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Emailing a text-based meeting scheduler

Submitted by Merlin on November 29, 2005 - 6:23am.

ButtUgly: Main_blogentry_231105_1 [The Iteration List]

A very clever and satisfyingly lo-fi way to find the best date for an event based on several people’s schedules. By passing around emails with an ASCII, monotype text representation of the possible dates and times, each person uses a symbol to indicate their preference and availability. Very clever stuff.


       December
       0                 1                   2                   3
       1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 0
       t f S S m t w t f S S m t w t f S S m t w t f S S m t w t f 
Janne  + + - - + + + + + ? ? + + + + - - - ? ? - - - - - - - - - + 
Ville  + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + -
Kalle  - - - - + + + + e e e - - - + - - - - - - - - - - - - - - +
Sanna  - - e e - - - + ? ? ? + + + + + - - + + - - - - - - + + + +
                     * *           *

From this table, it’s easy to see what would be suitable dates for everyone (marked with “*”). The initiator of the sequence suggets Thursday 8th, and everyone agrees. And while they were at it, they agreed on holding the 15th as “tentative”, so that they get to continue the game if it’s not finished in time. One of the advantages of this calendar is of course that you can immediately see who might not make it - and while everyone is equal, missing someone might not be.

[ Thanks, Brian ]

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I have a similar tool...

Submitted by Tim Yao (not verified) on November 29, 2005 - 1:00pm.

I have a similar tool I created back in 1999 but with a CGI interface (easier to manipulate the columns and people can respond asynchronously). See http://thinking.teiru.net/sched

I had ideas for improving the interface (allowing the table to be rotated so that the people are listed in rows rather than in columns, only displaying each user’s entries while they are editing them, allowing users to add new date/time possibilities, creating a GUI for setting up new scheduler instances, etc) but never got around to implementing them.

The existing tool is available under the terms of the GPL if anyone wants to play with it.