Another GTD Contender - Openloopz

There was a slight setback in my GTD life this week. NirvanaHQ have decided to pull the pin on their current Android app direction. They will be looking at developing a new Android app from scratch and it may be a couple of months before we see anything. That means I am left with a second version of the beta. It is functional but as you would expect, buggy.

That means that the 2nd place prize winner is back in my focus once again. I haven't written about Openloopz but I have to say, this little app is quite the cracker!

OpenLoopz, IMHO tick's just about all of the boxes, and the ones it doesn't are being developed.

1. Firstly, it is a very pure implementation of GTD, complete with what I consider to be the Holy Grail on an Android platform, auto next action.
2. Secondly, it is a smooth, bug free, fast light app. It is a pleasure to use. Seriously, you should check it out. If only the majority of Android apps were both as smooth and aesthetically pleasing.
3. OpenLoopz also has a handy little geo location dimension to it. If you tag geographical contexts (like @Home and @Work as opposed to @Computer etc) your list of active tasks will be based upon your location. Very very handy, certainly for someone like me.

The reason why it doesn't have a five star rating from me (and indeed the reason I am still hobbling along with Nirvana HQ instead of OpenLoopz) is that:

1. The big drawback is that it is a hack to make work across multiple devices. There is a backup function, but there is no simple cloud sync option just yet. The developer is working on this as we speak and I look forward to seeing what it will look like.
2. Another smaller pet peeve of mine is the ability to look at a list of tasks by context. I have not been able to figure out how to do this just yet. What I mean is the ability to flick to @Agenda-Team Meeting and get a list of all the tasks I have added to that context quickly. (This was the reason why MLO is in third place, see my previous posts for more info on that handy little app.)

So in my mind, it is a race. NirvanaHQ are working on their Android app to supplement their first class web based GTD system, whilst OpenLoopz has a brilliant Android app but are now working on the back end. A race to the middle. Good luck to the both of them.

Watch this space.

How MLO *almost* worked for me as a GTD solution on Android.

When I hit the limitation of Due Today, I did some research and found what I thought was going to be the Holy Grail of GTD goodness on the Android (and Windows) platform.

My Life Organized (In Australia, we spell organised with an “s” instead of a “z”. Still a bit strange to type it with a Z.) is a brilliant solution.

The Android app is small, reasonably simple to install (you have to purchase a code and then insert it into the app. I believe it is a little more seamless through the app store these days) and after an hour or two, reasonably easy to use.

There are two main reasons that I used it extensively for almost a year. Firstly, the Windows app. The Windows app, whilst looking decidedly 1990’s, is pretty powerful. In terms of functionality, it seems to be the equivalent of Omnifocus on the Mac. Ugly as a mangy dog, BUT powerful.

I would do the bulk of my work on the Windows app and use the Android app during the day on the road.

This leads me to the second reason I used MLO for a while. Cloudsync. They use their own servers and you need to pay a subscription fee per year. It felt a little cheeky to pay for the Android app, the Windows app and then subscription for a cloud based service, but it is a pretty powerful solution.

The last time I used MLO (about 3 months ago now) you had to manually get the Android app (and the Windows app now that I think about it) to sync, but I never had a problem with syncing.

Once again, you can smell the big hairy but can’t you?

I was beginning a meeting with a colleague of mine. I got my Android phone out, selected all tasks assigned to the context @Agenda-Chris and only one was listed. I was pretty sure there were at least 4 things in my system to talk to Chris about but for the life of me I couldn’t find them. I fiddled around, whilst apologising profusely to Chris whilst we tried to manage the agenda for the meeting and finally found a “tasks by context” view on the Android app.

The tree view showed that I indeed had 4 items assigned to this context. I hit the line item on the tree view and no cigar. It told me how may I had but would only allow me to view the “Next” task. This is great GTD methodology but the system totally failed me when it came to giving me all tasks by context.

The frustration was quite profound! That particular approach is is totally doable on the Windows client. The only way that I could get a list is to either use my laptop computer in meetings (which often happen in cafe’s) or to print a list in advance from my Windows machine and take it with me to a meeting (or take a quick screen shot with my phone).

I asked the guys at MLO (who are incredibly friendly and responsive by the way!) if it was possible and if I was just missing something but they said that this was in fact how they had designed the Android app. This is an abject fail as far as I am concerned as the majority of my work is meeting with people and discussing lists of issues. Over half my contexts are either individual people or meetings that I attend.

I continued to try and make it work but in the end I had to admit that the mucking around to make it work was taking me longer than actually getting things done.

At that point, I had to reluctantly say goodbye to MLO, as much as I really enjoyed using it, and began my search for the solution that I am using now. More on that in my next post.

I would be interested to hear if anyone hit the same limitation with MLO, if they have discovered a work around, or indeed if it is now possible to get a view of tasks by context?

A question from Klintron

You wrote: "There is only 1 app (currently, there is one more in the works due at the end of October) in the Google Play store that actually does this." Are you referring to MyLifeOrganized? It does this and it's what I use but I'd be interested in hearing about another solution if one exists. What's coming at the end of October? I know Nirvana does auto next and has an Android app in beta...

Hey Klintron, thanks for the question. Whilst MLO does auto next action, its fundamental inability to allow you to view all tasks tagged with a specific context powerfully shoots itself in the foot. (In case you don’t know what I am talking about, on the Android app you can’t pull out all tasks assigned to say “@Agenda-Meeting”, you can only see the next action tagged with the context. Useless for setting meeting agendas unless you pull out your laptop and fire up the Windows client.)

So when I refer to the one client, I am talking about Shuffle. The last time I used Shuffle, the online sync function was problematic at best.

And yes, the “end of October” app is Nirvana.

Does that answer all your questions?