Fitday for PC?

[rybread]

Can someone tell me about what Fitday for PC is like?

I'm so very frustrated with the web version. The selection of food stinks. I hate that I can't delete foods I've added, or edit them for that matter. I hate that I can't categorize the foods I add as custom. I hate that I can't 'combine' a bunch of foods in a group to add all at once when selected. [Would be lovely for those breakfasts that are the same everyday!] I could go on and on...

Does the PC version fix or make up for any of these things?

I hope I'm not being too picky, especially with a service that's free. Its just that professional web development is what I do, and all I can keep thinking about is how terrible the usability of Fitday is, and that it's an application that could be made 150 times better!

Thanks.

[Brook]

Fitday PC allows you to enter in your activity level to help estimate your BMR, as well as help you estimate the amount of calories you should restrict to meet your weight goal as you set them. It has charts in it that allow you to keep track of your measurements and moods. I find the food explorer and activity explorer to be easier to use. Entering in custom foods is essentially the same, but I find entering them into the food log is easier.

I really like it much better.

I find I use it a lot more too being it's just sitting right on my desktop.

HTHS
~Brook

[Elizellen]

I would echo Brook's comments about fitday pc being more useful than the online free version.
One feature I have just discovered is the 'ingredients' tab. You have probably noticed that fitday always assumes we use margarine to cook omelettes and so if I selected that as a food it always added the margarine to the figures. Well in fitday pc you can customise your omelette and deduct that margarine and add butter instead and then save it as a favourite or custom food to use again.
Of course you can just as easily enter all the ingredients for a recipe quickly too. I usually load in all the ingredients for a whole recipe but call it however many servings in the quantity box, thus my breakfast quiches entry has 12 servings as the quantity for the whole recipe and when I eat it I just put in how many I had to get the correct figures
Also it has a 'history' tab so if you want to repeat entries from a previous day - even a week ago - you can bring up those entries and add them to today's menu easily.

[Isabeau]

Hrmmmm....maybe I will invest in it....hrmmmm. Any downsides to it?

[Brook]

Yeah. It costs $20. LOL

..No seriously, I find it to be worth every penny!

[kkat55]

There is another program which is similar. It is called Diet Power and you can download a trial version at www.dietpower.com.

[lbiessen]

Sounds like I may have to invest in it.

I love fitday pc! Had it over a year and love it!

[Elsie150]

"The selection of food stinks."
Is there more food choices in the PC version?

"I hate that I can't delete foods I've added,"
What do you mean you can't delete them..you check the box beside it then hit the remove checked button.

"I hate that I can't categorize the foods I add as custom."
I agree...even if it was just alphatized to avoid repeats would speed things up.

"I hate that I can't 'combine' a bunch of foods in a group to add all at once when selected. [Would be lovely for those breakfasts that are the same everyday!]"
You can! This is how I do it. With a clean slate enter what you would have for that breakfast. Now either open another window or you can use your back up button for this next part. You click on New Custom Food...and Add New Custom Food and you just enter your info there. Either by looking at the other window for the info or by hitting your back up and forward buttons until you have entered it all. I do this lots. The only drawback to it is that if you change anything in it...the next time you do a recipe then you would have to do the whole thing over.

[rybread]

Originally Posted by Elsie150

What do you mean you can't delete them..you check the box beside it then hit the remove checked button.

No, I mean when I've added a custom food, it is forever in my custom food list. So those terrible foods I was eating when I was going low-cal are still there, and I'll never eat them again, but I can't delete them entirely.

You can! This is how I do it. With a clean slate enter what you would have for that breakfast. Now either open another window or you can use your back up button for this next part. You click on New Custom Food...and Add New Custom Food and you just enter your info there. Either by looking at the other window for the info or by hitting your back up and forward buttons until you have entered it all. I do this lots. The only drawback to it is that if you change anything in it...the next time you do a recipe then you would have to do the whole thing over.

Yah, I know. Its just totally bad application design that I have to do this in this totally backwards way. In SparkPeople.com, for example, I can select as many foods as I want, and group them together under any title I want. It automatically comes up with a nutritional value for the whole batch for me, without me having to do the footwork, and going back and forth between windows, adding/subtracting, then adding it as a custom food, etc etc. Then when I want to add it to my day, it automatically adds all the foods I had saved, with one click.

So instead of "random breakfast of eggs, mushrooms, tomatoes, ground beef, etc" as one list item, I actually get each individual ingredient and its nutritional value listed. I find this more helpful than one line item, especially when I go back to inspect my foods on days where I've been really successful, or not so much.

Does that make sense?

So I was just hoping that Fitday for PC makes up for the downfalls of the web version, though so far it doesn't sound like it does. I'm almost tempted to just code my own food tracking application, cause I can't seem to find one I like.