AleksSoft TimeZone - Great for Travellers!

[Darius Wey]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.geocities.com/alexaleks3/' target='_blank'>http://www.geocities.com/alexaleks3/</a><br /><br /></div><img src="http://www.pocketpcthoughts.com/images/web/2003/wey-20050507-TimeZone.gif" /><br /><br />If you travel a lot, then TimeZone may be for you. As a Calendar plug-in, TimeZone automatically changes the start time of appointments when you hop from one city to the next, and it also adds some extra information to the Location field (so not only will you know the actual time of the appointment, you'll know the actual location too). Neat! TimeZone is available as a free download from <a href="http://www.geocities.com/alexaleks3/TimeZone.zip">here</a>.

[Pony99CA]

If you travel a lot, then TimeZone may be for you. As a Calendar plug-in, TimeZone automatically changes the start time of appointments when you hop from one city to the next, and it also adds some extra information to the Location field (so not only will you know the actual time of the appointment, you'll know the actual location too).
I haven't tried it (I don't do a lot of time zone hopping), but I hope this isn't one of those programs that attempts to "fix" what isn't broken -- the way Calendar displays appointments in different time zones. There's been a lot of discussion about that previously (search on time zone appointments with Pony99CA as the author and require all words in the results to see some), so let's not continue that here. I'm just curious to hear what this actually does from somebody who has used it; the download site's description was difficult to decipher.

Steve

P.S. It's odd to see the buzz about this now. Besides the PPSG source you cited, I saw it mentioned on Arne's unwired (http://www.theunwired.net/?itemid=2358). However, I believe this program is fairly old; I had Aleksoft's site listed at my site back on August 2003, and I seem to recall this program being there then. Bringing up old gems is fine (they'll probably be new to somebody :-)), so I'm just curious what started it.

[Darius Wey]

I haven't tried it (I don't do a lot of time zone hopping), but I hope this isn't one of those programs that attempts to "fix" what isn't broken -- the way Calendar displays appointments in different time zones. There's been a lot of discussion about that previously (search on time zone appointments with Pony99CA as the author and require all words in the results to see some), so let's not continue that here. I'm just curious to hear what this actually does from somebody who has used it; the download site's description was difficult to decipher.

It's not entirely about fixing something that 'aint broke'. Granted, the current Calendar does a decent job at timezone management but it's far from perfect. I'll admit that I've not had a problem with it before but others would beg to differ. Hopefully for them, this plugin acts as a quick fix. Besides, it adds a couple of extra features which is always a bonus.

P.S. It's odd to see the buzz about this now. Besides the PPSG source you cited, I saw it mentioned on Arne's unwired (http://www.theunwired.net/?itemid=2358). However, I believe this program is fairly old; I had Aleksoft's site listed at my site back on August 2003, and I seem to recall this program being there then. Bringing up old gems is fine (they'll probably be new to somebody :-)), so I'm just curious what started it.

Age is hardly a factor to burst a bubble over. If a quick tip, remedy, etc. seems like a benefit to the Pocket PC community, there's little reason why it cannot be shared. Since this plugin has received little mention in the past couple of years, it's worth giving it a bit of community love seeing as though it does what it says. :)

[TTown]

Does this work on Pocket Informant 2005?

[Darius Wey]

Does this work on Pocket Informant 2005?

I'm not entirely sure. PI and AF do support external plugins to an extent (this is evident when you install programs such as CityTime and Pocket Streets), so TimeZone may just work. The best way is to probably try it yourself. If it doesn't work in PI, you can always uninstall it.

[Pony99CA]

I haven't tried it (I don't do a lot of time zone hopping), but I hope this isn't one of those programs that attempts to "fix" what isn't broken -- the way Calendar displays appointments in different time zones. There's been a lot of discussion about that previously (search on time zone appointments with Pony99CA as the author and require all words in the results to see some), so let's not continue that here. I'm just curious to hear what this actually does from somebody who has used it; the download site's description was difficult to decipher.
It's not entirely about fixing something that 'aint broke'. Granted, the current Calendar does a decent job at timezone management but it's far from perfect. I'll admit that I've not had a problem with it before but others would beg to differ. Hopefully for them, this plugin acts as a quick fix. Besides, it adds a couple of extra features which is always a bonus.
I've maintained that the best way to improve the Calendar would be to allow specifying the time zone when an appointment was created and to have a quick way to view the Calendar in a given time zone. That would prevent a lot of wasted time going to the Clock settings applet that you currently have to do to correctly create and view appointments in different time zones.

If that's what this plug-in does, that's great. If it actually changes the appointment time, I think that would be a mistake. Do you know what it's actually doing?

Steve

[Darius Wey]

Do you know what it's actually doing?

I'm not certain what the program manipulates since I don't have access to the code. What I do know is that if you are switching timezones, the Calendar can muddle up your appointment's time if you previously added the appointment in the wrong timezone. So in this case, the program rectifies that problem by linking appointments to the correct time in the designated city. I hope that made sense.