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What kind of appointment book or planner do use/like the best?

Microsoft Outlook and Blackberry

Google calendar and Android.

MS Outlook, iPad, iPhone.
And the Filofax is great!!

Here's one for you:

PLAIN PAPER APPOINTMENT BOOK!

I used to use iCal, Outlook, et al and then one day a couple of things hit me:

1. I was held hostage by constant upgrades that were no longer backward compatible, etc.
2. I had to keep multiple backups in case I ever lost data (which happened occasionally during syncs)
3. It feels good to not have the computer involved in every single thing we do.

So I sprung for $15 and bought one of these:



No syncing, no worries about crashing and data loss, no worry about OS required updates and patches, etc.

Best $15 I spent this year.

YESSSSSS! I am getting a bit tired of mandatory expensive updates and endless fiddling with data entry. My old card file boxes are looking more and more attractive each day.

Lol my question was about paper appointment books/planners. I was wondering which ones specifically are considered good. What kind of layout they should have etc.

I use something called the Moleskine weekly notebook. It's in soft cover, something that vaguely feels like leather, but you can also get it in hardcover. It has Monday through Sunday on the left page (verso) and a lined page for notes on the right (recto).

http://www.moleskine.com/us/collect...s-weekly-notebook-black-soft-cover-large

Anything Moleskine is wonderful. The paper is really good quality. I like to write with fountain pens, and I use Molskine for my journals, etc.

LOL, Interesting topic. I used a DayMinder weekly planner before getting an iPad, they're good.

If you become a working piano technician you'll have to make a lot of choices and decisions during any given day. You might as well start with the tough ones like finding the right appointment book.

It's beyond me why anyone would use Google calendar! Google already knows enough about me without having to know my whereabouts every day.

I don't worry about that, I have nothing to hide and besides, my tinfoil hat protects me from almost everything else.

Suit yourself.

I volunteer for a group that uses Google calendar to schedule it's volunteers. Imagine my surprise, when dates I'd agreed to volunteer on appeared on my phone calendar without me entering them. My phone is tied to Google calendar. Somehow, the group had been able to access my calendar and add appointments to it without my permission. There is a switch on Google calendar to turn this off, which I did. Why Google would allow third party access to my calendar is beyond me.

I have both a planner that shows a full month on two facing pages. Also, I use Google Calendar and CalenMob on my iPhone. CalenMob seems better at harvesting all my Google calendars. I keep several different calendars with different colors. iPhone's Calendar program just doesn't seem to be able to keep everything straight.

I thought it was interesting when I was tuning pianos at Interlochen during their pre-camp prep time a couple of weeks ago that they use Google Calendar. I have noticed that many organizations do.

What I like about the online/computer calendar is that it is available on both of our computers here at headquarters and also out at the customers on my iPhone if I need to schedule something at that location. It's always up to date. And Google has far more reliable backup strategies in place than I do and I probably have better backup procedures than most people reading this list. (I maintain two backup drives -- alternating between the one attached to the computers and one that is offsite).

I still appreciate paper, though. It's really easier to flip through than the computer in some respects.

When the service is "free," you're the commodity! You guys can continue making Google rich, but I'll pass.

I have one of these for every year that I was in business. It got a bit tiresome answering customers who were amused that I used such an old fashioned thing as an appointment book. But I stuck with it anyway. Once every three months or so, I'd run it through the copy machine for backup.

Technically correct, but . . .

The ads aren't obtrusive. I have completely tuned them out at this point. My mind just assigns "not pertinent" to certain areas of the screen and I normally don't even see it. I consider it a small price for something that would take substantial money to duplicate.

The DayMinder is what I've been looking at so far so maybe that's what I will use. Which size did you have?

I might as well start a good habit of organization before I'm ready to be a technician.

Mine is about a 5 X 7. Perfect size for carrying around. When you open it up, it shows the whole week at a glance.

Best part is, it's your eyes only.