Study plan
Two screens tell you what to study. Study has all your files and how far you are in each one. The Study plan spreads what's left across the days until the exam.
Study
Study, in the sidebar, shows the files in the space you have selected at the top. First comes Where you left off, with the last one you stopped halfway through. Then there's a section per folder, and at the end Not in a folder, for the ones outside any folder. If you have no folders, the list is called Your files.
Each row tells you where you are: "Page 12 of 40" with a thin bar along the bottom if you've started it, See it again if you've finished it, or how many pages it has if you haven't opened it yet. Tapping a row opens it where you left off: slides open in the viewer, with Mina explaining (see Listening to explanations); a document or a recording opens in the reader.
On the right are the Summary and Mind map cards for the whole subject. The first time they say Make; while they're being made, Making…; once ready, Open. If you upload something afterwards, they show New material. Both are saved in Materials like any other file. Reading and changing them is covered in Summaries and maps.
When the space is empty, the list is replaced by the upload card: whatever you drop there goes into that space.
On a phone, Study is one of the tabs at the bottom, and it has one extra row above the list: Study plan, "What to study each day until the exam". That's how you get to the plan on a phone.
The plan before you set a date
Study plan, in the sidebar, opens the plan for the space you have selected: there's one per subject. With no exam date, the top shows how much of the whole subject you've covered ("You've studied half of the subject") with a ring and the details: how many files and how many slides you've seen.
Below that is What's next: the step that's up now, highlighted, and the rest grouped by what needs doing ("Study 3 files", with how long it takes). Each group opens so you can pick one.
On the right is the When is your exam? card with Make the plan. Under it are the space's Materials, each with its progress, and what you've studied for this subject this week. If the space is empty, the plan asks for files first: Files first, with Upload material.
Making the plan
Make the plan asks six questions, one per screen, with your progress at the bottom ("2 of 6"). Next moves on and Back goes back. The cross at the top right leaves without saving anything.
| Question | What you answer |
|---|---|
| When is your exam? | You tap the day on a month calendar, and the date and how long you have left show underneath ("12 days to go"). If the plan already had a date, Remove the date is there too. |
| What kind of exam is it? | Written, Oral, Multiple choice or Problems. Tapping one moves straight on to the next question. |
| What material does it cover? | You check the files it covers. Next to each checked file, All opens How far does it go?: the whole file, up to the end of a chapter (in a book with a table of contents), or up to a slide or page number you type. Your notes are always included. |
| How are you doing with each one? | For each file: Haven't seen it, Struggling, Getting there or Got it. If only notes are included, this question is skipped. |
| How do you want to study it? | One or more of: Understand it well, Memorize it, Practice questions, Work through cases. Understand it well and Practice questions come checked. |
| How much time a day? | 30, 45, 60, 90 or 120 min a day. If for your last exam you studied a lot less than you said you would, it reminds you: a plan you keep works better. |
After the last answer you tap Make the plan. Mina thinks it over for a moment (Putting your plan together) and then Your plan is ready appears: how many days, how many steps and how many minutes a day, with Start with today's and See the plan. The plan is built from what you've already studied in each file.
To change something later (the date, what's covered, the minutes), Change on the exam card reopens the same questions with your answers filled in. The only one you answer again every time is what kind of exam it is.
Your plan, day by day
With an exam coming up, the screen is titled For today. Next to the title is the day's goal: what you've studied today in this subject against the minutes you chose ("25 of 60 min", and once you get there, "60 min today"). Below are today's steps; tapping one takes you to do it.
Once you've done today's steps, it says Today is done and how many steps come tomorrow, with Get ahead in case you want to do tomorrow's first one now. If nothing is left at all, it tells you so: what remains is going over what was hardest.
Further down is The days left: the next three days, each with its steps and minutes, which open to show them. The rest are folded into one row ("9 more days"), and at the end is Exam day, with the date and the kind of exam. If what's left doesn't fit in the minutes you chose, a card says so in numbers: "It doesn't all fit in 60 min a day", and how many minutes it would take.
On the right is the exam card: "Exam · Written", how long is left in large type ("In 12 days"), the date and a bar with the steps done ("8 of 30 steps done"). It has Add notes and Change, and on exam day it adds Yes, I took it.
Under the card is In the exam: each file with how far it's covered, if not the whole thing, and how many of its steps you've done. If any were left out, it says so ("2 files aren't in it") with Change next to it. Further down, how much of the whole subject you've covered and what you've studied of it this week, with how far you are from the ten-hour badge.
To practice everything the exam covers at once, there's the plan's last step, The day before: practice the whole exam. In the calendar, the exam card offers Practice it all when the exam is today or tomorrow.
Exam notes and tasks
Add notes opens a box at the top of the right-hand column for the things that aren't studying: what's covered, what the professor said, what you can bring. With Add a task you add things to do, each with its own checkbox; finished ones drop to the bottom. If you don't write anything, the box doesn't show.
The steps
Each step is one concrete thing to do with a file, and tapping it takes you straight to where it's done:
| Step | Where it takes you |
|---|---|
| Study (file) | To Mina's explanation in the viewer, from where you left off. |
| Skim (file) | To the short version of the explanation, for something you've already seen. How it differs is in How it explains. |
| Read the summary of (file) | To that file's summary. |
| Remember N concepts from (file) | To a review: you say what you remember about each concept and then see the slide. See Practice and review. |
| Go back to what you missed in (file) | To the first slide behind what you got wrong while practicing. If there's no slide to go back to, you practice it again. |
| Practice (file) and reach (goal) | To a practice session on that file, with the score you're aiming for. |
| Work through cases from (file) | To a case-based practice session on that file. |
| Explain (file) out loud | To a short practice session where you answer by speaking. |
| Reread your notes: (note) | To that note. |
| The day before: practice the whole exam | To a practice session with questions from everything the exam covers, mixed together. |
What Filmina can check, it ticks off on its own when you do it (hovering shows Filmina checks it). The rest you tick yourself in the circle on the left.
Right-click a step, or use the three dots beside it, for two options: Mark as done, for something you studied on your own, and I don't want to do this, for something that won't help you. A step you ticked yourself can be unticked with Mark as not done. Skipped steps go into a separate row ("2 steps you chose to skip"), and Bring it back restores them from there. What you skip is recorded: after the exam, the feedback takes it into account.
Each step you finish gets a small celebration (One step done), and so does a finished day: Today is done. The fire keeps going.
After the exam
On exam day, Yes, I took it on the card asks How did it go?: Well, So-so, Badly or I don't know yet. The plan is marked as taken ("Taken on November 3"), with what you studied still there whenever you need it, and Set another date for the next exam. The first one you mark earns you the First exam taken badge.
If the date has passed and you didn't mark it, the plan asks Did you take it yet?, with Yes, I took it and Set another date, in case it was postponed.
The day after, on Home, Mina asks how that subject went, with the same answers plus I haven't taken it yet, which opens the plan so you can move the date. If you don't answer and don't open Filmina that day, the question reaches you as a notification or an email.
Exams you've taken are listed under Your exams, in the subject's plan whenever there's no exam in progress. Each one shows how many steps you did and how much you studied, plus concrete feedback for next time: whether you studied almost everything in the last three days, whether you studied fewer minutes than you set, which files went unseen. The button showing how it went lets you answer or change it.
If the latest one went badly, Plan the retake appears underneath and opens the plan questions for the next exam.
Mina and the plan
Mina knows what's on for today, when your exams are and how you're doing in each subject. With the chat open on the plan, the suggestions are Where do I go next?, Will I make it with the plan? and Move today's to tomorrow. How to open the chat is in Asking Mina.
Mina can change the exam date and which files are covered, but never on her own: she shows you a Change the plan card with the old value crossed out and the new one beside it, and the plan only changes when you tap Change the plan. Leave it keeps it as it was.
You no longer choose how detailed the explanation is: the plan step decides (a skim uses the short version). See How it explains.