Interesting reactions!
In the past few weeks I have been exploring the state of ToDo managers some more and I feel I have something to share about that.
Part of what I do is personal efficiency consulting. I go to peoples workplace and help them work more efficiently. This can take various forms, but in terms of ICT it involves helping them to better manage loads of email and tasks, usually under Windows with Outlook. Now Outlook has a reasonable Task functionality that can be tweaked to work effectively for most. But recently I helped a client who had an all too familiar problem. She had to plan and manage various projects that would run for several months and loosely involved other people at different moments in time. There were interdependencies and various deadlines, but there was no formal projectteam or structure. Try planning and managing that kind of work in Outlook 2010, where Microsoft has removed the (very rudimentary) timeline view that was available in OL 2003. She ended up doing all the planning on paper…. A full scale project management app would be a huge overkill for her, so I started looking for something between a ToDo app and project management software that would give her a good timeline view and visual insight in critical deadlines and future peaks in workload. That proved difficult, I only found an app called Pagico. It is cross-platform and offers the timeline view I was looking for. It also implements an interesting feature called a project space where you can create various task lists and drag in relevant emails and documents, a bit like Curio’s idea spaces but without the visual bells and whistles. Unfortunately data entry could be more efficient and is a bit confusing for beginners. So it could use some fine-tuning. And then there is the 50 euro price tag.
Suggestions for other apps would be welcome.
Then, on an unrelated search, I stumbled upon a very inexpensive OS X/iOS-only app called Notesuite that combines note taking functionalities with ToDo management. While not suitable for my clients, it showed something important: the ToDo part is not the result of an afterthought but has some quite decent functionalities. Think subtasks, assign-to, tags, contacts, note import, basic email import. For just 5 bucks…..
The point here is that as the market for OS X ToDo apps is oversaturated, differentiation becomes more and more difficult and consequently prices will go down. So some developers started thinking of creative new ways to make their products stand out. I wonder what that will mean for OF development.
In the past few weeks I have been exploring the state of ToDo managers some more and I feel I have something to share about that.
Part of what I do is personal efficiency consulting. I go to peoples workplace and help them work more efficiently. This can take various forms, but in terms of ICT it involves helping them to better manage loads of email and tasks, usually under Windows with Outlook. Now Outlook has a reasonable Task functionality that can be tweaked to work effectively for most. But recently I helped a client who had an all too familiar problem. She had to plan and manage various projects that would run for several months and loosely involved other people at different moments in time. There were interdependencies and various deadlines, but there was no formal projectteam or structure. Try planning and managing that kind of work in Outlook 2010, where Microsoft has removed the (very rudimentary) timeline view that was available in OL 2003. She ended up doing all the planning on paper…. A full scale project management app would be a huge overkill for her, so I started looking for something between a ToDo app and project management software that would give her a good timeline view and visual insight in critical deadlines and future peaks in workload. That proved difficult, I only found an app called Pagico. It is cross-platform and offers the timeline view I was looking for. It also implements an interesting feature called a project space where you can create various task lists and drag in relevant emails and documents, a bit like Curio’s idea spaces but without the visual bells and whistles. Unfortunately data entry could be more efficient and is a bit confusing for beginners. So it could use some fine-tuning. And then there is the 50 euro price tag.
Suggestions for other apps would be welcome.
Then, on an unrelated search, I stumbled upon a very inexpensive OS X/iOS-only app called Notesuite that combines note taking functionalities with ToDo management. While not suitable for my clients, it showed something important: the ToDo part is not the result of an afterthought but has some quite decent functionalities. Think subtasks, assign-to, tags, contacts, note import, basic email import. For just 5 bucks…..
The point here is that as the market for OS X ToDo apps is oversaturated, differentiation becomes more and more difficult and consequently prices will go down. So some developers started thinking of creative new ways to make their products stand out. I wonder what that will mean for OF development.
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