What makes a great to-do app? Is it about features or a whole new way of using it? Could a different mindset be the key? Maybe a simple design?<p>I've tried all the famous apps: todoist, basecamp, linear, trello, asana, obsidian, and even github. But something feels missing. The process of researching, note-taking, logging, tracking, and completing tasks—it's not quite right.<p>Imagine you're making a to-do app from scratch. What would you focus on? What new ways of thinking or methods would you bring in? What could you leave out?
I was working on a todo app for Android over a decade ago and it was very simple. The only gimmick was that it tried to replicate the satisfaction of crossing off a to do list item with pen and paper. Not checking it as done, clicking anticlimactically on a bubble next to the name, but running a line through it with extreme prejudice and satisfaction. Specifically, you were supposed to run your finger across it and it would be sliced in half with haptic and audio feedback.<p>Because that’s the point of to do lists: to empty them. And giving a satisfying experience of completing an item seemed to me the best way to encourage that.<p>I never finished it. I stick with pen and paper these days because it’s my opinion that a to do list should not survive the day it is written. Anything longer lived is not a to do list, but a list of goals or obligations. A slip of paper with hand scrawled tasks, easily lost, reinforces that. It’s funny to me, in fact, that I can write out a todo list faster than I can type (via phone keyboard) or dictate it. Modern tech is still so slow.<p>Anyway, anyone please feel free to steal the gimmick if it fits into your project. I’m sure some app out there already has.
My dream to-do app is a combination of some novel features plus the best ideas from other apps (TaskPaper, Notational Velocity, Drafts app, SimpleNote, etc...)<p>The overall concept is tasks, notes, and bookmarks are integrated together. As I do a task, I often want to take notes on that task. Some bookmarks can be tasks to read/share later.<p>- Plaintext-based interaction + graphical views (markdown, calendar/timeline, etc...)<p>- TaskPaper-style tags like @due(2023-10-10)<p>- Drafts-style actions on text<p>- Multiplatform/sync like SimpleNote<p>The novel features of my to-do app:<p>- Priority is just the due-date: I usually want to work first on tasks that are due earlier.<p>- Larger tasks are broken down into sub-tasks. Those sub-tasks can have earlier due dates, bumping up the "effective priority."<p>- "Effective Priority" is a dynamic tag: its value is based on the first of the parent's or children's due-dates.<p>I've been making prototypes of subsets of the features, like:<p>- <a href="https://multi-launch.leftium.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://multi-launch.leftium.com/</a><p>- <a href="https://instant.leftium.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://instant.leftium.com/</a><p>- <a href="https://todo-taskpaper.leftium.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://todo-taskpaper.leftium.com/</a><p>- <a href="https://plaintext-press.leftium.com/https://www.dropbox.com/s/1g5qrmfinno8a5j/patagonia.taskpaper" rel="nofollow noreferrer">https://plaintext-press.leftium.com/https://www.dropbox.com/...</a><p>- <a href="https://github.com/Leftium/todo.html">https://github.com/Leftium/todo.html</a>