Merge Calendars & Reminders Help
Help Contents
Tips ☝️ (How we get the most out of Merge)
When travelling, we use icons for modes of travel. E.g. a flight diary entry always starts with ✈️ emoji. In merge, simply type ✈️ in the search field to see all of your flights in a simple list
In Contacts, other than Birthdays and Anniversaries, we have a custom events set as RIP to commemorate the date of family and friends who have since passed away. This is then displayed in Merge, and can also be filtered to a list using Focus
When setting up a new Contact/Birthday, you don't need to have anything in a phone Contact except for a name and a Day + Month. You don't need a phone number, an email, or even a year.
So you can set a birthday for your new-born, great-great grandparents, dog, cat, goldfish - whatever!
Experiment with lots of new Calendars! Shared, subscribed (e.g. holidays), private, business - Merge will keep them all together or you can get the best out of Select and Focus views. You can also have Multiple Reminders Lists (set new Calendar/Reminders lists up in Apple Calendars and Reminders)
If you email/message someone from the Contact detail page (the one with all the Star sign info) on their Birthday, there are a few emoji's and a simple message pre-populated for all you busy people out there.
From your iOS device Home Screen, you can long-press the Merge icon and get a fast shortut to create new events or jump to Birthdays
Menu and Settings
Menu
Main Menu
Select 👉
Settings
Interval
Group by Day, Week, or Month
Display
Confirgure how much detail per row
Contacts
View Contacts editor, or display Merge's unique and (may we say fabulous) Birthdays Countdown view
Reminders
Options for viewng Completed and Unchecked Reminders
Reminders Options: for the way you do things
Options are available in the Merge Menu which can change the way Reminders are displayed.
Show Completed Reminders
Allows you to turn on all past checked Reminders, and even search them
The bottom Menu option is a bit of a mouthful and in need of an explanation;-
Keep past unchecked on original date
If you are the type of person who does not tick off their Reminder when it's due, and instead let them drift off to the forgotten past, this may be a good option to keep your today view clean.
Move past unchecked to Today
If you are a rigid To-Do list checker who always make sure no Reminder ever goes unchecked, you can set this on. All unchecked Reminders stay stubbornly on your Today date (with an overdue count) until checked off.
I don't understand how Reminders work 🤯
After receiving a negative AppStore review regarding the way Merge handles Reminders (which was incorrect, unfair, uneducated, patronising, and very irritating!) I skipped my morning coffee and went for a long run to unwind and think. Which prompted me to add this section.
As a retired couple, we code for a hobby. Our motivation is good feedback - NOT $$$.
A good feedback/review puts a big smile on our faces for the day. It makes us feel that what we do is worthwhile. Negative feedback as you can imagine has the opposite effect. ANYWAY, enough😄 back to Reminders;-
How do Reminders work and display? Yes it can be confusing. The best advice I can give is to spend a few short minutes with this test. First add these reminders;
Undated
Dated
Dated and Timed (alarm)
Checked (completed) reminder
See how they are displayed in Merge, Apple’s Reminders, or your favourite Calendar app. Maybe wait a day and see how the undated and unchecked Reminder is displayed in all your apps. You can also in Merge settings show/hide completed Reminders and change display options.
Hopefully by then the advantages of Merge are more apparent! It's one of the reason we (us, family, friends) use only Merge. Enjoy!
Settings
Wizard View 🪄
[Day, Week, Month] [Expand/Compress] [Countdown] [Show/Hide lines]
Wizard view gives you a way to fast-switch between your two favourite views. These are saved. You can still over-ride any of these settings in the main Merge menu.
Why have Fetch Range?
🐇 <---------> 🐢
Merge "grabs" an entire range of data into one object to allow the flexibility to sort and group items the way it does.
Getting snappy performance in Merge
The settings above affect the speed of Merge when switching views. If you have a very large number of calendars and entries, try speeding up Merge by:-
Turning off "show completed Reminders"
Reducing the fetch range (default is -1 week, + 1 year)
Avoid using Day View. (Merge has to work hard to sort/group all the days)
Performance will be improved in future updates (and those iPhones/iPads are only getting faster!)
Multi Day Events
ON
When you enter a multi-day event, if this switch is on, all events will display; e.g. an event spanning 2 weeks will display 14 times (every day). in expanded mode the duration is also displayed.
OFF
If you switch this off, the event is displayed twice (Start and End days), with duration in expanded mode. Also, when you are inside the range, “Ends in x days” is also displayed.
Display Icons & Symbols ➡︎🏁⏰
► Top bar icons
Refresh Carries out a full fetch, then jumps to today.
Menu Access to all settings/features.
Calendar Toggle's graphic month view on/off (only in Month Display Mode).
(Display Mode)
Wizard View Fast-switch between your two custom views. (Set up in "Other Settings")
New Item New Calendar event, Reminder event, or Contact
► Row Symbols
Multi-day event ➠
Multi-day event end ➠ 🏁
Repeating event⇅
Note 🗒
Reminder alarm set (specific time) ⏰
Reminder High Priority event I
Reminder Medium Priority event I
Reminder Low Priority event I
Reminder No Priority event I
Month Calendar View 📅
Scroll Merge list to move the Month View display
Bottom label displays current event (top row of Merge List)
Top arrows jump forward/back a month
Heat map Shade of red highlights number of events that day.
Touch date to jump to a date in Merge display.
Long-press date to add a new item on that date.
Focus View 🔦
A fast & snappy way to see one Calendar list only. Temporary until Refesh button clicked (top left)
All Items
Choose a row, swipe right-to-left
Swipe to Focus
Touch Focus
Only Selected Calendar shown
You can change Day/Week/Month/Compressed views. Touch Refresh (top left button) to return to normal Merged views.
Setting up non-Apple Calendars to Merge
► Google and Outlook
To add your Calendars/Reminders/Tasks into Merge (or any iOS App), simply add it to the iOS world in Settings. You can still use your current way of accessing your Calendars, as this runs in sync/in parallel. (Screenshots below iOS 14)
Settings/Calendar
iPhone or iPad settings
Accounts
Show all current accounts
Add Account
Add new account
Choose your account
Have your password ready and follow login instructions
Enable
Choose what entities you want to sync
Run Merge
Choose Select, select your entities, your Calendars/Tasks should now be visible