For most, life is unfortunately all about go go go. Though your trusty BlackBerry does make life more manageable, sometimes (usually after your 200th email) you still need a little reminder. Have you ever forgotten to send an email off on time? Or even to give your boss a call like you were supposed to over 3 hours ago??
The good people at Link-Two offer a few applications to help you through your day-to-day trials and tribulations. One of these applications is Follow Up! Pairing up with your BlackBerry’s native Calendar, Follow Up makes sure you won’t need to jump back and forth from your memo pad or calendar from your email.
Now before I forget, and have Follow Up remind me, let’s jump into the review.
Link-Two – “Making your BlackBerry Better”
The following is an important note; some features of Follow Up can be found in applications such as Empower Html Email Viewer, which was reviewed by moi not too long ago on CrackBerry.com.
Despite this, I decided to give Follow Up a fair shot. Besides, Follow Up does have another trick up its sleeve. Perhaps programs like Empower are not preferred by everyone. It also doesn’t seem to work on my 8310, which may be running an OS currently in beta ;)
So for you, my fellow Users and Abusers, I shall disrobe my BlackBerry of its current OS (no peeking!) and forgo with Empower.
Now as I said before, Follow Up has the ability to let you create a reminder for you email. All of this is done using your Calendar. The newest version of Follow Up even allows you to create a Task entry using your email. Notifier or Task, you decide!
So, let’s get this application into action. After you open up an email, click on your BlackBerry button. You should see Follow Up at the top of the menu, click the BB button once again.
Follow Up…GO!
In this screen you see the subject of the email being used as the subject of the reminder.
Set your time, note the subject.
You know, if you want it set for 6:03am for whatever reason
You can choose from 1 hour, 6 hours, 12 hours, 1 day, 2 days, 1 week or your own custom time (just as you normally would in your Calendar). Once you have your reminder set, click the BB button once again and select “Set Follow-Up”. The reminder will use which ever tone you have set for your typical calendar entries. If you happen to have an entry already in your calendar, and you set your reminder for the exact time, the reminder is moved in order keep the two from conflicting. Why can’t these kids just play nice?
To get the tasks going you have to select the Settings option, then change the default “For reminders use” option from Calendar to Tasks. Save and go back to your email. Whew, I’m not sure about you, but I got a little dizzy. With either the Calendar or Task entry, the body of the email does come up in the notes, which is a nice feature.
decisions decisions
a detailed look at your task at hand…get to it!!
Shall we set a Follow Up?
After a thorough inspection (like I was a Doctor giving a physical) of Follow Up, I would have to say that I was not incredibly impressed with this application. Now may be the time for me to get nice and comfy in a seat next to Ebert and Roper! Having to switch from Calendar to Task and back again was a bit of a yo-yo hassle. With Empower, I could access both from the menu screen. Now, my Google button on my computer may be wearing thin, but my research proves that Link-Two cares what users think of their products and take opinions into consideration. So, feel free to send in your two cents and get the ball rolling for the next upgrade. I hope you folks at Link-Two will look at this issue and include this option for your next version (and hopefully it'll be a free upgrade for thos who pick Follow-Up up right now!). Follow up is available for purchase at the CrackBerry.com store for $19.95. To find out if this is a program built for you, a free trial version is available for download.
Pros
- ability to set reminders using your Calendar or Tasks
- multiple options as to when you would like the reminder to start
Cons
- constantly having to navigate in and out of Follow Up
- Set a specific notifier tone specifically for Follow Up
Download
