OmniFocus vs OmniPlan!?
 

Hello,
maybe this question is very stupid, but maybe not for a newbie in projectplaning.

I'm a OmniFocus user from the first day and I love it. So I handle all my projects for customers in a projectfolder 'Customers' and give everyone an own project.

In this projects I can create subprojects, if needed and set start- and duedates.

So the most projects I've to done, I've to done alone (no teamwork).

And I love the cloudsync. So I can see all my projects on my iPhone and iPad.

Is there any reason or case, where or why I should use OmniPlan, too?

As I said, I'm new to 'real' project planing and I'm glad, if there's a way to be more productive :)

Thank's to all!

I've occasionally heard of folks who were working solo but had projects of enough complexity that OmniPlan was going to be useful, but in the majority of cases, I think it would be overkill for one-person projects.

(The exceptional cases where it was useful were projects where there were a lot of physical resources - tools, chemicals, that sort of thing - that needed to be scheduled fairly tightly.)

Feel free to [URL="http://www.omnigroup.com/products/omniplan/download/"]grab a copy[/URL] from our website, of course, and give it a try - it'll run for two weeks in trial mode and we're happy to answer questions as you kick the metaphorical tires.

Thank you, for your help :)

I don't have a breadth of project management software experience, but I've devoted a lot of time to two such projects, one in Microsoft Project for Mac LONG ago (don't laugh;), and now with OmniPlan. Both were projects that mostly were me as the one doing the work, and resources weren't significant. I realize there is a methodology to (software-based) project management involving multiple human and other resources, and that is where project management software, properly applied, can shine. Domain knowledge is also especially important.

Where my work currently differs (and I acknowledge, I'm in the minority), is that I'm trying to figure out work domain knowledge as I go, and bring on help in a kind of ad-hoc way. What I've found with OmniPlan, is that it works, but I must keep super clean on all details. In OmniFocus, I can be a little bit looser, but still feel on track.

I guess what I'm postulating, is a new project management schema, that brings in the individual action management of OF to project management. This is a software challenge; but probably more so, a theoretical challenge. But perhaps there is an outcome that could change how we work together.

Bob

OmniPlan is rocktastic for being able to see all the moving pieces whilst keeping the themes and big picture in mind. If you've got a bunch of people working on a project, OmniPlan is great, but as both Brian and omnibob point out: if it's just you and a few others, OmniFocus might be the way to go.

For example, I manage teams of both sizes, and for teams with one or two subject matter experts and a few reviewers (stakeholders), I use OmniFocus. With my larger projects that involve people from a variety of business departments, OmniPlan is my go-to product.

Bottom line: use what works for you. If you're finding OmniPlan is just too powerful, use OmniFocus.

OmniFocus is great as a personal task manager, but if schedules/dates or multiple people are of more significance to you then may want OmniPlan.

OmniFocus is great for most things, but the one thing it can't tell you is when a project might finish - even if you put durations on all your tasks. This is the one thing that tipped me over into buying OmniPlan.

It's probably worth noting the Omni are planning to release OmniPlan for iPad this quarter (which will likely be considerably cheaper).

Also Omni are working on OmniPlan/Omnifocus integration (no availability estimate announced AFAIK) - so you may not ultimately have to choose between the two.