Ecosystem Android

Published on July 10th, 2010 | by Kyith

10

Getting Things Done(GTD):Shuffle To Do List for Android Review

Shuffle is a task management to-do list build upon the Getting Things Done methodology that came up by David Allen

I am still having problems finding quality To Do List application that follows the GTD concept on the Android, while on the iOS platform, we have tons of competitive quality to do list softwares.

Shuffle initially look like a good software for GTD and I hope that it measures up so that it makes my switching over to Android a lot less easier.

Lets take a look how it performs.

Download it here

Pros

1. If you like a task manager that adds to your Google Calendar, this is a good one
2. Great UI
3. Can be Simple
4. Fulfills basic GTD
5. Able to switch perspectives from menu at almost all screens.
6. Shows number of un-completed tasks in the context
7. Very nice contexts

Cons

1. No notification sited.
2. Only 1 level project hierarchy
3. No synchronization to desktop or web (such as Remember the Milk or Toodledo)

Cost

Shuffle is FREE. You can download it from the Android Market.

Version Reviewed

The version reviewed is 1.6.3

Appearance

The UI looks more like a copy of the Sense UI rather than the stock Android UI, which is a complement to Shuffle because I think it generally looks very good.

All text boxes and labels are spaced out well. The color theme is done very nicely.

Projects Hierarchy

In terms of Projects Hierarchy, Shuffle only allows you to have one level. This to me is something negative.

I would prefer one which at least have 2 levels like most on the iOS such as Appigo ToDo or 2Do which have 2 levels.

It would seem that most people use GTD base on this concept

Areas of Focus (AOF) 1

—- Project A

—- Project B

AOF 2

—– Project C

—– Project D

With Shuffle, the best way is really to see projects as the lowest level group of actionable tasks you need to do

—- Project A

—- Project B

—– Project C

—– Project D

Creating a Project

Creating a task is pretty standard.  However you can assign a project to a context. This might afford you to cheat and let your context be your Area of Focus.

Another interesting thing is that you can specify if the Actions is to be completed in sequence or in parallel. Whats the difference? To be honest I can’t really tell since they are all list out in the project view, but it is highly probable that in your other views (Inbox, Contexts, Due) they will only appear after the first one is completed and hide the rest that is not suppose to be done now.

This is a good feature as if its suppose to be completed sequentially, it blocks out the tasks that you cannot do first from the user. However, there could possibly be a lot of projects where tasks are in sequence and others where they are not.

Setting up Contexts

Contexts setup is easy. There is a pre-define set of contexts created that you can use for starters. Those are locational based contexts, so you might want to add your own people based, or time based contexts.

What’s nice about Shuffle is that the user makes creating contexts fun by adding color themes that is similar to that of Google’s Gmail color tags.

You can also assign icons to your context should you be a more visual person.

Good thing i s that you can find icons for

• Leisure
• Internet
• Work or Review
• Computer
• Urgent or Next Actions
• @Home
• @Commuting
• @Boss
• Reading or review

Creating Actions

Right we are down to creating what it matters: Tasks. Or in the case of Shuffle its called Action, which is more or less what David Allen describes them as.

You can add actions in a lot of places and you can specify which project or context it belongs to.

You have the option to use scheduling. This is a concept I am not accustom to as I normally only use due date. Here you can specify start date and due date and their time.

An examination of the check box below probably shows how this is geared up to be. You have the option of adding this task to your google calendar.

Essentially, some people uses the calendar more than a task list, so they might like this.

But for me, there are tasks that takes place as soon as possible ( like the constraint in Microsoft Project and I wouldn’t want to set the start date. I only set the due date to know when this milestone have to be done.

Review and Doing: Switching Perspectives

When it comes to reviewing, Shuffle makes use of a Perspective button in the Android Menu. There it allows you to have a quick access to other perspective views. This is a good feature.

Projects Perspective

Projects perspective shows your projects and its task in a expanded view. It depends on how  you feel but I feel this is good as it shortens the time for review.

Another style common to Smartphone to do list is to bring you to a task list once you click on the project. I feel sometimes that is very crumble some.

Due Actions Perspective

Due actions are split into Today, Next Week and Next Month. Abit limited but I think for a free application I am not asking for much.

Contexts Perspective

If you are doing work, you will spend most of your time at the Contexts Perpective. The good thing is that it is very presentable and you can easily see how much actions in each contexts you have not carried out.

Inbox Perspective

Conclusion

Overall, a very competent Task Manager for a smartphone. Would it make my switch to Android easier? I think if I do not have a choice, I can live with this, but comparing this against the to do list I am using now which is 2Do on the iPod Touch 3G I think its still very far.

The biggest knock back have been the Projects Hierarchy and the form of date entry used. I would prefer something like what some to do list such as Appigo To Do implemented which is a full calendar for selection:

Tags: Shuffle

About the Author

Kyith Kyith is a blogger with interest in all things on Wealth Mastery, Technology, Business and Productivity.