Todays Alarm Clock - Memory Hog?

I use my playbook as my daily wakeup alarm, it concerns me that the OS sometimes closes todays alarm clock by itself.

Today i come home to my playbook and its running at 80megs of memory left just with these apps open:

battery guru
todays alarm clock
music browser (not playing anything)
app world

i click on the native browser, immediate crash, started to close apps one by one to see if i could free up the memory, after each app closed i would try to launch the native browser.
The browser would NOT load until i closed every app except battery guru, the biggest spike was going from 150megs to 398megs when i closed todays alarm clock.

anybody else see these symptons? Before I would see out of memory notifications, now i just noticed apps being closed by themselves :confused:

bump nobody else multi-tasks their playbook?

I've experienced the same. Just kill the app during the day, reset the PB before sleeping, turn on app.

Originally Posted by bahandi

I've experienced the same. Just kill the app during the day, reset the PB before sleeping, turn on app.

great so i gotta jump through hoops to get this thing to work.............. daily.

has anybody else noticed the OS will close apps now? instead of displaying out of memory?

Jump through hoops? Why would you have an app you use as a "wake up alarm" constantly running? And I hardly consider pressing the battery icon then restart so difficult.

Hmm, experienced that, but I typically only get the alarm up and running right before I go to sleep. No need to keep it on during the day for me.

i've had my playbook since nov. and i have yet to do anything that would require multitasking. i use today alarm to wake up and on occasion for the radio selection but if i have the radio playing then i have no need to use anything else on the playbook, but that's just me... i don't know how you measure what apps use the most memory though., all in all i haven't had any problems with today's alarm, the only thing that bugs me about it is the constant updates it gets, and that the radio is reduced to practically thumbnail size when your alarm goes off.

also i'll add that the few times that i've had an app or browser crash on me is when i have it bridged to my phone. so if you are having issues check and see if it is when it's bridged.

jumping through hoops, such as resetting the OS and closing and starting the app on a daily basis,

those are considered jumping through hoops for me.

i prefer a setup where i do not need to turn it on and off on a daily basis, i utilize the saved alarm feature and leave the app running in background all the time, i figure since the app has this built into it, it should function as designed.

what i believe is happening is the weather/news/radio is updating and there is no program code to dump previous memory, or free up its memory to accept the new data streams,

i thought we bought a piece of hardware that is praised for its multitasking capabilities? :eek:

i can see memory usage by looking in the hardware section and how much memory is being used, also in conjunction with batteryguru

seems to me that leaving an app running all day is a great way to burn out your battery, never mind the memory - regardless of which device youre using. i use my pb as my daily alarm as well, but use clock xr, which i fire up before i plug it in for the night.

since firing up and closing down an app takes a swipe and about a second, its probably just about forming a new habit and reorganizing your favourites tab to improve quick access.

that said, i hope os2 improves the built-in clock alarm. it isnt even as functional as my pos 9700 running os5. that would solve the op's problems re wanting something to set and forget.

Please explain, what does the "save alarm" feature have to do with keeping it running in the background?

You've got a bunch of answers now, none as "extreme" as mine. All of them stating that you just need to kill the app. I'm sorry that two swipes is too much work for you. Perhaps the PlayBook isn't the device for you.

I agree with Afgui, you should be able to set the alarm and forget it. You should not have to remember to start every day/night. The alarm clock that is built into the playbook does not have to be started or restarted, you set your alarm and it always works, for the time and days you set. I'm guessing that the apps don't have hooks into the Operating System and rather than running in a mode that is integrated into/with the OS, they run on the side. Unfortunately, that is a weakness. The clock/radio with alarm that sits on my dresser does not have to be started every night. I set the alarm time, make it active, and it works every night, until, well until someone unplugs it or changes the setting. Perhaps many of the Playbook users are too young to remember these old fashion alarm clocks.
:)

Originally Posted by schmidjaschmidja

I agree with Afgui, you should be able to set the alarm and forget it. You should not have to remember to start every day/night. The alarm clock that is built into the playbook does not have to be started or restarted, you set your alarm and it always works, for the time and days you set. I'm guessing that the apps don't have hooks into the Operating System and rather than running in a mode that is integrated into/with the OS, they run on the side. Unfortunately, that is a weakness. The clock/radio with alarm that sits on my dresser does not have to be started every night. I set the alarm time, make it active, and it works every night, until, well until someone unplugs it or changes the setting. Perhaps many of the Playbook users are too young to remember these old fashion alarm clocks.
:)

i'm confused by this; i assume you mean opening and closing the app. which takes no more then a simple touch, which is equivalent to the on/off button on an actual physical alarm clock.
going further; the app DOES let you save alarms and assign what days you want it to go off, recursive, one time, etc. those old fashion clock radios you speak of will go off every night like you say including weekends if YOU don't turn it off before you go to bed. so what's the difference between that and this app other than being too lazy to touch an app before you go to bed??....
you can choose your OWN music from within the playbook or an outside radio station or it's own selection of stations for EACH alarm you set...when you close the app it is all saved, so i'm not understanding the complaints really.... if yours does not do this then try deleting it and redownload.

Okay, to keep this simple, again, think about the alarm clock that comes built into the pb operating system. You set it up, set the alarms, etc. and that's it. You don't have to do anything else, period. No swipes to start/stop/etc, no restarting, no starting an app after a restart, it just works anytime the playbook is on or in stand-by. Doesn't wear out batteries, memory or anything else. I think the issue, in part, is just remembering to start or restart the app every day/night or as needed. Yes, it's simple, but if you forget, you get no alarm. Not the case with the built-in. I set mine 3 months ago, and guess what? The alarm goes off at 6:30 AM, Monday-Friday, without any intervention, without me remembering to start an app, no swipes, restarts, etc. Simple as that.

I installed this application and when I set the location to launch the browser and then blocked tablet.
Do not want to work. With OS 2.0 beta works.

Originally Posted by schmidjaschmidja

Okay, to keep this simple, again, think about the alarm clock that comes built into the pb operating system. You set it up, set the alarms, etc. and that's it. You don't have to do anything else, period. No swipes to start/stop/etc, no restarting, no starting an app after a restart, it just works anytime the playbook is on or in stand-by. Doesn't wear out batteries, memory or anything else. I think the issue, in part, is just remembering to start or restart the app every day/night or as needed. Yes, it's simple, but if you forget, you get no alarm. Not the case with the built-in. I set mine 3 months ago, and guess what? The alarm goes off at 6:30 AM, Monday-Friday, without any intervention, without me remembering to start an app, no swipes, restarts, etc. Simple as that.

I know this thread is a month old, but I have another issue with Today's Alarm Clock. I have several different alarms set, each with a different "radio station" as the alarm sound. Those seem to only work when they feel like it. But the alarm DOES start on time. And when I shut off the individual alarm, the app loudly announces the time and weather as it's supposed to. Am I the only one with this problem? Is there a fix?