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Technical Support - FAQ's - Pimlical/Android: Frequently Asked Questions

 I got a new Android phone - how do I move Pimlical to the new phone (Instructions are for V-4.0.x or later)?   
1.    On your old phone, Menu | Backup Everything (if you don’t see that option in the menu, update your preference: MenuCommandsAndOrder to display it). That command copies everything in your Pimlical folder in scoped storage (.../Android/data/com.pimlicosoftware.PimlicalA/files/Pimlical) to the old Pimlical folder off the root: /Pimlical
2.    Connect old phone to desktop with USB cable and copy the /Pimlical folder (always include all sub-folders!) to the desktop.
3.    Install and Launch P/A on the new phone, that will create the Pimlical folder in Scoped Storage and install the default preferences.
4.    Connect new phone to Desktop with USB Cable and copy the saved, Pimlical folder from the desktop to /Pimlical on your phone (i.e. where the ‘old’ Pimlical folder was, off the root of the filing system).
5.    On the new phone use Menu | Restore Everything which will copy everything that was on your old phone to the Pimlical folder in scoped storage on the new phone.

If you do not have a subscription, you won't be able to use the new Backup/Restore Everything Menu commands, in which case you will need to copy the Pimlical folder manually.

I have the latest version of Pimlical/Android but it just exits with NOT LICENSED or TRIAL VERSION.
If the version you installed ends with -G (i.e. like V-3.5.14-G) this means you purchased it from the Google PlayStore.  Google pulled Pimlical from the Playstore because they keep on changing the rules on what is permissible and what is not. Pimlical used a permission that Google recommended a couple of years ago, but now decided was too dangerous and promptly pulled all Apps that had it. So the permission was removed, but then found they were also pulling all Apps that were not compiled with the latest AOS12 libraries, so the App was recompiled again and 2 days of work spent trying to figure out all the changes required to be compliant with AOS12. By the time that was done, they changed it to requiring the AOS13 libraries.

Worse, Google has apparently decided that if an App is no longer listed in the Playstore, they could just erase all information about it in their database including all the licensing and purchase information(!) the result being that they would ALSO no longer permit the App to be licensed.

At this point, enough is enough, and Pimlico has decided that ALL future development of the Pimlical Calendar App will only take place with the Direct Download version, especially because features like Set Link to File and features that use File Navigation are then no longer crippled by Google's restrictive rules. V-4.0.x is only available as a Direct Download. Information about getting the direct download version is at https://www.PimlicoSoftware.com

If the version number ends in -D, then you had originally purchased Pimlical/Android directly from Pimlico. In that case, you will not be licensed unless the ReferenceID displayed in menu | About matches the information in Pimlico's registration database. Go into Menu | About and look at the ReferenceID and send that to Pimlico Tech Support along with your full name, address and if possible, the original email address you used when you purchased Pimlical. It will then take some 24-48 hours for new license files to be uploaded, so try again in some 24-48 hours by going into menu | About (you may need to exit and go back again in to menu | About to see the change take effect. If you have no email account on the device, your ReferenceID will typically be the Device ID. The ReferenceID is only displayed in later versions of Pimlical/Android (2.1.35 or later).

HELP! I just upgraded from V-3.7 to V-4.0 (or later) and ALL my data and preferences have disappeared!!
First, nothing has been lost. When this upgrade is made, P/A now has to conform to the new Google requirements for the Android OS which require ALL Apps to store their data in a special sand-boxed area underneath {root}\Android\Data\. So the Pimlical folder has now moved to {root}\Android\Data\com.pimlicosoftware.PimlicalA\files\Pimlical. V-4.00.x of Pimlical/Android will automatically migrate your data (just confirm in that information dialog on launch that you wish to do that by tapping the SETUP button).

If you choose to temporarily uninstall PimlicalA prior to a reinstall, make certain you check the box to retain Pimlical's data, as otherwise, AOS will not only uninstall PimlicalA, but also permanently delete all the local data and preferences! In general, it's probably a good idea to retain the old Pimlical folder as backup for a while.  Also menu | About will now display the new, full path to the Pimlical folder in "scoped storage".

For even more detailed, step by step instructions, reference this document.

My AntiVirus Software is complaining that PimlicalA is "dangerous" or "suspicious"
Just ignore that erroneous message. Many badly written AV programs use heuristics (a fancy word for supposedly "intelligent" guesses) to try and figure out if programs are a problem or not. There is no way to know why this erroneous message appears. It might be that some Java library that Pimlical uses was also used by some malware, and the AV program then just assumes that ANY program that uses that java library must also be a problem (which is obviously a ridiculous assumption). Or it maybe that the Company flags all apps that are not in its proprietary database as being "suspicious".

AutoSync is failing with System Error or other Error Message
Autosync can fail for a number of reasons (sometimes the dropbox server seems unavailable(?!). Sometimes the contents of the calendar on the server get corrupted because of an interrupted file copy, etc. However, as of August 2022, there is a new issue:

Dropbox no longer permits applications (like Pimlical) to store the login credentials and re-use them. So you have to log in fresh to dropbox every time. This means that on both the desktop and the phone, you have to RESET AUTOSYNC first before using it (P/D: Special menu, P/A: Debug Menu). V-4.x.x of P/A and P/D both have a preference option AlwaysResetBeforeAutoSync that will do this automatically for you.

Unfortunately, since this was a security measure by dropbox, there is no way to defeat it or work around it.

Alarms are not reliable, floating update not taking place, Widget is not refreshing, other odd things happening
Make sure that you have disabled battery optimization in the Android System Settings. Pimlical has many background tasks and activities, and if battery optimization is enabled, the Android OS will prevent Pimlical from executing those tasks!

No Google/Android calendars show up when I go into menu | Select Calendar, but they ARE there in the built-in Calendar App
You have inadvertently denied Pimlical permission to access your Android calendars, most likely because of some glitch while installing the upgrade, or because of a misunderstanding as to why Pimlical is asking for access to your calendar. Go into system settings | Apps | PimlicalA | permissions and make sure that ALL permissions have been granted to Pimlical/Android. Then force-stop and relaunch Pimlical and your calendars should appear. If that fails to resolve the issue, UNINSTALL Pimlical, then download and REINSTALL Pimlical as that completely resets the OS permissions for PImlical. Note that when you reinstall, you WILL be asked for permission to access three items - you MUST grant permission to Pimlical or it can not run. If it still fails, try force-stopping Pimlical, then manually turn OFF all four permissions (in Settings | Apps | PimlicalApp | Permissinos), then uninstall Pimlical, reboot your Android device  and then reinstall Pimlical and grant all the requested permissions.

With the latest release, a Shopping Cart Icon shows up in what should be blank spots in Edit dialog
You have an old version of the Android OS, V-6.0.1 and it appears there's a bug either in the compatibility libraries that Google provides for Android-11 (with which P/A has to be compiled), or in an incompatibility between those libraries and V-6.0.1 of the Android OS (specifically, google is clipping off the high order bit of an 8-bit signed byte so instead of 1111 1111 (-1) it presents 0111 1111 (Decimal 127). Since it is not possible to fix Google's software, the only workaround (imperfect, but better than nothing) is to install a custom Icon collection that blanks out the Shopping Cart Icon (#127). After downloading this file:
1.     Force-Stop Pimlical/Android
2.     Delete the IconArchive.dat file in the Pimlical folder on the phone
3.     MOVE the file you downloaded from the above link to the Pimlical folder on the phone
4.     RENAME the file to IconArchive.dat
5.     Relaunch Pimlical

DirectSync is not working on my new Moto phone - but identical settings worked fine previously! Is this a bug in the phone?
Yes it is. There is a bug in that phone the most obvious symptom of which is that the SEND TO: dialog fails to display the IP address and port number that you set in the preferences in P/A (obviously check that HttpAddressesForSync and PortNumberForNetworkSync are set properly first). The apparent solution to this is to force stop your "Wall paper App" which is preinstalled on that phone (unfortunately, you cannot remove this app). The dialog will still be blank, but then DirectSync should at least work. Hopefully, Motorola will fix this bug at some point. This flaw is not present on any other standard Android phones. See this message thread on the Pimlical Forum for more information.

The List (or Day, Day+) View is blank (new issue in V-3.5.29) or only displays 1 day
V-3.5.29 of Pimlical is now compiled with the Android OS 4.1 libraries and there's a bug in the OS whereby Out Of Memory Exceptions are not reported properly, and as a result, Pimlical does not reduce the number of days in that view to match available memory. Solution is to either (a) reduce the pointsize of that view (Preference: ListViewFont) or reduce the number of days in that view (Menu | Views | Long-press the List+ button). Note that depending on the density of events, you may need to step it back a bit more than the minimum value in order to avoid some other list page not displaying. If an Out Of Memory condition occurs, Pimlical automatically sets the List View to display 1 day to ensure the view displays - you can then advance that number to a value which still results in the list view being displayed consistently.

V-3.5.44 and later will request more memory to be allocated to Pimlical/Android, and that should provide some relief for this issue for most users.

Help! I just installed P/A and ALL my events have disappeared!!
First of all, nothing is lost. Most likely, due to a hiccough in the Android OS while upgrading (or possibly due to an inadvertent user error), the new Permissions feature that now has to be supported for OS 6.0 and later is interfering. Go into System Settings | Apps | PimlicalA | Permissions and make certain that you have granted permission to External Storage, Calendar, and Contacts (Phone permission is only needed if you intend to use Pimlical to dial phone numbers). If ANY one of those three permissions was not granted, that's your problem, and fixing that should take care of the issue. If not, try uninstalling and reinstalling Pimlical (you will note it asks for those three permissions on startup). You may also need to go back into menu | Select Calendars to make sure the calendars you are using are properly selected. If you just installed V-3.9 or V-4.0 - see the second FAQ above.

I now constantly see an Alarm Clock icon on the Status bar - how do I remove it?
Pimlical was forced to switch to use the AlarmClock function in V-3.7.15 because Google is apparently unwilling/unable to fix the bugs in the RTC Clock alarm. However, as a side-effect of that, the Android OS now always displays that icon because Pimlical always has an alarm set for the next event with an alarm. To remove that icon, google for how do i get rid of the alarm clock icon on {device}?  where {device} is your brand/model of phone (there are many different procedures depending on what phone you have). The AlarmClock function is also used to trigger the advance of Floating Events (AdvanceFloatingEventsTime), so even if you have no future events with alarms, you would still see an alarm set at 2am, unless you disable the advance by setting that preference to midnight (00:00/12:00a). However, if you do that, floating events with alarms set to trigger you first look at Pimlical (which will force the advance), will not go off because the date has not yet been advanced on them, so this is not recommended.

On most phones you can Open your Notification Panel, press and hold the Settings Icon for a couple of seconds (until it starts spinning) and then release. That adds the option System UI Tuner to the system section and there's an option there to hide the Alarm icon. Samsung (as usual) inexplicably disabled this ability, so you will need to do this with an application from your desktop - Click Here to download a zip file for windows - unpack contents to any folder, connect phone to desktop and enable USB Debugging in Developer Options (to see Developer Options, Go into [Settings]. Tap on [About device] and repeatedly tap on the [Build Number] until a toast notification comes up stating you have enabled developer options). Then click on System UI Tuner.exe to launch it and the System UI Tuner window will appear on your desktop where you can then change some of the settings (not all changes are supported though, but the alarm icon can be removed this way).

You can also choose to go back to the older (but less reliable) RTC CLock alarm by setting the preference: UseAlarmClockForAlarms to False (default value is True). Pimlical will then use the prior alarm mechanism which does not cause the Android OS to put that icon in the status bar. However, if you contact Tech Support complaining about unreliability in the Alarm function, you will of course be told to set this preference back to True as that is the precise reason Pimlical switched to using the Alarm Clock function.

Some Alarms are getting missed now
To get alarms to work properly and reliably, you must first be using V-3.7.15 or later of Pimlical/Android as that version now uses the more reliable OS AlarmClock feature to set alarms (previously, the Android OS RTC alarm feature would fail on occasion). Also you may need to Whitelist PimlicalCalendar so that it is not optimized as "optimization" means that the OS is permitted to change the behavior of  alarms (!). You should also allow Pimlical to run in the background. Finally, a "swipe-close" on Pimlical may act as a force-close in which case any pending alarm set by Pimlical gets canceled (some phones do this, some don't).

Android 10 appears to have a new issue - it seems to no longer properly support the feature of allowing applications to re-launch themselves after boot-up in order to reschedule alarms. If you see this problem on your phone, for now at least, just launch Pimlical one time after re-starting your phone.

Android OS 10 (and 11 and 12) still have a bug whereby when you change the preference for SnoozeNotificationSound, FloatNotificationSound and CustomNotificationSound, you must also use the CLEAR DATA option in the system APP settings for Pimlical in order to have those changes recognized by the Android OS. Remember that on an update, your sounds may change/relocate, and become inaccessible to Pimlical (phone turns on but no sound appears - also, usually creating an error file referencing createAlarmNotification2()...). The Clear Data option will also fix that problem too.

I tap the screen but often nothing happens - this also happens on a long-press on an item, why is Pimlical ignoring it?
If you have a pretty high resolution screen, you are probably moving your finger on the screen as you tap/press it. So the Android OS interprets the gesture as a Fling or Scroll operation instead. The latest release of Pimlical/Android now has a special preference: FingerSlipThreshold with a default value of -1.  That is changed by Pimlical to a value that should be appropriate for your phone and avoid this issue, but if you are still experiencing an issue, try adjusting this to a higher value and see if that helps. What this preference does is tell Pimlical that in a Fling or Scroll operation, if the finger only moved a small distance, then it should be interpreted as a tap or press. This is especially worth doing on a device with an HD screen (and very definitely with 4k screens!). Pimlical is probably one of very few applications that simultaneously supports taps, long-presses, scrolls and Flings on the main screen, which is why you might not see this issue in most simple applications. Some devices (like Samsung) seem to have a bigger problem with this than other devices, perhaps because of custom modifications to the Android OS(?).

I am losing preferences and seeing them unexpectedly reset/seeing error messages, etc.
Look in the Pimlical folder for error files (files that have the word 'error' in the filename or extension). If you see error messages that contains messages referring to a rename problem such as: Failed to rename temporary file to current!, this usually indicates you are having an issue with badly written antivirus software. The problem is that when Pimlical closes out a temporary file, before it can rename it, some other process leaps in and locks the file so it can scan it for viruses, and by locking the file, Pimlical is then unable to rename the file. This is, of course, inappropriate behavior - as no application should be stepping in and locking another application's files (!). The antivirus program is assuming, that since the file has been closed, the application won't need to look at it for a while and that should be long enough for it to quickly scan the file, but that's a completely erroneous assumption and leads to this problem as it is quite common to write a temporary file out first (to be sure it gets written properly) and then delete the original and rename the temporary file. It is also a stupid idea as if an application is inserting viruses into its data files, it's not going to be so incredibly dumb as to leave it out in the open where it's obviously detectable.

Anyway, the latest releases of Pimlical attempt to recover from this by repeating the rename operation if the main data file is missing and a temporary file exists - it might be possible to improve the workaround a bit, but the only rational solution is to turn off any "live-scanning" or 'real-time scanning" feature until such time as the company rewrites it properly so it does not interfere with a running application.

My local calendar just disappeared, why? and how do i restore it?
First, to restore your local calendar, go into menu | Select Local calendar and tap the RESTORE button and pick an earlier restore point - for more information on backup and restore - see the helpful video in menu | Help & USage Tips | online manual.

Second, do you have Anti-Virus software installed? Several AntiVirus programs are badly designed and interfere with the normal operation of Pimlical/Android (in particular, they are instantly locking closed files, thereby preventing P/A from renaming files). Programs such as Avast, should likely be removed until such time as the developer updates them to function properly in a multi-tasking environment (the value of such programs with the android OS has yet to be confirmed anyway according to most reviewers).

Finally, look in the Pimlical folder for any error files (files with a TXT extension and usually the word 'error' as part of the filename, such as UncaughtException_ErrorXXXX.txt) and send those files here for analysis if you see any.

Items entered in Pimlical/Android are not appearing in Google Calendar OR How do I set the default calendar for new events?
Pimlical/Android by default uses the same/identical database as the built-in calendar application, so the first step is to make sure that a newly created item in the built-in Android calendar application syncs to Google, as if that is not working, Pimlical/Android won't work either (make sure you have sync enabled, etc.).

Second, did you assign the item created in P/A to a Google calendar? By default, P/A will use the first calendar in the database and on some phones, there is a local calendar (called things like MyCalendar PC-Sync etc.) which does not sync. Make certain in the Edit dialog that you have a Google calendar selected. You can set Pimlical/Android to always create an item in a specific calendar by setting the preference DefaultApptCategory (and DefaultFloatCategory, DefaultTaskCategory) to the name of the calendar you want to use (with earlier versions of P/A you had to type in the calendar name, prefixed with A_ , but all newer versions provide a selection list for this function.

Third - did you click on Refresh in Google Calendar to be sure the item is missing? If you still have a problem, ensure you have the latest release of Pimlical/Android and if it still fails, contact tech support at the link at the top of the page.

The Date Picker (or Time Picker) isn't displaying all the digits properly
There's a calculation error in some versions of the Android OS that can cause the default fontsize to be just slightly too big. To fix this, just adjust the preference DatePickerFont (or TimePickerFont) to a slightly smaller fontsize.

How do I set up an event to repeat on more than one day in a week?
The answer is to realize you are wanting an even that repeats on a WEEKLY basis, and if you setup a weekly repeat, you will see there are checkboxes that allow you to select which days of the week you want the event to repeat on. So if you want the event to repeat on weekend days only, just check the boxes for Saturday and Sunday, etc.

How do I set up Pimlical so it always opens with today's view?
This is a very basic question, so we recommend that you read through the online manual (menu | Help & Usage Tips | Online Manual) as this indicates there's likely a lot of functionality you are overlooking. The simplest way to make this change is to go into menu | Views and pick an item in the dropdown list for the Startup View (all views start with today unless you pick the option to preserve the last view and date). For more control, edit a filter and make the appropriate adjustments in the Repeat Rule & Views Pane (last pane with repeat icon) and the Date Rule Pane (calendar icon).

Keep in mind that there is no concept of exiting an application in the Android OS. You may THINK you are 'exiting' the program by hitting the back button, home button or even using menu | Exit in Pimlical, but the program remains running -- all that happens is that the Android OS displays the Home Screen, or last viewed application. So when you subsequently tap the Pimlical icon in the Home Screen, you are not launching the application - rather you are just switching back to it (as you would say in Windows by using Alt/Tab). However, since most users think they are 'exiting' the application, Pimlical does try and simulate this by setting a flag so that when it gets re-activated, it acts as if it is being launched and obeys the startup view.

Google Calendar syncs some, but not all items, in the calendar to Android Calendar that Pimlical/Android uses
By default, the Android calendar sync routines do not sync the entire contents of each Google Calendar. It appears that older (more than approximately one month?) non-recurring events do not get synced. You can temporarily force the Android calendar sync routine to sync everything by going into Pimlical Desktop, selecting all items in that calendar in Advanced Find, then clicking on Find then Shift and leaving the shift value at 0 and click on OK. That will mark all items as recently modified. However, it appears on some Android phones, this strategy only works for a short period of time.

How do I get a link to the latest version of Pimlical/Android?

Send an email to the Tech Support email address: SWSupport@PimlicoSoftware.com with this subject line: Pimlical/Android Download Request and you will get an email back usually within a few hours with a link to the latest release. You must send the email from the email address that you originally used to purchased the application with in order to get the download link. If you no longer have that information, email tech support directly and try and provide as much identifying information as possible to locate your original order.

I have the latest version of Pimlical/Android but it just exits with NOT LICENSED or TRIAL VERSION.

You will not be licensed unless the ReferenceID displayed in menu | About matches the information in Pimlico's registration database. Go into Menu | About and look at the ReferenceID and send that to Pimlico Tech Support along with your full name, address and if possible, the original email address you used when you purchased Pimlical. It will then take some 24-48 hours for new license files to be uploaded, so try again in some 24-48 hours by going into menu | About to see the change take effect. If you have no email account on the device, your ReferenceID will typically be the Device ID. You can not change your ReferenceID.

Text is truncated and mangled in the Edit Dialog and several other dialogs
At this time, Pimlical does not cater to the LARGE font setting in the System Settings (Settings | My Device | Display | Font Size) because it would require a complete redesign of several dialogs which would also make the information much less accessible for the vast majority of users who use the Normal or smaller settings. There are no immediate plans to address this issue. Set the Font Size to Normal to confirm that was the issue with your device. If it was already set to Normal, contact Tech Support.

I can not control the Alarm Volume setting, or alarms sound even when all sound volume settings are turned off, or no alarms sound at all
Some Android phones have no setting for controlling the Alarm Volume (Bug? DDD? (Dumb Design Decision). Although the standard Android OS has such a control,  many Samsung phones have no control over it. In that case, set the preference: UseRingtoneVolumeForAlarms to true and then you can control the Alarm volume by adjusting the Ringtone Volume. 

DirectSync Seems to be losing track of changes made to Floating Events (ex. items marked as complete are coming back as incomplete, etc.)

If you advance floating events on both platforms, it is essential that you set the preference FloatAdvanceSetsDirtyFlag to false. Otherwise, whichever platform advances floating events at the latest time will prevail and changes made to the floating event on the other platform will be overwritten.
 

DirectSync can't find my phone as a drive when I mount it with USB cable - or can I sync via network instead of USB?

Some Android devices have Phone Storage which is internal to the phone and which does not appear as a PC drive to many applications (including Pimlical) when mounted via USB cable. In that case, we recommend that you use an app like WebSharing (available on GooglePlay) which can mount the Phone Storage as a network drive that Pimlical can see. This also works well in general for syncing from P/A on any Android device to P/D and appears to be fast and reliable.
 

Pimlical does not launch at all and indicates it needs to be restarted
If you see this error immediately after your device has been upgraded to Android 4.x from an earlier version of the Android OS, the most likely explanation is that you are using an old version of Pimlical/Android released before this new version of the OS. Android 4.x is not backwards compatible with respect to the Android calendar, so you must install a version of P/A released after that updated appeared. Go to your private download link to download the latest release of P/A, or if you have forgotten it/lost it, send an email to technical support with the subject line Pimlical/Android Download Request.

Otherwise, if you see this error when you try and run Pimlical/Android for the first time, this usually indicates that either (a) you have an incompatible Android device (see minimum requirements), or (b) you have something highly unusual in your If calendar that is causing an issue. In the latter case, contact technical support right away, and preferably arrange for the email address: PimlicoSoftware@gmail.com to be granted access to the calendar that is causing the problem.

If this problem occurs after Pimlical has been running previously ok, it indicates that some major corruption is present. The fastest way to get back up and running is to attach the phone to the desktop and rename the Pimlical folder to say Pimlical-Problem. Then relaunch Pimlical which will rebuild all the standard, default preference settings. By renaming the folder, you will then be able to communicate with Technical Support and the cause of the failure can be determined.
 

Why is every word capitalized in the title field of an event?
Everything like this is almost always controlled by a preference setting. You may find it useful at some point to just peruse all the preference settings by going through each section of preferences and scrolling through all of them to see the wealth of things that you can change to customize this application to meet your needs. For example, by default every word is capitalized for an event, but the preference: AutoCapitalizeEventTitle can be set to false if you don't like that behavior.
 
Pimlical seems sluggish when moving from view to view or day to day
If you have a lot of very large note fields, and a large number of records in the database, trying to display the note field in the main views may be the problem on slower devices, so try setting the preference IncludeNote to false.

How do you scroll the display in the Day/Day+ views?
Scroll by pressing down at top center of the screen and then drag down the screen - an up/down stroke in the center of the screen causes the display to scroll. In most cases it is not an issue unless you are using very small time slots (such as 15min) or toggled the display to show all 24 hours of timeslots even though nothing is present in them. If you do that, you can minimize the issue by selecting a briefer duration between the Start time and End time for the day in preferences. Also keep in mind there is a menu option to toggle the display of untimed events on and off as usually the problem is a large number of floating events at the beginning of Todays' schedule.
 
Items entered in Pimlical/Android are not appearing in Google Calendar OR How do I set the default calendar for new events?
Make sure that the item is marked as being in a Google Calendar in the Edit Dialog. By default, P/A will put items in the first calendar it finds, and if this calendar is a local or other calendar (such as PC Sync, or My calendar), it won't appear in Google Calendar. You can set a permanent default for the calendar that P/A uses by going into Menu | Preferences and changing the preference DefaultApptCategory (or DefaultFloatCategory for floats) to the name of the Android calendar prefixed with A_ (so if the calendar is 'My Appts', set this preference to 'A_My Appts'). if you are using Pimlical's local calendar, you would just set it to the category in the local calendar.
 
I have just upgraded, but cannot see the new hi-rez icons which are supposedly in this upgrade.
When upgrading, your existing icon collection is never overwritten because you might have customized it. If you have not customized your collection, you can safely delete the existing icon collection (UserIcons.dat in the Pimlical folder for Pimlical/Desktop, or IconArchive.dat in the Pimlical folder for Pimlical/Android) and the new icon collection will appear when you next launch Pimlical.
 
Icons in Pimlical/Android are the wrong size or some icons are hidden at the bottom of the screen.
Especially, when upgrading and using a new icon collection, you may find that the icon sizes in the icon selection dialog are too big or too small for you taste. You can control the size of the icons in that dialog with the preferences: IconDisplayWidth and IconDisplayHeight. If it looks like the number of rows is incorrect (a problem on just a few Android devices), you can use the preferences: FixNumberOfIconRows and FixNumberOfIconRowsLandscape to fix the number of icon rows to a suitable value for your device. You can also control the size of the icons displayed in the EventSelectionList with the preference: SelectionListIconSize.
 
I have icons in my desktop collection that I can't see in Pimlical/Android
You can always generate a compatible icon collection for Pimlical/Android provided that you have all the separate graphics available in a folder (on installation of Pimlical/Desktop, there is an icon folder that has all the graphics that comprise the collection of graphics used in Pimlical/Desktop's icon collection). Just use the EXPORT button in Menu | Icon Management in Pimlical/Desktop to generate an IconArchive.dat file that you can then copy to the Pimlical folder on your phone's sd (or virtual SD) card. Then force-stop Pimlical or kill it with a task killer and relaunch Pimlical and you will then see the matching icons.
 
The font sizes used in Pimlical/Android aren't right for this phone
With tens of thousands of different Android devices out there (and all slightly different,) it's not easy to try and come up with default font sizes that work well on every device. However, it only takes a moment to change them. On initial install, you do have a chance to preset most font sizes to either a Small set (suitable for low-rez devices) or a Large or Huge set (suitable for very high-rez devices) instead of using the  standard defaults. You can change the font sizes of various items in the User Interface by going into menu | Preferences | DisplayFonts. In any view, you can use an up-down (or down-up) stroke on the right edge of the screen to dynamically change the size of text in that view (every view remembers the font size independently) to match what you like to see. The option to pick small/standard/large/huge fonts is only shown once when Pimlical is launched after being installed. You can get those options to re-display by setting the preference: ShowHelpOnStartup to true and then going into menu | Help & Usage Tips. If you want to have Pimlical retain the original font settings, uncheck all four boxes.
 
Sync with Exchange Server does not work, or only works one way
The following post about this problem (which is not a Pimlical/Android issue) may be helpful:


Some deeper digging in the internet showed that other users have the same problem. They describe that the sequence in how the accounts are added to the phone influence if Exchange is showing up in the calendar app or not. Many users solved the problem by completely resetting the phone and to set up the Exchange account before setting up the Google account.

This is not necessary! Here is a solution which works without completely resetting your phone:

  1. Delete the Exchange account under “Settings > Accounts and Sync”
  2. Delete the calendar data by going into Settings, Applications, and selecting both Calendar and Calendar Storage, then “Delete data”
  3. Re-add the exchange account.

Please note that your Exchange calendar won’t be deleted; but if you have items in your local calendar they will be gone after these steps!

I see a new version in Menu | About | What's New, but Upgrade button says I have latest version
When a new version is released, it is first posted on the web site along with an updated Revision History, but not marked as an official version. The Pimlical Forum is then notified of the new release so that highly experienced users download it first. That way, if there is any unexpected issue say on a particular phone, it can get addressed before the entire user base starts downloading it. If no major issues are found, Pimlico then marks it as an official upgrade and at that point, the Upgrade button will recognize it as a new official release. That process typically takes around 3-4 days to run its course. Also, when Google or Amazon Market choose to upgrade your phone with the new version is not something that is under the control of Pimlico Software.

If you purchased Pimlical/Android some time ago directly from Pimlico Software, you can get a link to the upgrade by sending an email with the subject line: Pimlical/Android Download Request to Tech Support.
 

I am in an unusual timezone and get an error: ERROR: TimeZone Problem.....
If you see an error message like: ERROR: TimeZone Problem, Home, Current or Creation Timezone Specified in Preference database is not in correct format or references an undefined Timezone or DST Rule, this most likely means that your particular timezone has not been defined in the Worldtimezones.txt database. If this is the case, you need to add a line to the Worldtimezones.txt file that is in the Pimlical folder on the phone (use either an Android text editor like Jota, or connect phone to PC and use notepad.exe to edit the file). Add the line in this format (this example is for Saskatchewan that uses Central time, but no DST rule):

-06:00 Canada/East-Saskatchewan[Sask]

The first character is - for timezones West of GMT and + for timezones East of GMT. This is followed by the Offset from GTM in HH and MM. If there is a DST rule, there is a single letter after the GMT offset (See Pimlical Reference Manual for details on how to setup DST rules). This is then followed by the Olsen database name for the timezone. Try and locate the name in the Olsen Database which lists all the Olsen names for timezones. If it's not there, try and at least locate a timezone with the same attributes (GMT offset and DST rule) - if not, make one up (it's ok for Pimlical, but if you sync to Google, Google needs a valid Olsen name). At the end put in the abbreviation for the timezone in brackets (this is arbitrary, so you can use whatever you like there). Close out the Worldtimezones.txt file. Launch Pimlical, go into Menu | Preferences and tap the Date/Time Settings button and that will force a re-read on the current Worldtimezones.txt file in the Pimlical folder and you should then see your new entry and can select it.

One other possibility if you set the correct timezone but it gets corrupted/reset on a regular basis is that your phone does not set the timezone correctly, or does not follow the proper Android standard for designating the current timezone. If that is the case, you can set the preference AutoSetTimezoneFromPhone to false which will prevent P/A from trying to reset the timezone. You can then manually set the timezone in the Date/Time section of preferences, and be assured that P/A will not change them based upon the Android OS.
 

Alarms are not sounding OR Pimlical does not seem to obey Alarm volume setting
First, make sure that your alarm preferences are set up properly (PimlicalAlarmHandling should be set to Local or All). In particular, you may need to explicitly assign an alarm sound to the preference AlarmDefaultSound and AlarmFloatDefaultSound as some Android devices fail to provide any default sounds and also fail to notify an application that the normal Android default isn't even supported. Also, on some Android phones (such as some Samsung phones), the Alarm volume setting is not something displayed in System Settings, so there is no easy way to change it - however, there is a small applet, Volume Manager which you may want to install that does allow you full access to all the sound volume settings.
 
How can I change the number of days displayed in the Day+ view?
Go into Menu | Views and do a long press on the view button for either the Day+/week/Month+/list views and you can change the default number of days/weeks/months that are displayed. You can also set up a filter in Pimlical Desktop, export it and copy it to the Pimlical folder on your phone and then use the import feature to import it into Pimlical/Android. The format of filters in Pimlical/Desktop and Pimlical/Android is the same. There is also an option to allow the Day+ view to be anchored to the start of the week or not.
 
How can I change the color of items or set a default?
Normally calendar colors are set from whatever Google Calendar is using. You can override those colors by changing the color of a calendar, or by setting the preference UseGoogleCalendarColors to false. Go into Menu | Select calendars and briefly tap the calendar in the list. A dialog then appears where you can set the default foreground and background color for the calendar, as well as a default icon. Pure white (255,255,255) and pure black (0,0,0) are treated as default values and are the default settings. To set an explicit white, use (254,254,254) or for black (1,1,1) so Pimlical realizes it's not a default setting for the color.

To set the color of just a single item, go into the edit dialog and towards the bottom of that dialog (scrolling down if necessary), you will see a small F and B (for Foreground/Background) to the right of the Private checkbox - click on that area and you will get a color selection dialog where you can set the foreground and background color for the item. As noted in that dialog, you can preset any color you like into the selection palette through the [Colors] section in Preferences. A custom color set for an event will always override the default color setting for the calendar.
 

The times of my events are shifting by one hour (or more than one hour)
Check the timezone settings carefully. In particular, there are two places in Google Calendar where timezone information is set - globally in the main Settings and in the setting for each individual calendar. Make sure this matches the timezone setting in Pimlical as well as the timezone setting for your phone itself. If your phone is resetting to the wrong timezone (some phones reset to Mountain time when in fact it should be Arizona Time), then change the preference AutoSetTimezoneFromPhone to false and manually set the timezones in the Date/Time Items sectdion of Preferences.
 
There's some funny text/characters at the start of the note field - why is it there?
Pimlical has many advanced features not present in any other calendar application. The only way in which these advanced features can be maintained is by putting tags (in square brackets) at the start of the note field as the note field is guaranteed to be updated properly by all conduit software. These tags are of course hidden in all versions of Pimlical. When Google fixes the bug in Android whereby the ExtendedProperties field is trashed by their Android sync software, it will then be possible to change the preference UseGoogleExtendedProperties to true at which point the tags will be hidden in Google Calendar at least as the tags can be put in that hidden field. There are no such options with Outlook or other calendar applications, so the tags do have to be there. If you just use Pimlical/Desktop and Google calendar, you can use the Extended properties field as Pimlical properly supports it (with the caveat that if that calendar syncs with any other application, that other application's sync software may destroy that field.
 
Accented characters are not displaying properly after DirectSync to other platform
This will be an encoding issue. You need to set the preference: JavaDefaultEncoding to be matched on both platforms. If they are currently blank, try changing them to read UTF-8 as that will likely resolve this issue. If you are using a non-Roman language, note that any valid encoding that is permitted by Java can be used in Pimlical - just make sure both platforms are properly matched, and also always re-test with newly created memos and not old memos as changing this preference is not likely to retroactively correct any encoding issues.

Note: if your operating system does not support accented characters in filenames, then you should avoid their use for things like category names or titles of memos.
 
Pimlical is slowing down because of a large number of old appointments - how can I archive them?
Simplest way to handle setting up an archive for use in Pimlical/Android is to use Pimlical/Desktop and do this:

1. In Pimlical Desktop, go into advanced find, hit clear, then pick a start date of 1-jan-1900 and an end date of say 31-dec-2009 and hit ok
2. Click on CHANGE and specify a category of ARCHIVE (create that category if necessary) and click on OK
3. Set the preference ApptCategoriesToSync to only include the Archive category.
4. Create an archive calendar on the handheld called say PimlicalArchive.dat - you can easily create that by just duplicating PimlicalLocalCalendar.dat under that name so that both PimlicalLocalCalendar.dat and PimlicalArchive.dat are in the PimlicalCalendars folder.
5. Do a sync overwrite from desktop to PimlicalArchive.dat (ApptCategoriesToSync will only copy the Archive category).
6. Change ApptCategoriesToSync to include ALL categories, EXCEPT "Archive"
7. Sync normally now from desktop to PimlicalLocalCalendar.dat

On the desktop, you can see all your events by just displaying all categories. In Pimlical/Android, to view the archived items, you would go into menu | Select Local Calendar and select the Archive calendar to look at (and then do that again to return to viewing the regular calendar).

What is the difference between Floating Events and Tasks? They look very similar
They are very similar, and tasks exist largely for historical reasons rather than as a necessity to manage task-type functions. Most Pimlical users only use floating events, but users who were used to having a separate tasks app/database, or who are still syncing to or using third party apps that need the old Palm MDB databases find it essential to have this function maintained.

The most obvious difference is that every instance of a repeat floating event appears in the database, while only the next occurrence of a repeat task appears in the database.  There are significant differences in how repeat floats and repeat tasks are managed - the former automatically reschedules itself to the next occurrence and drops a non-repeat instance of the item as a reminder on that instance day. Also, repeat floating events support a reschedule from checkoff date, so if you set a repeat float with a 60 day repeat interval but check it off thirty days later, it will reschedule in another 60 days rather than just 30 days.

There are also separate tasks views in Pimlical/Desktop and Pimlical/Android, for users who just want to focus on those items.  Floating events share the same set of categories as regular events, while tasks have their own separate set of categories. The start/end dates of a task are tied closely to the due date, while the start/end dates of floating events are not. Users who regularly export their calendar in iCalendar format may want to keep their tasks as tasks rather than floats so they can be easily excluded from the output file.

Over the years, the attributes of floats and tasks have become closer and closer as users have asked for the same capabilities in both items, so if you are wondering whether you should use floats or tasks, or why both are present, chances are you can ignore tasks and just use floating events.

How do I link an appointment to a contact?
There are many commands available as a popup when the Event Selection List is displayed (this list pops up whenever a brief tap is made on a day in any view). The popup commands are accessed with a long press on the event. Scroll towards the end of the list to access the commands that allow you to add and view a linked contact (there is no limit on the number of contacts you can link). Note too that you can change the order of the popup commands and also choose which ones are displayed.
 
A brief message ("toast") appears but I can't read it because it flashes off the screen too quickly
Some devices seem to have shorter display times than others. However, there is a preference, LongDurationForMessages that you can set to TRUE to tell the Android OS to display the message for a longer period of time than usual - so you might want to set that preference.

How do I schedule an event that repeats on every other day of the second-to-last week of every month that has a new moon in the first two weeks of that month, (but not if there is a lunar eclipse in that month)?
In the Repeat dialog, tap the center of the screen 11 times in rapid succession and then stroke the Kanji character for the Moon at top left, then press the back button for exactly 273 seconds and a dialog will open allowing you to enter this event (Be sure to check the box saying 'skip event if new moon coincides with lunar eclipse'). And time it carefully as if you hold the back button down for more than 275 seconds it causes a hard reset and engages a normally unused stepup transformer that converts the 5v from the internal battery into 440V at 10 amps which can cause a bit of a surprise to the unsuspecting novice and likely result in dropping the phone). Glad to see you reading the FAQ's.


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