almost...
well there was a big problem with excluding weekends. it seemed that setting the basetimeline was useless.
from the docs it seems like this is all you need to do:
SegmentedTimeline timeline = SegmentedTimeline.newMondayThroughFridayTimeline();
but thats not true. you need to call addBaseTimelineExclusions(start long, end long) to add these exclusions to the base timeline!!! this isn't in the docs.
another thing is that you can't pick an arbitrary date for your start and end dates. both start and end dates have be segment dates. if they are not, no exception is thrown but the program wont work
now the only thing ... is that i cant get it to exclude holidays by using addException()!