It’s not a bug per se, it’s an unintended feature.
(Source: iamdevloper)
(Source: iamdevloper)
I’ve always been a big fan of making lists to keep myself organized and motivated… the motivation comes from checking things off. Lately, my lists have been in different places and I have not been overly consistent. Upon realizing this, I remembered that I had a todo list application running on both of my macs, as well as my iPhone and iPad. I opened it up to find a bunch of old tasks and projects that hadn’t been touched for months.
Clearly, something about the app caused me to fall out of the habit of using it, to the point where I pretty much forgot about it and the stuff in it1 . When I remembered it, I started to set it up with my current projects and tasks and it quickly became apparent that I would not use it consistently this time either.
The application2 is well designed and I never encountered any bugs, so it wasn’t an issue of quality. The problem came down to a lack of keyboard support. The applications I use the most have extensive keyboard support. Both my desktop and laptop are configured with global keyboard shortcuts to perform certain tasks. I can take notes, schedule appointments, write blog posts, launch applications, you name it, without ever touching a mouse or touchpad. I work better that way and am much more likely to form good habits when I can do it all through the keyboard. So this application was not going to cut it.
I went about searching for task-list applications that had the features I was looking for. The most important requirements were:
Some of the “nice to have” features included:
I read reviews and comparisons and evaluated a handful of apps.
I started with the trial version of Things. Things is a very nice application. It did pretty much everything I needed. It had a global shortcut, decent keyboard support within the application, tagging, projects, etc. What Things is missing is support for syncing between multiple macs. I tried to work around this using Dropbox, but it required the app to only be running on one machine at a time and even when I did that, I somehow managed to hose my database file completely one morning, so this was not ideal. I didn’t like the idea of having to worry about one application whenever I had a need to switch machines.
Things is getting sync support at some point in the near future3, and I did find a hack to add a lock file in Dropbox to prevent opening the app on a second computer, but before I tried that, I decided it was worth looking for an alternative.
After realizing that sync was going to be an issue (at least for a little while) with Things, I took a look at TaskPaper. TaskPaper is a well built application with simplicity at its heart. While it was fun to play with, I didn’t feel like I would keep using it once the novelty was gone. I think for me it came down to not having clear visual separation between items. In a more graphic heavy UI, items are clearly broken out into their own “blocks” and for me, being able to easily glance at my list and pick out the next task I want to focus on is important.
I believe TaskPaper supports customizing the visual style of the text, so I may have been able to tweak it to be more aesthetically pleasing, but for me, that would have become a huge, time-sucking excuse to not do the things on the list. In some cases, it’s just better if certain decisions have been made for me.
I looked at OmniFocus briefly, but it didn’t sound like a good fit, so I moved on, planning to try it out if nothing else worked out. It looks and sounds like a nice application, but seemed a little too GTD focused for my taste.
The other night, I found The Hit List. I grabbed the trial and I’m glad I gave it a shot because this app is awesome!
The Hit List has everything I was looking for and then some. First off, anything you can do in the application can be done with simple and intuitive keyboard shortcuts. Many of the keyboard commands are just single keystrokes. Tasks can be added, moved into different projects, tagged, marked as complete and cancelled. It supports subtasks, projects (through multiple lists), start dates, due dates, smart folders, priorities, repeating tasks, time estimates and even has a timing function to track the actual time for a task when you need it. Pretty much everything is optional, so it is simple to just add a an item and move on. The global shortcuts allow for quick task entry and entry with context. The context entry is a very cool feature (something that Things also has). It carries contextual information from your current application into the task, so if you are reading an email and want to create a task to follow up on it, you use your global shortcut to create a new task and it will include a link to the email. The same is true for other applications, so links to other documents or web sites can be automatically included in the related task. Tasks in THL allow for notes and there is a “card view” that allows you to look at a single task at a time, with a large area for creating and reading notes specific to that task.
THL syncs through a paid service. At first, I wasn’t thrilled with that idea, but it is only $20/year, is available as an in-app purchase (not having to pull out my credit card for yet another website made it a much easier decision) and is extremely fast. It syncs across multiple macs and the iPhone app (which I also purchased) so I can keep track of everything I have to do from anywhere and I know it will be tracked everywhere almost instantly. I think you can sign up for sync for a month for around $2, so you can test it out with the trial to see if it’s worth it.
The iPhone app is very nice and so far seems to work very well. I have a added a couple of tasks through it, but mostly use it to see what’s next and check off chores and errands as I complete them. When I go back to the desktop version on either mac, it has been updated. And unlike Things, I can keep it open on all 3 devices without any issues.
I also use an application called Fantastical, which allows me to create appointments in my calendar using natural language. So I can type something like “Dinner with my parents next saturday @7 at their house” and it will fill in the appropriate subject, date, time and location for the event. This is by far one of my favorite applications because I don’t have to fill out multiple fields and I don’t even need to look at the calendar to setup an appointment. Much to my delight, THL allows for natural language when setting start dates, due dates and repetition of tasks! So without the need to look at a calendar or know what date a specific day is, I can easily set something that is due “next tuesday” or “tomorrow”. For repeating tasks, I can type in something like “every 3rd Wednesday” and it’ll figure out how to make that work. “Today” works too, but their is a shortcut for that, and for a task that you want to make due today, you just select it and hit “t” on your keyboard.
There are several good task applications out there, but if you are a keyboard junkie like me, and you want an app that works on multiple macs without the need for hacks, you should take a look at The Hit List.
not that I left everything undone, I just didn’t use the app to track it. ↩
I’ve chosen not to call out the previous application here because I don’t want to give the impression that I didn’t like it, or that anything was wrong with it. It just didn’t feed my keyboard addiction. ↩
They even have a beta available right now that does sync, but I didn’t really want to spend the money until it was out of beta, so I continued my search. ↩
MURK AVENUE: I FOUND ICE CUBES 'GOOD DAY' -
CLUE 1:
“went to short dogs house,
they was watching Yo MTV
RAPS”
Yo MTV RAPS first aired:
Aug 6th 1988
CLUE 2:
Ice Cubes single “today was a good day” released on:
Feb 23 1993
CLUE 3:
”The Lakers beat the Super
Sonics”
Dates between Yo MTV Raps air date AUGUST 6 1988 and the release…
Client: I told you I had to have that sign up yesterday. What’s your excuse?
Me: We installed it yesterday morning.
Client: Don’t lie to me. I just looked on Google Maps and even if that stupid tree is in the way, I can clearly see that the sign hasn’t been changed.