[Design] A calendar that tracks people and locations

[Callum Macdonald]

Nobody has anything to say about my ingenious brainwave that's going to
change the world? :)


CM.

On Fri, 2006-05-26 at 12:27 +0700, Callum Macdonald wrote:

> Hi Guys,
> 
> New on the list, I've done a quick search and I don't see anything on
> this thread, so thought I'd start it off.
> 
> I have this idea that my calendar should be smarter. Specifically, I
> think it should be aware that my appointments are in *locations*. That I
> need to physically move from one location to another, spending time in
> *transit*. Those locations might be in different *time zones*.
> 
> In terms of comparing my availability with others, our locations should
> be taken into account. If I'm in Bangkok and I'm scheduling a meeting
> with someone in New York, I can't squeeze them in for lunch between my
> bank manager in the morning and my daughter from school in the
> afternoon.
> 
> For example, I schedule an appointment with a client. My calendar knows
> my default location is in Bangkok between 9 and 5. I schedule the
> appointment for 9am, so my calendar prompts a 30 minute transit time
> before the meeting from my home location to my appointment and then a 30
> minute transit time from my appointment to my office location.
> 
> After a few hours in the office, I'm flying to Europe for a meeting the
> following day. I enter my flight as a transit appointment, and add a
> timezone change of -6 hours into the GMT+1 timezone. While I'm at it, I
> enter my return flight as a transit appointment and return to my normal
> time zone.
> 
> I set up a few appointments in Europe and enter those. My calendar
> automatically prompts me to enter them in local time and visually shows
> the appointments in local time on my daily calendar. It shows my transit
> time as a squashed / expanded transit appointment as I move timezones.
> It also shows me my appointments in my home timezone time alongside
> their local times. Just so I know what time my body will think it is!
> 
> My availability is publicly available through my calendar published on
> my web site / server. My calendar doesn't show my appointments, but
> based on my rules, it shows my availability and if I've set the transit
> appointment to be public, it shows my location on a given day.
> 
> Thus my colleagues in Europe can check my schedule and suggest
> appointments at times when they know I'll physically be in the region.
> 
> I see this as a natural development from the basic calendaring
> functionality that has existed for years.
> 
> Before I get carried away, is this already in the design plan for
> Chandler? Has it been considered and thrown out for a very good reason I
> haven't thought about? Am I going stark raving mad, would this be about
> as useful as an ashtray on a motorbike?
> 
> Any and all comments would be gratefully received.
> 
> Kind regards,
> 
> 
> Callum.
> 
> Blog: http://www.callum-macdonald.com/
> 
> 
> 
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