How the Planner Works
How PayMe builds your agenda — rocks, water, deadlines, priorities, and the rules the planner follows.
How the Planner Works
The planner builds your agenda day-by-day, filling each day with work until capacity is reached. It runs automatically whenever something changes — you never run it manually.
The result is a rolling 30-business-day horizon: every day shows exactly what you're expected to work on, with start and end times, respecting your work schedule and breaks.
Two kinds of items: rocks and water
Every item on your agenda is either a rock or water.
Rocks — you placed them
A rock is a task you've pinned to a specific day and time. Meetings, calls, scheduled reviews — anything with a real-world time constraint.
Rocks are placed first. The planner never moves them.
How a task becomes a rock: Drag it to a specific time on the timeline, or set a scheduled date + time when creating it.
How a rock becomes water again: Remove its scheduled time (right-click → "Let planner arrange" or clear the scheduled date).
Water — the planner places them
Water tasks have no fixed time. The planner packs them into available gaps around rocks, top-down through the day. When something changes, water reflows automatically.
Visual rules
| Pinned (rock) | Auto-arranged (water) | |
|---|---|---|
| Opacity | 100% (solid) | 60% (translucent) |
| Times | Exactly what you set | Computed by planner |
| On changes | Stays put | May shift |
| Drag behavior | Moves the pin | Pins it (converts to rock) |
How the planner orders water tasks
- Blocked tasks go last — if a task depends on another that isn't done yet, it waits
- Overdue tasks first — past their deadline, need attention now
- Due today next — deadline is today
- Higher priority — priority 1 (critical) before priority 4 (low)
- Nearest deadline — closer deadlines get earlier slots
- Smallest tasks first — tie-breaker: shorter tasks fill gaps more efficiently
Deadlines vs scheduled dates
These are independent concepts:
- Scheduled date = when to work on it. Makes a task a rock.
- Due date (deadline) = when it must be done by. Affects priority ordering.
A task scheduled for Monday can have a Friday deadline. Setting one never changes the other. See Due Dates and Modes for auto, soft, and hard deadline modes.
How allocations appear on the agenda
Unassigned allocation hours show up as "Available · Project Name" blocks — transparent, lowest priority. Click one to create a task and plan that time. As you create tasks, allocation blocks shrink and real task blocks replace them.
Work schedule and breaks
- Work hours: e.g., 9:00–18:00. Nothing scheduled outside these bounds.
- Break: e.g., 13:30–14:30. Water fills the morning, skips the break, resumes in the afternoon.
- Work days: e.g., Monday–Friday. Weekends are skipped.
Each member can have their own schedule.
Deep work and minimum chunks
The "Needs focus" toggle sets a minimum daily block size (2h). A focus task won't be scheduled on a day that only has 45 minutes free — it waits for a day with a big enough gap. Only affects water tasks.
Related
- Due Dates and Modes — auto, soft, hard
- Budget Model — the four-level budget hierarchy
- Key Concepts — the mental model behind PayMe