workload Balancing.


Edit: Floating

Use this command (or Alt+F2) to toggle an item between Fixed and Floating.

For details on Floating / Fixed items see the section on Inserting Items into a Schedule.


Edit: Highlight Item
Edit: Highlighted

This command (or F3) will cause the selected item to be underlined.  Press F3 again to  remove the underline.

Certain reports include only highlighted items.  For example, the Month Outlook, the 3 Month Outlook, and the Chronological List.


Edit: Private

This is a toggle command that will flag or unflag a particular item as "Private".  Private items can be viewed only if your password is entered.  People using your view or modify password will see that there is an item scheduled (and its duration) but cannot view or modify it.  The shortcut for this command is Alt+F3.

An alternate way to make an item private is to begin the item description with the vertical bar character:  |

For more information on passwords, see Options: Settings: Passwords.


Edit: Schedule Item
Edit: Scheduled

Use this command (or press F4) to toggle an item from Scheduled to Unscheduled and vise versa.  Scheduled items appear in the schedule with a Fixed or Floating begin time. Unscheduled items appear without a begin time, above the scheduled items, and are not considered in time management operations by the dynamic scheduler.


Edit: Started

With this command (Shortcut: F5) the elapsed time of an item in progress can be displayed.  The Start Item command will start recording the elapsed time associated with the selected item.  The elapsed time along with the duration will be displayed on the schedule line. It will look like this: (:04/:30).  The first number is the actual elapsed time, the second is the originally planned duration.

When the item is marked as done, the total elapsed time will be saved and archived along with the item.  If you accidentally hit the Spacebar, marking  an item done that is not actually done, simply toggle the item to undone (by hitting the Spacebar again) and the timing will be restored.

If you would like to "restart" a "done" item use the Start Item command again.  The "done" item will remain marked as done however a duplicate item will be created and started at the current time. With this method you have a record of the two (or more) segments of time that the item was worked on.

The Start Item command may also be used to manually launch an EXEC or AUTOEXEC item earlier in the day on which it is scheduled.


Edit: Cut

The Cut command (Shortcut: Ctrl+X) deletes the selected item from the schedule. The deleted item is placed in a temporary holding area known as the Clipboard. You can then move the item to another person's schedule with the Paste command.  See also Edit: Copy and Edit: Paste.


Edit: Copy

The Copy command (Shortcut: Ctrl+C) copies the selected item to the Clipboard so that you may duplicate it elsewhere using the Paste command.  See also Edit: Paste.

Note: If Copy (or Cut) is used from the Schedules view, the item's date, time, duration and title is copied to the Clipboard.  If Copy (or Cut) is used from the Alphabetical Items list, only the item's title is copied.


Edit: Paste

The Paste command (Shortcut: Ctrl+V) inserts the item that is on the Clipboard to into the current schedule. In order for the Paste command to be available there must be some text which as been placed on the Clipboard via the Cut or Copy commands.

Cut, Copy and Paste are intended for use when you wish to place the item into someone else's schedule.  To copy an item to a different date on your schedule, use the Duplicate Item command and then move the duplicate item to the desired date.  See the section entitled Juggling Items for information on how to move items to a desired date.

Note: If Copy (or Cut) was used from the Schedules view, Paste will paste the item onto a schedule corresponding to the item's date.  If Copy (or Cut) was used from the Alphabetical Items list, you may Paste the item onto any date.


Edit: Duplicate Item

The Duplicate Item command will insert a duplicate of the selected item into the schedule directly below the selected item.  Shortcut: press double-quote (") while in the schedules view.


Edit: Start Item After Last

With the "Start Item" command (described above), the start time used is the time at the moment the command is issued.  With "Start Item After Last" the start time used is the time when the last done item was finished.  Use this command when you wish to "start" an item and indicate that you actually began working on the item immediately after the previously done item.


Edit: Append Time & Date Stamp

Ctrl+D will append the current time and date to the end of the item title.  This feature is available anytime outside of the Insert/Change Item dialog.


Edit: Item Done Now

Use this command to indicate that you just now finished the item.  Item Done Now marks the item done and, if on today, sets the begin time so that the item ends at the current time.  If the item is on a past day, the begin time is not changed.  The shortcut for this command is Ctrl+Spacebar.

Items on future days cannot be marked done.  Instead, move the item to the day it was actually done, and then check it off.

See also Edit: Item Done and Edit: Item Done, Fit To Gap


Edit: Item Done Now, Fit To Gap
Edit: Item Done, Fit To Gap

Use this command (Shortcut: Shift+Spacebar) to indicate that you just now finished the item, and that you began working on it immediately following the previously done item.

This command adjusts the begin and end time of the selected item so that the item fills the available time slot between the previous item and the item following.  In other words, the begin time is set to follow the end time of the previous item; and the end time is set to the begin time of the item following.  This command is useful when you wish to show 100% utilization of your time; that is, no unaccounted-for time.

In the event that you thought you were done, but then continued working on the item, issue the command again.  The duration will be extended to show that the item ended at the current time.


Edit: Indicate Attempt

If you attempt a phone call, for example, and the line is busy, press F6. A duplicate of the item is created and the original item is marked done and prefixed with the word "attempt:."

This is also useful for anything you begin but cannot complete. The time worked so far is recorded and you can finish later.


Edit: Set Status

To indicate that a selected schedule item is of a particular status, click on the item with the RIGHT mouse button, then click on the status for that item.  Note: If not using a mouse, press Ctrl+F3, then select the status.

The last status in the list (the eighth one) is "special".  If a date has at least one special status item scheduled, then the date heading will also appear in the special status color.

Related topics: Options: Settings: Statuses and File: Standard Report:Filter.


Edit: Insert Done Item

For those times when you want to record something you did that wasn't planned, press F10; or choose Edit: Insert a Done Item.  This is a shortcut for inserting an item, editing the begin and end times, and marking it done.  Default values for the begin and/or end time are used unless they are modified by being over-typed.  The default begin time is the end time of the previously done item.  The default end time, is the current time.  See also Edit: Item Done Now.


Edit: Handle Interruption

If you are interrupted while working on a started item, press the Pause key on your keyboard. The started item will be paused until the interruption is over. The end time will adjust while the interruption proceeds. When the interruption is over, press OK and the paused item will be resumed.

The interruption dialog is "modeless" which means you can slide it into a corner and go about work in other windows. Thus you can access information in you schedules during the interruption.


The Select Menu

You may select any schedule item by clicking on it.  To quickly select a schedule item that begins with a particular letter, simply press that letter key on the keyboard and the schedule will scroll down to the first such item.  To select a schedule for a specific date, click on the desired date on the pop-up calendar.

The shortcuts in the Select menu allow you to use keystrokes to select specific schedules and schedule items for viewing, editing or juggling.  The shortcuts are listed to the right of the commands in the menu.  Shortcuts are to be used instead of the pull-down menus;  so don't pull down a menu if you intend to use the shortcut keys.

Prior Item

Next Item

Prior Page

Next Page

Top Page

Bottom Page

Today's Schedule

Prior Day

Next Day

Scroll Up

Scroll Down

Prior Week

Next Week

Specific Date

Earliest Undone Schedule

Prior Schedule

Next Schedule

Find

Repeat Find

Earlier Find


Select: Prior Item

This command (shortcut: UP Arrow) selects the item above, or prior to, the item currently selected on the schedule.


Select: Next Item

This command (shortcut: DOWN Arrow) selects the item below the item currently selected, or the next item on the schedule.


Select: Prior Page

This command (shortcut: Page Up) enables one to view the previous page of a schedule that is too long to view on the screen.


Select: Next Page

This command (shortcut: Page Down) enables one to view the previous page of a schedule that is too long to view on the screen.


Select: Top Page

This command (shortcut: Ctrl+Home) scrolls the schedule to the top.


Select: Bottom Page

This command (shortcut: Ctrl+end) scrolls the schedule to the bottom.


Select: Today's Schedule

This command (shortcut: HOME) will select the schedule for today.


Select: Prior Day

This command will select the schedule for the day prior to the currently selected schedule.  A shortcut for this command  is to press the gray MINUS (-) key near the numeric keypad.


Select: Next Week
Select: Next Day

This command will select the schedule for the day after the currently selected schedule.  A shortcut for this command is to press the gray PLUS (+) key near the numeric keypad.


Select: Scroll Up

This command (shortcut: Ctrl+Page Up) scrolls the schedule up one page.


Select: Scroll Down

This command (shortcut: Ctrl+Page Down) scrolls the schedule down one page.


Select: Prior Week

The Prior Week command will select the schedule for the day one week prior to the currently selected schedule.  A shortcut for this command  is to press F7.


Select: Next Week

The Next Week command will select the schedule for the day one week after the currently selected schedule.  A shortcut for this command is to press F8.


Select: Specific Date

To specify the date of the schedule you want to view, press F9. You may also click on the desired date on the pop-up calendar.

See Entering Item Date for shortcuts on entering dates in Above & Beyond.


Select: Earliest Undone Schedule

The Earliest Undone Schedule command will select the earliest schedule of uncompleted items that exists in Above & Beyond.  Archived schedules will not be selected.   A shortcut for this command is to press the END key. Remember that all items on a schedule for a past day must be marked as done before that schedule will be archived.


Select: Prior Schedule
Select: Prior Schedule Window

The Prior Schedule command selects the schedule for the date immediately preceding the currently selected schedule.  A shortcut for this command is to  press the LEFT arrow key.

If viewing multiple schedule windows, the Prior Schedule command will select the schedule that appears to the left of the currently selected schedule.  If the left-most schedule is selected, the Prior Schedule command will change the schedule in that window to the schedule of the previous day.


Select: Next Schedule
Select: Next Schedule Window

The Next Schedule command will select the schedule immediately following the currently selected schedule.  A shortcut for this command is to press the RIGHT arrow key.

If you are viewing multiple schedules, the Next Schedule command will select the schedule to the right of the currently selected schedule.  If the right-most window on the screen has been selected, the Next Schedule command will change the schedule in that window to the schedule of the next day.


Select: Find

This command will find a schedule item which contains (or has a note that contains) a given text sting.   In the Find dialog box, enter the text string as follows:  To search item descriptions and memos, type the string in the "Item" line.  To search notes, type the string in the "Notes" line.  You may type the same or different strings in the Item and Notes lines.  For example you may want to find an item with "Jones" in the item description or "Project X" in the notes.

Click on OK and the first item with the specified string will be selected.  To find the next item with the specified string, choose "Select: Repeat Find".  To search backward in time, choose "Select: Earlier Find".


Select: Repeat Find

This command will find the next schedule item with text strings as specified in the previous Find command.


Select: Earlier Find

This command will search backward in time for a schedule item with text strings as specified in the previous Find command.


The Juggle Menu

The commands in the Juggle menu list the keyboard shortcuts for moving items within a schedule or to different schedules. See also Juggling Items.

Item Position...

Earlier in Day

Later in Day

Prior Schedule

Next Schedule

Prior Week

Next Week

Carry Over Undone Items

Balance Workload

Adjust Workload...

Less/More Workload

Optimize

Priority...

Raise/Lower Fluid Priority

Begin Time...

Earlier/Later Fixed Begin Time

Duration...

Shorter/Longer Duration


Juggle: Earlier in Day

This command (shortcut: Ctrl+Up Arrow) moves the selected item to before the item that is above it on the schedule.


Juggle: Later in Day

This command (shortcut: Ctrl+Down Arrow) moves the selected item to after the item that appears directly below it on the schedule.


Juggle: Prior Schedule

This command (shortcut Ctrl+Left Arrow) moves the selected item to the previous schedule.

If you are viewing schedules in multiple windows, the Prior Schedule command will transfer the selected item to the schedule on the left.  However, that schedule may  not necessarily be the prior day.  If you are viewing multiple schedules and the item you wish to move is in the left-most schedule, then the Prior Schedule command will cause the schedule in that window will change to the schedule of the preceding day and the selected item will appear in that schedule.


Juggle: Next Schedule

This command (shortcut: Ctrl+right Arrow) moves the selected item to the following schedule.

If you are viewing schedules in multiple windows, the Next Schedule command will transfer the selected item to the schedule, or window, to the right.  If you are viewing schedules in multiple windows and the item you wish to move is in the right-most schedule, then the Next Schedule command will cause the schedule in that window to change to the schedule for the next day and the selected item will appear in that schedule.


Juggle: Prior Week

This command (shortcut: Ctrl+F7) moves the selected item back seven days.


Juggle: Next Week

This command (shortcut: Ctrl+F8) moves the selected item ahead seven days.


Juggle: Adjust Workload
Juggle: Adjust Workload: Less/More

To increase you workload for today, press Ctrl+M. This brings in one fluid item from tomorrow that can be done today. To defer one fluid item until tomorrow, press Ctrl+L.


Juggle: Carry Over Undone Items

This command will bring undone items forward to the selected schedule.  Shortcuts: F12, or click on the suitcase toolbar icon.


Juggle: Balance Workload

Balance Workload (shortcut: Alt+F8) re-schedules all Fluid items dynamically. Precedence is given to the items in their order of priority. This means that all things being equal, higher priority items will be scheduled earlier than lower priority items. The priority 1 item may be scheduled today, for example, and the priority 145 item may not come up until next month. Each Fluid item has a relative priority from 1 to 999.

Balance Workload re-schedules Fluid items based on their priority, duration and the available free time.  Fluid items may be moved forward or back (between days), again based on priority and the best fit into available free time. The date range within which a Fluid item may flow is determined by the "Postpone" and "Deadline" dates that you have specified in the Insert/Change item dialog box.  That is, it will be scheduled after "Postpone" but before "Deadline".  If an item must occur on a particular day (such as Friday) or range of days (such as Monday through Friday), these parameters are also taken into consideration.

For an in-depth discussion of Workload Balancing, see the section titled Workload Balancing in the Introduction to Above & Beyond.


Juggle: Optimize

Optimize (shortcut:F11) rearranges the items on today's schedule to make the best use of your time. It does this by working to eliminate conflicts, taking into account the earliest and latest bounds for each item, as well as the priority of fluid items. If you have fixed items on your day, the Optimize command is a quick way to rearrange floating items on either side of fixed items to make more optimal use of time.  Fixed items are not moved.


Juggle: Raise/Lower Fluid Priority
Juggle: Priority: Raise/Lower Fluid

To quickly make adjustments to an item's priority without going into the change screen, these shortcuts can be used: Alt+Up raises the priority by one; Alt+Down lowers the priority by one.

If you are in Priority List view, you can also drag the item up to raise its priority, or drag the item down to lower it.


Juggle: Earlier/Later Fixed Begin Time
Juggle: Begin Time: Earlier/Later Fixed

To quickly make adjustments to an item's begin time without going into the change screen, these shortcuts can be used: Alt+Up subtracts five minutes from the begin time; Alt+Down adds five minutes.


Juggle: Shorter/Longer Duration
Juggle: Duration: Shorter/Longer

To quickly make adjustments to an item's duration without going into the Insert/Change dialog box, these shortcuts can be used: Alt+Left subtracts five minutes from the duration; Alt+Right adds five minutes.


The View Menu

The options in the View menu allow you to choose how you would like to view your schedules: in a single window, in multiple windows or as an alphabetical list.  Check marks to the left of the options in the  menu show which options are currently in effect.

Single Window

Projects

Alphabetical List

Priority List

Week at a Glance

Month at a Glance

E-mail

Define Week at a Glance

Tiling...

Horizontal

Vertical

Quad

Special


View: Single Schedule Window

Use this command (or press Ctrl+S) to display one schedule at a time.


View: Projects

Schedule items can be assigned to user defined Projects. A color cube to the left of each item indicates its project. To assign an item to a project, simply click on the cube and select the project from the list-box.

For an on-screen project summary for the viewed schedule, choose View: Special:Tally Project or press Ctrl+Y.  See also, File: Reports: Project Report.

To set up Projects, choose View:Projects. Press Insert to add a new project to the list. Type in the project name, and set the color for the project indicator. You may also enter notes related to each project. The Projects are listed alphabetically. Since the first project will be the default for new items, you may wish to force the most frequently used project to the top of the list by prefixing its name with a hyphen.  If you want the default project to be none, create a project named -none.

If you are using the project feature to set up account codes, you'll save time with a special feature of the Edit:Duplicate command. If the project you're duplicating has a number embedded in the text, it will be incremented by 1 in the duplicate. Remember to use leading 0's to effect proper alphabetizing in numerical order. For example, if you duplicate a project named "Account 005", the duplicate will be "Account 006". In this way, you can generate a large number of project codes quickly.


View: Alphabetical Items List

Use this command (or press Ctrl+A) to display a list of all unarchived items in alphabetical order.  Use this list to find an item if you have forgotten where it is in your schedule.


View: Priority List

Use this command (or press Ctrl+R) to display a list of all "Fluid" items ordered by priority.  Priority is set in the "Flow" area in the Insert/Change dialog box.  For more, see Fluid Items.

Note: The number (surrounded by periods) to the right of the item is the number of days ago the item was created.


View: Week at a Glance

Use this command (or press Ctrl+W) to display a week of schedules top to bottom (or side to side) on the screen.  To specify how many (up to 7) and which days of the week you would like to appear, use View: Define Week at a Glance.  To specify top to bottom or side to side select View: Vertical or View: Horizontal.  The default view is called Quad tiling.


View: Month at a Glance

Use this command (or press Ctrl+T) to display a 4-week calendar containing highlighted items for each day.  For information on highlighted items see Edit: Highlight Item. You can move backward or forward in time in jumps of one or four weeks.

You can scroll the view a week or month at a time in the following ways:

1:  Use the mouse on the vertical scroll bar,

2:  Press the UP or DOWN arrow keys, or

3:  Press the Page UP or Page DOWN keys.

Here is a tip on how to make the best use of the relatively small Month at a Glance boxes: Let the first three or four words of your item description be a concise abbreviation.  Use a "Ctrl+Enter" after this abbreviation; then type in the detailed description of the item.  Above & Beyond will then display just the abbreviated summary in the Month at a Glance boxes.  The summary will be followed by ellipses to indicate that there is more to the item description.


View: E-Mail

Use this command to view new or old (previously viewed) E-mail.  For new E-mail, the oldest message is shown first.  Click on Next for the next (newer) message.  For each message you have the option of replying by clicking on Reply.  You also have the option of adding the message to your schedule by clicking on Schedule. When all new E-mail has been viewed, Next will close the E-mail dialog.

For old E-mail, the newest message is shown first.  Click on Previous for the next (older) message.  You may also reply to, or schedule old E-mail messages.  E-mail you have sent is also saved and will appear in chronological order among old received E-mail.

For details on sending E-mail, see Edit: Send E-mail in the Menu Reference Section.  See also, File:Transfer: Archive E-mail.


View: Define Week at a Glance

Use this command to specify which days of the week will appear simultaneously when you issue the Week at a Glance command.


View: Horizontal Tiling

With Horizontal Tiling, when more than one schedule is simultaneously displayed (Multiple Windows or Week-at-a-Glance), schedules are tiled side by side, across the screen.


View: Vertical Tiling

With Vertical Tiling, when more than one schedule is simultaneously displayed (Multiple Windows or Week-at-a-Glance), schedules are tiled, one above the other, on the screen.


View: Quad Tiling

With Quad Tiling, when more than one schedule is simultaneously displayed (Multiple Windows or Week-at-a-Glance), four windows are tiled in quadrants.


View: Special

Immediate Focus

Time Graph

Present Filter Priority List

Multiple Schedule Windows

Hide Done Items

Browse Notes

Item Text in Full

Tally Project

History for Month

Item Creation Date

Export File


View: Immediate Focus

Use "Immediate Focus" for those times when you want to glance at your schedule and get a handle on what's to do now, and you don't want to be distracted by the vast number of items later in the day. This command cuts your display to just the next 7 items on today's schedule. Shortcut: press the Backspace key.

To go out of Immediate Focus mode, press the Backspace key again. Confirmation will show in the caption, much like it does with Hide Done Items.


View: Time Graph

This two dimensional graph shows fixed items in red and floating items in yellow.  The time range shown is that set in Options: Set New Item Defaults.  The date range shown can be scrolled with the scroll bar.  To return to today, simply click anyhere in the time column.

Double clicking on an item brings up the edit dialog box for that item.  Double clicking on a blank area brings up the dialog box for inserting a new item at that time and date.

Note: The font used in the time graph is specified in File: Choose Fonts: Screen: Multiple-View Text.


View: Present Filter Priority List

This view give you a filtered Priority list showing only the fluid items that you can do now, based on your restrictions of weekdays and time range for each item. Simply press Ctrl+F or choose View:Special:Present Filter Priority List.


View: Multiple Schedule Windows

Use this command to designate the number of schedules (2-7) that you would like to view at one time.  Unlike Week-at-a-Glance which displays schedules for a chronological series of days, this view enables you to display schedules for any dates, in any order.


View: Hide Done Items

Use this command to have only undone items displayed.


View: Browse Notes

In Browse Notes mode, the note for the currently selected schedule item is displayed automatically. The only "open" note will be the one for the currently selected item.


View: Item Text in Full

To view the entire item description, press Shift+V, or choose View: Item Text in Full.


View: Tally Project

To see the total time devoted to each project on the viewed schedule, press Ctrl+Y or choose View:Special:Tally Project.

The on-screen Tally Project summary also includes totals for "Old items" and "New items". Old items are those that were added prior to today's date. New items are those that were added today. These totals are helpful is you wish to know how much of what you did today "chipped away" at that vast iceberg of items to do, and how many were "surprises" that you added today.

Each duration shown is broken down into the time for Done items and Undone items.  The display format is:  <Done Items>/<Undone Items>


View: History for Month

Use this command to see the archived items for a particular month.  First go to the month you are interested in by using the pop-up calendar (or by pressing F9 and typing in any date during that month).  Then select View: History for Month.

For information on archiving, see Archiving Schedules.


View: Item Creation Date

To view the date an item was created, press Shift+C, or choose View: Item Create Date.


View: Export File

This command is an easy way to view the export file "Export.Txt".


The Surprise Menu

There may be things you do frequently that you cannot plan for, such as receiving a phone call. A list of commonly occurring items can be stored in the Surprise menu. When one comes up, select it from the menu and it is automatically inserted into today's schedule as a done item. This eliminates the need to type the item description and duration each time.

To add or delete Surprise menu items choose Surprise: Edit Surprise List. You can, of course, edit the duration, begin time or any other aspect of the done item once it has been inserted from the Surprise menu.


The Worktools Menu

In addition to AutoDial and the pop-up Timer, the worktools menu provides easy access to the accessories and applications you use most.  For example, the Above & Beyond Notebook, Windows Cardfile, Notepad and Calculator.  You may edit the worktools list (worktools.lst) to tailor it to your needs by choosing "Worktools: Edit Worktools List".  Here's a sample worktools.lst file:

Phone book <TAB> C:\ab\nb.exe  C:\ab\phone.nbk

Sales leads <TAB> C:\ab\nb.exe  C:\ab\leads.nbk

Project XYZ <TAB> C:\ab\nb.exe  C:\ab\xyz.nbk

The entries before the TAB will appear in the Worktools pull-down menu.  When an entry in Worktools is selected, the command line after the TAB will be executed.  It's important to use one TAB (and no spaces) between these two parts.

In this example, there will be entries for Phone book, Sales leads, and Project XYZ.  Clicking  on "Phone book" will run the Above & Beyond Notebook (nb.exe) loaded with the data from the file "phone.nbk".


AutoDial

If the currently selected item contains a phone number (with hyphens), that number will appear when AutoDial is selected.  You may make changes to the number before dialing.

When an item contains more than one phone number, you can indicate which one to dial by selecting it before clicking AutoDial.  If there is no phone number in the item description, simply type in the phone number to be dialed.  To dial the number, select Local, Distance or International.

AutoDial Settings

Fill in your local area code so that it will not be dialed when calling numbers within this area code.

If you need to dial 9 for an outside line, specify "9," in Outside Line Prefix.  The comma instructs Autodial to wait two seconds for the outside dial tone before proceeding.

Select the serial (Com) port that your modem is using.  Select Tone or Pulse depending on the type of phone service you have.  To save the settings without dialing a number, click OK.


Timer

With the pop-up Timer, you can easily time phone calls, meetings, or any other item. The Rate feature enables you to associate a value with the elapsed time (e.g. the cost of a telephone call or the charge for a consultation.)

To activate the timer, click on Timer in the main menu bar, or press Alt+T (when the main window has the focus).  When the Timer window comes up, its title bar will be colored to indicate that the timer window currently has the focus (i.e. commands and keystrokes will be directed to  this  window).

Looking at the timer window, you can see that there is a Rate box, option buttons for "/Minute" and "/Hour", and Start, Stop and Reset buttons. Along the bottom of the window, are three number groups. The leftmost number is the current time of day. The middle number is the monetary value of the elapsed time based on the rate. The rightmost number is the actual elapsed time.

Timer: Start, Stop, Reset

Timer: The Rate Feature

Timer: Focus To & From

Timer: Moving


Timer: Start, Stop, Reset

To start the timer, click on the Start button, or press Alt+S (when the timer window has the focus).

To stop the timer, click on the Stop button, or press Alt+P.  The timer can be stopped, then started again without having to be reset and it start counting from the previously accumulated time and value.

To stop the timer and reset the elapsed time and accumulated value to zero, click on the Reset button, or press Alt+E. If this is done accidentally, simply Reset again and the time and value figures are recalled.


Timer: The Rate Feature

When entering the desired rate, up to six digits can be used plus a decimal point (period) to separate dollars from cents.  Values can accumulate up to 100,000.

When the rate value is entered, click on (or press the TAB key to move the cursor over to) the Minute/Hour option buttons. Use the UP and DOWN arrow keys to select either the /Minute (per minute) or the /Hour (per hour) option.  Or you can press Alt+M to select /Minute or Alt+H to select /Hour.


Timer: Focus To & From
Timer: Switch To and From

The simplest way to move the focus from one window to another is to click with a mouse anywhere inside the desired window. You can also move the focus from the main window to the Timer with Alt+T.


Timer: Moving

You may position (drag) the timer to any desired location on the screen.


The Schedules Menu

Use the schedules menu to quickly switch between the schedules of workgroup members.  To view the schedule of a user, simply click on their name.

The schedules list is divided into two sections.  The upper section lists the users who are currently "open".  The lower section lists the users who are not open.  Clicking on a non-open user (in the lower section) will bring up their schedule, and add them to the "open" list in the upper section.

Adding Users to the Schedules Menu

Use the Edit Schedules List command to add users to the list (User.Lst) of network users displayed in the lower section.  The following is a sample User.Lst:

Robert <TAB> C:\Robert

Christy <TAB> J:\Christy

"Robert" and "Christy" will appear in the schedules list; and when selected, Above & Beyond will look for the schedule in the file specified following the TAB.

For  convenience in bringing up several schedules at once, you may include more than one datapath:

Managers  <TAB>  C:\Robert  J:\Christy  P:\John

When more than one datapath is specified as above, only the password for the first ".pak" file will be asked for.  Remember that if passwords have not been set, when prompted simply press Enter to proceed.

Creating a New .Pak File

If you wish to create a new .PAK file, first add a line as above to User.Lst indicating where you'd like the .PAK file to be.  Then, in the Schedules menu, select the new entry.  A message "File not found. Create?" will appear.  Answer "Yes" and the new .PAK file will be created.  When the new schedule is brought up, it will be "unnamed" until it is named using "Options: Enter Name".  Note: The name entered with the "Enter Name" command  does not affect the name of the .PAK file.  The name of the .PAK file of the currently open schedule can be seen by selecting "File:Name: Data File".

Arrange a Meeting

For details, see the The Meeting Maker in the section entitled "Workgroup Use".

Set LAN Directory

See Set LAN Directory in the Workgroup Use section.


The Options Menu

Delete Sample Items

Calendar

Settings

Time Values

Copy Above & Beyond for a Friend to Try

Enter Name

Order an Above & Beyond License

Order an Above & Beyond Upgrade

Enter User ID

Alarms and Agents Off

World Timeline

Conflict Checking On

Display Seconds in CaptionToolbar Off

Clock Off

Log Files Off


Options: Settings

New Item Defaults

Colors

Fonts

Statuses

Workload Balancing

Alarm Sound

Passwords

Time Zone


Options: Delete Sample Items

The Delete Sample Items command will remove the sample items from the schedules.

If Above & Beyond opens with sample items instead of your data, be sure that the path to your .PAK file is specified in your Above & Beyond icon command line.  In the Program Manager, select the Above & Beyond icon and choose File:Properties to view/edit the command line.  Your command line, for example, might be:

C:\AB\A&B.exe G:\Michael\Timedata.Pak


Options: Calendar

With the pop-up calendar you can quickly display the schedule of any date from 1987 to 2068.  You may also instantly move any schedule item to any date.  To open the calendar select Options: Calendar: Open.

Using the calendar and a mouse, selected schedule items may be quickly moved to any date.  Click on the item to be moved, then click with the RIGHT mouse button on the target date.  The item will be moved to that date.  To view the date, click on the date with the LEFT mouse button.

Calendar: Moving & Sizing

Calendar: Selecting Months

Calendar: Color Utilization

Calendar: 4-4-5 Quarterly Format


Calendar: Moving & Sizing

You can position (drag) the Calendar to any desired location on the screen.  If it is immovable, toggle (off) the Tiled option.

The size and location of the calendar will  normally be saved along with schedule changes.  If a size or position change is the only change made however, use the File:Save command to retain this information across scheduling sessions.

To manipulate the calendar with the keyboard, the calendar must have the focus.  You can use the TAB key to switch the focus between the calendar and the main schedules window.


Calendar: Selecting Months

To display the previous month on the calendar, you can either press the UP arrow key while the calendar has the focus, click on the UP arrow at the top of the calendar scroll bar.

To display the next month, either press the DOWN arrow key while the calendar has the focus, or click the DOWN arrow at the bottom of the calendar scroll bar.

To view the calendar for the currently displayed month in the prior year, press PAGE UP, or click in the gray area in the scroll bar between the UP arrow at the top of the calendar scroll bar and the scroll box (the white rectangle in the scroll bar).

To view the calendar for the same month one year ahead, press PAGE DOWN, or click in the gray scroll bar area between the scroll box and the DOWN arrow at the bottom of the calendar scroll bar.

You can also leap many years forward or backward easily by dragging the calendar scroll box up or down within the scroll bar.  The scroll bar represents the entire range of possible schedules from April 1986 to December 2068.  You can jump to the middle of the calendar range, using a mouse, by dragging the scroll box to the middle of the gray area in the calendar scroll bar.


Calendar: Color Utilization

By selecting Color Utilization in the Calendar menu, you can see at a glance, how full each of your daily schedules is -- for an entire month.  On the  calendar, each day in the month has a background color ranging from green to red; based on the percentage of utilization.  Pure green indicates a day that is 0% scheduled.  Pure yellow indicates a day that is 50% scheduled.  Pure orange indicates 75%.  Pure red indicates 100% utilization.

Days in the past which have been archived and current or future days which have no items or items whose total duration is zero appear gray.  The utilization is based on the time remaining today, and the length of your day as specified in "Options:Set New Item Defaults".


4-4-5 Quarterly Format
Calendar: 4-4-5 Quarterly Format

With this option selected, Month at a Glance, the pop-up Calendar, and the Extended Outlook (13 week printout) will appear in 4-4-5 format.

For more information on the 4-4-5 format, please see the section titled 4-4-5 Quarterly Calendar.


Settings: New Item Defaults

Use this dialog to specify the default duration and time bounds that will appear when the Insert/Change dialog box is displayed for a new item.

For "Duration", enter the amount of time you wish to appear as the default duration for your scheduled items.  Use "Earliest" and "Latest" to specify your normal working day.  Floating items will be scheduled between these times.  Note: By specifying the bounds here rather than individually for each item, you are then able to later "globally" re-adjust the bounds of all "floating" items by simply changing the values shown in this setting.


Options: Settings: Colors
Settings: Colors

Fluid items and Unscheduled items can be set to appear in a special color which you specify here.  In addition, you may choose a special background color for done items.


Settings: Fonts

You can select different fonts for viewing on screen and for printouts.

For printouts you can choose different fonts for "Normal text", "Headings" and "Extended Outlook".  Extended Outlook refers to reports such as the Week and Month Outlooks.

For on screen, you can choose different fonts for when schedules are displayed in a Single Schedule Window, and when displayed in Multiple Schedule Windows such as Week-at-a- Glance.  In addition, you may select a special font for Month-at-a-Glance text.


Settings: Statuses

Use this dialog to define up to eight statuses for schedule items.  Initially, six default statuses are shown.  These may be changed to suit your purposes.  Items of a particular status will appear in the color shown by the "Color Sample Text".  To change the colors of a status, click on "Set", click on a desired color in the "Basic Color" area, then click on OK.  Note: For comparison while choosing colors, the existing status colors are shown in the "Custom Color" area.

Windows will only use solid colors for text. If your selection is not a solid color, the nearest solid color will be used. To preview how your selection will actually appear, see the color sample rectangle that's labeled "Solid Color."

To indicate that a selected schedule item is of a particular status, click on the item with the RIGHT mouse button, then click on the status for that item.  Note: If not using a mouse, press Ctrl+F3, then select the status.

The last status in the list (the eighth one) is "special".  If a date has at least one special status item scheduled, then the date heading will also appear in the special status color.

Related topics: Edit: Set Status and File: Standard Report: Filter.


Settings: Workload Balancing

Use this dialog to specify that a certain amount of free time be allocated on today and/or future days to allow for the unexpected.  If no Free Reserve is specified, the Balance Workload will completely fill your working day with scheduled items.

Your working day is determined from the "Earliest" and "Latest" times in Settings: New Item Defaults.  On today, as the amount of time left in your working day decreases, the amount of free reserve allocated will be also be reduced accordingly.

In Keep Clear you may specify a date range to be kept clear of all fluid items. Use this, for example, when going on vacation.


Settings: Alarm Sound

With a Windows sound driver installed, your may choose from a list of .WAV files.  Without a sound driver, your choices are: the default, or no sound.


Settings: Passwords

A password may be set to restrict the viewing and/or modifying of your schedules by others.

Specify your password in Your password.  Use "Your password for total access including  setting passwords and viewing Private items.  If it is left blank, anyone will have unlimited access.  For more information on Private items, see Edit: Private Item in the Menu Reference Section.

To allow certain people to view your schedule, enter an "Others View password and give this password to them.  If they do not enter the password the schedules will appear blank.

To allow certain people to view or modify your schedule, enter an Others Modify password and give it to them.

If you have a password set, but don't want to have to enter your password each time you start Above & Beyond, you can add p=<your password> to the end of the Above & Beyond icon command line.  For example, c:\ab\a&b.exe c:\steve  p=m59b3


Settings: Time Zone

This is where you specify your time zone and the dates for daylight savings.


Options: Time Values

Use this feature to compute the dollar value of the time Above & Beyond  will save you!  Simply enter the amount of time you estimate that Above & Beyond will save you per day.  Then enter the value (per hour) of your time.  Click on Compute and see how much Above & Beyond is really worth!


Options: Copy Above & Beyond for a Friend to Try

Simply put a disk in your drive and select this command.

Note: Distribution of Above & Beyond is encouraged.  For more on this topic see Share the Benefits.


Options: Enter Name

Selecting the Enter Name command will cause a small dialog box to be displayed.  Type your name in the text box as you would like it to appear on printed schedules and in the Above & Beyond title bar.


Options: Order an Above & Beyond License

Use this dialog to become a registered user.  Please enter all the information including how you were introduced to this program.  To print the order form, click Print.


Options: Order an Upgrade
Options: Order an Above & Beyond Upgrade

This option is available only to registered users of a previous release. When a major upgrade is released, registered users of the previous version can purchase a license for the new version at a much lower price.


Options: Enter User ID

When you receive your user ID from 1Soft in response to your registration, select Options: Enter User ID.  Type your user ID into the text box that appears. The word "VALID" should appear.

If "VALID" does not appear, check the name that appears in the Above & Beyond title bar.  The name should match exactly the name appearing on the letter with your user ID.  If it is not the same, correct it using the Enter Name command.


Options: Alarms Off
Options: Alarms and Agents Off

This option will suppress all alarms and agents (Exec and Autoexec launching).  This is helpful in a LAN environment when viewing someone else's schedule.  For more, see Alarms and Agents Off in the Workgroup Use section.

Note: To test the alarm sound, toggle this option off, then on again.


Options: World Timeline

A world timeline can be displayed at the bottom of the screen showing the current time at six world-wide time zones. The cities shown are the first six cities listed in the file TimeZone.Lst. To display different cities, edit TimeZone.Lst accordingly. If you simply wish to replace a displayed city with another city in the same time zone, you may do that in Options:Settings:Time Zone. Select the city to change in the list box and overtype the name with the city you prefer.


Options: Conflict Checking On

With "Conflict Checking On" you will be alerted when attempting to schedule an item for a time period where there is already an item scheduled.  Above & Beyond will check for conflicts for one year into the future.  If a conflict is found, it will give you a warning message.


Options: Display Seconds in Caption

Set this option to have the current time displayed in hours, minutes and seconds.  Note: The "caption" is the line below the toolbar.


Options: Toolbar Off

Select this option to remove the toolbar from view.  Select it again to restore the toolbar.  For more information on the toolbar, see Toolbar.


Options: Clock Off

When Above & Beyond is running, a small digital clock is displayed in the lower right hand corner of the screen.  To switch back to Above & Beyond from another application, simply click once on the clock.  Select Options: Clock Off to remove the clock from view.

The clock colors may be set in the Windows Control Panel which can be easily accessed from the File menu in Above & Beyond. The background used is the color setting for Active Title Bar. The color setting for Active Title Bar Text is used for the digits.

To move the location of the clock, click the left mouse button down, drag it to another location, and release the button.


Options: Log Files Off

Select this option if you do not wish to have Above & Beyond maintain monthly log files of all done items.  For information on log files, see Schedule Archiving.

Log Files are optional because you can easily go back in time (in Above & Beyond) to see what was accomplished.


Technical Support

Over the Internet, E-mail to: 71240.1625@compuserve.com.  Visit our web-site at http://www.1soft.com for program updates and answers to frequently asked questions.

On Compuserve, E-mail to 71240,1625.  To post a public question or comment that other Above & Beyond users can see and respond to, E-mail to 71240,1625 from within the WinBiz forum, section 8 (PIMS).  You may download updates to Above & Beyond from WinBiz, library 8.

Fax anytime to (541) 822-3300. Telephone technical support is available at (541) 822-6000 during the hours listed below for your time zone:

Pacific U.S.:	8am - 4pm	Mon - Fri

Mountain U.S.: 9am - 5pm	Mon - Fri

Central U.S.:	10am - 6pm	Mon - Fri

Eastern U.S.:	11am - 7pm	Mon - Fri

U K:	4pm - Mid. 	Mon - Fri

W. Europe:	5pm - 1am	Mon - Fri

Sydney, Aus.:	2am - 10am	Tue - Sat

Hawaii:	6am - 2pm	Mon - Fri