The diary can be broken down into four key areas.

(1) The main diary, this is where your food and exercise will be listed.
(2) The top search box, the primary method of adding food and exercise to the diary.
(3) The progress box, this box will let you know how you are getting on
(4) The side menu block, this menu lets you update your weight and view results.
(5) The speed buttons at the bottom of the diary offer quick links to commonly used functions

The main diary section lists the products you have added to your diary.

The current diary date (1) is shown to the top left, anything you search for and add will be added to the current diary. The arrows before the date (5) can be used to change the diary date so you can add products for different dates.

In the top right of the diary you can see how many calories or kilo joules you have left (2). This is explained in more detail later in the help document.

Meal names are used to break your diary into sections. Clicking the blue arrow (3) will show or hide (collapse) the items in each meal name. When a meal is collapsed a summary of the calories used is added to the meal title line. To quickly change a products meal selection simply drag it into another meal or right click on the item and select the new meal name.

The +/- buttons (4) can be used to quickly increase and decrease the quantities of the product you have in the diary.

Right clicking the main diary box (or in the Mac version ctrl-click) provides a quick way to change a products meal title, to copy entries to another user on the same computer or to access the edit functions. Double clicking on an entry will automatically open the products edit screen.

The main search box (1) lets you search for food and exercise. The box will automatically clear the ‘What would you like to add to your diary?’ text when you start typing. Simply enter the product name you would like to add and either press your return key or click on the search button (3) to start your search.

The ‘Favorites’ / ‘Favourites’ button (2) will bring up a new window where you can quickly select from a list of food products you have added in the past.

At the bottom of the diary window you will see the progress box.

This is subdivided into three sub sections.

Section 1 lets you know how you are using your calories or kilo joules and how many you have left.
Section 2 gives you a breakdown of your nutritional profile.
Section 3 shows your target nutritional profile.

If you would like to change the target nutritional profile click the small spanner icon (4). To hide the progress box, click on the arrow icon (5).

If you would like to view progress in grams click on any of the totals. Click the totals again to swap back to percentages.

Tip: If you have added exercise to the diary the ‘remaining’ total will be adjusted to allow for your exercise credits. If you would like to see how many calories would have been left without the exercise credit simply hover your mouse pointer over the green ‘remaining’ box.

The side menu gives you access to the tools you will use to monitor your overall progress.

(1) Update results

Update your weight and any other measurements you would like to track.

(2) View results

Access the reporting section of the Perfect Diet Tracker to view your results and view progress graphs.

(3) Adjust targets

You can change your target weight, weight loss and activity level using this option.

(4) Edit profile

Make adjustments to your user profile, change your country (useful when on vacation or holiday abroad), change what is displayed in the diary window.

(5) Add to diary

The ‘Add to diary button will bring up a search box so you can add new food or exercise to the diary.

If you are using version 3.2.2 or later and have more than one user setup this button will read ‘Switch user’ instead of ‘Add to diary’ to help you quickly switch between different users on your system. You can use the ‘Add’ button directly below the diary or the search box in the top right corner of the window to add new products.

(6) Log out

Log this user out and return to the login screen.

The speed buttons give you quick access to commonly used functions.

Add

The add buttons can be used to gain full access the search food and add exercise windows.

Groups

The group button lets you group items together so they can be added quickly in the future. For example, you may have a common breakfast menu, perhaps a cereal, milk and sugar. You can select these items in the diary, then click on the group icon to group them together. The group will then appear in the favorites (you can also access this using ctrl or command and G on the keyboard). When you add the group all the items in the group will be added to the diary.

Edit

The edit buttons are useful to duplicate, edit or delete items in the diary. For example you may want to duplicate an entry, then drag and drop it into another meal and finally use the +/- icons to quickly alter the quantity.

Notes

The notes button with show the ‘day notes’ window. The notes window lets you add notes for each day.

To the bottom right of the window you will see a calendar. When you first start the Perfect Diet Tracker this will show the current date.

If you select a different date, the diary will be updated to show food and exercise items for your selected date.

The text shows how many calories you have left. This box will turn red if you exceed your calorie allowance!

In addition at the very bottom of the application window you will see a bar, this bar fills up as you consume your calorie allowance, and like the text above turns red if you exceed your calorie allowance.

You should aim to consume all your calories each day. If you are a little under or a little over do not worry.

You should not starve yourself in an attempt to lose weight faster, if you are falling short of the recommended calorie intake you may find your metabolism slows down, making it harder to lose weight.

If you find you have gone over the recommended calorie intake don’t panic or starve yourself the next day to make up! Simply start again the next day and consume the recommended calorie intake.

The title bar of the diary window shows the name of the user currently logged in.

The easiest way to add an exercise is to let the Perfect Diet Tracker do the calculations for you.

First, select the exercise or activity you would like to add from the list (1), you can change the exercises listed by using the ‘tab bar’.

Next, enter the duration for the exercise (2).

Finally, click the ‘Add this exercise to your diary’ button (3) and the Perfect Diet Tracker will calculate the energy you have used and add this to your diary as a credit.

If you have an exercise machine that tells you how many calories you have used, you can use option 2 to add your exercise and simply enter a name for the exercise (1) and the calories or kilojoules you have used (2). Finally click the ‘Add this exercise to your diary’ button (3) to add the exercise credit to your daily diary.

Do not add exercise that you would normally do as part of your daily routine, this should be set in the change goals section (set an appropriate ‘base’ activity level).

You should only add activities that are ‘in addition’ to your base activity level.

The credits are calculated from the type of activity, and your current weight. You may find one user gets a higher exercise credit as they weight more. This is correct as the user with the higher weight will have to use more energy to do the activity.

Selecting food search allows you to search for a food product to add to the diary.

This option will display a window with foods you have previously entered into your daily diary.

This can be a fast way to select foods you eat on a regular basis.

This option will show the groups and recipe manager. The manager lets you create a new group or recipie, add and remove items from the group, and insert all, or a portion size (for example 1/8th) into the daily diary.

Add exercise lets you add activities to the diary. Activities can increase your calorie allowance, but should only be added where they are in addition to your activity level selected during setup.

If you want to change your current activity level please refer to the ‘change your goals’ section in the options menu.

Duplicate selected creates a duplicate (copy) of the currently selected item in the diary.

This can be either food or exercise, and once duplicated you can double click on the item to change the quantity.

Delete selected removes the currently selected item from the diary. You can also do this by selecting an item and using the delete key.

Copy places a copy of the currently selected item in the clipboard.

You can also use the copy item to copy food items between days and even between users.

Paste will paste the contents of the clipboard into the currently selected field.

Clear empties the currently selected box.

Clear does not delete a food item from your diary, for this use delete instead.

23 October 2009: Updated groups entry for version 3.2