User guide Direct iMessage reference
Everything you can do with TextTodo.
A complete reference for setup, tasks, reminders, recurring work, Google Calendar, planning, corrections, and data controls.
Start
Keep using TextTodo while setup finishes.
A standalone “Hi” gets a short introduction and then “To get started, what timezone are you in?” You can answer with a city, region, common timezone name, abbreviation, or IANA timezone.
What happens next
- Commands that do not need local time work immediately.
- Timed commands are saved and finished in order after timezone confirmation.
- If a saved command needs clarification, TextTodo resolves it before returning to setup.
- A setup answer and a normal command can share one message.
- TextTodo asks: “Would you like your current list to be sent every morning? If so, what time?”
- It offers an optional Google Calendar connection link after that choice.
Daily-message choices
- Choose a local time for a full daily list.
- Decline daily messages entirely.
- Opt into a conditional smart check-in.
- Change a local delivery time or add more times later.
Conversation
Context helps with references, not permission.
TextTodo includes the latest 20 messages when interpreting a request. That makes short follow-ups useful, while every state-changing action still needs evidence in the current message.
Natural follow-ups
- “actually make that 6pm”
- “move it to Friday”
- “I did number two”
- “remind me about that at 8”
- A short AM/PM reply can resolve the immediately preceding time question.
Response style
- Simple successful changes may receive one thumbs-up reaction.
- Information, previews, links, questions, partial outcomes, and errors use text.
- Replies are terse and do not append the full list unless requested.
- Dates and times are formatted compactly in your timezone.
Tasks
Add, inspect, change, finish, and recover work.
Tasks can carry a title, an exact or date-only deadline, and a private note. Tasks remain separate from Google Calendar.
Create and inspect
- Add one task or a batch in one message.
- Give each batched item only the metadata stated for it.
- Add, append, clear, or retrieve private notes.
- Keep shopping details as private note lines on one task; they are not a visible checklist.
- List everything, today, tomorrow, overdue, or seven days.
- Search active titles and view completed work by period.
- Ask for one task’s complete details.
Change and organize
- Edit titles and change or clear deadlines.
- Complete, remove, restore, or undo the latest removal.
- Sort exact deadlines before date-only, then undated tasks.
- Move a task only within its equal-deadline or undated group.
- Infer AM/PM when one interpretation is clearly more likely and confirm the resolved time.
- Ask when time meaning remains genuinely balanced.
- Add
“add submit the history paper by fri at 5pm” - Batch
“add read chapter 4 for tmrw and email my coach by fri” - Note
“add a note to the paper: cite the archive source” - List
“what’s due in the next 7 days?” - Search
“find my tasks about financial aid” - Restore
“restore the task I removed”
Recurring tasks
Repeat an obligation on calendar-relative rules.
Supported rules are daily, weekdays, selected weekdays, and monthly. Completion creates one next future occurrence and skips missed backlogs.
Behavior
- The next occurrence stays hidden until its local date.
- Completion and creation happen atomically.
- A one-occurrence title override does not change the series default.
- Missed occurrences do not pile up after downtime.
Not included
- No completion-relative intervals.
- No habit history or streaks.
- No automatic performance summaries.
- No projects or subtasks.
Reminders
One-time, recurring, deadline, and snoozed delivery.
A reminder can point to a task or hold standalone text. A meeting-like item with a start but no end becomes a reminder at that start.
Manual and recurring
- Create, move, or remove a pending one-time reminder.
- Create one reminder for each occurrence in a compact list.
- Move matching reminders a chosen number of minutes before their stored occurrence.
- Create fixed-interval reminders with a five-minute minimum.
- Correct pending reminders without duplicating them.
Deadline and snooze
- Exact task deadlines can own reminders ten minutes before and at the deadline.
- Date-only deadlines do not create timed reminders.
- Remove deadline reminders without deleting the task.
- Snooze a reminder delivered during the previous 24 hours.
- Choose a duration or exact future time for the snooze.
Daily messages
Choose a complete list or a conditional check-in.
Daily schedules follow local wall-clock time and are recalculated after a timezone change.
Full daily list
- Add multiple local delivery times.
- Change or remove schedules and reject duplicates.
- Skip the message if there are no active tasks.
- Send the full active list only for configured list reminders.
Smart check-in
- Requires explicit opt-in.
- Sends only for overdue work or work due within 48 hours.
- Asks whether you want help planning.
- Never creates a plan until you reply.
Google Calendar
Read the primary calendar and change one clear event.
Calendar is optional. TextTodo uses one connected account’s primary calendar and keeps Google events separate from tasks.
Read and create
- Connect with a short, expiring, single-use link.
- See one day’s timed and all-day agenda.
- Combine the day’s agenda with active tasks.
- Find free periods across the complete local day.
- Create one or multiple one-time timed events.
- Get each outcome when a message requests multiple events.
Edit and synchronize
- Rename, move, retime, or cancel one unique match.
- Preserve duration when only the start changes.
- Ask for a day or time when a match is ambiguous.
- Create no default TextTodo warning for an event.
- Add a reminder only by explicit request with a lead time.
- Update or remove opted-in reminders after Google changes.
Only the primary Google Calendar is supported. Recurring and all-day events are read-only. Apple Calendar, Outlook, secondary calendars, and automatic task copying are not supported.
Planning
Review the schedule before it becomes Calendar time.
Generated planning uses one local day, one to three existing tasks, durations you provide, and fixed Calendar events.
Generated task plan
- Supply durations and an optional work window.
- Ask for missing durations instead of inventing them.
- Receive a text preview and correct it conversationally.
- Confirm only the latest unexpired preview.
- Create blocks after confirmation and report partial outcomes.
Fixed schedule preview
- Accept up to 20 exact same-day ranges supplied by you.
- Preserve every range without silent truncation.
- Warn about Calendar conflicts without moving blocks.
- Require confirmation before creation.
- Use stable event identifiers so repeat confirmation does not duplicate blocks.
Account and context controls
Control the conversation and stored connection.
- Help
Ask what TextTodo can do or how a specific feature works. - Reset context
/reset clears conversation context without deleting tasks. - Disconnect Calendar
Ask TextTodo to disconnect Google Calendar. - Delete data
/delete_my_data requests deletion of your TextTodo data. - Timezone
Ask to change your timezone; daily schedules follow the new local time.
Service boundaries
What the current version does not do.
TextTodo is a focused task, reminder, and planning assistant—not a generic tracker or an infallible delivery system.
No SMS, group chats, reactions as input, outgoing/system messages, or attachment-only commands.
No projects, tags, folders, Kanban, grades, courses, shopping lists, or general notebook.
No autonomous scheduling, silent Calendar changes, or completion-relative habits.
No Apple/Outlook, secondary calendars, recurring edits, or all-day edits.
Voice notes, photos, files, and attachment-only messages are not processed as tasks.
Do not use reminders for emergency, medical, financial, or safety-critical timing.
Ready to try it?