A little help from TARA
How to Use TARA
Your quick guide. Set a routine, follow your moments, and let TARA handle the clock.
Add an intake
On Today, tap the plus button, then Add intake. You can also open Settings → Manage Intakes → Add.
Choose Medicine, Vitamin, Supplement, Protein, Water or Other. Enter a name and, if you want, an amount. Tap Continue. TARA records the amount you enter; she does not choose a dose for you.
Choose when
In Choose the times, select Once, 2×, 3×, 4×, or Every. Choose hourly or half-hourly time detail, then your first time. TARA suggests the other times. For a daily schedule, tap a selected time and then an available replacement to move it. For an hourly interval, moving a selected slot shifts the interval’s anchor.
Changing frequency resets the time selection. Switching to coarser time detail can reset selections that no longer fit. Follow “Choose your first time”, “Tap a time to move it”, and “Choose a new time” to finish the step.
In Choose the days, choose Every day, Every 2 days, Every 3 days or Specific days. For a repeating day pattern, choose the first day in the two-week preview. For Specific days, select weekdays directly or use Weekdays / Weekends.
Every N hours is an elapsed interval anchored to your chosen start time. It continues across midnight; it does not use weekday selections. Calendar schedules use the time zone saved with the intake, so review your schedule when travelling.
Open Reminder windows to adjust the Smart Bar and preferred window. Start and end lets you choose a start date and optional end date. Tap Save Intake.
Your timing is your choice. Use instructions from your doctor, pharmacist, label or another qualified source when deciding what and when to take.
Follow Today
Your next moments lists unresolved moments in time order. It includes today’s scheduled moments and any moment whose reminder window is currently open. The first card gets the main controls; later moments stay visible below it.
Cards for the same intake share a soft background colour. “Next dose” identifies a later moment when that intake has an earlier, non-removed moment on the same day.
Pull to refresh to reconcile your schedule and reminders. When today is clear, TARA shows “All done for today”.
Take or Skip
During the reminder window, tap Take or Skip on the first moment. TARA records Taken or Skipped, briefly acknowledges it, and moves the next moment up. Take records the time you press it; it does not verify that you physically took anything.
Take and Skip are available throughout the reminder window, including before and after the amber preferred window. A moment left unrecorded becomes Missed after its reminder window ends.
Notification actions also offer Take and Skip. Medium and large Home Screen widgets offer Take for their next active moment. The app does not currently offer an undo or outcome-edit control, so check the moment before recording it.
Understand the timing bar
The bar spans your reminder window. TARA’s marker follows the clock, the diamond marks your preferred time, and the amber segment shows your preferred take window. Tap the bar to show or hide exact times.
By default, the reminder window runs from 3 hours before to 3 hours after the preferred time. The amber window runs from 20 minutes before to 20 minutes after. Adjust these while editing an intake.
The app’s “Perfect time to take” label means the clock is inside the preferred window you configured. It is an organisational label, not advice that taking something is medically safe. Try the visual example.
Change your plan
Open Settings → Manage Intakes, or the plus menu on Today, then Manage intakes. Tap an intake to edit its name, amount, category, times, days or windows.
Swipe left on a Today card or in Manage Intakes, or touch and hold, for more actions:
- Deactivate pauses the intake and removes its future actionable moments and reminders. The intake stays in Manage Intakes as Inactive.
- Reactivate starts a new plan from now and clears its previous end date. Review the intake if it needs a new end date.
- Delete asks for confirmation, then removes the intake and its upcoming scheduled moments. Past history remains.
Changes to scheduling or windows build a new plan for upcoming moments while retaining recorded history. Each device updates its own reminders after reconciliation; other devices need to sync before reflecting the change.
Look back at your history
Open History and select Week, Month or All Time. See Taken, Skipped and Missed counts and proportions, plus a Daily progress chart. Expand Recent details for the latest recorded outcomes in the selected range.
History describes the records in TARA; it is not a clinical record or a measurement of treatment effectiveness. The current build does not offer history export, outcome editing or history deletion.
That’s it. Your next moment is ready when you are.
Put TARA on your screens
Use your device’s widget gallery and find TARA → Next Moments. Choose Small (one moment), Medium (two) or Large (four, with a count of extra moments later today). Medium and Large include Take for the next active moment.
On supported Lock Screens, TARA also offers Inline, Circular and Rectangular formats. They show a name, countdown and/or scheduled time according to the available space. Tap a widget to open Today.
iOS manages widget refreshes, so the display may not update every second. Open TARA to refresh the underlying schedule if a widget looks stale. Widgets can show intake names while the phone is locked; Privacy Lock does not hide them.
Notifications, sound and alarms
Allow notifications when TARA explains the request, or use iPhone Settings → Notifications → TARA. Standard reminders are scheduled locally when a moment’s window opens and at its preferred time.
I see reminders but cannot hear them
Open TARA Settings → Reminders & Alarms. Check sound access and send a test reminder. The test arrives after about five seconds and does not record an intake. Standard notifications use the default iOS sound and follow Silent Mode, Focus, alert volume, notification Sounds, and scheduled-delivery settings. Vibration follows the device’s haptics settings; TARA does not have a separate vibration switch.
Can I use an alarm?
On iOS 26 or later, separately enable intake alarms in Reminders & Alarms and allow alarm access. These use Apple’s alarm system at preferred intake times, including in Silent Mode or Focus when permitted by the system. They are off by default.
Check how far ahead alarms are prepared. TARA prepares a rolling queue of up to 24 alarms and refreshes it when you use or sync the app and record moments. Reopen TARA before the displayed coverage ends. A confirmed alarm replaces the standard preferred-time notification for that moment; the upcoming reminder can still appear.
Stopping an alarm does not record an intake. Use Open TARA and then Take or Skip. Do not rely on TARA as your only means of receiving an essential alert.
Why did another device remind me too?
Each device schedules its own notifications and alarms. They are not sent by a central TARA server. After recording or changing a moment, another device must receive and reconcile the synced data before cancelling its obsolete reminders.
Privacy Lock and iCloud
In Settings, turn on Privacy Lock to protect the main TARA interface with your device’s available Face ID, Touch ID or passcode authentication. Authenticate once to enable it. There is no separate TARA PIN.
Privacy Lock is per device and does not hide notification previews, alarms or widgets. Adjust those in iOS if you want to keep intake names off the Lock Screen.
Settings also shows iCloud status. Private CloudKit sync depends on being signed into iCloud, storage availability and connectivity. TARA continues to use local data offline; if it has fallen back to a local-only store, that store does not sync. If sync does not recover after checking your Apple account and connectivity, contact support before deleting any data. Read the full Privacy Policy.
Still need a hand?
Email the existing GAMA DYNAMICS support desk. Include your TARA version from Settings, device model, iOS version, and a short description of what happened.
Email TARA support support@gamadynamics.com.auOnly include the information needed to explain the issue. Redact personal intake details from screenshots. Support cannot advise on medicines, doses or medical decisions.