Productive Organizer

One of the most popular category of app on the smartphone devices are To Do list applications. It is no secret why they are so in demand since

• most users have their phones with them just like their wallet
• with that, they are able to collect new tasks and review which tasks to carry out

Developers on the iOS have come up with great todo apps and in the process many of the most popular ones such as Omnifocus, Things, Toodledo and Appigo ToDo advocates users to use David Allen’s Getting Things Done to make sense of task management.

In a certain sense, Getting Things Done puts you in the role as the project manager and your job is to ensure the completion of many mini projects.

These apps work great for most people but for folks who does project management as a profession or plan projects at work, it may be lacking.

Some of the reasons why this is so:

• Projects managed typically defined by a start date and end date. Not all GTD task list does that.
• Projects can have infinite level of sub projects as defined by more granular milestones. Only Actionlists on the iPhone and iPad does this.
• Milestones affect main projects start and due date and they would have to adjust accordingly.
• Manpower resources needs to be allocated to tasks.
• Most todo list is not made for extensive review. Project management involves alot of review, adjusting start and due date and quick inputs. GTD todo list do not provide a eagle eye view on milestones and tasks to do that effectively.
• Most GTD task app syncs to the cloud but for most project managers they still use MS Project.

Being a project lead in software and system maintenance, I do acknowledge that task management app are found lacking in these area.

That is where SG Project comes in. The folks at SG Project came up with a very comprehensive management app for the iPad platform to carry out project management.

What SG Project does

To be honest I am astounded why there aren’t alot of third party developers who would tale advantage of the large screen size to create such a planning app.

SG Project comes in 2 versions SG Project Pro and SG Project 2.

SG Project Pro costs USD 39.90 and is made up of SG Project 2 (USD 9.99), SG Action Log(USD 5.99) and SG Risk Log(USD 5.99)

SG Project 2 is the task planning gantt chart review portion of SG Project Pro. My initial thought is that this is what i need only so if you want an app that can help you review big projects like how you would do it in MS Project then buying SG Project 2 could be enough.

SG Project Pro is able to do the following

Manage projects and sub projects

At the bare minimum, a project management app should allow the user to create milestones and sub milestones to it. SG Project does a Good job with that as you can freely indent and outdent your tasks.

Group tasks as their milestones or projects and have a clear overview

Easily reorder and delete tasks and projects

Specify greater detail for each task. This includes

1. Start Date
2. End Date
3. Duration
4. Notes
5. SG Project Risks
6. SG Project Action Items
7. Owner
8. Predecessors

Indent and Outdent, or add new tasks easily in the main task planning screen

Easily change the duration of each tasks or project on the main task planning screen

Easily complete tasks on the main task planning screen

Create dependencies for tasks constraint by other tasks

Set Predecessors so that tasks with dependency can be linked

Coloring and Predecessors enables user to view which tasks are constrain to only start after certain tasks.

Review in Gantt Chart

These nested task will be presented in Gantt chart format which can be maximized or minimized with a button.

You can move the timeline, that is, your start date of these tasks by dragging the task activity bar on the Gantt chart.

I find that the best view to review your Gantt chart is on a landscape view because you would be able to view more task details such as dependency, completion and manipulated them there and then instead of navigating within each task to carry them out.

Attach manpower to tasks

Often that is not provided in most To Do List app is assigning owners to the task or delegation.

SG Project allows you to assign a single owner to it

SG Risk Log Pro

Risk Log Pro enables you to create, manage the risk asscoiated with the project so that owners take a reponsibility in how they are handled.

It allows you to

• Document multiple risks for each project
• Set an Owner and Due Date for each risk
• Categorize risks into 4 main risk management strategies
• Quantify by assigning likelihood and severity values to each risk
• Sort and Filter the risk list for a project
• Maintain an organized history of notes for each risk
• Export a risk report to PDF and email from directly within the app

SG Action Log Pro

To be honest, I don’t really get the main difference between an action item and a task. I suppose if you use the concept of Milestones and Action Items, this will work well because Action Log will be linked to the milestones created in SG Project Pro

• Document multiple action items for each project
• Set an Owner and Due Date for each action item
• Set the state of each action item to move through a simple lifecycle
• Quantify by assigning a priority value to each action item
• Categorize action items into up to 10 custom-named groups
• Sort and Filter the action item list for a project
• View compressed view of the items using a pinch gesture
• Maintain an organized history of notes for each action item
• Export an action item report to PDF and email from directly within the app

Where SG Project Pro didn’t do so well

Duplicating tasks

We wish that duo locating tasks is easier as in the course of preparing this example I have numerous tasks that I would need to do that.

Collapsing tasks and milestones

All tasks are expanded and when reviewing, you really wish that you can collapse the tasks to view them on a high level

Limited colors to choose from

It would be better if they have more color tagging choices as for bigger projects these colors can easily run out.

Exporting to MS Project XML

Instead of exporting to a native ms project XML format, the app only allows you to export to ms project XML. The limitation is transiting between windows desktop and iPad will be a problem since most people do not save their document in XML.

Conclusion

SG Project comes across as a competent iPad app. This is the first iPad project management app reviewed and certainly I can envision myself managing tasks with a defined start and end date instead of processes on it.

The ability to review and see dependency not to mention delegation are pluses.

My gripe about it is that there are occasional crashes that is irritating me which I hope can be ironed lout in future releases.

Read my Getting Things Done series today!

I think the Pomodoro Technique suits some people. My friend Wilson recently chanced upon it and find that it really helps him to focus on small amount of work at a time.

It also allows you to know when you should have a break.

If you are on the Android Smartphone you can check out Pomodroido which enables you to practice the Pomodoro on the Android platform. Here is my review of it >>

For folks who want to learn the technique, the ebook is FREE and can be viewed here >>

However not everyone agrees with it.

Colin T. Miller, a Yahoo! employee and blogger tried it and have this to say:

Pomodoros are an all or nothing affair,” he says. “Either you work for 25 minutes straight to mark your X or you don’t complete a pomodoro. Since marking that X is the measurable sign of progress, you start to shy away from engaging in an activity if it won’t result in an X. For instance…meetings get in the way of pomodoros. Say I have a meeting set for 4:30pm. It is currently 4:10pm, meaning I only have 20 minutes between now and the meeting…In these instances I tend to not start a pomodoro because I won’t have enough time to complete it anyway

Mario Fusco argues the following:

Aren’t we really able to keep ourselves concentrated without a timer ticketing on our desk?…Have you ever seen a civil engineer using a timer to keep his concentration while working on his projects?…I think that, like any other serious professional, I can stay concentrated on what I am doing for hours…Bring back your timer to your kitchen and start working in a more professional and effective way.

To a certain extend I do agree with them. You should be able to break and monitor your time in short intervals. But we human beings sometimes suffer from short attention spans and distractions.

This technique aims to address that by using a timer. I don’t think it will always work myself.

For me, I follow David Allen’s Getting Things Done using WAToDo! Android To Do List. The key to assign specific time tags to tasks so that you can focus on short task better.

Notice the *long, *medium, *short tags. WAToDo! is flexible enough for you to specify that.

Once you assign tasks with these duration specific contexts, all you need to do is selected location and time specific context to focus on it:

MakeUseOf lists 3 great apps if you are looking for applications that help you make sense of all the clothes you bought (or those that your spouse bought!)

They are:

1. HomyFads Wardrobe Manager
2. Shmotter
3. ClosetBank

Personally, I think this if for micro-managers. It is too much work really to do this and the upside is limited. What do you guys think?

[MakeUseOf:How to organizer your clothes with your PC >>]

This application is really for fans of the Pomodoro technique.

What Pomodoro technique?

It is a time management technique based on working on “25 Minutes” or Pomodoros, which is the italian word for “Tomatos”.

What I feel is good about this technique is that it makes you focus your energy on short chunks of your time to become more effective.

There are five basic steps to implementing the technique:

1. decide on the task to be done
2. set the pomodoro (timer) to 25 minutes
3. work on the task until the timer rings; record with an x
4. take a short break (5 minutes)
5. every four "pomodoros" take a longer break (15–20 minutes)

Below in this article I have attached a book to teach you how to apply the Pomodoro time management method.

How can you plan on using your Android Smartphone to do that? Artifix have came up with the Pomodroido to help you do that. I like this app because I think it is well designed.

It lets you do the standard Start and Stop timer but also lets you count how many “Pomodoros” you have completed. The more you do the more productive you are in a week.

Price

Pomodroido is FREE. Do download it from the Android Market.

The Pomodoro Technique

For me to name the title this way it has to be something revolutionary, but its something Robert Scoble came across and so revolutionary that he has a 46 minute interview with the President:

What does Aro do? If, say, Bill Gates sends Steve Jobs an email, copies me, and is talking about Larry Ellison, Larry’s name will have a little square around it. Click on that square and a new UI fans out, letting me see other info. It’s like Rapportive or Xobni, but done much better and for the mobile interface. It makes your phone much more productive than it would be otherwise and that’s why I feel it’s so important.

Think of it as a semantics crawler. If you have an email it will crawl the contents and intelligently come up with things that you will do with the information

1. location of a eatery outlet without exiting the client
2. make an appointment on Google Calendar without exiting the client
3. add a contact in your email without exiting the client
4. take a name in your email and find if this person was emailed, was in the meeting with me involved.
5. basically take all your meetings, contacts, emails and make a social graph to provide you a lot of shortcuts
6. help you tag this image to facebook, flicker.
7. make it easier for you to create calendar appointments.

Take a look at this video:

This week’s most useful application comes from Logitech. Touch Mouse is quite a cool program. If you want to control your computers away from it like a remote control, be able to type and use it like a mouse pad, Touch Mouse from Logitech is the solution for you.

I tried it and it works. You need to download the application from the App Store.[Link Here >>]. At the same time, install a service component by downloading it from Logitech’s site.

When you start the application, you will be able to find your computer if your iphone or ipod touch is on the same WIFI network as the comp. if the desktop service component [Link Here >>] is install you can control your desktop from your iphone!

Very good if you are watching a video away from your pc!

Cost: FREE

I have blogged about this iPhone Mindmapping software that is really good and how you can use it to incorporate into your GTD system.

Their Version 2.2 is currently in the approval stage and what i like about them is that they don’t rest on their laurels but are coming up with more and more ways to make this mind mapping software as functional as the desktop applications.

Here is a video showing how you can map relationships between related nodes.

What i really hope to is that they can come up with Tagging and Tag filtering of nodes. That will be awesome

Also check out:

GTD Series Part 6:Project Review through iThoughts Mind Mapping Software

Mind Mapping Software for iPhone:iThoughts Review

Overview

iPhone and iPod Touch have access to 100,000 application and the strength of this platform makes applications developed to be very user friendly and effective.

In this page, I will list out applications and how-to guides that will help a mobile worker increase his productivity and make life easier with his iPhone or iPod Touch

On the Go Reading/Reviewing/References

How to Read PDF books/references/magazines on your iPhone or iPod touch with [GoodReader]

For me by far the best thing to do on the go using an iPod Touch or iPhone have been reading and GoodReader is a cheap and very enjoyable way to read your favorite books. Endorsed by Productive Organizer.

Fast PDF Reader for your iPhone and iPod Touch [Fast PDF]

Here is an alternative to good reader that makes browsing PDF a breeze.

Reading Mobipocket,PDF,LIT,EPUB, DRM free Kindle books for free on your iphone or iPod with [STANZA]

The best reader on the App Store. FREE and enables you to read all your existing books. Endorsed by Productive Organizer.

Wordprocessing, Spreadsheet and Presentation

Office Word and Excel on the iPhone:[QuickOffice]

If you are looking for a Word processing and spreadsheet application then perhaps QuickOffice suite is for you.

Note Taking

Note Taking Software that Syncs to your Desktop OneNote Application: [MobileNoter]

If you are a die hard OneNote user and would like to have an application that syncs with your desktop OneNote Notebooks, and access it offline, then you should give this a try.

To Do List

[Appigo ToDo] Getting Things Done To Do List Review

By far one of the more expensive to do list software but its well worth the money you paid for this. Syncs with Remember the Milk or Toodledo, or Mac Desktop and follows David Allen’s Getting Things Done methods. Endorsed by Productive Organizer.

Simple Cheap GTD To Do List: [eToDo] Review

If Appigo ToDo is too complex or expensive for you, you can always go for the cheaper option eToDo. Just as good and great workout for a Getting Things Done beginner.

Nested GTD To Do List: [Action Lists] Review

A good competitor to Appigo ToDo. This does NESTED Subprojecting, Contexts and sync to ToodleDo.

Smart Calendar GTD To Do List: [2Do] Review

Here is an alternative to Appigo Todo for the iPhone and iPod Touch. What is great about it is that the Smart Calendars make executing tasks daily a breeze.

Others

Turn your iPhone /iPod Touch into a wireless keyboard mouse with [Touch Mouse]

Want to control your pc away from it through your iPhone and iPod Touch? Install this app. its FREE!

Keeping Passwords,logins and Key Information securely with [SplashID]

SplashID have been securing your vital information for a long time and here is a review on it.

I’m not super excited over the new 4.3 inch display HTC Leo on Windows Mobile but man that combination would make a kick as Life Organizer.

These processor will really be a cut above the mediocre Qualcomm 528MHz processor.

Not only is the HTC HD2 large in stature — we’re still knocked over by that 4.3-inch capacitive touchscreen — it’s got game under the hood. Benchmark tests of the 1GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor reportedly lcock in at at least a 300 percent improvement over the Touch HD and its Qualcomm MSM7201 processor running at 528MHz. And another test showed an improvement of 1,822 percent. Between this and Nvidia’s Tegra processor, the future is now, people. The future is now.