A cadence is how often you would like to be in touch with someone. Longtime measures the gap since you last were, and tells you on the dashboard when it has grown longer than you meant it to.

Losing touch with someone is rarely a decision. It is a series of weeks in which nothing in particular happened, and then a realization that it has been two years. A cadence is a way of noticing that before the two years.

Setting a cadence

On a person's page, add a cadence. The interview asks how often you would like to stay in touch — "every couple of months", "twice a year" — and you save it. A cadence is a number and a unit: days, weeks, months or years, shown as "Every 2 Weeks".

You can also set one in passing — "…and I'd like to see her every month" — when you tell the interview about them, whether you start from their page or from the top of any page.

To change it, update the cadence from their page. To remove it, delete it from the ⋮ menu; they will no longer appear in Reconnect, and you can set a new one any time.

How it works

Longtime counts from your most recent connection with someone and adds the cadence. That is the day they are due. As the date approaches, their page shows it coming; once they are due, they appear in the dashboard's Reconnect panel. If you have logged a connection with them that is still in the future — dinner next Friday — they show as "Booked" instead and stay out of Reconnect.

It counts from the last time you were actually in touch — not from the last reminder, and not on a fixed calendar — so getting in touch early moves the next due date rather than stacking one up. A planned connection counts once you confirm it happened; until then it does not reset anything. See Connections.

Someone you have never logged a connection with counts as due straight away — so if you give cadences to a batch of newly imported people, they will all appear in Reconnect until you log a connection with each. Someone who has died never comes up as due.

Choosing an interval

The useful question is not how often you should speak to someone. It is how long a silence would have to be before you would be sorry about it.

For most people that is a longer interval than it first seems. A close friend you speak to constantly does not need a cadence at all — you are not going to lose them. The people cadences are for are the ones you like a great deal and hear from twice a year.

Start with fewer

A cadence on everyone produces a list you stop reading, which is worse than no list. Ten people you genuinely want to keep up with will do more than a hundred you have merely filed.

A cadence is only as good as what it measures

What a cadence measures is connections. If you speak to someone and do not record it, Longtime has no way to know, and it will keep telling you the gap is growing. Logging is quick — a sentence in the interview — and a connection with four friends counts for all four of them.

Connections can also come in from a calendar you bring into Longtime. Calendar events that had other people invited are proposed as connections for you to accept — longer ones as occasions — see Constant Bridges. Nothing from a calendar counts until you accept it.

Occasions never count. A week-long trip resets a cadence through the connections you log during it, not through the trip itself — see Occasions.

Cadences and birthdays are separate

A birthday arrives on a date. A cadence arrives on a gap. They are not related, and one is not a substitute for the other — a birthday message every year is a lovely thing, and it is not the same as being in touch. See Birthdays.

Details

How a person shows as their due date approaches:

When	Their page	Color	Dashboard
More than two weeks away	"Nothing booked", with how long until they are due	green	—
Within two weeks	"Nothing booked", with how long until they are due	amber	—
Within a week	"Time to reconnect"	red	—
Due tomorrow or overdue, or nothing logged yet	"Time to reconnect"	red	In Reconnect
Something planned with them	"Booked"	green dot	Not shown