ForumsNewsFuture Plans
Future Plans
| Author | Message |
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Dean |
I am completely amazed at the Silver plan going from $20 to $60/yr. It is insane and completely unacceptable.
I LOVE Toodledo and have used it since 2008. A more graduated increase makes more sense and perhaps a new tier of service that would include new features/functionality not available now. It is hard for me to justify paying 3x as much for the same product - regardless of how good it is. |
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AA |
Some good news at least for me, based on my email correspondence with Aaron, Toodledo's CEO:
https://www.toodledo.com/forums/2/26237/-117615/read.html#jump |
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Bernd73 |
This is in my opinion the beginning of the death of toodledo. Not only the pricing increase but also cutting the sync for free users with third apps is not acceptable. I loved using toodledo but I will leave if this goes live. RIP.
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mjbernstein |
I would like to chime in yet again. I have explored many options. Paper planner, Wunderlist, Anydo, Google tasks and many others.
For the foreseeable future I am sticking with Toodledo. Google calendar will remain my date planner. May Toodledo live long and prosper and frankly the price is worth it to me but as I reflect on things this is what I would like to see added--sorry for being repetitive 1) First I would like to have a calendar integrated into things. Tasks and daily schedule should be able to be seen in the same view; and even integrated. It's like vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce--independently they are good. Together they are DYN-O-MITE as JJ would have said. 2) Color is very important for visual thinkers. Color can be use to segregate tasks into context/folders/ etc...in a rapid and visual way. Alternatively one could use color to indicate when in the day that task is assigned and especially if integrated into a calendar define a time when that task is to be started and completed. 3) A blank page for notes to record what happened on each day. Important calls. Personal thoughts and diaries. Tracking those things that slowed us down or sped us up. And then the ability to recall those issues. 4) There are several categories allowed--Context, Folders, Goals, Location. We can define the members of the group--could we also define the title of the groups? For instance I use Context for when in the day I am hoping to get things done. 5) Manual sorting of tasks via drag and group would be good. You can do that in a subtasks but honestly, I have yet to figure out well how to make the subtasks behave. Does that need work? 6) A note boards that is more drag and drop--like a colorful bulletin board. Fun. Visually attractive. 7) There are my starting points and where I will finish. I still think the system (being the web utility for me) is clumsy and stale--but it is powerful. Now is needs refinement to match the ease of management and visual appeal of competitors. Aaron, you there? I will e-mail. Marc |
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elena.kucheryavenko |
Seriosly? 2.5 times rising of price? And there go all the promises made with purchase of toodledo that price changes won't concern current clients.
I would understand 10% rising - with some positive changes of service. But 250% rising for service that had no change or evolving in more than 3 years - no way. And the current state of toodledo doesn't value more than 30 dollars per year. First do smth good and start evolving, than lets talk about how much we are eager to pay for it |
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howard.fredericks |
Unfortunately for me, my current subscription expires in February so I need to make a decision about what will replace Toodledo, not whether it is replaced.
$60/year is too high for a to do list application, not matter how much I have relied on Toodledo over the years. Decisions like this are not made in a vacuum - subscriptions for note taking software, antivirus, tax and other SAS apps add up. A separate to-do list app is the least important. I am also concerned about the viability of the company. Toodledo will certainly lose some subscribers. How many is the real question and whether they can keep enough at the higher price to increase revenue. It will also be a hard sell to get 'free' users to convert at the higher price when there are alternatives at a more reasonable $25-$30 per year. Keep the Silver price at $30/year and $25/year with a 2+ year subscription and I would gladly pay. I always thought Toodledo was priced too low from a business perspective. The hoopla from new management when ownership changed hands was short-lived. They should have just said things will change on pricing. |
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korey99 |
This news made me evaluate my options. I've used toodledo for many years, and while it has some great features, some of which are unique, a lot of the reason I stuck around was just because I hadn't been looking around. I'm trying out a new app.
I think I'm going to move on to Todoist. Here is why, sharing in case it will help the toodledo team. #1: I can assign tasks to my family. Collaboration using free accounts #2: contexts are cool, but easily replaced by tags #3: in the mobile app, you can swipe to mark complete or to postpone. As a big Google inbox user, this is great. #4: hotlist is cool, but Todoist has awesome custom filters, which I used to make a better hotlist #5: manual ordering actually helps me more than subtasks #6: Todoist has projects instead of folders. I'm finding nested projects very useful. I have an "optional" top level project, and all my hobby projects fall under it. That's all stuff I really don't have to do urgently. A couple of things I don't like: - the booklet print is good. I miss it - I like have more priority levels. Toodledo has 5, but Todoist pretty much only has 4 (p4 is "unprioritized" |
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Joe_1540150980 |
I'm not going into a long response.
Thirty dollars per year was well worth it. Sixty dollars per year is not. I just converted over to a competitor's Web and Android applications. I wish everyone the best of luck. |
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mjbernstein |
Posted by DrFrankBuck:
Marc, Thank you for posting this. I am interested in yours reasons for staying. Could you go into some details about what you are finding with Toodledo that you would lose if you left. Earlier this morning, I started a thread along that line. (It's in the "Questions" section. I would welcome your comments either there or here. Not saying I am staying, but want to make a thoughtful decision. Posted by mjbernstein: I would like to chime in yet again. I have explored many options. Paper planner, Wunderlist, Anydo, Google tasks and many others. For the foreseeable future I am sticking with Toodledo. Google calendar will remain my date planner. May Toodledo live long and prosper and frankly the price is worth it to me but as I reflect on things this is what I would like to see added--sorry for being repetitive 1) First I would like to have a calendar integrated into things. Tasks and daily schedule should be able to be seen in the same view; and even integrated. It's like vanilla ice cream and chocolate sauce--independently they are good. Together they are DYN-O-MITE as JJ would have said. 2) Color is very important for visual thinkers. Color can be use to segregate tasks into context/folders/ etc...in a rapid and visual way. Alternatively one could use color to indicate when in the day that task is assigned and especially if integrated into a calendar define a time when that task is to be started and completed. 3) A blank page for notes to record what happened on each day. Important calls. Personal thoughts and diaries. Tracking those things that slowed us down or sped us up. And then the ability to recall those issues. 4) There are several categories allowed--Context, Folders, Goals, Location. We can define the members of the group--could we also define the title of the groups? For instance I use Context for when in the day I am hoping to get things done. 5) Manual sorting of tasks via drag and group would be good. You can do that in a subtasks but honestly, I have yet to figure out well how to make the subtasks behave. Does that need work? 6) A note boards that is more drag and drop--like a colorful bulletin board. Fun. Visually attractive. 7) There are my starting points and where I will finish. I still think the system (being the web utility for me) is clumsy and stale--but it is powerful. Now is needs refinement to match the ease of management and visual appeal of competitors. Aaron, you there? I will e-mail. Marc Sure--I am happy to explain my decisions to stay for now: 1) I have invested a lot into Toodledo (time and thought not money). I know how I like to use it and have a lot set up. So switching requires effort on my part. An equivalent year long paper planner would cost the same dollar amount as a year's subscription under the current system. I am currently Platinum subscriber--not because I need it but frankly--I felt that was my fair price for the use. 2) Toodledo is very powerful. Repeated task settings are not as easy with many other programs. 3) There are many columns to which to assign tasks and you can use them as you wish. So My first sort is context and that is based upon time that I usually do these things so that I get a nice sort where I can go down the list. That said I can sort by location so if I sort that way I can see if while I am somewhere I could finish off a tasks even if not when I had planned. I just do not see that elsewhere. These columns can be easily access when initially entering 4) I have never really gotten into subtasks--using priority and dividers instead but at least the option is there to explore that. 5) I do use the note and list section. I got a lot there so migrating can be tough. That also allows use of many fields and different sorting--again powerful. And unlike a simply database if you want to add of remove and re-add a column you can do that without too much pain. 6) Good task management starts with goals and I think that option is more apparent on Toodledo. 7) It is a bit clunky but Toodledo allows me to pick a date and look back at what I got done on that day. 8) Overall the system has not let me down--in years. The competitors are really not there with the power. Wunderlist is frozen and more of less tied to Microsoft--good luck there. There are many iOS only systems that may be good but really do not apply to me. I am mostly a web user and a tad Android. Google tasks--very meh. Any.do--just does not have the power. Wunderlist--well already talked about them. Google Keep is cute, very pretty, but limited. Kanban organizers (trello is really fun) have their place but I really prefer a list for a to do list. Now let me also add the following: I e-mailed Aaron and got what I believe to be a very respectable response. The response was honest. It expressed where they are, what they are doing, which things are easily done and which are technically more difficult. I hope Aaron does not mind but I will post his response. Again it was realistic. He seems that he is actually working on things without promising the world--if he was promising the world I knew he was more salesperson that effective leader. But his targeted goals and honestly really impressed me. So I view his response as one that should please us all at least in the way that we are dealing with a decent person not a sociopath: FROM AARON--- Hi Marc, Thanks for the note and taking the time to share share all these ideas with me -- I really appreciate it! I couldn't agree more with your points, starting with your last one: the system is clumsy and stale--but it is powerful. Now is needs refinement to match the ease of management and visual appeal of competitors. This is where we think we have opportunity to help Toodledo the most in the immediate term and where we are focusing our engineering efforts entirely. Calendar integration: I've heard this from several users, and I'd like for us to get better at this. I've heard some folks ask for calendars, some for Gantt charts, but it's clear that more options to visualize a timeline during the day and see how tasks fit in would be beneficial for many folks Color: One of the biggest values of Toodledo is for users to get a lot of information from a single screen. Integrating color better will add another dimension to surface information, which would boost one of our biggest strengths Blank page: Notes is something we offer today, but it's super clunky. If we could have a rich-text editor or templates, it would make this a far more useful feature. We know there's a lot of low-hanging fruit here. That being said, we are focusing on our core task management for now while the new team get into place. Customizability: Toodledo offers a powerful and flexible system, yet some folks want even more customizability. Defining the titles of groups and fields is just one of many things that we could do to open up the system more Better multi-select and drag-and-drop: We want to do this. Enough said. There are some technical reasons why it'll take us a bit of time, but we believe many users have an intuitive sense for dragging and dropping, and if that's how you work best, then we want to do that. Kanban Boards: I've used these myself in my previous role, and they're very powerful. It's something that's on our backlog and we can't pick it up right now Hope this helps, Aaron ---- Here's the truth--with task management especially YMMV (your mileage may vary) from product to product. What works for me is the combination of Google Calendar and Toodledo. I would add in Trello and Google Keep but that's 4 programs; too much. In theory there should be a way to allow Google Calendar and Toodledo to play nicely but it has not worked for me--So I just gotta use two windows. Again with any system practice plays a role and I am pretty practiced with Toodledo. Maybe if I practiced with the others I could be as comfortable as I am with Toodledo but my initial impression as that for me (again I only can speak for me)--others would be a backstep. I did a pretty thorough study in 2012 and it boiled down to Wunderlist vs Toodledo and frankly, I think I choose well. And finally again for me, the only way I can see to have near the flexibility of Toodledo would be to go to paper. I was really good with Paper but at some point--years ago--my life just outgrew the paper and that was that. And honestly, when the changes at Toodledo were announced I sorta got into a twist, and the gadget lover inside of me was hoping to find something just a good but more visually stunning to improve my life. But in reality that was a pipe dream and just switching to switch was the same as biting my nose to spite my face. Frankly, I wonder if that explains some of the huffing and puffing around these forums--an initial reaction. But with a little time that passed. Finally--If I sound like an advertisement, I have NO association financial or otherwise (outside of being a user) with Toodledo. Marc |
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dismukemail |
Posted by mjbernstein:
And honestly, when the changes at Toodledo were announced I sorta got into a twist, and the gadget lover inside of me was hoping to find something just a good but more visually stunning to improve my life. But in reality that was a pipe dream and just switching to switch was the same as biting my nose to spite my face. Frankly, I wonder if that explains some of the huffing and puffing around these forums--an initial reaction. But with a little time that passed. If I get to keep my current Gold features at $60 per year in the new individual plan as someone posted that Aaron said would be happening (when I emailed him shortly after I received the price hike email, he sent me a nice reply that, at the time, said they were merely reevaluating full history for individual plans) it will be a no-brainer for me to stay. That's $5 month verses $2.50 I am currently spending. I had more time on my hands this week than I usually do and checked out some competing services. I suppose in a pinch the paid version of Todoist would work for me - but I did not care for it. I disliked Wunderlist when I briefly used it before deciding on Toodledo and I still dislike it. There is a service that offers a Windows desktop program that syncs with an Android app. It is very powerful and has a ton of neat features. But I found that task entry on the desktop version was very clunky - I haven't checked out the Android app. All the others I looked at were very quickly discarded as no-gos. Bottom line is my time has value - and $2.50 per month more than what I am currently paying is not worth putting up with clunkiness or an app that I really don't care for. Plus, as Marc said, there is the time and effort of switching - not to mention time spent doing further comparison shopping to see if there might exist something that I like better than the two that I found to acceptable in a pinch. My time spent looking at other programs wasn't a total waste. Through the process of reading about other products and through reading this forum I have learned that there are features in Toodledo that I was not aware of. I have seen the star feature - but it never occurred to me that it could actually be useful. I did not know at all about the saved search feature. Very cool - and I now have one that adds a view that I wished the program had. And I was not aware that the Android app and even parts of the website accessed in a browser work offline. Plus there are the features that I already have been using and value. At $90 - out of principle I would do some more due diligence and at least give some other service a trial run. But my big concern at this point is what happens if too many existing paid subscribers abandon ship. A price hike in the realm of 100 to 300 percent - that doesn't happen very often and is something that naturally gives people pause. I guess it depends on the value that one gets from Toodledo. If one doesn't use all the features that make it unique it seems to me that they would be at risk. $30 per year is within the realm of money that I have sent just as a show of support for services that I find valuable without regard to any extra perks or features I might get. Beyond that, I start to consider the value proposition - including what else exists in the market. I already have enough frustration in my life. At work I have no choice but to use Outlook Tasks because my employer has access to very confidential data. My storing work related information on a third party website that our information security has not vetted and approved would, for good reason, be a huge no-no. I constantly wish I could use Toodledo at work. While I do love being able to easily convert emails into tasks, everything else about Outlook drives me crazy. With Toodledo I view my daily tasks in such a way that combats overwhelm and information overload. I have yet to find a good way of doing so with Outlook - and there are times when it annoys me enough I end up reverting back to informal paper task lists. So the last thing I need in my life outside work is having another task manager that frustrates and annoys me. But I am really picky when it comes to things like that - most people, I suspect, are a lot more flexible than I am when it comes to such things. |
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Ummagumma |
No offense, but how well do you know Outlook ? Its task module, with some tweaking (plaintext tags, custom views and conditional formatting), is very powerful. Especially if you combine it with OneNote.
The difficult part is finding a mobile task app that syncs with it while maintaining the fields that you use the most. |
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dismukemail |
Posted by Ummagumma:
No offense, but how well do you know Outlook ? Its task module, with some tweaking (plaintext tags, custom views and conditional formatting), is very powerful. Especially if you combine it with OneNote. The difficult part is finding a mobile task app that syncs with it while maintaining the fields that you use the most. I have used it for years and have tried tweaking it any number of ways. My main problem with it is visual - with Toodledo I can easily group like tasks by folder and see an essentialized view of all that is on my plate at a quick glance. I have yet to find an easy way to do that in Outlook. I absolutely dislike the color coded categories that is Outlook's default method that people always suggest that I use. It is possible to place Outlook tasks in folders. But there is no folder field in the task creation interface that lets one select a folder. There is a way to add in custom fields - but I don't have the skill to associate the self created field with any actual existing folder, assuming that there is a way to do it. To create a task and assign it to a folder one has to click on File, go to the properties/save screen and then click for a folder option drop down. That is very clunky - but I could live with that clunkiness after getting used to it over time. I can get all tasks to display with separate sections for each folder - but I cannot filter out those not due on the current day. If I go to the Today view, I can sort by folder - but it does not break out the folders into separate sections. For me, this means if I have a ton of tasks on my plate, I have to spend more time than a quick glance to get a good overview. And the more I have to study a long list of items, the more I feel a sense of information overload - which I personally find frustrating and have to be on guard against being discouraged by. I am guessing with advanced knowledge it could be tweaked and improved. But I have spent years doing google searches to find a way to optimize things. And I have never been able to get the custom views to work for me. I am probably quirky when it comes to such things. I know lots of people who love Outlook Tasks and use it without similar issues - but these are also people who do not struggle with information overload to the degree I do. My brain I guess is hard wired differently than many other folks - if I have a lot of information in front of me I have to be able to contextualize it, classify it and group it into hierarchies or else my brain will quickly fry. My way of doing things is just to work around my quirks and weaknesses rather than spend lots of effort to conquer them - which, for me, usually means finding tools, software programs and processes that are non-clunky to the way my brain works. But there are occasions when we have no options but to use whatever tools are provided to us. I do use OneNote all the time - I love it. But I use it for keeping notes. After reading your comment, I did a quick Google search on OneNote Outlook integration - and immediately found a site that suggests that I might be able to use individual sections within a OneNote notebook in such a way as to perhaps accomplish what I have been wanting. That is something I will absolutely follow up on and investigate - so thanks so much for the suggestion! This message was edited Oct 21, 2018. |
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Ummagumma |
Posted by DrFrankBuck:
I used the Outlook (including the task list) as my productivity package in the BlackBerry days and liked the task list very much. The primary reason for looking for another alternative was, just as you say, syncing with a mobile task app. Here is a question that I have about the Outlook task list...Is there a way to add tasks via voice? Yes, since it sync to iOS via Reminders, you can use Siri. |
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Ummagumma |
Posted by dismukemail: I have used it for years and have tried tweaking it any number of ways. My main problem with it is visual - with Toodledo I can easily group like tasks by folder and see an essentialized view of all that is on my plate at a quick glance. I have yet to find an easy way to do that in Outlook. I am not quite sure I understand what it is you're trying to do, as what I am thinking of is very easy. Every list created in Reminders syncs as a folder in Outlook, and vs versa. If I want to group items from all Personal folders, but filter out Work folders, I can do it very easily in Outlook using custom views, and in GoodTask on iOS using "Smart Lists" (saved filters, i.e. also custom views). Same with 2Do. I have two types of custom views - Master and Focus. Master shows all tasks, and Focus shows tasks between start and due dates, overdue, or manually placed there (I use Top priority for this, but could use a special tag). Master All, Master Work, Master Personal, Focus All, Focus Work, Focus Personal. I have same views set up in Outlook and in GoodTask so I am using the same workflow on both platforms. If I am working with a large project, I may sometimes create a saved view pulling together all tasks for this project. I absolutely dislike the color coded categories that is Outlook's default method that people always suggest that I use. Agreed. I have long ago switched to plaintext tags. I put them at the end of task subject, but could also put them in notes section. That way, I can carry these tags across all of my devices and records and apps, and use custom filtering to create views based on them. E.g. Project finances presentation llFU - the tag llFU means "Follow Up", i.e. someone owes me information for this. The beauty of this approach is that I can use it across all of my documents and apps - Onenote, email, spreadsheets - and use Windows indexing or Spotlight search to quickly find all related records with same tag. And adding tags can be automated on iOS via custom keyboard shortcuts, or on Windows via some freeware utilities. E.g. instead of typing llProj all I have to type is llp. (ll is purely arbitrary, any combination of letters would work as long as it's unique enough to avoid false search results). It is possible to place Outlook tasks in folders. But there is no folder field in the task creation interface that lets one select a folder. There is a way to add in custom fields - but I don't have the skill to associate the self created field with any actual existing folder, assuming that there is a way to do it. Yes there is folder selection in the new task creation dialog, at least in my version of the Outlook (2016). Go to File - Move to folder. Although it's easier to just click on the right folder when creating a task. At any rate, I prefer to keep the number of folders / lists to the minimum, and use tags instead - easier to clean up after the project is done. To create a task and assign it to a folder one has to click on File, go to the properties/save screen and then click for a folder option drop down. That is very clunky - but I could live with that clunkiness after getting used to it over time. I can get all tasks to display with separate sections for each folder - but I cannot filter out those not due on the current day. If I go to the Today view, I can sort by folder - but it does not break out the folders into separate sections. Well, actually filtering out all kinds of tasks is precisely what Outlook is great for. Just need to learn to use it. E.g.to show only the tasks due today, incomplete: View -> View settings -> Filter -> Advanced -> Field selector -> Frequently used task fields -> Due date on -> manually type "Today" (without parentheses) Click "Add to list" Then again, View -> View settings -> Filter -> Advanced -> Field selector -> Frequently used task fields -> Complete equals "No". Click "Add to list" Save view as "Due Today". Personally, I prefer a slightly different approach. My Focus views show in progress tasks (due date on or before today, start date on or before today), and tasks with Top priority (I use it just like Star in Toodledo). I then use Conditional formatting in Outlook to assign different colors and fonts to tasks due today, Overdue, or Starred (i.e. Top priority). So when I switch to the Master view showing all tasks, I can still very easily see my overdue tasks (red), started tasks (green), due tasks (blue) or Top tasks (blue and underlined). The rest are all plain black. I also use filters and conditional formatting to hide tasks (just like Negative priority in Toodledo). I use a tag llHide for this. They are hidden from all views except MasterAll, in which they show up as light grey and italic. All of this takes half an hour to set up, if you know what you're doing. And it can all be replicated in GoodTask on iOS. If you get into custom filtering in Outlook, I very much recommend to enable SQL in filters (there's a registry hack for it, easy to find on the internet). This way you can use Boolean operators to set up AND / OR conditions for filters. For me, this means if I have a ton of tasks on my plate, I have to spend more time than a quick glance to get a good overview. And the more I have to study a long list of items, the more I feel a sense of information overload - which I personally find frustrating and have to be on guard against being discouraged by. This is why I use Focus views. If I have a task that is due in mid-November and would take me a week to complete, I assign a start date of Nov 1st to it, and it is hidden from my Focus view - along with several dozen other tasks - and will pop up in it when its time comes. My total task count right now is over 300. My Focus view count is 4. - I am guessing with advanced knowledge it could be tweaked and improved. But I have spent years doing google searches to find a way to optimize things. And I have never been able to get the custom views to work for me. What is it you're trying to achieve ? In my experience, custom views (especially after enabling SQL) are very powerful and not all that hard to set up. I am probably quirky when it comes to such things. I know lots of people who love Outlook Tasks and use it without similar issues - but these are also people who do not struggle with information overload to the degree I do. My brain I guess is hard wired differently than many other folks - if I have a lot of information in front of me I have to be able to contextualize it, classify it and group it into hierarchies or else my brain will quickly fry. My way of doing things is just to work around my quirks and weaknesses rather than spend lots of effort to conquer them - which, for me, usually means finding tools, software programs and processes that are non-clunky to the way my brain works. But there are occasions when we have no options but to use whatever tools are provided to us. I do use OneNote all the time - I love it. But I use it for keeping notes. After reading your comment, I did a quick Google search on OneNote Outlook integration - and immediately found a site that suggests that I might be able to use individual sections within a OneNote notebook in such a way as to perhaps accomplish what I have been wanting. That is something I will absolutely follow up on and investigate - so thanks so much for the suggestion! OneNote is an excellent project managing tool. I use it to take notes AND develop tasks, and then export them to Outlook with a single click. Moreover, it helps me to keep high level tasks (more of brainstorming ideas) outside of my task list, and only export individual actionable items to my master list, keeping the size manageable. A lot of people just dump all tasks into their task list and then find it overwhelming. This message was edited Oct 21, 2018. |
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cspence |
You would think the new owners would engage around the topic and stop the hemorrhaging of paid members.
The longer they ignore this discussion the more members they lose to other services that have already developed a good or better solution, at a more reasonable pricing structure. If they have any hope of salvaging this company or their investment over the long term - they need to address the members concerns and help to identify a workable solution. Deer in the headlights I for one have moved on - Tried a variety of options and have been happy with the functionality of ToDoist (things 3 also an interesting option), with its projects, labels and highly customizable searches. Fully integrated across computer/browser, iPhone, iPad and apple watch.All very solid offerings that are undergoing continuous improvements. Took a little time to set up - but in many ways much stronger offering (at a better price) than Toodledo as it exists today. Was looking forward to seeing how Toodledo was enhanced by the new owners - but not going to pay a very high premium for a future product with unknown functionality. Had been a long term user, but it is time to move on for me. |
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