How to use Sailyn

Sailyn is a planner for people whose problem is not knowing what to do. It is knowing, and not starting.

Most of what follows is optional. The app works if you only ever add things and press start.

Getting set up

The first run asks a few questions. Pick everything that sounds like you rather than the closest single answer, because more than one usually applies.

Then it offers three ways to finish:

Recommended. Sailyn reads your answers and sets a session length, a work window, reminders, sound and, if you said you get pulled away, a list of sites to block. It shows you exactly what it chose. Every line has an arrow: tap it, the control opens underneath, change it, tap again to close.

Choose it myself. Thirteen screens, same settings, one at a time.

Skip. Sensible defaults, nothing asked. Everything is in Settings later.

Two of those screens open something bigger, the timetable and the semester dates. They open over the top and drop you back where you were.

If you close the app halfway through, you come back to the screen you left.

The four tabs

Along the bottom on a phone, down the side on a computer:

Now. One task, the one to do next, with a start button and how long it will take. This is the screen the app is for.

Plan. The next two weeks, day by day. Anything with a clock time is pinned there, and everything else moves as your days fill up.

Tasks. Everything you have added, grouped into Now, Later and One day.

Progress. What you have actually done: the hours, the times of day you finish things, where the time went, and the challenges you have joined.

Adding things

Press the plus. Two ways in.

Type it. "Finish the chemistry report by Friday, it will take about three hours." Sailyn reads the deadline, the size and the category, breaks it into sessions and puts them where they fit. You can correct anything it got wrong.

Fill it in. Name, category, how long, when it is due, which list. Faster when you know exactly what you want.

Anything longer than about ninety minutes gets offered as several sessions. Nothing is forced.

While a task is in the list

Tap it for the options: start now, change the length, move it to another day, push it to Later, split it, delete it. Delete offers an undo for a few seconds, and the undo is real, including on your other devices.

Adding a task from anywhere

You can add a task without opening the plus. On a computer, press N anywhere in Sailyn. On Android, tap Share in any app and choose Sailyn. On an iPhone, add the Sailyn shortcut once, then use Share or Siri. Whatever you send becomes a normal task in Now.

1. On a computer, press N anywhere in Sailyn, type the task and press Add.
2. On Android, tap Share in any app, choose Sailyn, check the name and tap Add.
3. On an iPhone, tap Share in any app and choose Add to Sailyn. It is in Sailyn the next time you open it.

Your capture key and the iPhone shortcut

A capture key lets the Sailyn shortcut on your iPhone or iPad add tasks for you. It is a private code that can only add tasks, so it cannot read your plan or change anything. You make it once in Settings, under Add from anywhere. If it ever gets out, make a new one and the old one stops working at once.

1. Open Settings, then Add from anywhere.
2. Tap Make a capture key, then Copy the key.
3. Add the Sailyn shortcut with the button, or with the steps shown, and paste the key when Shortcuts asks.
4. In any app, tap Share and choose Add to Sailyn, or say Hey Siri, Add to Sailyn.

Adding tasks from an AI assistant or a script

The same capture key lets an AI assistant or a script add tasks. Assistants that speak MCP use Sailyn's MCP server, which offers one tool, add_tasks; scripts post to the add-only API. Both can only add: nothing can be read, changed or deleted through them, and what arrives is planned the next time Sailyn is open. The addresses and an example are in Settings, under Add from anywhere.

Planning from photos of a timetable or a list

On Plan, Read photos takes up to six photos at once: a timetable, a handwritten list, notes. Sailyn reads them and shows classes and tasks in the same preview as a calendar file, and nothing is added until you tick it. A page with a date on it is that day; only a weekly timetable repeats. Each account can read up to 20 photos a week and 6 a day, every photo read counts, and the photos are never kept.

Opening Sailyn with a key on a computer

Inside Sailyn, press N to add a task. To open Sailyn itself from anywhere, give the installed app a key. A website cannot use Ctrl+N, because the browser keeps it, but Windows and Mac can both open an app with a key.

1. Install Sailyn from Chrome with the install icon in the address bar.
2. On Windows, find Sailyn in Start, right-click it, choose Open file location, right-click Sailyn there, choose Properties, click Shortcut key and press N. It becomes Ctrl+Alt+N.
3. On a Mac, open the Shortcuts app, make a shortcut with the action Open App set to Sailyn, then choose Add Keyboard Shortcut and press your keys.

Emailing a task to Sailyn

You can email a task to your own Sailyn address. Sailyn reads the whole message rather than the subject alone, so a date or a deadline in it is used, and a meeting invitation becomes the meeting in your week. Make the address in Settings, under Add from anywhere, where it appears once it is available. Keep it to yourself, and make a new one if it gets out.

1. Open Settings, then Add from anywhere, and find Email to Sailyn.
2. Tap Make my address, then Copy the address.
3. Send or forward an email to it. Sailyn reads the message, the dates in it, and any invitation attached to it.

Bringing in your calendar

Bringing in a calendar file

Plan can bring in a calendar file, like the one your university or calendar app exports. You see every event first and untick what you do not want, and nothing is added until you say so. Importing the same file again replaces what it added instead of doubling it.

1. Go to Plan and tap Import a calendar file.
2. Pick the .ics file.
3. Untick anything you do not want, then tap Add to my week.

Keeping your week in step with a calendar link

A calendar link keeps your week in step with a calendar you already use. It is the subscription address from Google Calendar, Outlook, iCloud or your university timetable. Paste it once and Sailyn checks it every day, so a class that moves moves in your week too. The link opens that whole calendar, so Sailyn keeps it sealed and never shows it again.

1. In your calendar app, copy the calendar's subscription or iCal link.
2. In Sailyn, open Plan, tap Link a calendar, and find Calendar links.
3. Paste the link and tap Add the link.

Adding an iCloud calendar

An iCloud calendar comes in through its public link. Sailyn never needs your Apple password. Anyone with that link can see the calendar, so give it to Sailyn and nobody else.

1. On your iPhone, open Calendar and tap Calendars.
2. Tap the i beside the calendar and turn on Public Calendar.
3. Tap Share Link and copy it.
4. In Sailyn, open Plan, tap Link a calendar, and paste it under Calendar links.

Connecting your iCloud calendar

Connect iCloud with an app-specific password, which Apple makes for you in a minute. Your calendar then stays up to date by itself.

1. Your Apple ID needs two-factor authentication. Most have it already.
2. Open account.apple.com and sign in.
3. Open Sign-In and Security, then App-Specific Passwords, and press the plus. Name it Sailyn.
4. Apple shows a password like xxxx-xxxx-xxxx-xxxx. Copy it.
5. In Sailyn, open Plan and tap Link a calendar. Under iCloud calendar, type your Apple ID email, paste the password and press Connect iCloud.

A connected Google calendar

Connecting a calendar keeps your week in step with it without a link. Each event keeps its own name unless you turn names off for that calendar, and changes follow on their own. You can disconnect at any time, which stops it at once and removes what it added.

1. Open Plan, tap Link a calendar, and find Connected calendars.
2. Tap Connect Google and say yes to the permission it asks for.
3. Tick the calendars to count. Event names are on; untick them for any you want kept as busy time only.

Bringing in tasks from another app

Import tasks sits beside Link a calendar on Plan. Export a CSV file from Todoist, TickTick or Notion and choose it; Sailyn shows the tasks it found before adding any. Names and due dates come across, and a task you already have is not added twice.

1. Export your tasks as a CSV file from Todoist, TickTick or Notion.
2. On Plan, press Import tasks and choose the file.
3. Check the list, then add them.

Now, later, one day

Three lists, and only one of them is work.

Now is what you are actually doing. It is the only list that counts toward your day, and the only one Now and Plan draw from.

Later is real but not this week. Sailyn asks about the oldest one every three days. Answering resets the clock, whatever you answer.

One day is a maybe. Asked about once a month, and the wording says explicitly that nothing needs doing about it.

The point of the split: a list of forty things with six real ones is a list you stop opening. Move things to Later freely.

Sessions

Press start. A timer, the task name, and nothing else on screen.

• Pause stops the clock. Paused time does not count.
• Finish early keeps what you did.
• The volume slider appears while sound is playing.
• On a phone the session shows on the lock screen with a working scrubber.

At the end you get coins, the task's progress moves, and Sailyn offers whatever is next.

The day at real times

Your plan gives every task a start and an end. It places work inside the hours you said you work, around your classes, plans and anything you marked kept free, and it never plans past the end of your day. If something fixed lands in the middle, only what comes after it moves.

1. Open Plan to see today with times on it.
2. In Settings, Hours, set when you work and which days.
3. Mark lunch or training as kept free in your timetable, and nothing is planned over it.

Sound

Off, pick each time, or chosen for you. The last one learns: if you always skip rain, it stops offering rain.

Sail Now

A session with no task attached. Press it, the clock counts up, stop when you stop. Useful when you are already working and want it recorded.

A Sail Now never becomes a task. It does not appear in your plan, it does not become something to do later. It counts toward your hours, coins and insights and nothing else.

Starting with five minutes

A big task, or one you have moved twice, offers Just 5 minutes. It sits under the suggestion on Now and names a first step. The session starts as usual; after five minutes it says so, and Stop here counts the time and puts the rest back in your plan. Keep going and nothing changes.

1. On Now, under the suggestion, press Just 5 minutes.
2. Begin with the first step it names.
3. After five minutes, keep going or press Stop here.

Continuing later

Continue later, on the paused screen, stops now and keeps what you did. It counts the minutes, pays for them as a finish would and ends the session on every device. What is left goes back into your plan with the time that remains. On a fixed session, the day is marked done and a task holds the minutes left.

Minimising a session or a break

Minimise keeps a session running in a strip above the tabs. Use the rest of Sailyn meanwhile: the clock, the sound, the blocking and your reminders carry on, and Pause and the button to end it are on the strip. Tap the strip to open the session again. A break minimises the same way.

1. In a session, press Minimise.
2. Use Plan, Tasks or Settings; the strip keeps the time.
3. Tap the strip to go back to the session.

Marking a class or shift done

Open a class, shift or meeting and press Done it to mark it done. Say how many minutes you worked, and it pays like the sessions it would have been and counts in your hours. Done is done on every device, and it is not offered again.

Routines

Repeating things that are not really tasks: a walk, a stretch, a few steps you take every morning.

Add one with a name and a time, or an anchor like "morning" if the exact time moves. Meals and medication are not routines: they are in Planning and wellbeing, under Balance and Priority.

A routine with steps is a routine you can follow when you cannot think. Type them separated by commas, or let Sailyn split them.

Routines do not consume your planning capacity. They are things that happen, not work you have to fit in.

Your day and wellbeing

Planning and wellbeing

Sailyn can look after your sleep, meals and medication, not only your work. In Settings, Planning and wellbeing, Off changes nothing. Balance plans as usual and nudges you: a meal when it is time, a dose when it is due, bedtime when it is near. Priority plans around them: planning ends at bedtime, meals keep their time, Now waits while a meal or a dose is due, and when a class lands on a meal Sailyn offers to move the meal. Medication reminders and cycle tracking are there in every mode. Every answer can be changed, and turning it off puts everything back.

1. Open Settings, then Planning and wellbeing.
2. Pick Balance or Priority, then your usual bedtime and wake-up time.
3. Balance nudges you on Now. Priority keeps time for meals and Now waits while a meal or a dose is due.

When today holds too much

If today's work is more than the time left, Now shows a plan. The most important work stays today and the rest moves, by name, to the next day with room. Fixed events and work due today stay where they are. Use this plan moves them, Keep my plan leaves everything as it is, and the third button opens Plan. It works in every mode; with wellbeing on, the time left runs to your bedtime.

1. Now says how much flexible work is planned and how much time is left.
2. It lists what stays today and what moves to which day.
3. Press Use this plan, or Keep my plan to leave everything where it is.

Errands, and where you are

An errand is planned with the trip there and back. Shopping, the gym or a pharmacy run is placed only where the trip there, the errand and the trip back all fit. The trip comes from what you said, else from your location, else from how far your errands usually are, set in Settings, You. Your location stays on this device: use it once, keep it up to date, or leave it off. Sailyn's server only learns your country and region.

1. In Settings, You, choose Use it once or Keep it up to date.
2. Or set how far your errands usually are.
3. Tell Sailyn you need groceries tomorrow, and the trip is planned with it.

Goals

A goal is an outcome with a deadline. Sailyn breaks it into steps and the steps into sessions.

Describe what you want and by when. You get steps in order, each with a date and its own sessions. Everything is editable.

Your reading list

A book on your reading list becomes one sitting a day. Add it with the plus on Plan, with its page count if you know it; Sailyn writes a Reading task for each day and shows pages read against the total. A book with no page count counts sittings instead, and says so rather than inventing a total.

1. On Plan, tap the plus and choose Book.
2. Give it a name, and its pages if you know them.
3. Finish a reading session and say what page you are on.

Your reading pace

Each reading sitting is sized by how fast you read. Set pages an hour on a book in your reading list, or leave it empty and Sailyn learns your pace from the page you log after reading, once three sessions say so.

1. Open your reading list and tap the line under a book's progress.
2. Type how many pages you read in an hour.
3. Sittings still to come are resized and stay on their days.

Coming back to something for revision

A book or a goal can come back as a revision some days after you finish it. Choose how many days on the book in your reading list, or on the goal on Plan. When the day comes, Sailyn adds Revision 1 as a goal of its own with a session in your plan, and what you finished stays finished. A revision asks the same question, so Revision 2 follows only if you want it.

1. Open your reading list, or find the goal on Plan.
2. Under Revise it later, pick how many days after finishing.
3. When the day comes, Revision 1 is on Plan as a goal. Finish it, and pick days again for Revision 2.

What the numbers mean

A goal shows 9 of 17: sessions done out of sessions in the goal. It moves every time you finish something, which is the point of showing it. Each step also shows its own count.

Deadlines

Sailyn checks continuously whether the work still fits. If it does not, it says so and offers two things:

• Extend the deadline. It tells you how many days would be enough.
• Put in more hours. It tells you how many a week.

It never quietly moves the date and never packs your days to make the maths work. A plan you will not follow is worse than an honest no.

Editing

Delete a session and the count adjusts. Delete the last session under a step and the step goes with it. Delete every step and the goal is archived rather than sitting there empty. Deleting a goal takes its sessions and nothing else.

Challenges

Time-bound programmes. "Twenty-four workouts", "three sessions a week for four weeks".

Each has a start, a length, and a shape:

• Daily. One thing per day, on its day.
• Weekly. A quota per week, any days you like.
• Pool. A number of sessions, done whenever.
• Target. A number of focused minutes.

When your day one is

A challenge has one start moment worldwide, and you never start halfway through your own day. If it opens at two in the morning your time, your day one is tomorrow. If it opens at ten in the evening somewhere further west, their day one is tomorrow too, which may be a different date. Both are correct.

Joining late

You get today's task immediately. Not tomorrow's, and not a fresh programme starting today. The days before you joined stay unavailable, and they are never marked done on your behalf.

If too much has gone for a clean run, Sailyn says so plainly and says what is still true: you keep the coins, you stay on the leaderboard, the routine still counts. Only the win has gone.

Tasks

One at a time. A daily challenge does not hand you the next one while one sits unfinished, and a window that has closed leaves your list rather than sitting there overdue.

Buddies

Link with someone by username. Both sides have to agree.

A buddy can see when you are busy. Never what you are doing.

Anywhere you pick buddies, the ones you have picked are outlined and their names highlighted. Tapping a picked name removes it.

Chat, and Sailyn in it

Chat is where Sailyn and your buddies are. Sailyn is the first conversation and tells you what happened while you were away; every buddy you link with is a conversation under it, and you can make a group from people you are both linked with. Messages are words only, links are checked, and an operator can read a chat if it is reported.

1. Open the chat button in the header.
2. Tap Sailyn for what it has to say, or a buddy to write to them.
3. Tap New group to talk to more than one person at once.

Linking with somebody

Linking is how two people see each other in Sailyn. Open Settings, then Reach, and share your link; whoever opens it is linked to you. After that you can plan something together, sail a session together, or set a goal you both work on. Nobody sees your tasks, only what you choose to share.

1. Open Settings, then Reach.
2. Share your buddy link with somebody you know.
3. When they open it you are linked, and Plan together and Sail now with someone start working.

Reporting and blocking somebody

Report and block is one press, on every chat and every buddy. It ends the link, stops every future invite in both directions, and separates you from plans you shared; the other person is told nothing about why. You pick one of four reasons and there is no box to type in.

1. Open the chat or the buddy, and choose Report.
2. Pick the reason that fits and confirm.
3. The link ends at once. Settings, Reach lists who you have blocked.

Plan something together

Pick a time, Sailyn checks you are both free, they approve. Once approved it is fixed: your other work moves around it, it does not move.

Move it. Anyone can suggest a new time, at any point: before anyone has answered, or after everyone has agreed. The agreed time stays until everybody has said yes to the new one. If they say no, the original is still there. Change your mind before they answer and nothing is announced, because nothing happened.

Call it off cancels for everyone and tells them. That is a different button from abandoning a suggestion, on purpose.

When a plan is called off it stays on your list, struck through, saying who ended it. There is no offer to suggest a new time, because somebody decided and that decision stands.

The cross removes the panel from your list only. It sends nothing and tells nobody. The same goes for letting go of a plan whose time passed, or one somebody declined: those are your list to tidy.

Sail now with someone

A shared session, right now. No date picker, no title, nothing to fill in.

Tap it, pick who, send. That is the whole flow. Picked names are outlined so you can see at a glance who is in; tap again to take someone out.

You are in automatically. Everyone else has fifteen minutes to accept, and it needs all of them, not most.

When the last person accepts the voyage starts for everybody at the same instant. One clock, counting up, the same number on every screen.

Anyone can finish it, and it ends for everyone. Their name is shown on the others' screens.

If somebody declines, or the fifteen minutes runs out, there is no session. It does not quietly start with whoever said yes. Sending a fresh invitation asks everybody again.

The button is on Now whether or not you have anything queued. Wanting company is most useful when there is something in front of you that you cannot start alone.

And like the solo one: a shared voyage is never a task.

Coins and the shop

Coins come from finishing sessions. Longer sessions pay more; so does finishing a goal step.

They buy themes and small cosmetic things. Nothing you can buy affects planning, and nothing is ever taken away. Un-finishing something does not claw back coins you earned.

Settings worth knowing about

When work can happen. Fixed hours, whenever you are awake, or any time. The middle one is right for days that start at eleven.

How much a day. Worked out from your window and your classes, or a number you set.

How much a week. Measured from what you actually manage, or set by hand. Measured is usually kinder and more accurate.

Session length. 25, 50 or 90. Twenty-five is not a lesser choice.

Reminders in a session. Off, at the end, start/middle/end, or every few minutes.

Blocked sites. A list, with a browser extension if you want it enforced.

Theme. Light, dark, or follow your system. The button is in the header, not buried in Settings.

Timetable and semester. Classes and shifts, so planning knows when you are already busy.

Your layout

Your layout puts each screen's sections in the order you want. In Settings, Your layout, pick a ready-made layout (Everything, Studying, Working, One thing at a time or Calm), or press Customize, drag the sections of Now, Plan and Progress, untick what you do not use, then press Done. Sail now always stays.

1. Open Settings, then Your layout.
2. Pick a ready-made layout, or press Customize.
3. Drag or untick sections, then press Done.

The look, and hiding rewards

Settings, Look holds the theme, contrast, text size and the moving sky. The theme decides every screen, and the sky over the harbour follows the time of day either way. Under Rewards, Hidden takes the coins, the harbour and the light at the end of a session off every screen. Coins are still counted, so showing them again loses nothing.

1. Open Settings, then Look.
2. Pick a theme, more contrast or larger text.
3. Under Rewards, choose Hidden to see only your work.

Reminders and alarms

Sailyn reminds you before anything with a time. Classes, imported events, tasks at a time and routines each get a reminder at the moments you pick in Settings, Reach, as a notification, an alarm or both. The phone app sets the alarm in your Clock app, so it rings even on silent; in a browser it rings while Sailyn is open. A task or a series can have its own.

1. Open Settings, then Reach.
2. Pick how long before, and Notification, Alarm or Both.
3. Open a task or a class to give it its own.

Keeping a time zone

Sailyn follows the device's time zone unless you fix one. In Settings, You, a fixed time zone keeps today, the hour and your calendars in that zone on this device, wherever you travel, and every event stays at the same moment. From this device goes back to following the device.

Sailyn on your computer and phone

Sailyn runs in a browser and as an app for Android, Windows, Mac and Linux, from the downloads page. The apps block the sites and programs you choose during a session, closing only the tab, show the session on the lock screen and offer a widget. Your work syncs between them, and one session runs on every device at once.

1. Open the downloads page and pick your device.
2. Sign in with the same account.
3. In Settings, choose what to block during a session.

Extra protection

Extra protection is a switch that only ever takes things away. With it on, plan titles are replaced by their category, nothing is sent to you between ten at night and seven in the morning unless you asked for it, and no marketing mail or analytics is collected. Anybody can turn it on, and anybody 18 or over can turn it off again. Under 18 it is always on.

1. Open Settings, then Privacy.
2. Turn on Extra protection.
3. It applies at once, on every device you are signed in on.

When you are struggling

There is a Need help now? button at the bottom of every screen. Red, and always in the same place, whether or not you have work queued.

It shows the crisis line for your country and an emergency number. If your country is not one Sailyn has a checked number for, it still gives you the emergency line.

Opening it does nothing else. No task, no coins, no record that you opened it. It is not measured and it never will be.

Your data

Your username does not have to be real. Your password is hashed and cannot be read by anyone, including whoever runs Sailyn.

Everything works offline. Changes sync when you reconnect, and if you have edited on two devices they are merged rather than one overwriting the other.

You can export everything or delete your account from Settings. Deleting takes your tasks, sessions, plans and challenge entries with it.

The privacy policy names every outside service that receives anything.

Things that go wrong

"Could not reach Sailyn." The connection, not your work. What you did is saved on the device and syncs when you are back.

Something looks stale on one device. Both devices agree within a few seconds of the second one being opened. Nothing is lost either way.

A challenge task you expected is missing. Check whether its window has opened. Nothing appears before the challenge starts, and a day that has closed is gone rather than overdue.

A buddy plan you agreed disappeared. Look for "called off". Anyone on it can cancel, and everybody is told.

The timer looks wrong on the lock screen. Reopen the app; it re-syncs to the real elapsed time. Nothing is lost.