I'm a bit late to the party here, but I wanted to say that I had serious issues getting the software to activate, and still was getting a greyed out 'continue' button even after I installed the patch this morning. live chat with martin was not productive, even though he was helpful and we had a good work session troubleshooting. i did finally get the activation to move to a green 'continue' button by scrolling to the first space of the area for the s/n and pressing 'enter' when the cursor was on the first letter, not pressing 'enter' while the cursor was on the last letter as if it was a proper cut and paste. weird. anyway, i can not believe that i spent all of these hours trying to activate a program, but it was the tech challenge. i can not speak as to the actual software itself because I have not had the chance to use it.

I recently started using a program called Efficient Man's Organizer Free:

http://www.softpedia.com/get/PORTABLE-SOFTWARE/Office/Calendar-Organizers/Portable-Efficient-Man-s-Organizer-Free.shtml
Despite the somewhat dumb name it does more things than I need and I like the fact that it's portable. Todays offer is way too buggy so I gave up and uninstalled it. As far as the voting goes, it would be nice to know what type of people are downloading it. Like a general field of professions or something. I'm sure most of the thumbs down are from a bunch of 20 something, so called power users who still live in Mommy's basement, think they know everything and probably don't need an organizer or time management program because they don't do anything anyway.

Tried this utility. Graphics are nice, but usabilty leaves a bit to be desired. I will be uninstalling.

It wouldn't hurt to run a spell-check before releasing text...
e.g.
Under the "Study and Learn" template task, the subtext is "Deep research of the concepts encuntered in working session".

I think you just coined a new term (c:

great user interface...thx

Like several above, I have followed all directions to a "T" and still cannot get the continue box to turn green after inputting my code. It wouldn't let me reinstall the program either. It says I'm activated it's still in my Windows 7 laptop try to the left, but it won't open or do anything that I can see. Very frustrating to spend so much time trying to get a TIME program to work, and then not even be able to register it within the giveaway period. I'm not blaming GOTD of course and maybe the software company was just overloaded with hits on their website so things didn't work as planned. I'm just bummed I couldn't try it out after all my efforts and after I even publicized it on my website this morning. :(

Sorry. DayTimer still works for me MUCH better than an electronic planner. If I write it, I remember it. If I type it, it's gone in a cloud of electrons.

Someone said. "re-invent the wheel"... Yup.

Win XP SP 3 .

In the description it should say this prog needs adobe air to work, anyways it downloads adobe and instals it for you, if you dont have it. Then you get the registration screen.

Obviously the vendor does not want many people to try his prog as it they make it as difficult as possible. Why not just give the key in the wrapper? Why do you have get your customers annoyed before they have even started?

You enter your email and it sends you an email asking you to confirm what that you have just given it. You click and are then redirected to a page with your email address as the name and the reg key is given.

Which you copy and paste in the registration boxes , but the tick does not go green as you cannot continue. A bit of research their site says copy exactly . Yep did that. Now there email has a space before the email address , so try that. After mucking about with the key and email address eventually you might strike lucky and the tick goes green and it installs.

Why should it need all this hassle just to instal a prog.

I like the idea it saves what you alter , but the time boxes through out the day dont appear to accept enough words for your tasks .

It appears to be like a calendar only worse. " Essential pm " free version is better or any other calendar prog.

I would need more time to experiment with session planner pro to see if it has any good points as at present I cannot see any other than it automatically saves what you change/ put. .

How about "InTask Personal", dudes?? Professional features offered for FREE!!

==> CAUTION: Highly addictive and definitely not for noobs!!

http://www.intaskpro.com/

Enjoy!!

I have to give Session Planner Pro a BIG Thumbs Down. I didn't even get into the meat of the program so could not evaluate it for it's usefulness or not.

The first thing I noticed was that it require Adobe Air. I'm not a huge fan of anything Adobe, but so many things use Flash these days one is almost forced to use Flash, but as a general rule I don't install anything else Adobe. So I was surprised when I noticed that it requires Adobe Air, while installing, but hit the accept button because I'm always interested to see if a Planner is any better than what I'm already using. The install went without a hitch, but then that's when the fun started.

I received the messages for the Serial number, no problem, verified that I requested it and then copied the registration information. When I pasted the registration information into the input boxed the "Continue" button would not light up. I had to manually input the registration information; the "Continue" button finally lit up. I pressed that and that's when the real fun started.

I've registered a lot of programs and usually they simply give you a dialog box that says something like, "Registration Successful" or nothing at all and you have to look inside the program to verify that the program is now registered. But this thing took off in a glorious celebration. I suppose trying to convince me how secure it is.

But, the next thing that happened is the main reason for the Thumbs Down. After the glorious celebration to let me know it was now registered (what a bunch of crap) it then offered me a tutorial to learn how to use the program. I say, "Great"; tutorials are always better then fumbling around and give you a good idea of what the program really does. So, I says, "O.K", let begin. When I clicked O.K. that's when every one of my security programs lit up asking for my permission to let all these new programs run at Start Up. I let very few programs run at Start Up and never a new program I know nothing about. And so I began to click "NO" on everything. Session Planner Pro closed immediately without further ado.

But, it didn't really close; it was hiding in the System Tray. So I click on it and nothing. Right Click and the only option I get is to "Unhide Program" and so I do. Now the only options inside are to create a New File from a Template or Create a New Empty File. So I attempt to do that not knowing what in the heck I'm doing and it opens up a "Save" Dialog. Save What?

No way to get into the program, so now I'm looking around to figure out how to shut Session Planner Pro down; close the program. The main Window offers an "X"; click on it and the only thing that happens is it gets dropped into the System Tray, but does not close - shut down. Left clicking the icon in the System Tray brings up the main Window, which is USELESS! Right clicking basically offers the same action, "Unhide Program".

Thank God for "Process Hacker". So the only way to shut this program down, that I found is to either "End Process" in Windows Task Manager"; I did not try this - I prefer "Process Hacker" or "Terminate" in "Process Hacker" which is what I did.

I don't care whether this is the best Planner on the Planet, I doubt it is, but I'm wondering what they are trying to hide. Besides I couldn't get the program to do anything useful. It's a doner and a goner.

I will be uninstalling Session Planner Pro and Adobe Air when I'm done writing this. If you can't trust a program you shouldn't keep it. If you were able to get this program to do something useful that's great, but I still don't trust it.

I've come back to make what I hope might be a couple of helpful points:

a) To those who say you can't turn the program off...
maximise from the SYSTEM TRAY icon...use the minimise button (top right in program window)...program minimises to the TASKBAR...right-click on the running item in the TASKBAR...choose close. Done.

b) Why would I keep a history?
As a homeworker, my boss can ask at any time what I did last Mon/Wed/Friday/Whatever. This program allows me to export that day/date, with a lsit of what I did when. I accept if you are on the road this might not be very useful to you, but for developing on a computer from home, that is a potentially useful feature.

it need to install Adobe AIR first!!!

This looked like it could be useful to me. Followed all steps: extracted, ran setup, got serial number, entered email and serial number, got confirmatory email that the software was activated and to run the program. Nothing happened. Tried in Run as Admin, nothing. Re-installed. Nothing. When checking compatibility, said this program incompatible with my laptop. I have a 6 month old ASUS with 8G RAM Intel Core-7 processor, a discrete NVidia graphic card with 1G RAM.... I wonder why the program won't run? Will try after a reboot, and if still no joy, will uninstall. Lots of time wasted - just opposite of what this app. i supposed to do!

Just my Aussie brain thunking but…
Unless their name happens to be Colin Hay (who, as we know, originally hails from Scotland), does any Australian say they are from "Down Under"? (Maybe Delvine Delaney when she was on The Love Boat - does anybody else remember that? "Oo, you've got me up a gum tree there mate!")
How does my comment contribute to the evaluation of this software? Not at all. I'm hoping for a new record of green minus signs.

The interface GUI style maybe cool looking but makes it hard to read on the left side the numbers are way too small and light gray on white is not easy on my eye

sorry, not a keeper for me

Hi, nice to see something quirky and a thought behind it (plus all so innocent suggestions like in comment #6 from Mark in Australia about "game voice reminders" for instance.. it would have to me promptly followed by saving any such session and switching PC off?:)

I would say that any attempts to organize time are commendable, but in most cases highly impractical. You don't have to be game player to loose time on your PC, if (like me) you are a shameless perfectionist in any given art/photo/word project (and that's your guilty pleasure:) - chances of any Software of that nature working are probably close to finding Elvis on Mars, lol.

That said - I would not give this Giveaway thumbs down (per say). If you're a student/school age Person and trying to show independence and maturity from your Peers - I'm' sure time organizers such as this Session Planner are a good place to start acting? Also nice to see a modest (for a change) fee that this Developer is asking for!

SO MUCH FOR THEORY..
Being curious by Comments about it's pleasant GUI a.s.o, but warned by problems with getting it going - I decided to test it for myself (XP Pro, SP2, latest Adobe AIR, Symantec AntiVirus Auto-Protect put to sleep while installing):

E-mail with reg code came to hotmail (junk folder) pretty quickly. After Pasting text with details - NOTHING happened, Program wouldn't start, so restarted Windows, on Startup got Message: "C:\WINDOWS\system32\command.com - The parameter is incorrect" ??, so clicked it off and everything slowly started.. and back to Session Planner!
Took ages for pasted text on Registration window to work before finally green button with plus sign activated itself.
Clicking on desktop icon of Session Planner Pro GOTD Edition still does NOTHING, Icon in Taskbar has only 2 options: either it opens, or after choosing to close it (NO exit!) shows "unhide program", and inside the Console Windows of it - side slide bar DOESN'T slide.., very little substance in Options. All I hear now are some nice:) "task" sounds that it does something, but where and what - God knows, I clicked everything off, seems more complicated than it SHOULD be?

Tested for Those who might want to install and keep it. Personally - that's where this journey ends. Don't say I didn't give it a fair go!:)

#6 Maybe this will help you. I'm using Pomodoro App program when I'm using my computer. After 25 minutes it rings and a screen pops up telling me to quit what I'm doing and take a 5 minutes break. It's specially perfect when I play games. It kicks me out of the game screen! More info at:
http://www.pomodorotechnique.com/
and you can get them free at:
http://gigaom.com/collaboration/9-free-pomodoro-timers/
Give it a try.

@ #1 Tech, Very very well said. It is ridiculous how many people knock a GIVE AWAY without so much as a reason. Just because something doesn't appeal certainly doesn't make something "Shit"!!

@ #2 Leo, Don't be a Twat!! Obviously I don't need to give you my reason for calling you a Twat as it'll be quite clear to somebody of your infinite wisdom!!

I'm gonna pass on the offer today as I don't have a use for it. However, just coz I'm gonna pass on it, I shall NOT be giving it a "Thumbs Down". Thankyou for the offer though & Keep up the good work.
Thanks also to Giovanni, your remarks are also a huge help. Keep it up please.

Cheers All,
Roadie John.

To the developer of this software. Claims like "..You always know what you wanted to be doing in any given moment of the day..", if I already know that, then why use this software and who will be updating the computer and why. Furthermore, what happens when I'm way from the computer and working in the field, why would I spend extra time to do inputs and be constrained by a software that acts like a diary. And finally, who would like to know all that an what would you do with such saved info.

Down loaded and installed very easily on my old Dell Dimension 2400...XP Pro SP3 , & set up fine...it does require you install Adobe Air 3 :>)
I am ADHD & this is a wonderful program for ME! )

To those who complain about the number of thumbs downs not matching up with the number of comments: First of all, get used to it and get over it; this has been happening ever since I discovered GAOTD a few years ago, and there is nothing that indicates it's going to change. Secondly, constantly whining about that will not help anyone get a sense of whether they want to try the program either, so that's just pointless.

Now, as to the program itself, the concept isn't really well thought out. How can a person keep track of his time precisely throughout an entire day with a program that's running on a computer?! Unless EVERYTHING you do involves sitting in front of a computer or you have one in front of you running 24/7, you're going to miss many or most of the reminders and popups when time periods end and begin!
This kind of program would be far better suited to either a tablet, a smart phone or as a Windows program, at least a Windows 8 tablet, which not only isn't available yet, but may either not sell very well or be too expensive in most peoples' opinions. Even if one carries around a laptop, they are't going to be going everywhere they go and doing everything they do with the thing running.
So, by way of disclaimer, I have not, and will not actually try the program, not because it doesn't run well or crashes or is hard to register, etc., but rather because the concept doesn't make much sense. TO ME. If you feel differently, of course you should try the program and see what it does for you.

#24 "creative procrastination.” is often labelled "research" or "administration" to hide the fact that very little has been accomplished in that time. :-)

re: votes... Keith's point is convincing (#2), people are just voting to say "i don't want/need this software." offer something "fun" and the vote balance swaps

I've now read the rest of the manual during my lunchtime. It will use free icons and other sound files (e.g. downloaded from the internet, so that's good.

Also, there is a timer pops up as each task draws to a close. Nice touch.

The Customisation Wins It For Me.

The installation went well and once I'd downloaded the manual, I was able to see how to make the many adjustments.

I Liked:
* The customisation
This is, for me, a big deal: I can put faces to appointments etc, instead of daft icons and I can add ring-tones to times when I need to call people. (I'm willing to bet it will use mp3 voice files - so I might say "Try calling Fred again" for example and attach that to a phone task.

* the way the program comes to the front to show me what I am being alerted for.

* The time-line moves with the clock, so I can easily see if I am ahead of, or behind, the tasks entered.

I disliked:
* Finding the manual wasn't instinctive - the top toolbar blanks and so those icons started hidden.

* the "more icons" link sends you to a page where you can buy icons from $6-18 a set.

* The "drag your own picture here" (to use it as an icon) was greyed out.
(It does tell you in the manual to add the images you want into the "icons folder" for the program - once I'd done that, the image came up as expected).

Verdict?
Some minor niggles but some good plus points for me. I will be keeping this for now and will play with customisations later. If it works as I am expecting, I will certainly be spending the £11 for the lifetime version.

Thanks to the developer and GOTD.

P.S. For the benefit of #16 NISSEPELLE: I'd rate Session Planner Pro around 7/10 (or 9/10 if my customisation plans work)

Nr 1. People seem to quick to pull the thumbs down trigger W/O trying the software because it's not what they wanting to see offered. Just a guess.

#14 I agree, but am adding a thought. Let's face it web pages have not been complicated to build and have three kinds of counts on them for a long time. How about keeping the existing way Thumbs Up/Down is ---- as it stands, but maybe giving it a different names like Useful Comments. Then, why not have a count of how many downloads there have been. Then, a third count that rates the programs 6/10, etc. "relative to programs I have actually used". (This would be sort of the Paul Ryan approach of not affecting the way things are done now. :)

Also, the thumbs down appear when a company cannot communicate clearly in English, and it's clear that they made no attempt to learn before they post their product. Such is the company's offering today. Notice "You always know what you wanted to be doing in any given moment of the day. This eliminates confusion, stress and creative procrastination." Come again Partner?

Downloaded and installed easily. Have to give an email address to receive key. Email received almost immediately. Very pretty application.

This is a program I really wanted to like, but I have to uninstall it for the following reasons:

- high CPU usage
- no EXIT that I can see. I looked everywhere. The only way to stop it is a cold kill from Task Manager.

Now I understand that such a program is meant to be running all the time, but then it should be a small app with low CPU demand. This one is way too fancy for what it does. It's a pity, but I had to uninstall.

Looks like a nice tool for retired people or users working from home!!

But overall nothing special!!

BETTER FREEWARE ALTERNATIVES:

http://www.rescuetime.com/
http://www.manictime.com/
http://www.truetimetracker.com/
http://www.tomighty.org/
http://lifehacker.com/5906919/use-wunderkit-to-make-your-ideas-reality


Enjoy!!

The developer certainly has the marketing thing down on their website and they've put as much lipstick on this glorified pomodoro application as they can. That's not a bad thing and it's kind of refreshing given the typical offering here which slaughters the King's English while giving every incentive *not* to try the product on their website.

As far as what it does, it's basically just a timer which you might not understand given the term "planner" in the name. Personally, I like the category and although I'm partial to the timer in True Launch Bar (a GAOTD offering from awhile ago) it's probably a keeper for me.

Kudos to the developer on their website marketing and (semi) kudos to them on the product. Would I recommend it? If you've got True Launch Bar, sort of, because it's mostly redundant. Otherwise, yes.

You have to install Air Adobe. First window of Session Planner Pro can not accept the registration.(Continue-button did not work)! Deinstalled.

Downloaded and installed the software in my Windows 7 notebook without problem. Started the program and entered my registration information when asked for. Press "continue" button and the software frozed and absolutely will not do anything. I do not see how good the software is when it does not even accept my email address and serial number as given to me by the publisher. Uninstalled immediately and moved on to the next software to evaluate. What a waste of time!

This should be a great tool for companies, but I don't believe in time-management software for personal purposes. These programs are not flexible enough to meet the needs of the average person.

The best app I've found is 'Getting Things Done' (GTO) from
http://www.mylifeorganized.net/
They offer a Free Edition. But even this software provides much more than I need.

I don't want a program to tell me, what to do.

-

I use a fantastic Calendar, which works also as a reminder:
http://www.ukrebs-software.de/
Give it a try.

And here's my BEST TIP for all those web-workers and alike:

GoalTime 2.0 - it's FREE!
http://www.dcsoft.com/products/goaltime/

This tiny peace of software is sort of a countdown-timer. You feed it with your tasks and the time you wish to spend on them on a daily basis.

Start GoalTime in the morning (better: auto-run) - click on a task when you begin with it and again, when you pause. GoalTime estimates, when your daily deeds will be done. It displays your progresses graphically.

HINT: GoalTime allows only one set of tasks. If you have different schedules (e.g. weekend), you need a second set. Simply make a copy of GoalTime.exe in a different folder.

This tiny app (385 kB) is all I need for self-control.

What's more annoying than the plethora of down (or up) votes without corresponding comments is the insistence of some to always comment on this occurrence. It's likely, I would think, that those who simply vote down and walk away don't bother to read the comments posted. And those of us who value feedback from others are likely to read the feedback that is here, and not give great weight to the thumb voting. So perhaps if we all just realize that this is the way it is, we can get on with reading the comments to help make our decision to try or not, and not commenting on the lack of comments by those who don't comment and apparently don't read our comments on their lack of comments either. Huh? =vD

If those who download and run the programs offered here, rate the prog it would be a much better indicator of if the prog is good, bad or inbetween.
An exempel:
I rate this 6/10 or 2/10 or 10/10. That would be more acurate, I think.

I will suggest that you download and try this software just for the beautiful and unique GUI -- very clean and pleasant for the eyes. It must have been written by somebody with very delicate taste and style. I presume that this software is for those who work around with their computer all day long, setting the start time and end time of an activity with a countdown. Many I am sure will not really find it better than a simple alarm clock, which one can even carry anywhere.

Perhaps the thumbs up/down option should only appear after the programmes have been downloaded? Presumably, people who download the programmes would at least try to instal them, and hopefully try them.
This would make the evaluations more meaningful.

Thumbs up, thumbs down, who cares? Whether a person likes a program or not is highly subjective. Some people like Windows, others like Mac, while still others prefer Linux.

All I want to know is what the program does, is it helpful, how it compares in terms of features with other software, and is it a piece of software that I can use?

i recieved no error not confirmation, though i am still awaiting the arrival of the key in my inbox !

Hi!

Anyone getting the "The application cannot proceed!" error, simply go ahead and try again. It will work eventually.

Thanks,
Martin

Looks to be a day planer, I may d-load this if the reveiws are good. Would be worthwile if intalls it on laptop to carey around with them, not soo much if on a big decktop compter. But it look hopefull, thank :-&

That's one thing I learned about GAOTD over time. When I first learn about this site, I was always look at the software, think about whether I would want it and if I do, look at the thumbs up/down. I would later learn that to be a VERY bad choice. There were a few software that I later learned and tested them out personally to find them to be excellent. Looking at the thumbs up/down here generally show that these software were "junk" which turns out to not necessarily be true. It's just people who find no needs for it and therefore instead of just leaving it alone, decides to do a thumbs down.

In other words, it's best not to judge the GAOTD by the amount of thumbs but to actually read the comments since those are generally pretty good with suggestions and actual comments about the software. Of course the BEST way to know if the software is good is to TRY IT yourself and using other people's comments as something like tips.

I tried pretty hard to keep software that tracks what I do off of my computer. I also feel I do a pretty good job of staying aware of what I do and for how long I do it. If this is challenging to you, it looks like a pretty good program. I don't vote for or against software here nor to I pay attention to the votes.
That being stated, here are some alternatives:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_time_tracking_software

Well ok i had a freeware program years ago which was a Day planner, it was a good idea at the time (can`t remember the name of it after all these years) It helped plan my days well, UNTIL i started getting into
Computer Games, i started losing track of the time, playing to long etc,
So the Day Planner was no good to me Anymore.

I think this type of Program would be Great if say the Developers of Session Planner Pro could somehow add in a feature which could maybe know when you ran a games .exe file add somehow if that even possible
knew when you are playing a game, after say 1 hour have a Voice kick in over the Audio To Remind you to stop playing the game and do your next timed session. Maybe a voice of a Bossy Wife/Mother (just a thought) If this program could have little types of Audio or voice
reminders, i think it could help alot of people stay on their planning sessions, As some would eventually over Time would start to get lazy and forget to remind the software to Remind them of planned schedules, not just from playing games, Audio reminders kicking in while working on other Time Consuming software would be a good idea i think.
Sorry i won't be installing this Great sounding Software Today and thanks to GOTD and Limitless OU for the offer. P.S. it's good to see what looks like good software coming from a small country like Estonia.

Mark. (Australia)

I haven't voted yet, but I will comment on post #1, which, although getting several 'useful +' tips, has not get an answer.

My feeling is that in a lot of cases somebody is 're-inventing the wheel', and trying to charge for it. Not necessarily in this case, but people judge the TYPE of program rather than the content.

The best example is when a Screensaver is offered. The majority think these are unnecessary, and a waste of system resources. They constantly all get huge thumbs down, but still get offered.

My feelings on this is that a thumbs down vote is given as a message to GOTD that some types of programs are not generally wanted.

I will take bets that the next time a Screensaver is added here, however good it may be, there will be over 80% thubs down within 5 minutes of it being offered.

There also seems to be the same feeings about time management / PIM software such as today's offer. There is a pattern - regardless of the software.

Very simple program, nice fancy interface but of little use. Many better freewares.

Trying to get licence from their 1st email:
The application cannot proceed!
An internal error occured. Please contact your administrator and describe the steps you took before you encounter this error message.

Error msg: Unable to connect to the database. Please make sure the database information specified in admin/includes/config.php are correct.

#1,
Some of us have already tried it. If that appeals to your infinite Aussie wisdom.

Just my Aussie brain thunking but... 81 thumbs down and no comments? Seriously? How about sharing your reasons why this or any other giveaway is no good for the rest of us unenlightened plebs? I logged on here 2 days ago, seconds after the new GOTD was posted and there were already 6 thumbs down. Seriousy, how do you download software, install it, evaluate it, and then post a negative here... in mere seconds? They are free giveaways for heaven's sake, be thankful, or be helpful, or both.

Have a nice day from Downunder.