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Molly McDonald has put together an excellent review of Wakerupper features over at DemoGirl.com. Thanks Molly!

Twitter Hack

Twitter users may now ‘follow’ Wakerupper on Twitter and schedule telephone reminders via direct message. Among other things, this enables users to schedule Wakerupper telephone reminders via Twitter’s SMS gateway - so you no longer have to be in front of your computer to schedule a call. All you need is your phone and a Twitter account.

Objective

Schedule Wakerupper telephone reminders via Twitter.

Requirements

1. Wakerupper account
2. Twitter account
3. Mobile phone configured with your Twitter account (optional, but highly recommended)

First, in Wakerupper…

1. Log in to your Wakerupper account and go to Wakerupper > Settings. (If you don’t have a Wakerupper account, write to beta@wakerupper.com).
2. In the ‘Twitter name’ field, enter your Twitter username.
3. Save your changes. You’re done here.

Then, in Twitter…

Assuming you’re logged in to your Twitter account, send the command

follow wakerupper

In a minute or so you will notice that Wakerupper has started following you as well. Woohoo!

OK, this is where things start to get fun. Send a direct message to Wakerupper along with the time you want to get a call and whatever you want your reminder to say. For example, you might send:

d wakerupper 7 hours from now wake up for flight

or

d wakerupper wednesday 3pm conf call

Wakerupper receives your Twitter direct message, parses the date and time from your instruction, and schedules your reminder. Once this is complete, you will receive a confirmation Tweet, like so:

6467367842 will be called on Mar 24 at 06:15 PM. To cancel, reply with ‘d wakerupper cancel xku78s’

If you would like to cancel a telephone reminder, you may do so via Twitter by following the instructions provided in your confirmation Tweet. You may also edit or cancel a reminder scheduled via Twitter on your Wakerupper upcoming calls page.

All telephone reminders scheduled via Twitter are placed to the telephone number designated as your default telephone in your Wakerupper account. Likewise, telephone reminders scheduled via Twitter observe the default timezone specified in your Wakerupper settings. Wakerupper currently does not support scheduling recurring calls via Twitter.

What about text messages?

For those of you new to Twitter…

Once you’ve added your phone to your Twitter account, you can send a text message to the Twitter short code assigned to you (40404 in the U.S. and 21212 in Canada) and Twitter sends the message on. So, now anytime you want a Wakerupper telephone reminder and you’re not in front of your computer, just text the following to short code 40404 (or 21212 in Canada):

d wakerupper 1 hour from now get laundry out of dryer

and your telephone reminder will be scheduled!

Note: The Wakerupper Twitter hack is experimental software and should be considered far less stable than other methods of scheduling Wakerupper telephone reminders.

Google Calendar Hack

This is the first in a series of posts that will demonstrate various methods of integrating Wakerupper with other online tools that you already use.

Many people who use Wakerupper also use some form of calendaring software to manage their schedules. In a typical case, a person might first identify an important event in their calendar and then, in a second step, visit Wakerupper.com to schedule a corresponding telephone reminder. This process is inconvenient and inefficient. But what if you could assign telephone reminders to events without leaving your calendar?

Objective

Schedule Wakerupper telephone reminders from within Google Calendar.

Requirements

1. Wakerupper account
2. Gmail account (for this hack to work, your Wakerupper email must be your gmail account)
3. Google Calendar (if you have Gmail, you have this)

First in your Gmail…

1. Go to Gmail > Settings > Filters
2. Create a new filter
3. In the field ‘Has the words:’, type ‘wkr’
4. Click the ‘Next step’ button
5. Select ‘Forward it to:’ and put ‘gcal@wakerupper.com’ in the text box.
6. Click the ‘Create Filter’ button

Then, in your Google Calendar…

1. Go to Google Calendar > Settings > Calendars > Notifications
2. Set ‘By default, remind me via Email 5 minutes before each event.”
3. Create an event in Google Calendar, and include ‘wkr’ in the ‘what’ or ‘description’ field of your event.

Okay, all set?

Five minutes before your event, Google Calendar will send a notification email to your Gmail, which will recognize the ‘wkr’ and forward the notification to Wakerupper, which looks up your default phone number using your email address, calls you on the phone, and reads you the text in the ‘what’ of your Google Calendar event.

Now anytime you want a Wakerupper telephone reminder for your Google Calendar event, just include the text ‘wkr’ in your Google Calendar event.

Note: The Wakerupper-Google Calendar hack is experimental software and while it is known to work, it should be considered less stable than other methods of scheduling Wakerupper telephone reminders.