Set threshold without target

jhwist

I'd like to limit my caffeine intake, so I've set a Maximum Threshold. However, unless I also set a target that is non-zero, cronometer will not mark the caffeine amount as read if I go over the threshold. Alas, setting a target as well is counter productive, because now I get either a yellow color (if the target is set close to the threshold) or a green with 1000% (if the target is, say, 1mg).
Is this a bug or is it by design that target and threshold do not work independently?

Karen_Cronometer

That's the way it was designed. If there is no Daily Target entered, would you expect the target to be calculated out of your Maximum Threshold instead?

jhwist

No, I simply want to be able to set a threshold, as I don't care about reaching a minimum. Say I don't drink coffee at all for a given day, then the field stays grey, or respectively shows the amount I took in (but still grey, because it's neither "yellow" or "green"). If I take in too much coffein (according to the max threshold) then the field displays red.

By forcing me to also set an artificial daily target I'm encouraged to drink at least that much coffee (or alcohol, or whatever), and that doesn't make sense to me.

tabularasa

Any progress on this?

I am experiencing the same issue and agree with jhwist (100x).

When Max Threshold is set, and Daily Target is not, the desired functionality could be to:

• have the bar turn red when the Max Threshold is exceeded (and set the % of daily value on the far right to something like: "-- %" or "n/a %")
• remain gray otherwise.

Like jhwist, as it stands currently, I have to set an arbitrary Daily Target to get the "red bar" warning, but it creates confusion since I don't really want the Daily Target or the effects that come from it (e.g., green bar, white bar, % of daily target value).

Would love to see this addressed, as it applies to quite a few nutrients (e.g., Cholesterol, Sat. Fat, Trans Fat, Caffeine, Sodium, etc.)

Thoughts?

fathers

Bumping this thread as I also completely concur with this:

Would love to see this addressed, as it applies to quite a few nutrients (e.g., Cholesterol, Sat. Fat, Trans Fat, Caffeine, Sodium, etc.)

RMK

ONE MILLION UPVOTES TO THIS.
Bumping this thread because this drives me insane. I'm also sending the following text to Support:

The way that Cronometer currently represents several of the nutrients that the site tracks is actually contrary to professional nutritional guidance. There are MULTIPLE categories on this site where the medical consensus is "none of this if you can, or as little as possible; but definitely no more than [5mg or whatever]." To accurately reflect this advice, progress bars actually should be GREEN if there's no minimum and the maximum hasn't been reached yet, then red if the limit is exceeded -- because anything less than the limit is meeting the goal. And the maximum value could be used for figuring the percentage, because whether I'm at 30% of my maximum or 90% of my maximum, I'm still in the "green zone" of meeting my goals; but once I go a single mg above the maximum, I'm in "red territory" of exceeding a suggested or self-imposed limit.

I'm not a computer guy, and I know that there's no such thing as an "easy fix" on a site this size. But I think the decision tree is pretty straightforward:

The first 2 approaches are already in place and applied to default and custom values.

1) If there's a minimum but no maximum value, as with many of the nutrients, then:
+ The percentage value next to the progress bar is the minimum value.
+ The progress bar is grey until the user reaches the minimum and green after that.
= [user hasn't met the suggested or desired goal -> hits the minimum -> user has reached or safely exceeded the goal]

2) If there's a minimum value and also a maximum value, as with sodium and some other nutrients, then:
+ The percentage value next to the progress bar is the minimum value.
+ The progress bar is grey until the user reaches the minimum value, green after reaching the minimum, and red after reaching the maximum value.
= [user hasn't met the suggeted or desired goal -> hits the minimum -> user has reached or safely exceeded the goal -> hits the maximum -> user has exceeded the goal at an unsafe or undesired level]

The logic of the 3rd approach flows directly from the logic of the first 2, and could be applied to default or custom values.

3) If there's no minimum value but there is a maximum value, as with caffeine or alcohol -- or transfats, then:
+ The percentage value next to the progress bar is the maximum value. This avoids getting an "NT" and no tracking instead of a percentage -- and also avoids readings like "2600%" if the user is forced to enter a value like ".01mg" in order to track the nutrient.
+ The progress bar is green from the start, until reaching the maximum value, and red after reaching the maximum.
= [user has immediately achieved the suggested or desired goal of consuming anything less than the maximum (0%, 20%, 40%, 99% are all within the goal range) -> hits the maximum -> user has exceeded the goal at an unsafe or undesired level (even just 101% of the maximun is too much)]

Look, if you're on Cronometer, you're almost certainly a little bit OCD / very detail-oriented. I promise that there are a ton of users out there tearing their hair out over this. And even folks who didn't know that they wanted/needed this function will be delighted when they find out that they have it as an opttion.