Those who use the PC for work and have many daily activities that are repeated and that need to be remembered, instead of keeping things in mind or using diaries, can take advantage of some web applications or programs that send reminders on the screen . You can use the Microsoft Outlook calendar or Thunderbird to configure the automatic arrival of emails that notify you of appointments to remember.
However, not everyone knows that it can be done much earlier and easily with the task planning present in every version of Windows, including Windows 7 .
Scheduled tasks can be used to automate anything from running programs, sending emails or even to view reminder messages .
Therefore, without using external programs, if there is a need for the computer to "reminder" and display notifications on the screen exactly at the time it is needed, you can use the task scheduler or "task scheduler" in English.
To use the scheduler, click the Start button and type in the search box: schedule task .
You can also open the scheduler from the Control Panel if you are using a version of Windows other than Windows 7 which this guide refers to anyway.
To configure the display of a reminder message on Windows, go to the Actions menu at the top and click on " Create Activity ".
Enter a recognizable name that can be remembered and found to add an automatic task for the computer to perform.
For the new activity, after writing the name, move to the " activation " tab and click on the " New " button.
You have to choose when the new activity, in this case the warning or reminder, must start running.
You can choose a certain date and time of the start day and you can create alerts that repeat every few minutes.
From the drop-down menu at the top, you can also choose whether to create an alert that appears when the computer starts, when you log in or following the occurrence of a computer event (for example if a certain error appears).
After you have configured how to activate the alert, go to the ' Actions ' section to define the message to be displayed .
Press the " new " button again and choose to display a message from the drop-down menu.
Give it a title and then write the text of the notice as long as you want.
Click OK to save the new created task which can be viewed in the general list of activities (Task Scheduler Library ).
Surely there will already be some activities that have been automatically configured by some programs such as the search for updates of Apple or Google programs.
Each automatic task task that is configured in Windows can be tried to verify its actual functioning.
Then select the reminder from the list and press Run on the top menu " Action ".
When the reminder is no longer needed, you can delete it, modify or deactivate it by pressing the right mouse button on it when you see it in the library with the list of scheduled activities.
Windows Scheduler can be used to do several different jobs.
For example, you can set up an automatic backup of the entire computer from here, scheduled every week at a certain time.
In this case, in the Actions section, instead of selecting to send a message, you must select the start of a program by selecting the .exe file from the list of Windows programs.
On the right side of the scheduler window, you can click on the " create basic tasks " button to display a simpler wizard to use and create a task that will be performed for any user who has logged on to the computer.
In another article, some examples of activities planned for Windows maintenance.
To work, both to send messages on the screen and to run programs automatically, the computer must be naturally on and awake, that is, not in standby or in suspension, when that activity must be performed otherwise it will be skipped or repeated, depending on the configuration given.
In other articles on calendars and reminders, I remember:
- Desktop gadget calendars with reminders
- Notes and reminders always visible on the desktop with post-its
- Reminders, to-do lists and online checklists
- Google Tasks to create lists of activities, events and online appointments
