Location change and time of appointments in calendar

[THVD]

I used a Palm for 4 years. When going from one location to another, I changed the time by using a program called BigTimePro. With that program it was possible to change the local time setting according to the location without that timings of all the items in the calendar were changed.

Using now a new device with Windows Mobile 5, when changing from location and thus from time zone by using “Settings” “System” “Clock and Alarms” and using the “Visiting” button, after making the changes, all the timings of appointments are changed as well.

In fact what I want is the time set to the location where I am but without having all the timings changed in my calendar.

How can I do this or did I missed something?

[setec]

What about Settings -- Date and Time -- and using the Visiting Time Zone?

[gpstoloff]

I used a Palm for 4 years. When going from one location to another, I changed the time by using a program called BigTimePro. With that program it was possible to change the local time setting according to the location without that timings of all the items in the calendar were changed.

Using now a new device with Windows Mobile 5, when changing from location and thus from time zone by using “Settings” “System” “Clock and Alarms” and using the “Visiting” button, after making the changes, all the timings of appointments are changed as well.

In fact what I want is the time set to the location where I am but without having all the timings changed in my calendar.

How can I do this or did I missed something?

Unfortunately, this is one of the joys of WM; MS has mandated that the calendar times must move in synch with the local time zone.

I've been looking for WM equivalents to BigTime, but haven't found any to date. You might try StyleTap to provide a PalmOS emulator for running BigTime, but I have no experience with the combination to recommend it one way or the other.

[THVD]

Unfortunately, this is one of the joys of WM; MS has mandated that the calendar times must move in synch with the local time zone.

I've been looking for WM equivalents to BigTime, but haven't found any to date. You might try StyleTap to provide a PalmOS emulator for running BigTime, but I have no experience with the combination to recommend it one way or the other.
Using Outlook on my home PC, I did a little experiment. When changing the local time zone, all the appointments in Outlook are also moving in time.

As you said, it is one of the joys of WM. I guess there is no way to get rid of the problem within the provided way WM is conceived.

[Sven Johannsen]

Unfortunately, this is one of the joys of WM; MS has mandated that the calendar times must move in synch with the local time zone.

It was mentioned that this is the default behavior of Outlook, and it has been since at least '98. There is in fact a KB article that explains that this is useful if you travel. Didn't cause much stir until handhelds and PPCs came out, because desktops didn't move, and it was the rare individual that changed their timezone on their laptop when they traveled.

About the only use I acknowledge for it is for conference calls. If it is a 9AM conference call in LA and you happen to be in New York and changed your Time Zone, you will be appropriately alerted at Noon. (of course you will be 3 hours late for all your other appointments ;).

There are two options. One is to simply change the time, not the time zone, totally disregarding the Visiting feature, like you would on your wristwatch. The other is to get a third party program that lets you enter appointments with a TimeZone offset. CityTime is one.

In the latter case if you are in LA and will have a 9AM appointment in NY, you enter the appointment as 9AM in New York. Unfortunately it will sit in your calendar at 6AM as long as you are in LA, but when you get to NY and change the Zone, it will be right.

I bit of FYI. If you are an MSN Direct (SPOT) user and you have your appointments sent to your watch, you better enter them with where they are in mind. The watch automatically picks up the new Time Zone when you go somewhere, and the appointments are shifted just like any other MS calendar.

[THVD]

There are two options. One is to simply change the time, not the time zone, totally disregarding the Visiting feature, like you would on your wristwatch. The other is to get a third party program that lets you enter appointments with a TimeZone offset. CityTime is one.
As the matter of fact, I have been using CityTime.

The problem is, the settings used within CityTime does make exactly the same as you would have within WM:
1. if you change your local time, then the times of the different cities within CityTime are not correct anymore as they are moving together with you changed time setting but your appointments are kept like they were programmed.
2. if you change your city location, then the times of the different cities within CityTime are still OK but the times of your appointments are moved in time.

As I am a real globetrotter for some 40% of my time and program my appointments at home, WM is really less user friendly compared to the logic of Palm: you travel to some city, using BigTimePro, you just change your local time according to the city where you are. All your programmed appointments are staying like they were programmed but your time is changed according to the city you are actually moving to.

Honestly, I believe MS can learn from Palm for this.