Alarm Application Page

Use this page to specify what action occurs when the alarm goes off: run an application; visit a web site, open a folder, run a shortcut, etc.

Run options

…the first time the event occurs

The application runs the when the event first occurs and not if the event window is displayed again after the event is snoozed.

For example, if an alarm is set to go off at 5:00 pm and to repeat every day, the application will run at 5:00 pm. If you specified that the event window was displayed and pressed the Snooze button, the application will not run when the event window appears again. The application will, however, run when the next event goes off, the next day at 5:00 pm.

For reasons that will become clear, this is the only option that's valid if you do not have the alarm display an event window.

…each time a snoozed event occurs

The application runs after the event's first occurrence. In other words, it only runs after you snooze it the first time.

For example, if an alarm is set to go off at 5:00 pm and to repeat every day, the application will not run at 5:00 pm. If you press the Snooze button and snoozes for 10 minutes, the application will run when the snooze interval expires at 5:10 pm and the event window appears again. The application will run every subsequent time the event window appears as a result of you pressing the Snooze button. The application, however, will not run when the next event goes off, the next day at 5:00 pm.

This can only be selected if the alarm displays the event window.

…when you press the Snooze button on the event window

The application runs whenever you press the Snooze button on the event window.

This can only be selected if the alarm displays the event window.

…when you press the Off button on the event window

The application runs whenever you press the Off button on the event window.

This can only be selected if the alarm displays the event window.

…when you press the Run button on the event window

The application runs whenever you press the Run button on the event window. The Run button is only visible if you select this option. You can run the application as many times as you want, just by pressing the Run button again.

This can only be selected if the alarm displays the event window.

Open

Alarm++ opens the specified application, Web site, file, etc. when one of the above conditions occurs, just as if you had double-clicked it yourself. It also passes the specified arguments on the command line for that application.

Click the Browse button to find a specific file or shortcut that you want to run. You can also enter text directly into the field - this is how you to enter an "application" such as: http://www.microsoft.com or c:\Windows\Favorites. In the first example, the Alarm++ application will start your browser and go to the specified web site. In the second example, Alarm++ will open your Favorites folder.

You can also drag and drop the file you want to open onto the page; Alarm++ will automatically enter its path in the appropriate field.

Note: Alarm++ can run anything a Windows® shortcut can run. You can even Browse to a shortcut, and Alarm++ will run it when the event goes off. This is a very flexible way of specifying an application or Internet URL to run.

Tip: If you need to specify a "Start in" folder for the application, you can do it by creating a shortcut to that application and then Browsing to that shortcut in Alarm++.

Almost anything can be done at a specific time by creating a Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) script and invoking it with this feature. For example, you can write a VBA script to generate quarterly sales reports and e-mail them to a distribution list. You can then set an alarm to run that script at pre-determined times. (Please consult the documentation on your VBA application for how to invoke it and run a VBA macro at startup.)

With Windows® 95/98 and NT 4.x, most applications will print the document specified on the command line if the /p switch is present. For example, to print the "Status Report.doc" file in Word for Windows®:

Open: winword.exe

Arguments: /p “c:\Favorites\Status Report.doc”

Even more powerful is Microsoft's Windows Scripting Host (WSH). It enables you to write JavaScript (JScript) and VBScript files and run them directly from Windows or from the command line. Of course, this means that Alarm++ can run them as well. In these scripts, you can manipulate files, shortcuts, COM objects, etc. You can download and install the WSH from http://msdn.microsoft.com/scripting/.

Arguments

These are the arguments to the above application. Alarm++ passes them on the command line when running the specified application. For example, to run Microsoft® Word and pass a document on the command line:

Open: winword.exe

Arguments: “c:\Favorites\Status Report.doc”

This is (probably) identical, but without arguments:

Open: “c:\Favorites\Status Report.doc”

Arguments:

You can also use these variables in the arguments in order to pass some information about the event to the application.

%name%
%message% (all newlines are converted to spaces)
%eventdateformat% (formatted with your regional preferences)
%eventtimeformat% (formatted with your regional preferences)
%eventyear% (e.g., 2003)
%eventmonth% (1-12)
%eventdate% (1-31)
%eventweekday% (1-7)
%eventhour% (0-23)
%eventminute% (0-59)

Note: The variable names are case-sensitive. Also, since some values might have spaces in them, you might need to put quotation marks around the variable so that the value is treated as a single string.

ExampleResult
"Name is %name%" "Name is Staff Meeting"
"%message%" "%eventdateformat" "Time for the meeting!" "Thu, 15 Aug 2003"
%eventyear% %eventmonth% %eventdate% 2004 8 15

Test

Press this button to invoke the specified application and arguments. Use this to make sure what you've set up works the way you want it to.

See Also

Event
Alarm General page
Alarm Repeat page
Alarm Advanced page
Alarm Media page
Alarm Speech page
Alarm Window page
Alarm Application page
Alarm Mail page