Python Debt Reminder Tool Using APScheduler and PyInstaller

The author describes a personal need to remind a friend about unpaid debt and builds a small Python tool that shows a pop‑up message at regular intervals.

The tool relies on the built‑in pip package manager (available in Python 2.7.9+ or Python 3.4+), which can install third‑party libraries such as apscheduler and pywin32 . pip is a modern, universal Python package manager that handles searching, downloading, installing, and uninstalling packages.

The core source code uses win32api to display a message box and APScheduler to schedule the reminder every minute (the article later mentions changing the interval to half an hour). The complete script is:

<code>import win32api,win32con,time
from apscheduler.schedulers.blocking import BlockingScheduler

def DrunkWater():
    win32api.MessageBox(0, "Your debt is overdue, please settle promptly!", "Debt Reminder", win32con.MB_OK)

scheduler = BlockingScheduler()
scheduler.add_job(DrunkWater, 'interval', minutes=1)

if __name__ == '__main__':
    while True:
        scheduler.start()
        time.sleep(1)
</code>

To distribute the tool, the author chooses pyinstaller as the packaging utility and pywin32 for the pop‑up functionality. Installation commands are:

pip install pyinstaller pip install pywin32

The packaging command executed in the directory containing the script is:

pyinstaller -F -w demo.py

The -F flag creates a single executable file, while -w runs the program without a console window. After building, the dist folder contains the standalone executable that behaves identically to the original demo.py script.

Finally, the article shows screenshots of the packed executable and confirms that the tool works as intended, providing a convenient reminder for overdue debts.