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Task managers - what should they be able to do?
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Posted by Cassius
Mar 31, 2008 at 03:04 AM
Graham, I liked your list of requirements.
I used Ecco for years and was quite satisfied. Here’s one you probably have not looked at: myTasks (http://www.kingstairs.com). I admit to knowing NOTHING about it other than it’s developer also authored Jot Plus, which is not very sophisticated, but is straightforward to use and has some nice convenience touches.
-c
Posted by Stephen Zeoli
Mar 31, 2008 at 01:04 PM
Graham,
Great list. I have a few additions. The ideal task manager would have a GANTT charting feature (which means tasks would require a start date, as well as a due date). ECCO had this and I found it very useful.
Columnar meta data should allow you to turn any column field into a hieararchy. That is, if you have a column with fields for “project” or you should be able to see a view in which your tasks are show as follows:
Project A
... Budget projection
... Writing of proposal
... Client Review
Project B
... Meet with design team
... Present design to client
... First draft to client
... etc…
or by Client:
Client A
... set up teleconference with client A
... send first bill to client A
Client B
... draft proposal to client B
Client C
... follow-up on Project Z results
These views would be available from any of the column data, so you could view by due date, start date, vendor, etc…
Of course, Zoot, which you are very familiar with, does this and it does most of what is on your list, except for the RTF/HTML part… a big part, admittedly. It does not do GANTT charts, either, of course.
Good topic!
Steve Z.
Posted by Graham Rhind
Mar 31, 2008 at 01:50 PM
Thanks for the inputs up to now! Just some responses in the meantime:
>Susanne wrote:
>I seldom have a task that does not involve other people, either I need something from them, or they are waiting for me to deliver.
Therefore I would add assigning tasks to other people (if possible a contact from outlook or so) and also a (user defined) assignment type (waiting for, deliver to, contact, etc.).
Absolutely. As I work on my own I tend to forget the poor souls who have to take other people into account :-)
>Chris Thompson wrote:
>I honestly think “GTD” is a liability
I agree entirely! I wrote in an Amazon review of the book that I thought the system flawed and only applicable to certain people in certain circumstances.
>Manfred wrote:
>You probably looked at Agenda at Once. See http://www.agendaatonce.com/features.html
Agenda at Once comes very close, but there’s a bug which stops recurring tasks from recreating themselves in the current version (1.2.3 I believe), which the developer says will be corrected in the next release.
Jack Crawford wrote:
>An interesting new arrival in the Outlook GTD market is Foresight (at http://www.enhanceyouroutlook.com).
It does look interesting, though I dislike greatly software which is sold on a subscription basis and ties you in to your investment. I also have a problem with using Outlook as the basis of task management mainly because of its strange behaviour in deleting an associated e-mail when deleting a task. I know the task can be marked as completed and not deleted, but this stuffs the task manager full of completed tasks which can never be deleted. Strange and utterly annoying.
Cassius wrote:
>Here’s one you probably have not looked at: myTasks (http://www.kingstairs.com).
Yes, I tried that (having used JotNotes myself many years ago). I can’t remember why I rejected it - I have a feeling recurring tasks aren’t supported, though don’t quote me on that.
Graham
Posted by Daly de Gagne
Mar 31, 2008 at 03:33 PM
Chris, re contexts—admittedly not for everyone.
However, the intention of contexts is to simplify and shorten task lists.
In your example, the context could simply be “Errands”—and you’d group your errands together. For me, I know right away what items I want from Safeway, what I have to go to the bank for, what I want to go to the drug store for. In the case of Safeway I might have a separate shopping list to make sure I buy everything I came for.
Without contexts, one can get a list of 20 or more items for the day, sometimes more. If you are like me, you go out and might come back with two of three things because you overlooked one item on the list. I find with long lists I overlook things unless I continually review the list.
Or I get overwhelmed, and then in my typical ADHD style start to spin my wheels.
So context is meant as a tool to simplify, to make sure nothing gets left out, and that everything gets done.
I`d agree that some people do better with more freeform systems—or are able to carry in their minds what they need to be doing. Allen`s idea, however, is that many of us don`t, so empty the mind of the stuff that can be put on paper or in software.
Daly
Discuss and learn about David Allen’s Getting Things Done:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Getting_Things_Done
Chris Thompson wrote:
>As far as I can tell, Ecco does all of the things on your list except “definable icons per
>task”... I suppose even that one could be done with a customized bullet column.
>
>Ecco
>will probably never be bettered as a total package of good user interface +
>functionality for task management. (I think of it as an operating system for
>projects, really, it’s so customizable and poewrful.) SQL Notes looks like it’s
>coming along and betters it in several ways functionality-wise, but the UI leaves a
>lot to be desired. On the Mac, OmniFocus is similar in some ways but is too
>GTD-inspired. Good if you really want to get into that methodology, but what makes
>Ecco genius is its freeform nature.
>
>I honestly think “GTD” is a liability, and
>software developers are in some sense chasing a false grail by trying to jump on that
>bandwagon. For instance, David’s notion that every task should have exactly one
>context is poorly thought out. For instance, what about an item I can buy either at the
>grocery store or at a drugstore? What context do I use for that. OmniFocus tries to stay
>within the GTD mindset by keeping the single context restriction but introducing
>hierarchical contexts, but that only partially solves the problem. Also, contexts
>are in some sense inherently counterproductive… a big part of the GTD approach is
>the idea that you should be able to dump items into your inbox as quickly as possible.
>Yet as soon as you introduce contexts into a program, you not only have to hit some
>hotkey, enter your task, then you have to tab to another field, decide what context
>this task should be in (is it “business” or “phone”?), type some more stuff, then hit
>OK. Too much work for no payoff.
>
>Some of Allen’s ideas, like delegation, periodic
>reviews, etc. are useful though. But I’m skeptical of systems that aim too much to the
>GTD paradigm. The better systems are freeform like Ecco or Things.
>
>—
>Chris
>
>Graham Rhind wrote:
>>I did find one personal task manager that did
>>almost
>all of this but had a problem with database corruption. I am therefore
>>currently
>having to use a blend of Outlook, Zoot and Sciral Consistency.
>
Posted by Daly de Gagne
Mar 31, 2008 at 03:40 PM
Graham, I like the web-based program given with my signature.
I am also using Central Desktop http://www.centraldesktop.com , also a web-based program, to see how it goes.
Part of this is crimping on my part because I prefer to do a lot of this stuff on paper.
For example, I have a wonderful Circa notebook from Levenger in Boston that has plastic sheets with 96 pockets for conventionally sized index cards to be inserted vertically. Levenger has its own take on the index card—lined on both sides, vertically. I love this system because nothing gets lost in it, and it is helpful to me as a pre-planning step, plus keeping notes temporarily from journals or books. http://www.levenger.com/
Daly
Try This Great Web-Based GTD Site:
http://www.nozbe.com/a-A3F240E3
Discuss and learn about David Allen’s Getting Things Done:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Getting_Things_Done/
Graham Rhind wrote:
>With the release of another personal task manager (a term I personally prefer over
>“to-do list” or otherwise), I thought it might be useful to take a look at what these
>task managers should be able to do. The number of programs I’ve looked at for task
>management must be approaching three figures, and I still haven’t found one I would
>happily use. Many task managers start off with great plans but a good many never reach
>maturity (and I could name names), so I think we need to look at what the software
>currently does rather than the plans the developer has for it.
>
>I don’t think my needs
>are particularly individual to me - I’m an empiricist and try to let the nature of tasks
>themselves define what the software should be able to do. Many claim to support
>Getting Things Done principles though, having ploughed through that book, I can
>contest that many don’t. Many aim for usability but confuse it with lack of
>sophistication - a program can be powerful and also simple to use. Also, for me, the
>software can be embedded in PIM software or be standalone - as long as it fulfils basic
>requirements.
>
>To my mind personal task management should fulfil these
>criteria:
>
>Critical:
>
>- Full support for recurrence (which universe do
>developers live in where tasks don’t recur?); automatic recreation of a recurring
>task upon completion/deletion
>- Date and time due
>- Alarms and snoozing
>-
>(Definable) priority indications
>- (Definable) categorisation/tagging
>-
>(Definable) status indication (waiting, complete, pending etc.)
>- Full featured
>notes editor (RTF/HTML, tables and graphics enabled)
>
>Important:
>
>- Unlimited
>sub-tasking (i.e. a tree-like structure)
>- (Definable) colour coding (font and
>background)
>- Import/Export/Synchronisation (with Outlook, Palm etc.)
>-
>User-defined views by any aspect (dates, tags, categories, text etc.)
>- Undo
>- Easy
>entry of tasks into the program using drag and drop and/or key combination
>
>Nice to
>have
>
>- (Definable) icons per task
>- Date started/date ended
>- Time planned for
>task/time actually taken
>- Reporting
>
>I did find one personal task manager that did
>almost all of this but had a problem with database corruption. I am therefore
>currently having to use a blend of Outlook, Zoot and Sciral Consistency.
>
>What does
>everybody think? Will the grail be obtained? Is there a program out there I’ve missed?
>What other features have I forgotten?
>
>Graham
>