# Settings

Source: https://docs.gdc-world.net/recipe-book/settings/

## Categories

Settings hold the lists you choose from when you describe a recipe, plus a few defaults for planning and units. They apply to your whole household. Open them with the gear button ⚙ in the header, or go to [Settings](https://mealplanner.gdc-world.net/settings).

*[Image: The Settings page with the lists of categories, tags and devices.]*

**Categories** say what kind of dish a recipe is. You filter by them on the Recipes screen, and the planning assistant uses them to put dinners together.

Each category has a row with three boxes:

- the name in English,
- the name in German (the app shows the one for your current language),
- its role on the dinner plate.

The role tells the planning assistant how a recipe of this category fits into a dinner:

- **Main dish**: one recipe is the whole dinner.
- **Protein / meat**, **Side** and **Vegetable**: two or three of these are combined into one dinner.
- **Not planned**: drinks, desserts, sauces and the like. The assistant never suggests them, but you can still plan them by hand.

*[Image: The category roles: a main dish stands alone, protein, side and vegetable are combined, not-planned categories are never suggested.]*

To add a category:

1. Type the English name in the empty row at the bottom (for example "Dessert") and, if you like, the German one. Without a German name, the English one is used.
2. Pick its role. A new category starts as **Not planned**, so nothing unexpected turns up in a suggested plan.
3. Tap **Add**.

The ✕ at the end of a row removes a category. At least one category must remain.

### Renaming and removing

This applies to categories, tags and devices alike.

- **Renaming** an entry changes its name everywhere, including on recipes that already use it.
- **Removing** an entry takes it off the list of choices. Recipes that already have it keep it. In such a recipe's edit form the entry is shown with a dashed outline; tap it to take it off that recipe.

So if a category, tag or device is only badly named, rename it rather than remove it and add a new one.

## Tags

**Tags** are extra labels such as "quick", "vegetarian" or "winter". A recipe can have as many as fit, and you filter by them on the Recipes screen. Tags are also what you can exclude from planning (see [Planning](https://docs.gdc-world.net/recipe-book/settings/#planning)).

Each tag has an English and a German name. Add one in the empty row at the bottom and tap **Add**; the ✕ removes one.

## Devices

**Devices** are your kitchen equipment, such as the oven, stovetop or air fryer. You mark on each recipe which ones it needs; they are shown at the end of the recipe.

Besides the two names, each device has a capacity: how many dishes can use it at the same time.

- **1 at a time** for an oven: the planning assistant will not put two oven dishes into one dinner.
- **4 at a time** for a stovetop with four rings.
- **No limit**: the assistant ignores the device. New devices start like this, so they never restrict anything you did not intend.

Add a device in the empty row at the bottom and tap **Add**; the ✕ removes one.

## Planning

Here you choose tags the planning assistant should never suggest, for example "party" or "Christmas". Tap a tag to mark it; tap it again to clear the mark.

This list is the starting point for **Never suggest** each time you open the assistant. There you can still change it for a single week, without changing this default (see [Never suggest](https://docs.gdc-world.net/recipe-book/planning-assistant/#skip-tags)). You can always plan such recipes by hand.

## Units

**Default units** sets how ingredient amounts are shown when you open a recipe:

- **Original**: as written in the recipe.
- **Metric**: grams, millilitres, °C.
- **US**: cups, tablespoons, ounces, pounds, °F.

On each recipe page you can still switch for that recipe (see [Translation and units](https://docs.gdc-world.net/recipe-book/recipe/#translate)).

### Save

Changes on this page apply only once you tap **Save settings** at the bottom. **Cancel** leaves without saving.

Above the buttons, **Guide** with **Open the guide** leads to this guide, the same as the ? button in the header.