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To-do list app Remember The Milk gets a healthy update on Android (video)
We have a soft spot for Remember the Milk, not least because the cross-platform app is handy for divvying up to-do lists between different groups in remote locations. If you're on Android and in the market for a new productivity tool, a significant update to version 3.0 makes this a good time to try it. There's a video after the break showing how the new interface works with vertical columns, similar to those on the iOS version, so you see a selection of lists on the left, list contents in the middle and the precise details of a task when you swipe to the right. Sounds simple, perhaps, but it's more fluid -- especially on smaller screens. It's also good that the constant "reminders" about upgrading to a Pro account aren't as in-your-face as they were in the old version, which makes the whole thing feel a bit more chilled out. For more personal and less urgent stuff, however, you might find Springpad to be a bit friendlier.
Quickly sketch out class or meeting schedules with Weekly Schedule for iPad
With so many ways to share calendars and schedules, sometimes it's nice to go a little bit old-school with a blank sheet of paper, a Magic Marker and a little bit of time. Mobile Simplified's $0.99 Weekly Schedule app, just released to the US App Store for iPad, delivers some of that hands-on feeling as it lets you create sharable weekly agendas, monthly calendars and task lists. Weekly Schedule inherits most of its features from the $1.99 iTeach Pad, which also includes student management and lesson plan options; both apps share a UI aesthetic with a more "classroom" feel than most iOS offerings. The core schedule features are simple: on a time grid for the week, you add your event blocks and build out your schedule. If you want a specific event to repeat all week long (a morning meeting, for instance) just tap and hold to duplicate it. Blocks get a specific duration, color and name when you create them, and they hold onto that indefinitely. (You can also edit the names of the days, and it's easy to accidentally edit Friday when trying to tap the "add event" button.) The quick drag-and-drop rearrangement of the blocks -- almost as if you had paper cutouts on a cardboard schedule -- makes it easy to fit all the necessary schedule elements into your week, and know that you're not skipping anything. In the monthly calendar mode, you're actually getting an alternate view of your iPad calendar data one month at a time. It's not as flexible as dedicated apps like Agenda or Readdle's Calendars, but it's a nice overview. The Lists view gives you a basic task manager, with folders to group lists of individual to-dos. Each task can be checked off with a single tap. Sharing and exporting is an interesting -- and very constrained -- feature in Weekly Schedule. Nothing is cloud synced, dynamic or remotely editable (except events in the Calendar view, if your native calendars are shared); it's all local data, all on your iPad. For the weekly view and the calendar view, there's one way to get your work out to your colleagues -- you email an image of the schedule or calendar. Yep, that's it. For task lists, the email is text instead of an image, which is appropriate for that data type. I'd love to see some next-gen features (AirPrint, flexible export options) make it into Weekly Schedule down the road. In the meantime, though, if you have a weekly planner to make and only your iPad handy, it's a solid tool.
Audiobus claims to mix audio sources on your iOS device
We've seen before that iOS can be very powerful in terms of producing audio, but there's one big drawback, and it's that iPhones and iPads are still only designed to be used for one task at a time. If you want to do more than one task at a time (like combining beats with a synth, or processing and recording vocals), you're either out of luck, or you have to find an app that does both. Until now, apparently. Audiobus is a brand new app for iOS that purports to have solved this problem, and will combine audio sources and actions across multiple apps somehow. That means that with Audiobus, you can play synths in one app, play drums in another, and record them all together in a third. There are a few catches, not surprisingly. The first is that each app you use must be Audiobus compatible -- you can't just combine any app's output with any other, sadly. But there's a solid list of Audiobus apps available already, and presumably adding the compatibility in isn't too hard. Second, of course, using multiple apps at the same time can push the processor a little bit, so Audiobus recommends you use newer devices, in order to get as much power as possible. But otherwise, this sounds like a nifty suggestion for the apps listed as compatible. Audiobus is available now for $9.99. I think this is probably the next area where Apple can grow with an official solution. Obviously, Apple has wanted to keep iOS devices targeted towards one task at a time, but if third parties start creating other ways for apps to connect, Apple may get pressured to release more and more options for sharing information across multiple apps.
Task: Clear ripoff on steroids
Task ($0.99) from Nuage touch is an amazing to-do app. It's basically Clear on steroids. There's just one problem: it's not by Realmac Software, the people who invested so much time and energy creating a stripped-down, gesture-based interface. Listen folks, it's one thing when Apple Sherlocks you. It's another when a competitor basically muscles in, takes everything that defines you as unique and special and uses that as a jumping off point. Sure, they're validating you. Sure, they're giving you a huge compliment. But when does "perhaps borrows a little too much" cross a line? Task has some awfully cool stuff in it. When you take away the added spiffy, what you have is Clear: copied, enhanced, but Clear. And for that matter, Clear undercut by two bucks in pricing. We at TUAW support innovation. We want people to push boundaries, define new areas, and take apps to the next level. If we approve of Task then we're basically saying: "We want you to innovate but prepare to get cut in an alley by thugs who don't respect your time, talent, or effort." Create your own greatness. Buy Clear. Show them you care. Product Video Smackdown Realmac responds We reached out to Realmac for comment. Nik Fletcher, the Realmac product manager responded with the following statement We're flattered (shall we say) to see that so much effort has been made to recreate some of the interactions and GUI in Clear. Competition is always good for developers - it pushes us to make better products - but at the same time, it's quite disheartening to see so many apps liberally borrow so obviously from Clear. Since Clear launched, we've seen a lot of knockoffs and apps clearly inspired by Clear arrive on the App Store - in the region of one per week, by our records. Since our last update to Clear at the end of April, we've been back to work at the next Clear release. We've got some big plans for Clear that should start to take shape over the course of the next few months, so stay tuned.
TUAW'S Daily iPad App: Pocket Informant HD
WebIS Pocket Informant is an advanced PIM that has been around for years, transitioning from the Windows Mobile platform to iOS quite nicely. The iPad version of this calendaring and task management app is particularly notable for its wonderful layout and efficient use of the entire iPad display. One feature Pocket Informant was known for, even back in its Windows Mobile days, was its many settings and options. And, thankfully, these features are carried over to the iOS application. The settings menu on the iPad has options for General settings, Appearance, Today settings, Calendar settings, Task settings, Sync setting and Advanced settings. Under each of these headings are options to change colors, views, orientation, notifications and more. It's a field of dreams for those that like to tweak an app to their personal tastes. Pocket Informant HD has the appearance of daily planner and can be viewed in either portrait or landscape view. In either orientation, there are tabs on the right side which lets you switch from calendar view, task view, agenda view and settings. Each section has even more options in the top bar. From this bar, you can add an event or task as well as switch from days, month or week view. You can also display information from an individual calendar and use a search box to find a specific appointment or task. Despite all these options, everything is neat, orderly and pleasing to the eye. For those who adhere to a planning regimen, Pocket Informant HD supports Getting Things Done or Franklin Covey ABC/1-99 Prioritization of tasks. It also syncs with multiple Google calendars, iOS calendars and Toodledo. Some users may be overwhelmed by all the options and views available, but most users will be pleased by the power and flexibility of this personal information management app. At $12.99 Pocket Informant HD is pricey, but it's worth the cost for those that rely on their calendar to help manage their busy lives. %Gallery-129441%
TaskRabbit iPhone app lets you crowdsource your tasks
TaskRabbit is a unique service that lets busy people offload their tasks to those willing to do them. It costs a small fee, but you can have your groceries delivered, laundry done and dogs walked before you return home from a busy day at work. When it launched, the service was web-based only, but TaskRabbit recently developed an iPhone app that lets you manage your tasks on the run. You can create a new task, monitor the progress of a task and even price a task using information based from the TaskRabbit service. It lets you add descriptions using a voice recording or images so the person completing your task knows exactly what to do. It's an interesting use of modern technology that melds your mundane routine with the power of the crowd. And it's now on the iPhone. [Via TechCrunch]
Task system adding 250 free quests to LotRO
What, exactly, is a "task"? Aren't all MMO activities tasks in some way? And why does the word "task" get stranger the longer you look at it? The task system, hinted at by Lord of the Rings Online's devs over the past few weeks, has stirred a lot of curiosity and speculation in the community. LotRO's Allan Maki whipped up a recent dev diary to clarify the system and outline how tasks are different than standard quests and the epic storyline. Tasks, grabbed by players off of bulletin boards located around Middle-earth, are short collection quests that involve looting a set amount of specific "vendor trash" items from mobs. Typically, these drops were merely sold for coin, but now players have the option to turn them in for XP and deed progression. Task deeds, once maxed, will award players with special items like cloaks. However, as Maki explains, tasks are limited by level, meaning that higher-level players cannot pick up and complete low-level tasks. While the task system looks to be in testing for a while longer, Turbine is excited to add 250 of these mini-quests to the game for all players, both free and subscriber. You can read the full dev diary over at LotRO's website.
TUAW Giveaway: Bugger puts repeated reminders in your pocket
Given the number of things you have to keep track of in a day, sometimes a simple task manager -- the kind that reminds you once and then waits until the next day to tickle you again -- doesn't seem adequate. If you wish you had a snooze button for your tasks, maybe Bugger (US$0.99) is worth a look. Developer ZZTech built a tool to solve this problem, and it does the job pretty well (note that it requires iOS 4 and a backgrounding-capable device). You can create reminders for any future date and for an assortment of categories, then set a 'bug level' of every 10 minutes, 30 minutes, hourly, daily or weekly -- and if none of those intervals suit you precisely, you can customize them. After the reminder trips, you'll get on-device background notifications every time the clock ticks around until you either get 'er done or delete the reminder. There's no sync to desktop or cloud task managers, and none of the power features of higher-echelon GTD tools, but in this case you probably won't miss them. For speedy, gotta-finish task tracking, Bugger gets it. We've got 10 promo codes for Bugger to give away, and all you need to do is leave a comment below telling us what task is most likely to slip your mind. Open to legal US residents of the 50 United States and the District of Columbia who are 18 and older. To enter leave a comment on this post about your most misremembered task. The comment must be left before Friday, September 24 at 11:59PM Eastern Daylight Time. You may enter only once. 10 winners will be selected in a random drawing. Prize: One copy of the Bugger app (Value: US$0.99) Click Here for complete Official Rules.
OmniFocus for iPhone finally has reminders, but implementation is awful
[Update] Ken Case comments below, addressing some of the concerns listed here. It looks like a future version of OmniFocus on the Mac will be able to directly update the OmniFocus reminders on the server, removing at least one of my complaints. Ken Case from The Omni Group has been twittering for awhile about the impending inclusion of alarm reminders for OmniFocus. The task management app's iPhone users have been pestering The Omni Group to implement reminders as push notifications, but OmniFocus refuses to do so. They say that reminders that rely on connectivity are not good enough, and they have instead chosen to implement reminders by exporting due dates and times into iCal. Once the time comes for a reminder, it pops up like a normal iCal appointment reminder. Well, OmniFocus 1.5.2 for iPhone was released, and now we get to see how this alternative reminder system works. If I had to choose a word to describe this implementation, that word would be "awful." Here's why: The Omni Group has taken great pains to point out that you do not need to be using the desktop version of OmniFocus to get use out of the iPhone version. But for users that only have the iPhone version and are not synchronizing it to either MobileMe (which has a yearly fee) or a WebDAV server (complicated for non-techies), they can't use this implementation of reminders. That's right; the way it works is that OmniFocus on the iPhone exports your reminders to your synchronization server, then points iCal on the iPhone to the server to import your reminders. That means that if you enter new due dates in OmniFocus for iPhone but don't happen to have connectivity, you won't get reminders. Wait, I thought it was implemented this way in the first place to guard against a lack of connectivity? Your OmniFocus reminders unnecessarily pollute your iPhone calendar with reminders. This is a visual problem when you need to glance at your calendars and see what actual appointments are coming up. On the iPhone you can either look at one specific calendar, or all calendars, so if like me you need to regularly stay on top of more than one calendar, you're forced to look at your OmniFocus reminders as well. Oh, and even when you complete them in OmniFocus and resync, they don't go away in your calendar. [Update] Stephen points out in the comments that this works as expected, and upon further testing I have to agree. Maybe I was being a bit too impatient. Since your OmniFocus reminders are actually just fake appointments, there is no way to audibly differentiate them from appointment reminders. They sound and look exactly the same. Remember the Milk, for example, uses push notifications on its iPhone app, and you can set the notification sound to a number of different options. That way you know that you're being reminded of a task rather than an appointment. Reminders are set based on Due time, rather than Available time, and in terms of flexibility you can set the reminder to be 5 to 60 minutes before the task is due. By the time a task is actually due, isn't it too late to be reminded about it? Finally, if you're a user of OmniFocus for the Mac, your reminders are not created on your iPhone until you think to launch OmniFocus on the iPhone and synchronize it. That means that if you work all day in OmniFocus on your Mac (like I do), then drive home and start doing other stuff and don't happen to open OmniFocus on your iPhone, you won't receive any reminders for tasks that you might have set for that night, or until you actually open and sync OmniFocus on your iPhone. So, what would I rather see? Push notifications, like the many other OmniFocus for iPhone users out there that have been providing their feedback to The Omni Group. As mentioned, Remember the Milk has implemented push notifications, and the ability to change the notification sound isn't the only trick it has up its sleeve. The Remember the Milk icon on my iPhone's screen shows how many due tasks I have that day, and the number changes almost instantly when I make changes on the web version. To see how many currently available and due tasks I have in OmniFocus, I again have to launch the app and wait for it to synchronize. While I love OmniFocus and I think The Omni Group does amazing work, this implementation of reminders for the iPhone version of OmniFocus is just full of an amazing amount of fail. It's a hacky workaround that still doesn't ensure that a lack of connectivity won't adversely affect the user's ability to receive reminder notifications. Omni folks, this is just meant to be tough love -- I wouldn't be saying all of this if I didn't truly care about OmniFocus.
Macworld Expo: Big things for Things
It was a heck of a coming-out party for Cultured Code's Things, the task organizer and GTD platform for Mac and iPhone. With a passel of awards for the product (including a Macworld Best in Show) and a shipping 1.0 version of the desktop app, the CC gang had plenty to celebrate.I stopped by the Cultured Code booth for a chat with Michael Simmons and a look at some of the late-breaking features in the desktop release. I don't have the evolved and tweaked GTD workflow that some of my colleagues bring to bear, but I can say that Things is one of the few task managers I've found myself "moving into" naturally and easily, and I'm still using it after a couple of months. Now, if it only synchronized with my favorite cloud-side task manager ... but hopefully that's just around the corner.Owners of the iPhone version of Things should check the new "gear" icon for a 20% discount off the US$49.95 cost of Things for Mac, good through 1/15/09.Video in the 2nd half of the post.
Japanese hardware sales, 11 Dec - 17 Dec: ARG edition [update 2]
Update 2: Congratulations to Kurifurisan, Mr. Scolex, Oro, and Jennifer for successfully completing the ARG! The clues are explained below.Clue 1: As you can see below, the word Wii and the numbers 10 and 29 are highlighted in bold. This obviously refers to the Wii Fanboy blog in particular, on the date October 29th. Only one article was published on this date: Toys R' Us nonsense.Clue 2: In this post, we can immediately see that the post picture has been altered. It features four DS games: Spyro: A New Beginning, Contact, and Nintendogs (presumably the newer Dalmatian Edition). These games were all released on the same week, and thus, should have led you to the DS Fanboy post DS Releases for the Week of October 16th.Clue 3: This post had an extra final line added: "4 leaves take 5 4 good, 6 feet under. A shame, really." Silly numbers games aside, the death and departure of four leaves refers to the untimely dissolution of Clover Studios, makers of such fine games as Viewtiful Joe and Okami. This should have referred you to the final destination post, Clover Studios Goes Six Feet Under on Nintendo Wii Fanboy. If you found the cross-linked post on DS Fanboy, there was a message saying you had the wrong blog.We hope you enjoyed the game, and if you failed to complete it, you'll have some chances next year to prove your mettle. If you gain any, that is. Hah!For the uninformed, ARG stands for "Alternate Reality Gaming". That's really just a silly hype-word, we think, but here we go. Your task: follow the sequence of clues to various past posts in both Nintendo Wii Fanboy and DS Fanboy. Should you manage to defeat our ingenious riddles, post a comment on the final post to declare your victory to the world. Heck, we'll even go back and give you a star for doing it, too ... the feature is temporarily out of service, but our tech guys should have it back up and running soon.Below are the sales figures for this week, and contained therein, the first clue.- DS Lite: 319,708 10,078 (3.25%)- Wii: 108,237 22,798 (26.68%)- PS3: 70,942 20,771 (41.40%) - PSP: 48,962 20,032 (69.24%) - PS2: 37,730 7,270 (23.87%) - Xbox 360: 17,168 18,175 (51.42%) - GBA SP: 1,867 29 (1.53%) - Game Boy Micro: 1,491 64 (4.12%) - Gamecube: 1,152 583 (102.46%) - DS Phat: 158 9 (5.39%) - GBA: 42 25 (147.06%) - Xbox: 3 3 (50.00%)[Source: Media Create]
Midnight Inbox v0.9.5
Since we first heard about it a month ago, Midnight Inbox has been improving by leaps and bounds. One only needs to check Midnight Beep Softwork's development blog to get updated on all the changes and improvements (far too many to thoroughly list here), but put simply: a lot of performance and stability improvements have been made and the UI has received a significant update. Midnight Beep has been keeping a very open ear to user feedback, and they have a lot of cool features coming down the pipeline, such as: iCal syncing, printing of hipster PDA cards, archiving, live filters and search, support for Quicksilver, Automator and AppleScript and of course - language localizations.For beating some heavier hitters to market with what is quite possibly the first true GTD app, Midnight Inbox certainly doesn't look too shabby, and neither does its $35 price tag. Check out Midnight Beep Softwork's site for more details and to take a demo for a spin.
Widget Watch: The Daily Grind 2.0
Dave Caolo found The Daily Grind last month, just this week it was updated to version 2. The new version of this task-tracking widget adds colored labels and the ability to drag and drop tasks for greater organizing goodness or "simply because it's an addictive pastime."The Daily Grind v2 is donationware and available from Thomas Pilgaard Miller's site.
