![]() | Creating and manipulating alarms |
Prev | Using KAlarm | Next |
To create a new alarm, do one of the following. This displays the alarm edit dialog through which you configure the alarm.
Select Actions->New.
Right click on the system tray icon and choose New from the context menu.
Click the Middle mouse button on the system tray icon.
Right click in the alarm list and choose New from the context menu.
Double click on empty space below the last entry in the alarm list.
Alternatively, you can create new alarms preconfigured from various sources:
To base your new alarm on an alarm template, display the alarm edit dialog as described above, and then click Load Template. Select a template from the list which appears and click OK. The alarm edit dialog is then preset with the details from the selected alarm template, which you can now edit as required.
To base your new alarm on an existing one, highlight the existing alarm in the list and select Actions->Copy. This opens the alarm edit dialog already filled in with a copy of the selected alarm's details.
To create a new alarm which displays an existing email message, drag the email from KMail onto KAlarm's main window or system tray icon. This opens the alarm edit dialog with the entire email message (including sender, recipient, etc.) as the alarm text.
Dragging any piece of text onto KAlarm's main window or system tray icon opens the alarm edit dialog and sets the alarm text.
To create a file display alarm, drag a file URL onto KAlarm's main window or system tray icon. This opens the alarm edit dialog and sets the file name.
You can automatically create birthday alarms for people in KAddressBook as described in Importing birthdays from KAddressBook.
To modify an existing pending alarm (expired alarms cannot be amended), do one of the following:
Double click on its entry in the alarm list.
Select it by clicking on its entry in the alarm list. Then choose Actions->Edit.
Right click on its entry in the alarm list and choose Edit from the context menu.
This displays the alarm edit dialog.
To delete existing alarms, do one of the following:
Select one or more alarms by clicking on their entries in the alarm list. Then choose Actions->Delete.
Right click on the desired entries in the alarm list and choose Delete from the context menu.
To view an existing alarm without the ability to modify it, do one of the following:
Select it by clicking on its entry in the alarm list. Then choose Actions->View.
Right click on its entry in the alarm list and choose View from the context menu.
This displays the alarm edit dialog in read-only mode.
See Alarm message window for how to acknowledge alarms.
If you frequently want to set up similar alarms, you can create an alarm template to avoid having to enter all the details from scratch each time. A template can contain all the details which an alarm can contain, apart from the start date.
As an example, you may regularly want to set an alarm to remind you about a television program whose time varies from week to week. The template would contain all the alarm details (message text, whether to play a sound, etc.) except for the time and date. Now, to create the alarm, all you need to do is in the alarm edit dialog load that template and then enter the time and date.
You can create, modify or delete templates using the Alarm Templates dialog, or you can create a new alarm template based on an existing alarm.
To create a new alarm template, do one of the following:
Display the Alarm Templates dialog by selecting the File->Templates... menu item, and click New. This displays a blank template edit dialog.
Display the Alarm Templates dialog by selecting the File->Templates... menu item, select an existing template from the list and click Copy. This opens the template edit dialog already filled in with a copy of the existing template's details.
Highlight an alarm in the alarm list and select Actions->Create template. This opens the template edit dialog already filled in with a copy of the selected alarm's details.
To modify an existing template, display the Alarm Templates dialog by selecting the File->Templates... menu item and click Edit. This displays the template edit dialog which is described below.
To delete existing templates, display the Alarm Templates dialog by selecting the File->Templates... menu item, select one or more templates and click Delete. A confirmation prompt is issued to prevent accidental deletions.
The template edit dialog is similar to the alarm edit dialog. The following controls are different:
Enter the template's name in Template name. It is the template's name which is displayed in template selection lists, so it is best to choose a name which will remind you of its function. Each template's name must be unique.
In the Time group box, select one of:
Default time if you do not wish to specify any trigger time. Alarms based on this template will initially use the normal default trigger time for new alarms.
Time to enter a time when the alarm is to be triggered.
Any time to specify that the alarm should only have a date, not a time.
In the Recurrence Rule group box in the Recurrence tab, no day or month need be selected for weekly or yearly recurrences, respectively.
You can set up display alarms for birthdays stored in KAddressBook, by File->Import Birthdays.... This displays a dialog which allows you to select which birthdays to create alarms for.
In the Alarm Text group box, you can set up the text to be displayed in the birthday alarm messages. The message text is created by combining the Prefix text followed by the person's name followed by the Suffix text. No spaces are added, so remember to include any necessary trailing space in Prefix and leading space in Suffix.
If you change the alarm text, the birthday selection list will be re-evaluated.
In the Select Birthdays list, select the birthdays which you want to create alarms for. Note that the list shows only those entries in KAddressBook which contain a birthday and which do not already have a birthday alarm in format currently defined in the Alarm Text group box.
The remaining controls are the same as for Text alarms in the Alarm Edit dialog.
Prev | Home | Next |
Using KAlarm | Up | The alarm edit dialog |