Tagamac

As if you didn’t have enough to do this holiday season, the alpha version of iGTD 2 is slated to be released sometime near the end of December. As of this writing, the alpha is about 95% done and presumably ready for public consumption.

I’m honestly a little perplexed by the number of independent Mac developers releasing alpha software these days, complete with bugs and lacking promised features. I’m sure that the pending release of OmniFocus is the reason GTD developers are pushing their software out the door as soon as possible, but it still seems like a fairly dangerous move. Even software that is publicly released in beta form often gets seriously delayed as the developer becomes swamped by feature requests and duplicate bug reports, and I imagine the problem is far worse for hotly anticipated applications like Things and iGTD 2. I’m sure releasing alpha software results in an initial burst of interest, but I wonder about the long-term benefits.

Which Getting Things Done application to use has been on my mind lately, thanks in large part to the public release of OmniFocus which was closely followed by the iGTD 2 previews and my own Things screencast. With so many good-looking options either available or soon to be available, I’m sure that more people than I have been wondering which app will be right for them. Since I’ve had a chance to use almost all of them, I figured it would be nice to offer a quick general comparison of the available (and pending) options.

There are some similar aspects to all GTD task managers, but I think one of the primary deciding factors whether or not a particular piece of software will work for you is how much structure you need or desire. With that in mind, here’s the GTD software for Mac OS X, ordered from most structured to least: Midnight Inbox, OmniFocus, iGTD, TaskPaper, iGTD 2 (early development), and Things (approaching public preview). If you’re like me and agonize over task managers, then this is a pretty daunting list (and if you count some of the less polished options, it’s nowhere near complete). However, with an eye to structure, I don’t think it is all that difficult to narrow the list down to a couple of applications that you should try. [read more...]

Update Jan. 7, 2009: This screencast is many months out of date; to see a great overview of Things, check out Cultured Code’s official screencast. As if the public beta of OmniFocus and a sneak peak of iGTD 2 weren’t enough, I am pleased to reveal the first Tagamac screencast: a preview of an alpha version of Things, the upcoming Getting Things Done application from Cultured Code that uses a tagging system to allow you to get things done your way. Click below to view the screencast in all its glory. I hope you will enjoy it, and I apologize for any bad sound quality. It was an interesting challenge to produce. Please note that although both versions are relatively large, the small one is optimized for viewing on an iPhone (or so says QuickTime). The screencast runs a little over 11 minutes long.

[read more...]

In what is turning into the Weekend of GTD, iGTD‘s developer, Bartek Bargiel, has published a first look at the upcoming features in iGTD 2, including a number of short screencasts. Along with a much more stream-lined and understandable interface (at last), iGTD 2 promises tabs for quickly switching between specific task views, a Things-like departure from contexts that uses focuses and tags for sorting tasks, and vastly improved hierarchical project relationships.

This is definitely an exciting teaser for the future of what is currently the top GTD contender (in my opinion; your mileage may vary). iGTD is not without flaws, as I have remarked myself, but iGTD 2 looks like it will be a solid competitor for more polished newcomers to the field like OmniFocus and Things.

This actually has nothing to do with tagging, but since people who like tags and people who like task management often tend to congregate these days, I figured I’d post it. Omni has released a public beta for OmniFocus and is offering it for half the eventual sale price through their online store as a special pre-release sale (introductory price $39.95, regular price will be $79.95; OmniOutliner Pro owners get an additional 25% off).

I can only imagine the conversation at Omni: “Damn it, this project has been sapping our resources with no return for far too long.” “Hey, how about a Christmas bonus? I wanna buy a pony.” “Oh fine, we’ll sell a promise for less than the real thing and you can have your freaking pony.” In any case, while I’m currently hoping that Things will provide my GTD fix, OmniFocus is clearly going to be a standard-setting GTD application and is well worth checking out.

If it wasn’t enough that it’s currently released at an intro price, TaskPaper is on sale November 1, 2007 only at the MacUpdate Promo. If you enjoy managing your to-dos without all the cruft that shows up in so many GTD-based software, TaskPaper may well be the perfect solution for you. I’ve been using it while I waited for iGTD to get updated, and I’m not sure if I’ll go back. TaskPaper is that cool.

For more information, and to download the demo, head over to the MacUpdate Promo page.

iGTD 1.4.5.6 has received a minor pick-me-up today. If you’re running Leopard, then pick it up over at the iGTD downloads page. This minor update provides the ability to link to specific Mail.app messages whether or not you have MailTags installed and fixes a pair of bugs that affected editing tasks.

For more information, see the blog announcement.

iGTD, a powerful GTD task manager with tagging support, has been updated to 1.4.5.6. This minor update is intended for users of Mac OS 10.5 Leopard only, and mainly re-implements adding tasks to iGTD via the function keys for most major programs. iCal synching is still unavailable.

Although iGTD will eventually be merged back into a single application that is compatible with both Tiger and Leopard, the developer wished to get the fix out as soon as possible. For more details, please see the 1.4.5.6 announcement.

TaskPaper, a very slimmed-down text-based “getting things done” style task manager, was released yesterday for the introductory price of $18.95 (with a 15 day trial). TaskPaper cuts task management down to the bare essentials: projects, tasks, and tags, and may be the perfect solution if you are not interested in the feature-rich offerings of applications such as iGTD or the forthcoming OmniFocus or Things. I highly recommend you check this program out; it’s an ingeniously simple take on task management.

Off-topic, apologies for the lack of updates recently; I moved into a new apartment Monday, and was only able to get the internet hooked up Tuesday (making me wish that I, too, had a hammer and knew how to use it).

Several apps received minor updates while I was away from the internet. Yep was bumped to 1.6.5 (including several bug fixes and performance tweaks), iGTD jumped to 1.4.5.6 (several minor bug fixes), Keyword Manager received a larger update to 1.3 which brings compatibility with iPhoto ’08, Pukka version 1.6.1 added support for the free RSS feeder Vienna, and PackRat is now at version 1.3.2 (fixing a crash that some people were seeing).

For more details about the updates, or to download them, please use the links above (all except Yep have blogs or release notes).