A Week With ‘Todo’ by Appigo Software - Conclusions

Appigo has created a great app. As you read the earlier parts of this series, you'll see that the app is highly recommended, but integrating an iPad (or any kind of a PC) as the foundation for your personal workflow leaves gaps.

I’m still not comfortable carrying the iPad with me all the time and whipping it out for a quick note. I use paper which doesn’t care if I drop it, doesn’t care if left in a really hot car or in direct sun, and is not a target for theft.

On the other hand, the iPad has a backup if lost. I have never lost my folder or journal (touch wood). Once I panicked that I left my logbook in an airport lounge but someone had ‘kindly’ moved it to my desk drawer. Another time I left it in a restaurant and had to drive 100 miles the next day to recover it... but never lost.

Concluding…

The first lesson from all of this is that it’s all about the workflow, not the tool. iFocusToday.com is my workflow but you can use any that works for you. But use a tool and process that integrate short and long term work management. You have to methodically flow work that has been put away for later into your active lists with minimum effort and maximum assurance that you haven’t lost anything in the process. Just using an to-do list won’t deliver that in the real world.

There is no absolute and right answer here. It’s somewhat a matter of taste. I don't engage in PC/Mac, iPhone/Droid, or GTD/Franklin debates. I do what I do to get my work done and so should you.

A Week With ‘Todo’ by Appigo Software - Part 3 [jump to part one]

What has kept me from using any app for my weekly planning and to do list is convenience and here is where the rubber hits the road.

1. Time to make a single new entry.

My first test is to add an entry for later this week. Say today is Wednesday and I want to add “Call Joe M Friday at 617-555-1212”. 

• Time for weekly VR sheet to open the binder, grab a pen, and write the note in Friday’s slot is about 18 seconds.
• With the iPad dark (booted but asleep), Todo not loaded, and using Todo standard entry the time is about 32 seconds.
• If Todo is already loaded, the time is about 18 seconds, the same as paper. Pretty good. 

I expected the difference to be larger. 

 2. Time to have the entire list in sight and be ready to decide what’s next.

• Paper: 2 seconds
• From a ‘dark iPad’ with Todo about 7 seconds.

Enough about timing. The difference is at most a couple of minutes a day. 

3. See What’s Complete

I like to recap what I’ve completed. Some days it's run-all-day and feels like nothing has been accomplished. But of course it has. Todo politely takes completed items and moves them to the completed list. I like that my weekly paper allows me to recap the day and week with a quick glance.

4. Scratch Notes

An other thing I keep on my paper list is scratch notes. These are the notes that have limited long term use but need to get written down immediately - often names and phone numbers of the person calling me right now. The name of a person who is calling me right now. Travel mileage. A quick diagram. These could go in my journal; the notes on my weekly plan are a crutch for when it is more convenient than my journal.

Scratch notes are a challenge on any electronic device when there is no time for a boot or wake-up.

Paper wins this round. 

5. Away for Later 

Some notes written during the week have to be put away for a later time; you want them out of site until that time. Here the Todo app is a partial win.

With my paper system I make the note in a ‘next week’ column and then give it a real schedule when I do my weekly refactoring. With Todo I can place it wherever I want the first time.

I like to see the longer term items regularly in case they change priority. At iFocusToday.com the ‘put it away for later’ process (more at http://www.ifocustoday.com/520weekrefactoringy/ ) better balances getting something temporarily out of sight and then taking a look at it at the right time.

Continue with part 4 on Thursday...

A Week With ‘Todo’ by Appigo Software - Part 2 [read part one]

This app has a lot going for it:

• Its the right level of complexity and you can setup the categories you want and ignore most everything else. Not to simple, not to complex.
• You can sync it with Toodledo - an online service that is too complicated for my taste, but is an independent site. For my test, I did not use Toodledo for anything except backup. Meets the need for independent backup.
• This company has other products and charges $5 for Todo. A price above the riffraff in the app store but not out of line. Looks like this is a real business.
• In the week of use I encountered no bugs and no crashes. Good for them!

First a look at what I have been evolving for years. Its a portfolio-like folder with a pocket on one side to carry the papers I need for meetings and reference for that week and a mini clipboard on the right that holds my weekly sheet. You can see more about the weekly sheet at http://www.ifocustoday.com/week-three/

I find the usability of Todo about the best of any app I’ve seen. The layouts, editing, filtering, grouping and convenience are top shelf. Congrats to them for hitting the sweet spot. 

It looks really good on the screen. If looks could make me use a product, this is the one. Bright crisp design and a clean layout helped in part by the great screen on the iPad.

Unlike smart phone based apps, the iPad has enough screen real estate that you can actually work with the lists. Smart phones are OK for referring to the list or adding an item, but they don’t cut it for managing the list - moving things around to setup the day or week. This form factor works.

Continue with Part 3 on Monday

A Week With ‘Todo’ by Appigo Software - Part 1

I try almost every to-do application that I see. Most get a cursory look as they suffer from what I have learned are fatal flaws: 

• Too complicated. I believe it wastes time over-categorizing on many different dimensions. Some folks like to categorize and view by date, location, person, priority, context, etc. I believe that time spent both creating and viewing such an elaborate setup is better spent on productive work. 
• Too simple. One linear list doesn’t do it. I’m have about about 70 items for the next two weeks and looking at all of them all the time wastes time.
• No Backup. There needs to be a copy somewhere other than on the one device I am using. Better yet the backup is stored at a different company.
• Run by real people. An early test I run is to send them an email or look for an active blog. No activity and I presume nobody is home. There are some cool hobby sites out there, but I won’t trust them with my planning.
• Visible means of support. If there is no charge and no advertising, that’s a bad sign: probably a hobby site.
• Bugs. If I see a bug in the first hour, it's a throw-away. I might not understand how it works and what I believe is a bug they may call a feature. Tough. If the software is that unfriendly it's off the list.

Based on that screening, there are darned few to-do applications that I try for a week. Todo for the iPad by Appigo made the cut and I took it along with me for the week instead of the planner that I recommend at ifocustoday.com

Part 2 of this series will post later this week.