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My needs are really simple. i rely on Outlook tasks as the master and use gSyncit to link my desktop outlook to Toodledo on my iphone. I find native tasks on an iphone just awful. The one feature very hand on the app on my iphone is hotlist but am I going to pay $36 a year for that undecided. Off to look at other options sadly........

I appreciate the developers desire to turn this app into a recurring revenue model but the pricing is steep for the value I would get.

Posted by Ummagumma:


Thanks for the response guys!!
Sounds like you are well versed in the different Task Mgmt options. We pretty much went from a notepad to a Word doc to Toodledo. So, I'm not really knowledgeable about what is available, but with the 300% price increase, I will quickly learn. We have a small team of three that work together and use it as a simple way to manage our business (and personal for me) tasks and delegate them back and forth on occasion. We already use Podio to collaborate on/setup business system processes and checklists, use BoxSync for sharing/storing documents, Google Calendar to track personal and business appointments and Buildium to manage property and tenants. So for a simple Task Managment software, here is a list of the things we use and want.

1) The ability to use it on two Macbook Pro laptops, one PC, two iPhones, an one android.
2) Have the ability to use it offline on an iPhone and have it sync when we connect to the internet. I travel a lot on airplanes and use the time I'm not connected during taxi out to update my list.
3) The ability to share and delegate tasks between collaborators. I like the feature Toodledo has that allows me to selectively choose which Folder my assistant/office manager can see (ie. They can view my business tasks, but can't see personal tasks).
4) A way to prioritize tasks visually and sort them in a logical manner (I think almost every task management program does this).
5) The ability to search in both laptop and cell phone app.
6) Be able to add notes with more detail about the task
7) Have customizable reminders with the ability to choose format (ie. popup, text, email)

If any of the big dogs (Google, MS, Apple, etc) had a platform that handled those things, I would be more inclined to spend my time moving there and learning their system as in my opinion, they have the resources to keep improving the software and there is a higher probability that will remain in business longer; not to mention the price is either free or cheap. It would be nice if something integrated well with one of the software systems mentioned above (Google Cal, Podio, Box) but I'm not really sure how that would look or what exactly I mean by that question. I guess I just want something that is simple and intuitive and if I can have fewer programs to keep open or review the better.

Any suggestions??
I'd also love to hear from any other small business owners or property managers as to what systems they have designed that work well for them.

Thank you!

After an initial flurry of trying to find an alternative that works well (for my needs) I had given up and resolved to bite the bullet and pay the ransom for a year of service, thereby delaying the decision by a year. But I cannot - every time I go to the Subscribe page (prompted by the arrow glaring at me in the left pane of my browser), it's still showing the old plans (with no warning of the impending change). None of the old plans say I will get 3rd-party app access (because it is supported by all of them for another 31 days).

This makes me determined to look again at the alternatives because I don't want to be painted into a corner come New Year's Day, or worse stuck in a tool that suddenly goes out of business because the users all moved to something else.

I don't need a lot of TD features. They all currently exist in the free version. But I *do* need to be able to make changes on a phone *and* in a browser and have them sync, plus I need support for sorting by context (or something analogous to it). Sadly most alternatives don't hit all those features, the one that does (RTM) will not import from TD (I used the beta version as directed and got no tasks after the import - but that's a question for the RTM forum).

Ditching TD altogether and syncing Ultimate To-Do List directly with Google Tasks is a non-starter (whoever "designed" (using the term loosely) Google Tasks should be selling deep-fried sliced vegetables).

This is pretty frustrating.

A better business plan would have been to make some substantial improvements and then announce increases.

.

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).

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.

Posted by Ummagumma:

I still miss Outlook and WinMo 5/6 with exchange, plus Pocket Informant. Tasks synced perfectly and PI made the tasks accessible and added robust filtering and sorting. 10 years later, and there is still no good replacement solution!

Posted by Ummagumma:

Well, if you want you can in fact achieve something very similar to alarm functionality. Take a look for example here. If you use it with NOW() or other date/time-related conditions and for example add MsgBox which appears with the sound you are ready to go :)

This is honestly hard to fathom. I can't imagine ANY user not caring about having "at least" a year of completed task history. What an odd thing to try and differentiate price points with. I could understand the free plan not offering any history, but for a paid plan to exclude at least a year is utterly baffling.

Posted by GerTruDis:

I have found that the "upgrade" page (accessed by clicking the new arrow on the bottom left of the TD menu shows subscription rates at the old prices but with changed feature limits. Is everyone getting this or is it account by account? Of course one now cannot subscribe until 30 days before your subscription ends. Maybe at that time the annual subscription charge will suddenly show the planned increase. That is devious, because you then have only a month to make an assessment, find a new Task App and transfer your data.

The saved search feature is pretty robust, even in the free plan, you I think you are going to find what you need. There is an import if you want to pull in all your data and put RTM through its paces. I just posted in another thread how to get to the import (because it's not obvious). Good luck. Keep me posted on what you're finding.

In Toodledo, my sort was Due Date then Priority, then Star.
To get the same thing un Remember the Milk, I use the "This Week View. That gives me a first sort by due date. I select "Priority" as the sort, which in effect gives a secondary sort by due date. From there, switch the sort to "Drag and Drop" to further organize the tasks within that priority.

Posted by Ummagumma: