What should you be doing?
Drop us a note by e-mail to let us know.
For a quick introduction to the basics of PingMe, please check out our Getting Things Started guide, which describes how we use PingMe to get things done.
Creating Pings by voice is one of our coolest new features, but we can't take all the credit for it. Hop on over to our blog to read about how you can use PingMe with another service to create Pings by simply speaking into your phone.
If you've forgotten your account password, we have just the thing for you: a password reset form.
Any Ping, repeating or pestering, can be stopped from further dispatches in two ways. The first is to edit the Ping on the website and check 'Mark as done'. The second, and probably easier method, especially if you're mobile, is to reply with a stop command. From your e-mail client or phone, reply to the ping with either stop, done, ok, or off on a line by itself, and PingMe will halt the Ping. When you next visit the PingMe website, you'll find that the Ping no longer displays on the screen by default, but you can find it in the Archive.
When a regular, non-repeating Ping (we call these 'one-time' Pings) is sent to you, PingMe marks the Ping as done, and when you next visit the website, it will show up in the Archive screen. Simply click the 'Archive' link from the Pings screen to see such Pings.
Similarly, when you stop a repeating or pestering ping, you will no longer see those Pings on the main screen either, they are also moved to the Archive.
Pings that are not repeating or pestering are considered one-time Pings. Often these Pings carry a message reminding us to take care of a task at a specific time. Once the Ping has been sent to us, the system marks it as 'Done' and it no longer displays when you log into PingMe.
For most people this is fine, but if you are using PingMe to keep track of tasks, and you forget to do one, you might like to see that Ping the next time you log in. In this way you are reminded to reschedule the task if the Ping came and went and you somehow missed it. To get this kind of behavior, simply check the 'Require Confirmation?' box when creating or updating the Ping on the website, and the ping will continue to display after it has been sent to you until you either check 'Mark as done' or you respond with a stop command.
A target is an e-mail address or mobile device. When you sign up for an account on PingMe, a default target is created for you that points at the e-mail account you provided on signup.
Every user account has what we call a "PingMe Address." It was sent to you by e-mail when you created your account, and you can see what it is (and change it) by going to the Profile screen. You'll want to keep this address secret and somewhat obscure so that it's hard for other people to guess what it is and then make Pings you don't want; trust us on this one, spammers will try it. So if we enter 'shoes45rockets' in the Profile screen, our PingMe Address will be shoes45rockets@gopingme.com.
It often happens to us that we have some idea or notion, some thing we don't want to forget to do, while we're on the move, sitting on the BART or PATH trains. PingMe accommodates this circumstance by allowing you to send e-mails that will create Pings. We call these 'Remote Pings.'
All you have to do is send an e-mail to your PingMe Address, and here we describe the format of that message.
The e-mail you send to create a Remote Ping will have a particular format, all one one line:
[ date/time info ] This is my message [ flags ]Here are some examples of how you can specify the date and time a ping should be sent:
That last one bears a little bit of explanation. When you use '10m' you are telling PingMe 'ten minutes from now'. When you use 'mo7 d1 h6p' you are telling PingMe 'July 1st, this year (since you didn't specify), at 6pm. Bear in mind that when using this format you can set a Ping in the past, and if it's a one-time Ping, it will never be sent!
So there are really two date formats - one is literal (like Jun 5 13:00), and the other is based on interval pairs that you chain together. You can mix them up and they are evaluated against the current time from left to right. Let's say the current time is 2007-07-01 1:00am and consider what we get when we specify '10m h3 d 20', evaluating left to right:
Flags are options that modify how the ping will behave. Without any flags provided, you are creating a one-time Ping that will be sent to all of your targets. Flags can be specified in any order in a format of: [flag: option] [flag:option]. It is necessary to include at least one space between flag:option pairs. The flags and their options are:
A full example that brings this all together would be something like:
h5p m30 1d Poker game tonight! t:m p:15That Ping is set to go off tomorrow at 5:30pm, and will be sent to our mobile targets every 15 minutes until we write back with a stop command.
Creating Pings through Twitter is as easy as creating pings on the go, and the syntax is almost the same. There's two steps to get started:
Note: To distinguish new ping messages on Twitter from updates you must use the + symbol when creating messages from Twitter. This means that the full syntax for creating a new ping via direct message is:
d gpm +h5p m30 1d Poker game tonight! t:m p:15The 'd gpm +' portion is what's new, but the rest of the syntax is what you'd normally use to creating pings on the go.
Caution: If you leave out the '+' you will end up rescheduling the last ping sent to you.
This is a list of all the interval names recognized by PingMe in any e-mails that you send to your PingMe Address to create new Pings or replies to existing Pings.
'min' => [ 'm', 'min', 'mins', 'minute', 'minutes' ], 'hour' => [ 'h', 'hr', 'hrs', 'hour', 'hours' ], 'day' => [ 'd', 'ds', 'day', 'days' ], 'week' => [ 'w', 'ws', 'wk', 'wks', 'week', 'weeks' ], 'month' => [ 'mo', 'mos', 'mon', 'mons', 'month', 'months' ], 'year' => [ 'y', 'yr', 'yrs', 'year', 'years' ]
Pings are color coded to help you quickly identify how you set them up.
Repeating pings are for reminders that you want to receive periodically, either daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly. These are great for tasks that you do at regular intervals. Pestering pings are for when you have a singular task that you can't afford to forget. They repeat much more frequently than repeating pings, and like repeating pings they will continue until you tell them to stop. Both pestering and repeating pings can be stopped from the website or by replying with a stop command.
When you receive a ping, by SMS or E-mail, you can reply to change the behavior of the ping. For instance, if you send yourself a ping like "Take out the trash", and you're not home yet, but you want to be reminded again, simply reply with a description of when you want to receive the Ping next. The format of this is exactly the same as that used for specifying the date and time when creating a Ping on-the-go. Here are some examples:
The interval codes themselves (d, h, mo, etc) are short versions of the full code. Here is a list of all the supported interval names, which you can use however you are most comfortable.
Rescheduling Pings via Twitter is almost the same as doing it via e-mail or SMS, you're simply using Twitter to transport the new schedule command.
There are two steps to get started here:
Note: Ping reschedules you send to our twitter account won't have any information telling us which ping to update, so we assume that you want us to update the last one sent to you. Keep this in mind while using this facility.
Here's an example of a ping reschedule sent as a direct message to our Twitter account:
d gpm h5p m30 1dThe text that is bolded is what's new to the syntax, the rest is the same as doing it via e-mail or SMS.
A really great way to collaborate, coordinate, and track tasks with others is to add them as your Contacts on PingMe. When a user accepts the invitation to be a contact, a two-way relationship is formed, allowing both users to see each other's targets and to share pings. We think it could be especially useful for political and electoral campaigns!
The usefulness of this feature becomes very apparent once you have some contacts. When you are creating or editing your pings you can then select whom to share the Ping with, and you can select any of their targets. Combine this with all the other dynamic features of pings on the website and remote, and you have a very powerful and flexible task tracking system!
When another user invites you to be their contact, you'll receive an e-mail letting you know about the invitation, and you'll see the number of pending invites listed in the Contacts tab link at the top of the screen on PingMe.
The Contacts screen lets you remove existing contacts, accept or reject contact invitations, and invite other users to be your contact. Each of them displays on an index card. You can also invite other folks who aren't already users of PingMe to join you in using our service.
On the main Pings screen, there is a sidebar section called Contacts that, when expanded, displays your current contacts. Clicking on one of your contacts filters the displayed Pings down to those you share with that person.
