How to use tobuy

tobuy tracks household items you buy repeatedly and tells you when it is time to order the next pack. The better your stock updates, the sharper the prediction.

Dashboard

• 🔴 Buy now — stock is at or below the buy threshold.
• 🟡 Soon — within the warning window (default 21 days / 3 weeks).
• ⚠️ Needs input — no confirmed stocktake yet.
• 🟢 Plenty — comfortably above target.
• ⚠️ Stale — no update for 14+ days. Please run the quiz or quick confirm.
• ⏳ Pending — a stocktake is waiting for you to press Confirm.

Three ways to log stock

1. Quick actions on each card — tap ➕ Purchase, ➖ Use, or 📋 Check directly from the dashboard.
2. Quiz mode — press 🧮 Quiz me on the dashboard. The app picks items that need attention and asks one question at a time. Easiest on a phone.
3. Manual form — open the Stock entry tab for full control.

Why Confirm matters

A stocktake is saved as pending until you press Confirm. Only confirmed values are used to predict run-out. This guards against typos and unexplained jumps. If a value looks wrong, an admin can exclude it from prediction.

Anomaly detection

If stock goes up without a matching purchase, the event is flagged as 🚨 unexplained increase and excluded automatically. Admins get a Telegram/email alert so the missing purchase can be added back.

Purchase request board

Anyone can request an item. If the name matches an existing item, the current stock and predicted run-out date are captured automatically — this is the strongest signal for the predictor.

3-week rule

Finding the lowest price usually takes about three weeks. The default warn days is 21 so the first alert lands at the optimal moment. Earlier alerts waste storage; later alerts force you to pay more.

Seasonality

Predictions weight observations from the same season more heavily (e.g. bottled water in summer, rice in winter). Monthly correction factors will arrive once a full year of data is collected.