ForumsQuestionsPros/Cons of Alternatives to Toodledo.


Pros/Cons of Alternatives to Toodledo.
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pawelkaleta

Posted: Nov 02, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
Posted by gtappend:
However similar the "story" may be, the pricing policy certainly isn't!

Todoist are increasing from $29 to $36 per year, not tripling the price. And, more importantly, current premium customers remain locked into their current price so that the increase only affects new customers.

I think that is a crucial difference. If Toodledo hat done the same thing and locked Silver and Gold customers into their prices rather than just until the end of their current subscription, there would have been a lot less discussion about the increase.

Posted by Purveyor:
And one more difference: Todoist is allowing/encouraging free users to upgrade now at $29 per year before the price increases.

When Toodledo announced that the price will increase in 2019 for renewing subscriptions, the price for new subscribers was immediately increased to $60/year for Silver and $90/year for Gold.

I totally agree.
Ummagumma

Posted: Nov 02, 2018
Score: 1 Reference
I just can’t warm up to Todoist. E.g. the inability to sort tasks on mobile is rather mind boggling in 2018. (Unless you are Apple).

If I ever go back to a paid subscription service, I think RTM will be very high on my list.

I am also re-thinking my workflow. One of the biggest limiting factors in choosing the suitable tools was my insistence on using the due dates to track the deadlines, and start dates to schedule/ filter out tasks for action. Not very many apps and services support the start date. I should be fine for the foreseeable future (GoodTask + Outlook, with CalenGoo as a backup option, or RTM if I move to a paid service again). But I will also try a different approach - putting the deadline in task subject and using Due date for scheduling work; this should open up the possibilities quite a bit.
Ummagumma

Posted: Nov 03, 2018
Score: 2 Reference
Posted by DrFrankBuck:
I agree with the idea of putting the hard deadline as part of the task.Been doing this for years and it works great. (Example: Write grant proposal for ABC project (DEADLINE NOV. 17). Part of my weekly planning includes searching for the work "DEADLINE" and it brings up every task that has a true drop-dead date. I use Due Date for the date I want to see the task again. For me, Start Date (which has a default of today) is a quick reference for how long the task has been hanging around (although there is a spot on both Toodledo and RTM that shows the creation date.)

I am like the automatic migration of overdue tasks to the current day...looks like that's being planned for Toodledo and the collaboration on the free plan.



I have many tasks that take from days to weeks of work to complete and have concrete deadlines. So starting work on time is just as important as finishing it on time. Some tasks may be due in 3 weeks but I need to start working on them tomorrow, some may be due next Wednesday but I can start next Monday and still have plenty of time.

For these high workload tasks, I have three main requirements - (1) start them early enough (2) finish them before the desadline (3) hide them out of sight until I need to start working on them.

So, without using the start date, that's how I do it now

"11/19 Task XXX" (with due date 11/12)

"11/16 Task YYY" (with due date 11/14)

Task YYY is due earlier but takes less work to complete, so I can start working on it later.

The due date field is now my start date, it is when the task shows up on my list and I need to do something about it.

If I need to compare the actual deadlines, I sort by title. I only need to do this for project tasks.

For simpler tasks that can be done in an hour or less, and especially repeating tasks, I put the actual deadline at the end, since I don't want them to clutter my deadlines view. E.g.

"Pay water bill before 21st" (with due date 12/15 repeated every 3 months)

I think this would work well for me in the long run... although having separate Start and Due date fields has it's advantages, too. If I did not use mobile devices and voice input, I'd stick with this approach.


This message was edited Nov 03, 2018.
MM1772

Posted: Nov 03, 2018
Score: 1 Reference
I don't use start dates in Toodledo because I found it confusing. For me, "Due date" is always the date on which I need to do something (in this case, start a project). I usually have the actual deadline date in the task name.

I think I'm going to try @DrFrankBuck's trick of using DEADLINE in the task name with the actual deadlline date, and @Ummagumma's trick of putting the deadline date at the beginning of the task name (although I'll probably write it in YYYYMMDD format since I often have projects that span calendar years or some that I find out early enough to write a task for it a year or two in advance).
Ummagumma

Posted: Nov 03, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
Posted by MM1772:
I don't use start dates in Toodledo because I found it confusing. For me, "Due date" is always the date on which I need to do something (in this case, start a project). I usually have the actual deadline date in the task name.

I think I'm going to try @DrFrankBuck's trick of using DEADLINE in the task name with the actual deadlline date, and @Ummagumma's trick of putting the deadline date at the beginning of the task name (although I'll probably write it in YYYYMMDD format since I often have projects that span calendar years or some that I find out early enough to write a task for it a year or two in advance).


If you’re using Windows, look at Texter. It can automate text entry, very useful for using plaintext tags.
arishun

Posted: Nov 04, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
If you pay for new price of Toodledo, please see Amazing Marvin before that.
This is more expensive than Toodledo.
But I think that it is a wonderful service.

Start date,
Due Date,
Date to run.
He will manage these separately.

He has an estimate time in his task.
He tracks it with a timer that works alone.
(He is the only one who can do this except Toodledo, as far as I know)

He can do all that Toodledo can do.
And he can do more than that.
shelbyp

Posted: Nov 04, 2018
Score: 2 Reference
I have now tested RTM and thought I would give some feedback, as Purveyor has already given the exhaustive comparison list, these are more some specific areas I thought I would like to highlight.

1. Import from TD, gets the tasks in, but the tagging was clumsy if your list has 10,000 tasks you might have some work todo. I would have thought priority would have been mapped to tags Top,High etc , they are note mapped. Contexts were not taken into account. So priror to exporting you should setup the tags so they work they way you would like!

2. RTM is heavily tags/Saved search based. together you can accomplish most (I think) that context, goal, folders,priority etc do in TD, but you need to think up your tags approprirately.

3. RTM ismuch better on Android (don't know IPhone). RTM app kills Ultimate Todolist in terms of usability and is feature rich. Ultimate TodoList works for me, but RTM is so much more professional...

4. I was particularly interested in IFTTT integration. RTM has it, but is missing a key trigger (Trigger for task which completes with a specific tag). This would be SOOOO useful eg. for calendar integration I could tag /Calendar and have IFTTT post my google or outlook calendar. TD has this function, but it is extremely buggy and unreliable. I can't trust key appointments with the current state of TD IFTTT. I hope this is fixed soon. If RTM adds the feature I need for IFTTT I will switch over. If TD in the meanwhile is able to fix and there are some other improvements, I will probably stick with TD.

5. Using the infinite subtasks capability, you can obtain the functionality of Outlines in TD. I actually really like TD Outlines, very fast and user friendly. I use only the online version I was disappointed with the IPhone support (very slow) and Ultimate_todolist does not support the outlines on Android. RTM support for infinite subtasks is smooth online and on Android.


This message was edited Nov 05, 2018.
kerrinhardy

Posted: Nov 06, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
Tried clickup for a month or two but it just wouldn't click. There's also no functionality to email in a task, which I sorely missed.

Someone mentioned ticktick.com and I've now fully made the switch. It's on all my devices (mac, windows and iphone) and it just feels really nice and clean. Premium is under $28 / year and I only really needed that for the Windows desktop app.

Have taken the opportunity to sort through my tasks in the move. At first I was frustrated at the acquisition, but now I'm glad the pricing increase and changes pushed me to make the move.

I don't really like advertising a product on the forum of another, but the absolute plethora of to-do apps makes it impossible to try them all so this thread has been really helpful.
Purveyor

Posted: Nov 06, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
For anyone who is wondering about the popularity of various online task managers, there's Alexa website traffic statistics.

For example:
Toodledo
Remember The Milk
Todoist

And, for comparison:
Evernote
Slack


This message was edited Nov 06, 2018.
gtappend

Posted: Nov 08, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
On the subject of start dates:

Todoist allows you to set up multiple reminders per task, and receive this as a desktop notification, e-mail, mobile push message or text message. So I'm trying out putting the start date (when I need one) in as the first reminder. The trouble is, that the task still does not appear in the main screen if it is not actually due in the next 7 days, ie. you start work on it but have planned longer than a week for the task.
gtappend

Posted: Nov 08, 2018
Score: 1 Reference
On the subject of pricing:

Todoist support have confirmed to me, that as long as you start a trial before the price rise kicks in, you will still be locked in to the old price even if the conversion to a paid account is after 1st December, as long as you don't revert back to the free level first.

In the case of Todoist business, which is the version I am looking at, even if I add new employees in future they will also be added at the old $29/user/year price as long as I don't cancel the subscription on my main account.
Anastassia_2

Posted: Nov 15, 2018
Score: 1 Reference
Another long time user here exploring alternatives. I like that Toodledo gives a total duration of all tasks in a given view and use this feature a lot for planning purposes. I looked into Nirvana, RTM and TODOist and they don't seem to have this and some even don't track estimated duration. Has anybody come across task managers that would do this?

This message was edited Nov 15, 2018.
leopoldo

Posted: Nov 15, 2018
Score: 1 Reference
Posted by Anastassia_2:
Another long time user here exploring alternatives. I like that Toodledo gives a total duration of all tasks in a given view and use this feature a lot for planning purposes. I looked into Nirvana, RTM and TODOist and they don't seem to have this and some even don't track estimated duration. Does anybody come across task managers that would do this?


Take a look at ClickUp or My Life Organized. Both have this feature. I'm playing around with both trying to decide if I'll move to them. ClickUp is more geared towards teams but pretty good for individuals. $60/year but they have a very generous free plan and a lot of great features and is ACTIVELY developed (seems like significant updates come out every few weeks). My Life Organized is a $90 one time cost (if buying both mobile and desktop versions) plus $15/year for cloud sync, but also has a lot of great features. It's a little clunky when it comes to data entry but part of that is because it's got so many super user features.
pawelkaleta

Posted: Nov 28, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
Is anyone of you considering doit.im as an alternative? Could somebody share some thoughts or pros/cons vs TD? RTM looks promising, but what do you think about doit.im?

This message was edited Nov 28, 2018.
Purveyor

Posted: Nov 29, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
The About Us page for Doit.im does not inspire confidence.
coolexplorer

Posted: Nov 29, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
Posted by Purveyor:
The About Us page for Doit.im does not inspire confidence.

Exactly.
The Doit.im UX looks appealing but you get locked in. No way to export your data if you are unhappy with the app.
pawelkaleta

Posted: Nov 29, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
You're both right, thank you.
MM1772

Posted: Dec 20, 2018
Score: 0 Reference
I'm just wondering if anyone has found a good substitute for Toodledo's Notes module (not the task notes, but the notebook notes). Toodledo has said they don't plan to do much development on this feature because there are so many other options out there, which -- to me -- makes good business sense at this point.

I've looked at SimpleNote, Standard Notes, and Zoho Notes. I didn't really like Zoho Notes, so I crossed that off the list.

Standard Notes was okay and has a good encryption story, plus automatic backup, but it's open source and I don't know how long the project would continue (yes, it's true that many open source projects last much longer than commercial projects, but...) The big drawback was that it wasn't clear to me how I could move to another app if I wasn't happy with them or if they disappeared. Having spent a lot of time researching and trialing other apps, I don't want something I can't leave easily.

SimpleNote is also at least partially open source, but the company that provides it, Automattic, also created WordPress.com, so I don't think they're going to go away soon. Their support group was very helpful when I asked about a Toodledo Notes import. Though they don't have a specific import for it, they suggested I try their text file import. This, however, involves saving each note as a .txt file. You can get to that point by exporting the notes as .CSV, then opening the CSV file and stripping out the columns you don't need. Basically, the only column their import uses is the Notes column itself, so you lose the note title and folder. If you know VBA (or know someone who does), you can write a little script that instead writes the folder name as a tag (for example, #HomeRepair) in the note body, and then saves the note using the title as the filename. To make the Title into a valid filename, you have to do a search and replace on all the entries in the Title column and changing all spaces and special characters to a hyphen or underscore. I'm probably not explaining it clearly enough, and there are probably quicker ways to do it, but you get the general idea: It *can* be done with a little work, and support is very helpful. I had 600+ notes, but I saved only 300 as text. I've imported a few of those as a test.

Why didn't I just go with OneNote? I didn't see a good way to export if I wanted out. (I might have missed something, though.)

Why didn't I go with Evernote? Same thing. Also, I keep hearing rumors that they're not doing so well or that they're focusing so much on the business audience that soon there won't be lower-cost plans for the individual user. None of these rumors seem well-founded, but, as I said, I don't want to go through this again right away.
Mike Thomas

Posted: Dec 20, 2018
Score: 1 Reference
Once I heard that Toodledo wasn't going to continue to develop Notes I switched my Notes to OneNote, but I'm already paying for Office 365 so there was no additional financial hit.

However, I did it manually, and would probably just do the same if I ever needed to leave OneNote.

I'm not super happy with OneNote though - on a phone it just seems to be a bit flaky when (for example) copying & pasting text - I often end up with stuff pasted in the wrong place.
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