Most people live lives that are divided into weeks. This means, that if you are not busy on tuesdays one week, chances are that this is also true the following week. Because of that, Synago’s planning algorithm supports the notion of preferred days.
Imagine a week has been scheduled, and most of the days have a minyan.
Days | Attendees | Minyan? |
---|---|---|
Sunday | 5 | |
Monday | 11 | |
Tuesday | 8 | |
Wednesday | 14 | |
Thursday | 13 | |
Friday | 10 | |
Saturday | 12 |
Joshua has just signed up.
Joshua is into blue t-shirts.
Joshua, like most people, has a busy week. But he does not work on Fridays, so he knows for sure that he is able to attend service that day. So he commits to 2 days, and checks of Friday as a preferred day.
Synago takes the first of Joshua’s 2 committed days, and looks for the day most in need of minyan. That seems to be Tuesday.
Days | Attendees | Minyan? |
---|---|---|
Sunday | 5 | |
Monday | 11 | |
Tuesday | 8 | |
Wednesday | 14 | |
Thursday | 13 | |
Friday | 10 | |
Saturday | 12 |
Magic happens.
Since Joshua has requested Friday, and Synago cannot find any other day to place him, which would cause a day to achieve minyan, Joshua’s request is granted.
Days | Attendees | Minyan? |
---|---|---|
Sunday | 5 | |
Monday | 11 | |
Tuesday | 8 + Joshua = 9 | |
Wednesday | 14 | |
Thursday | 13 | |
Friday | 10 + Joshua = 11 | |
Saturday | 12 |
The notion of preferred days is to be understood as it is: A preference. The feature was intentionally not called required days, as Synago does not promise to always honor the request.
Synago’s algorithm operates under the notion, that a potential minyan trumps personal user requests, Synago will still attempt to schedule people to days that could potentially gain a minyan, even if this falls on a day other than a user’s preference.
Preferred days should be seen as an attempt to honor individual schedule conflicts in the grander scheme of planning. If a user has committed to days that not yet have achieved a minyan, regardless of preference, this user will still be notified about rescheduling requests.
Read more about how Synago handles rescheduling.