[Clock][UX] should support creating one-time alarms on any day of the current week

[Nekhelesh Ramananthan]

It is a common use-case to create an one-time alarm on any day in the current week. For instance creating a early morning alarm to wake up for a flight which doesn't require a repeating alarm. This is supported by clock apps of other platforms like Android.

Ofcourse there are some details that need to be fleshed out like, for instance if today was Wednesday and the user is trying to create a one-time alarm on Tuesday 14:00, then that alarm will be set for the next week Tuesday. But this is something that should be quite easy to implement. Just requires design and approval from design team.

[Alan Pope 🍺🐧🐱 🦄 (popey)]

My expectation from a clock/alarm app is that I can rapidly set an alarm for the following day. I frequently need to set a different one-time alarm for the next day. I shouldn't have to wait until 00:00 to be able to do that.

[Jamie Strandboge (jdstrand)]

AIUI, the current design only allows for creating a one time alarm for the same day that it is created. Eg, if it is Sat 14:00 and I want to take a nap now, I might set a one time alarm for 15:15. This is fine.

However, if it is Fri 22:00 and I am going to bed but I need to catch a flight and get up at Sat 05:00, I cannot do this and must use the calendar. At a minimum I should be able to set a one time alarm for some time within the next 24 hours, but I like the idea of setting a one time alarm for any day of the week.

While the clock and the calendar may both have alarm functionality, people think of them differently. If I open the clock app and see I can set an alarm, I am thinking of that as an alarm clock. If I open the calendar, I am more thinking of appointments, events and save the dates. Thought of another way, a clock alarm represents a single point in time whereas a calendar entry represents a time range. I wouldn't expect to set an alarm in the clock for Fri 17th next month, but I also wouldn't expect to have to set my alarm clock for tomorrow morning in the calendar.

[Giorgio Venturi (giorgio-venturi-deactivatedaccount)]

There's at least 2 ways to schedule an alert: Clock and Calendar

With the current Clock design, you should indeed be able to set an alarm
within the next 23h59m

I would leave the option of scheduling an event beyond the 24h to the
Calendar app

On Thu, Aug 28, 2014 at 9:55 PM, Nekhelesh Ramananthan <
<email address hidden>> wrote:

> ** Changed in: ubuntu-clock-app
> Importance: Undecided => High
>
> --
> You received this bug notification because you are subscribed to Ubuntu
> UX.
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/bugs/1362803
>
> Title:
> Clock should support creating one-time alarms on any day of the
> current week
>
> Status in Clock application for Ubuntu devices:
> New
> Status in Ubuntu UX bugs:
> New
>
> Bug description:
> It is a common use-case to create an one-time alarm on any day in the
> current week. For instance creating a early morning alarm to wake up
> for a flight which doesn't require a repeating alarm. This is
> supported by clock apps of other platforms like Android.
>
> Ofcourse there are some details that need to be fleshed out like, for
> instance if today was Wednesday and the user is trying to create a
> one-time alarm on Tuesday 14:00, then that alarm will be set for the
> next week Tuesday. But this is something that should be quite easy to
> implement. Just requires design and approval from design team.
>
> To manage notifications about this bug go to:
> https://bugs.launchpad.net/ubuntu-clock-app/+bug/1362803/+subscriptions
>

[Nekhelesh Ramananthan (nik90)]

On Fri, Aug 29, 2014 at 3:34 PM, Giorgio Venturi <
<email address hidden>> wrote:

> There's at least 2 ways to schedule an alert: Clock and Calendar
>
>
This can get confusing real fast. Imagine a scenario where the current time
is 29th August 18:00 and I set a one-time alarm for 09:00 in the morning.
That alarm would ring obviously ring correctly on 30th August at 09:00 as
expected. However say a few minutes after setting the alarm to 09:00 in the
morning and saving it, I decide that the time is incorrect and I actually
want to instead set the alarm to 29th August (Today) 22:00. How would do I
do that? The moment I had saved the alarm for 09:00, the alarm date was
changed to 30th August. So now when I want to edit the alarm, I cannot go
to the previous date.

Programmatically this is getting way complicated than it should :/

> With the current Clock design, you should indeed be able to set an alarm
> within the next 23h59m
>

> I would leave the option of scheduling an event beyond the 24h to the
> Calendar app
>
>
>

[Alan Pope 🍺🐧🐱 🦄 (popey)]

An alarm which wakes me each morning should be repeatable. E.g. Alarm #1 is Mon-Fri 6AM.
An alarm which wakes me each morning should be able to be different on weekends. E.g. Alarm #2 is Sat-Sun 8AM.

Therefore the clock should have the capability to set alarms both for the following morning "wake me in the morning" and for some days hence "It's monday and I just bought this phone, but I want to set my Saturday alarm now while I'm in the app setting my weekday alarm".

It's not reasonable to expect me to set tomorrow (being Tuesday) repeat alarm for Mon-Fri now (on Monday) and have to wait until Saturday to set it.

Which is what I'm getting from the implication that Clock does "now" alarms, Calendar does "later" alarms.

So the alarm functionality should be able to set alarms (not events, those are for the calendar) for any arbitrary time in the next 23h59m and allow them to be set to repeat. I should also be able to set an alarm for a different time for a future day in the next 6 days, and have it repeat. Anything other than this basic functionality seems out of scope.

[Nekhelesh Ramananthan (nik90)]

For RTM, clock app will support creating one-time alarms in the next 24-hours. As for creating alarms for the rest of the week, we will be looking into this post-rtm.

[Michal Predotka (mpredotka)]

I believe it's no longer a problem to create one time alarm.