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itsjustme (Messages of «#USER#») |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Feb 8, 2007 08:11:37
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It would be a huge productivity and usability improvement if the Organizer supported creating tasks by dropping items into the Organizer: drop a word document for example, and a task gets created that takes its title from the document's title, and attaches the file. Drop any Outlook item (calendar item, task, email, contact, ...) and the "best fit" task gets created, etc. To me, task management is a multi-step process. The first, that of task creation, needs to happen very quickly when there is no time, and no immediate need, to refine that task straight-away. Main thing is that the "gosh this also needs doing" thought is captured.
Similar, and in addition to (iii), an optional shell context menu item (Create Organizer task from this...) would be nice (but not essential). |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Feb 8, 2007 08:16:40
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I find it essential that tasks can be related to each other, at least in a 1:1 basis, ideally in an N:M relationship.
Tasks depend on each other, one task might gate another, two tasks together might gate a third, etc.
This is an important reflection of what real-life tasks really are. I am surprised to find the tool doesn't support this, and can only hope that a future version might.
I guess each task could have two lists, both empty or containing any number of other tasks. One list shows those other tasks that depend on the current one, the other list shows those tasks that gate this one. These lists would be such that a (double-?) click on a task reference in that list would open the referred task, etc.
Ideally, there was also a view that showed tasks along a timeline (due date & estimate time & actual time taken), and shows those dependencies. Pretty much like MsProject, but I am sure with a bit of thought an even better visualization may be found. |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Apr 23, 2007 09:30:39
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It would be nice if -maybe optionally- the tool could automatically calculate the % Completed figure based on Estimated and Actual Time data. |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Apr 26, 2007 09:28:08
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I don't think your argument holds. I understand about planning and tracking. When actual time exceeds the allocated (planned) time, the percentage done is unknown, and the bar could be shown in red - just as one of many ways of dealing with the >100% problem.
VIP is a tool for planning and tracking, but it doesn't really help with keeping track of the progress. Maybe my suggestion lacks perfection, but my request for better task and progress tracking support holds. |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Apr 23, 2007 09:35:18
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I usually enter actual time and estimated time in hours or in days, and the tool supports that. The tool doesn't allow defining the rules for translating the units, thought.
For example, if I enter "7 days", the tool might translate that into "One week". Although it doesn't always work out that way, I'd like my Sunday off. So, for me, 7 days mean 7 work days, or one week and two days.
Also, how many work hours make a day, etc.
I find it important that a not-too distant release of the tool supports defining these conversion rules: how many hours in a (work) day, how many (work) days in a week, etc. |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Apr 23, 2007 09:40:54
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The Time Left figure is based on the Due Date. That's important information as it tells me how much time I have to complete a certain task.
It would be great if the tool could also look ahead and tell me something intelligent about the start date: if a task X is due on such-and-such date and is estimated to take N hours (and knowing how many work hours are in a day and how many work days in a week, as requested in separate thread), the tool can tell me how much time is left until I need to start working on task X.
Even nicer if this calculation would take other tasks into account, too. If task X is due on day DX and task Y is due on day DY and Y has higher priority than X and DY < DX, then obviously X needs to start even sooner to allow for being interrupted by Y, etc etc.
The Organizer is great to help me keeping track of tasks and delivery dates, but it could do a much better job at telling me what to do next. |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Mar 28, 2007 11:27:49
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In 2.5, VIP had a pane that supported nested sorting(sort by priority, then project, then time left, etc. This was done by dragging column headers into that special pane.
With 2.7.1 I seem unable to locate that feature, or any replacement feature. Has it indeed been dropped, or am I just blindfolded and fail to activate it somehow? |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Mar 30, 2007 08:56:30
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Thanks, sorted. |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Feb 8, 2007 02:30:13
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Evaluating VIP Organizer and found a few small shortcomings. For the record, and in the hope of support from other users - and the makers of this tool:
i. it would be great (but not essential), if the Organizer supported customizable work flows
ii. it would be great if the Organizer supported file attachments (actual attachments, not references via URL) to tasks
iii. it would be a huge productivity and usability improvement if the Organizer supported creating tasks by dropping items into the Organizer: drop a word document for example, and a task gets created that takes its title from the document's title, and attaches the file. Drop any Outlook item (calendar item, task, email, contact, ...) and the "best fit" task gets created, etc. To me, task management is a multi-step process. The first, that of task creation, needs to happen very quickly when there is no time, and no immediate need, to refine that task straight-away. Main thing is that the "gosh this also needs doing" thought is captured.
iv. similar, and in addition to (iii), an optional shell context menu item (Create Organizer task from this...) would be nice (but not essential)
v. finally, the most unfortunate shortcoming of all: I find it essential that tasks can be related to each other, at least in a 1:1 basis, ideally in an N:M relationship. Tasks depend on each other, one task might gate another, two tasks together might gate a third, etc. This is an important reflection of what real-life tasks really are. I am surprised to find the tool doesn't support this, and can only hope that a future version might.
Anyways - it's actually a great tool, and I like using it already. I hope the above suggestions help making it even better. |
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itsjustme
User Posts: 12
Joined: Feb 8, 2007
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Posted: Feb 8, 2007 08:18:08
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Serge, I posted both the quick task creation suggestion and the task relationships in the feature requests forum. I added a bit to the task relationships request that hopefully answers your question. |
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