Comments for Allison Randal http://allisonrandal.com here be unicorns Wed, 04 Jan 2012 15:57:25 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.com/ Comment on Tody Task Manager by allison http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/31/tody-task-manager/#comment-288 Wed, 04 Jan 2012 15:57:25 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=309#comment-288 PPAs serve the same purpose as branches in source control, a safe location for testing changes or new features that acts like it’s part of the main distro. Are you on Ubuntu? If so, scroll down to “(Read about installing.)” on the PPA page and follow those instructions. Otherwise, I’ll make a regular tarball.

]]> Comment on Tody Task Manager by Andy Lester (@petdance) http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/31/tody-task-manager/#comment-287 Tue, 03 Jan 2012 16:53:02 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=309#comment-287 Can you give a pointer to what we’re supposed to do to use/install it? I don’t know what these PPAs are.

]]> Comment on Free Software for Task Management by Avi Kaye http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/12/free-software-for-task-management/#comment-286 Mon, 02 Jan 2012 20:33:03 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=297#comment-286 The real problem with pencil and paper (and I’m writing this with my task list for today written down in my notebook in front of me of course), other than what you mentioned, is that it’s bloody hard to manage more than simple tasks – at least, that’s what I’ve found. I can easily manage my tasks for the day, but when I need to manage 3-4 people, or a project that extends for more than 2 days, I find that I get very.. er.. focused on the specific tasks I’ve written down, and I sometimes lost sight of the bigger picture, or in this case, the entire project. And that’s if I’m just running the one project, with tasks that I add in a linear fashion. For more complicated matters, I think that you can’t escape using some sort of project management tool.

Now to take a look at what you’re working on :)

]]> Comment on Free Software for Task Management by allison http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/12/free-software-for-task-management/#comment-285 Mon, 02 Jan 2012 18:01:35 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=297#comment-285 @Avi, Curiously, text files and paper are exactly what I keep falling back to, even when I’m actively using some task manager app. Which tells me that there’s something about the simplicity of those tools that makes them more useful than the special-purpose tools, even though they’re not designed for the purpose. Still, they do have their own annoyances. Paper has nice visual scan-ability, but isn’t searchable, quickly gets cluttered with crossed-off tasks, and my lists have a bad habit of getting lost, especially when I travel. Text files are more portable (can be saved to some personal cloud like Ubuntu One or Dropbox), also have that nice quick scan effect, and are searchable, but they have a poor interface for search results, and editing or sorting for priority is a painfully manual process.

And sure, lots of websites will try to lock your personal data in. It’s to their advantage if you can’t easily migrate to another site. But, it’s so easy to provide a simple “export” feature, and users will trust the site more if they know it respects their rights to their own personal data.

It’s true that open source apps have the same potential for losing their maintainers, but they have one advantage over proprietary websites: I can take over maintenance of an app if the original authors ever disappear. Or, I could just start by developing it myself (http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/31/tody-task-manager/).

]]> Comment on Tody Task Manager by allison http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/31/tody-task-manager/#comment-284 Mon, 02 Jan 2012 17:30:00 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=309#comment-284 Ah cool, I’ll catch up with Bryce.

]]> Comment on Tody Task Manager by allison http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/31/tody-task-manager/#comment-283 Mon, 02 Jan 2012 17:29:16 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=309#comment-283 Thanks. :)

]]> Comment on Tody Task Manager by jorge http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/31/tody-task-manager/#comment-278 Sun, 01 Jan 2012 16:58:21 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=309#comment-278 You should link up with Bryce Harrington, he has a similar application (but more GTD focused) that you might want to swap ideas with.

This looks nice!

]]> Comment on Free Software for Task Management by Avi Kaye http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/12/free-software-for-task-management/#comment-276 Sun, 01 Jan 2012 07:12:28 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=297#comment-276 @Allison – In that case, your best bet is probably notepad (or the Mac equivalent) or pencil and paper :) (and no, I’m not trying to be cynical or anything). In almost any other case you have put some sort of trust into the tool you start using to not disappear in a few months, or, in the case of open source, stop being supported or developed. I find that as long as the tool appears to have some sort of maturity, and it’s been around for at least 6 months (which is like 6 years in Internet time :) ), then I can take it for a serious spin.

]]> Comment on Tody Task Manager by mhall119 http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/31/tody-task-manager/#comment-275 Sun, 01 Jan 2012 04:51:24 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=309#comment-275 I’ve been wanting to make exactly this app for over a year, this is fantastic!

]]> Comment on Free Software for Task Management by allison http://allisonrandal.com/2011/12/12/free-software-for-task-management/#comment-274 Sun, 01 Jan 2012 03:09:19 +0000 http://allisonrandal.com/?p=297#comment-274 It looks cool, but I don’t want to depend on yet-another-website that may disappear whenever the developers get bored (or decide they can’t make money by giving away data hosting). I really want an app that’s completely and totally free (libre and gratis), integrated with my desktop, and where I’m not tied into any one tool.

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