An alarm clock for your PC

Before you rely on it

An alarm on a computer depends on the computer being awake. Three things to know:

• It does not wake the PC. If the PC sleeps or is switched off at the alarm's time, nothing rings. For alarms during the day, check when your PC goes to sleep in Windows' power settings.
• A late alarm is skipped. An alarm missed by more than 10 minutes, because the PC was asleep or off, is not rung late. A repeating alarm simply rings again on its next day; a one-time alarm switches itself off.
• Octoolo has to be running. Closing the window is fine: Octoolo stays in the corner of the taskbar while an alarm is on. After a restart it is only running if it starts with Windows, which Start with Windows on the page turns on.

Skipping matters more than it sounds. A 7:00 alarm that went off at 9:30, when you opened the laptop, would only confuse; an alarm missed by a few minutes, while the PC woke up, still rings.

What happens when it rings

The notification shows the alarm's name, or just “Alarm” if you gave none, and its time. Windows plays its looping alarm sound and keeps the notification on screen until you choose:

• Snooze silences it and rings it again after that alarm's own snooze length, 5, 10, 15, 20 or 30 minutes. In the list, the alarm shows “snoozed until” its new time. A snoozed one-time alarm stays on until the snooze has rung.
• Dismiss ends it. A repeating alarm waits for its next day; a one-time alarm switches itself off but stays in the list, ready to switch on again.

Clicking the notification itself opens the alarm clock in Octoolo. There is no setting for another sound: the alarm uses Windows' own.

Days, snooze and the next alarm

Leave every day unpicked for a one-time alarm, the kind you set for a call this afternoon. If its time has already passed today, it rings tomorrow. Pick Monday to Friday and the alarm reads Weekdays; Saturday and Sunday read Weekends; all seven read Every day. Any other mix lists the days.

Each alarm has its own snooze length, so a gentle 5 minutes before a meeting and 30 minutes for the reminder to stretch can live side by side. Alarms are kept as times on your PC's clock, so a 9:00 alarm stays at 9:00 when the clocks change for summer time.

The line at the top always answers the question you open an alarm clock for: “Next alarm today at 14:30, in 2 h 10 min”. Without an alarm on, it says so. The Today page of the Productivity app shows the next alarm too, beside any running timers.

Example: alarms for a working day

Four alarms keep a home-office day on track:

The list sorts them by time and describes each one, for example “Stand-up · Weekdays · rings tomorrow”. After 15:00 the school call switches itself off and the other three carry on through the week. On a day off, flip their switches off instead of deleting them, and back on when you return. Each switch starts the alarm afresh from the moment you turn it on, so it never rings for a time that has already gone.

An alarm or a reminder?

Both ring as Windows notifications, but they behave differently:

• An alarm is a time of day. It plays the looping alarm sound until you act and comes back on its days without a list to manage. Good for fixed moments: the 9:00 stand-up, lunch, leaving for school pickup.
• A reminder is something to do. It has a name and a note, can be ticked as Done, and stays in the Late list until you deal with it. Good for “call the garage tomorrow at 10”.

For a length of time rather than a time of day, such as 12 minutes from now, use a timer.