I really enjoyed using this simple and clean app. I have a few suggestions:
1. The default message "nothing to do" shouldn't be automatically added to the tasks every time.
2. It would be great if, after snoozing, we could see the top "n" tasks in the main app itself.
3. Please add a feature to select multiple tasks at once.
4. Instead of a subscription, it would be better to have a one-time payment for the premium pricing.
> The default message "nothing to do" shouldn't be automatically added to the tasks every time.
This is only shown if there are no unsnoozed not-done tasks, would you prefer if it was left blank in this scenario? We wanted to provide a hint to user's about what they can do in this scenario.
> It would be great if, after snoozing, we could see the top "n" tasks in the main app itself.
There is an option to see all tasks in the menu, the decision to only show one task at a time was deliberate as the hope is to encourage the user either to focus on this task or snooze it. May I ask why it would be useful to see the top "n" tasks on the main UI?
> Please add a feature to select multiple tasks at once
Should be able to do this, is there something in particular you want to do to multiple tasks at once - like snoozing or marking them "done"?
> Instead of a subscription, it would be better to have a one-time payment for the premium pricing.
This is helpful. Our idea was that people would pay for cloud backup and synchronization - since the cost to operate the servers is ongoing I think this would need to be a recurring charge or we could end up spending more than we're making.
But if we identified other premium features that didn't require a cloud service then we could have a premium version with a one-time purchase. Are there any features in particular that you'd be willing to pay for?
Thank you for reviewing my inputs.
1. A simple placeholder will suffice; there is no need for additional text.
2. Don't want to press Cmd+T to see the tasks:)
3. Delete in bulk, specifically.
4. You could integrate Google Drive or OneDrive syncing instead of handling the syncing through your servers for a single fee.
Thank you, I've added the multiple task selection to our issue tracker. We could add a feature that will load/store the task list to a specified directory like Dropbox or Google Drive, I'll give this some more thought.
1. totally encrypted/syncing etc (iOS in the roadmap ;)
2. Infinite nesting (indenting/outdenting)
3. Swipe to indent/de-indent
4. Drag and drop rearranging
5. KeePass type standard that is "portable" in the sense your data is always soverign and extensible or whatevr
6. Purchaseable/One-Time Large payment like $50-100 with abillity to tip or however one wants to supplement if they wish to support dev
7. Customizable font/ui text and display size. This is important, a lot of apps that offer these features in various mixed bags are usually annoyingly ant-sized and non-customizable
I would love to see a Strongbox equivalent of Todo/Tasks. The world needs this. Enough of Todoist's monopoly on outliney/todos
Thank you so much for the feedback and suggestions:
> 1. totally encrypted/syncing etc (iOS in the roadmap ;)
We're considering offering an encrypted cloud service, or alternatively, integrating with Dropbox/Google Drive. Details are still being worked out but data sovereignty is very important to me so that will be an important design consideration whichever approach we choose.
> 2. Infinite nesting (indenting/outdenting)
While I understand the utility, this feature might detract from NowDo's core philosophy of simplicity. Our aim is to avoid complexity that might distract from task execution, though I'm always open to re-evaluating features that could enhance user experience without compromising simplicity.
> KeePass type standard that is "portable" in the sense your data is always soverign and extensible or whatevr
We're currently using a universal CSV format for easy import/export of tasks. Does this align with your expectations, or were you thinking of something different?
> Purchaseable/One-Time Large payment like $50-100 with abillity to tip or however one wants to supplement if they wish to support dev
Your suggestion for a one-time fee in the $50-$100 range, with optional tipping, is intriguing. Our initial thought was a lower price point ($10-$15), but we're open to exploring different models. The balance between accessibility and sustainability is key for us.
> Customizable font/ui text and display size. This is important, a lot of apps that offer these features in various mixed bags are usually annoyingly ant-sized and non-customizable
Excessive customization can sometimes detract from usability and design coherence. However, your point about text/display size is well taken, especially for accessibility reasons. We’ll consider this feedback carefully. Could you share if you find the current UI size too big, too small, or are you highlighting a general need for adaptability?
Also, no in-house or proprietary cloud-services you charge for. Thats an immediate no-deal. That was my biggest disappointment in having funded Obsidian which in many other ways is an incredible community reclaiming of Roam but the necessity to pay them like $60/year for a black box only they control and leaves you dependant on them broke my damn heart and discouraged the hell out of me.
Download Strongbox and learn from the master. That is such an amazing model from the user side and he seems to be making it work economically so thats all I got for now.
- philiosophy of pick your own cloud
service and it implements the syncing and management or just locally if people prefer
- doesn't lock you in + easy export
- implements MarkDown for notes but thats another good feature to fully implement for task notes, like Sorted3
- thing is, if you have anything non-Lifetime, it means it can be taken away at any point or at least eventually. That is unacceptable for anything (much moreso for content as important as people's notes and passwords etc)
- anything where your servers are involved means it requires a middleman which all of this emphatically does not require. That would be a YOU thing and not an US thing (not that youmre saying that but its super important to emphasize how basically done I am with Devs who pull that crap. I dont care if a Dev sells out or quits or whatever [insert dev situation], if I've done my homework I will likely be unaffected or should be unaffected and I just don't update or allow Apple to screw around with offloading apps
- I am free to top up with tips in the sense I can stochastically throw a little scratch Strongbox Mark's way when I'm able to rarely so I can express my appreciation for it
- He's very reponsive and even has his own subreddit! He hasn't become so big you never hear back from him, really just a mattr of time
- KeePass is an amazing format and he has done a mindblowingly amazing job of implementing all of it without the user habing to get dirty with rando plugin and junk
> > 2. Infinite nesting (indenting/outdenting)
While I understand the utility, this feature might detract from NowDo's core philosophy of simplicity. Our aim is to avoid complexity that might distract from task execution, though I'm always open to re-evaluating features that could enhance user experience without compromising simplicity.
Can I ask you to clarify something? Do you honestly believe that or is this sort of an oblique suggestion that it would be non-trivial/"unsimple" to implement?
FWIT, I have heard commentary over the years that engineering that kind of UI (where things can be dragged and dropped and moved around arbitrarily) in the way Todoist uses as its competitive advantage is diffcult to do and to get right
This is such a mission-critical thing otherwise you're like every other Todoist non-competes scrambling for Todoists crumbs. Its like literally just that to me with the infinite nesting and i can't remember if they allow swipe indenting but thats the most natural/intuitive in combination with drag and drop which can be used together and interchangably.
The issue with Todoist is they want to retain full control and deny your data portabillity and soverignty. They demand you sync thru their unencrypted (to them) cloud because they demand control or at least access to user content which they seem unwilling or unable to concede they won't leverage should buy-out talks begin.
No deal for them because of that but they still have the best UI (Sorted really is the closest thing and what I use alternatively) but theres no reason you can't swoop in and implement particularly 2 but probably all the things I've mentioned because that will be your path to folks like me showering you with money and actually out of desire for a superior self-funded project that respects and affirms our autonomy and allows for you to distinguish yourself in a non-trivial way.
Thanks
Edit: if you can cross-breed Todoist + Strongbox (KeePass) I will buy whatever you come up with provided the UI is closer to Todoist and the functionality captures both aha
Edit: infinite nesting ≈ subtasks but it can't be arbitraily limited to like 2-3 or whatever levels. If you find it philosophically problematic you could offer the user an advanced settings option that lets them toggle how many levels of abstraction/nesting levels they want to enforce and they can experiment and modify that as they settle in to your app and their own workflow
> do you honestly believe that or is this sort of an oblique suggestion that it would be non-trivial/"unsimple" to implement?
Not oblique, it's a common feature although I agree with you that few get it right.
But the issue isn't difficulty of implementation, it's with NowDo's philosophy, which is obsessive about simplicity. Our goal with it is to create the simplest useful todo app. The lack of features is its most important feature.
> This is such a mission-critical thing otherwise you're like every other Todoist non-competes scrambling for Todoists crumbs. Its like literally just that to me with the infinite nesting and i can't remember if they allow swipe indenting but thats the most natural/intuitive in combination with drag and drop which can be used together and interchangeably.
Todoist users aren't our target market, we're aiming for the people that want something much simpler and more opinionated than Todoist. We think they are an underserved market, but we're only in the very early stages of testing that thesis.
Thank you for this nice app. The default shortcut conflicts with my window manager, so I cannot use it. Please add a way to customize shortcuts. Also for the UI, if there is a mode that when the app is unfocus then the UI will hide all other text buttons, which I think will make it looks less distract.
Really nice and clean app btw!
> The default shortcut conflicts with my window manager, so I cannot use it.
Ah, interesting - may I ask what window manager you use? Is it the combination of CTRL+OPT that causes the conflict? We can make the shortcuts configurable, I've added an issue to our tracker.
> Also for the UI, if there is a mode that when the app is unfocus then the UI will hide all other text buttons, which I think will make it looks less distract.
This is something I've considered, perhaps a configuration option to hide the buttons when the app isn't focused. They serve the purpose of acting as a reminder about the keyboard shortcuts but experienced users shouldn't need that. I'll add it to our issue tracker.
> Really nice and clean app btw!
Thank you, and thank you also for the suggestions :)
Mine is not quite a window manager, I use Hammerspoon bindings. For example, Ctrl+Option+H/L moves the focused window left/right.
I think mine only conflicts with Ctrl Opt H, so it's still usable by clicking on the buttons
I find it a little odd tbat people would prefer a web interface for a todo app. Considering that the most likely source of my productivity being interrupted is... the web, I'm quite happy to see it as a mac native app.
I get that, but it seems like that would be a deliberately unfocused type of usage. Todo lists can take any form and there's no shortage of apps or services that do exactly that, but they don't all necessarily set out to do anything more than be a list of arbitrary stuff.
If I wasn't at my computer grinding through a list of computer work, checking a list would not help me focus on stuff I can't act on. If I needed a general list, I'd choose a product that aimed to be something like you describe.
Awesome! I've been looking for almost exactly this. The only issue is that I'm not totally comfortable installing a Mac app to try it out. I'd be happy to try it out as a web app first.
When you snooze it for >=1 day, does it reappear at the time that it was snoozed or do the tasks somehow group into buckets where if you snooze all tasks that appear today for 1 day, they'll all appear tomorrow at the same time?
Highly recommend making a simple script to do this, I distribute two apps manually and all I have to do is to kick off "./distribute.sh 1.2.3" which does every step required.
Zero installs, all web apps, where users don't control their data. The average users computer ability has no doubt dropped over time as software is catering for the lowest common denominator.
As this catering becomes more popular, this is the expectation people have, only original hardware vendors will be installing native apps. Sucks, but its the graveyard that we've built.
This is not necessarily true. For instance someone coming from Linux might be uncomfortable installing non open source source from not trusted origin (I.e. not the distribution package manager).
Also, installing anything anywhere is potentially a huge security risk, so I see why people use browsers as convenient sandboxes for trying out software.
Web app has usually the least friction, unless when it's not. For this particular app, it can be a very simple widget on the website homepage even. Shouldn't require any js framework etc and all data will be local in your browser. As a demo widget or full blown html/JS app, both can work.
> Awesome! I've been looking for almost exactly this.
That's exactly what I was hoping people would say, thank you.
> The only issue is that I'm not totally comfortable installing a Mac app to try it out. I'd be happy to try it out as a web app first.
That's helpful feedback, thank you. I'll give a web app version some thought.
> When you snooze it for >=1 day, does it reappear at the time that it was snoozed or do the tasks somehow group into buckets where if you snooze all tasks that appear today for 1 day, they'll all appear tomorrow at the same time?
NowDo only shows one task at a time - the "current task". This will be the oldest unsnoozed not-done task. So tasks won't necessarily be seen by the user the moment their snooze expires if there are older unsnoozed not-done tasks. Does that answer your question?
Nice concept to keep it always on top!
Would it be possible to have the current task show in the menu bar instead? would be even less obstrusive but still "always on top"
edit: would also help not having it show in the task switcher, now it sort of annoying to have it show up when Cmd-Tab'bing... while doing the task of course ;)
As a counterpoint, as someone who "single tasks" with one full-screen window at all times to minimize distractions I absolutely hate the fact that it is always there and immediately removed it for that exact reason.
Good luck with it though - the basic idea seems great even if it's not for me.
You are most welcome. Consider that you might want to ignore me though in order to build a successful product. My preferences might not be representative of many people - I'm a bit weird.
> Would it be possible to have the current task show in the menu bar instead?
This is something I thought people might want, so thank you for confirming. The reason I didn't do it because Apple's UI guidelines discourage using excessive menu-bar space, but I'm certainly open to it if there is demand.
May I ask, is the issue that the UI takes up too much screen real-estate? I've been wondering whether we should make it more compact, so I'd appreciate feedback on that.
I edited my original message probably right while you were posting this reply.
Main concern with the window it not so much that it takes too much space, but that it "exists" in the task switcher, which can be distracting when Cmd-Tab'ing.
Without going full menu bar way, perhaps a way to make it "transparent" to task switcher could help this - in fact maybe a mix between window (for showing current task) and menubar (for actions)
> edit: would also help not having it show in the task switcher, now it sort of annoying to have it show up when Cmd-Tab'bing... while doing the task of course ;)
I've added this to our bugtracker, will get it fixed ASAP. Appreciate the feedback.
It's a similar concept, but that only allows you to specify one task at a time. With NowDo you have a "queue" of tasks, as you mark each as done the next one is shown.
You’ve gone out of your way to be anonymous to your users, so you’ll only attract naive/ignorant/reckless users to let your code on their Mac, which might be enough for your purposes.
There was a tool called "OneTask" about a decade ago that I really liked and which served as a lot of the inspiration for NowDo.
Unfortunately its creators fell into the trap of adding a bunch of features which ruined it IMHO. It's not clear whether this is related to that, it doesn't look like it is.
There are, what makes NowDo unique is that I've whittled the feature set down to an absolute minimum - based on over 2 years of prototyping and usage. With NowDo the lack of features is its most important feature.
That’s great yeah, looks awesome. Sorry if it seemed like I was poo-pooing on it. Mostly meant that if everyone were to list their personal favorite todo app the thread would never end ha.
Yes, we have a mechanism to notify the user of updates and other important messages - they just show up like a special type of task (which can be marked done, or snoozed). It's checking this URL: https://nowdo.org/msg.json
We don't want to expand the feature set much beyond what it already is - since the lack of features is a feature - but we'll probably create a "premium" version to help us pay the bills. We needed a way to inform users about such updates, but we plan to use it very sparingly (perhaps a few times per year once NowDo is out of beta).
> Also, it'd be nice to be able to put it on my second monitor
Thanks for the suggestion - can you just drag it over, or is the issue that a second monitor isn't always connected?
Thanks! Will try out. Few feature ideas that I would personally like to have:
1. Time tracker, so we know how much time was spent on a particular task. And, a daily review section where we can see what was worked on the day and the time taken.
2. Ability to add tasks based on projects. Possibly, the ability to color code projects.
3. A tab/screen to manage projects, where we can add tasks and set the priority as 1, 2, 3, etc. 1 would show up on the NowDo screen.
Maybe you'd be better served by something like Toggl? You can create projects and really finely track time in it. Also the web ui gives you option to export a nice report on any given period for your tracked time.
Came here to say thank you for adding "(macOS)" to the title. Nothing more frustrating that clicking on an interesting Show HN, read comments that make you even more interested, and only then finding out the software is for an OS you never use.
My project is a library first with two applications built against the API ... A command line one that is also used for the PS1 variable and a gui app for when a visual exploration of the tree is needed.
I love the idea of interoperability between homegrown task managers. Another shameless plug: https://frogtab.com, which I’ve been building, following similar ideas of minimalism. I’m definitely going to check out your app when I’m at my macbook - and would be super interested in exploring integration!
This looks neat and I hope people find it interesting.
I’ve found the best todo app for me comes built into iDevices: Reminders.app. It’s got all the functions of this application, except maybe sophisticated snoozing (I haven’t tried NowDo and can’t say how good it is - snooze on Reminders.app is okay at best).
For one-time tasks, you can make a reminder with an alarm. For habits/recurring tasks, set up a recurring reminder. I assume you can have Focus-oriented lists, but I haven’t looked into it. It’s well integrated into iCloud of course.
Only thing it doesn’t do is give you a mail-to-task pipeline from Mail.app to Reminders.app. That’s a gap that I think needs to be filled.
Edit: nevermind, for mail-to-task just select some text from an email and do the Share… function to Reminders.app, it’ll provide a link back to the email in the reminder.
I think NowDo has quite a different philosophy to Reminders.app. I haven't tried Remoders but I've tried many others over the years. Every time the todo app itself became the distraction. Instead of doing what I'm supposed to be doing I'd be thinking about what task taxonomy I should be using or some other nonsense.
IMHO the lack of features is NowDo's most important and unique feature. I spent about 2 years prototyping and worked hard to remove every feature that wasn't absolutely essential, the less features the fewer distractions.
This won't be right for everyone, I have friends who couldn't live without labels and categories and other such features - but for me they just got in the way of getting stuff done.
You should definitely try the default reminders app because it looks similar to yours. It’s very simple and easy to use, it’s one of my productivity tools. I don’t think I ever even open the actual app, I just ask Siri to make a reminder for me and then complete the reminder in the widget or from the notification. The only advantage I see from yours (based on the website link) is that it’s keyboard-navigable, so maybe you could emphasize that more.
I was going to say, the main reason todo apps fail is because they are specifically about doing what people don't want to do.
If there were a generic way to unfuck your life on the other side of it, I could see it being wildly popular. Like a linear progression in weights, or a fasting diet, or a spaced repetition scheme, but for unwinding the effects of avoidant behaviours, with progress and results, that would be valuable.
I certainly wouldn't claim NowDo is a silver bullet, but I think it does a better job than any other todo app at avoiding the pitfalls procrastinators fall into. For the past 2 years I've been using a prototype of NowDo on i3/Linux that I cobbled together and it had a big impact on my productivity.
True, forgetting is the reason NowDo is always-on-top on the desktop, it's a constant but unobtrusive reminder of what you should be doing.
You're also right about todo apps assisting in their procrastination. That's why I kept NowDo so simple, there are no superfluous features to tinker with like labels, due dates, or categories.
Speaking as a chronic procrastinator, I think GP is more referring to the difficulty that comes with actually /adding/ items that need to be done. At least, that's always been one of the difficulties for me.
Absolutely - with NowDo you just hit Ctrl+Opt+A (from any app) and type the task, hit enter - and then you can safely forget about it and get back to what you were doing. Making it as easy and non-interruptive as possible to add tasks was a key design goal for exactly the reason you mentioned.
Wow, a free Mac app. I just recently bought a MacBook and I discovered that even for the most basic ones which are free on Windows and Linux, you have to pay.
All the functionality of the current app will remain free, so you can try it without worrying about a bait-and-switch. Note also that the app has full task import/export to CSV, so there is no lock-in. Your todo app should not cause you stress.
To pay the bills we plan to offer a paid service that will provide cloud backup and cross-device synchronization, but that's a few months away. I'd appreciate any feedback on this as a revenue stream.
I (and I think many people here) would be more than happy to pay a reasonable price for a reasonable product (haven’t tried yet this, but I think anything between 2$ and 10$ would be fine).
I know that software is not free to build, so I don’t expect it’s free to use. If you want to keep the product free, you can always add a Donate me button, to let people show their appreciation.
Kudos to you for letting us know what is the way you expect to make money. I try to never use software or services where the “making money” part is not clear.
I wouldn’t probably pay for a service, but I might be happy to pay a one time fee for a function that dumps the todo file (I understand it’s a csv) every time there is an update so I can integrate that on some other workflow (like committing to git, or importing into obsidian).
Another thing I might pay for is a iPhone app so I can mark todos completed on the go, but it’s probably very difficult to to a always on window there.
> I wouldn’t probably pay for a service, but I might be happy to pay a one time fee for a function that dumps the todo file (I understand it’s a csv) every time there is an update so I can integrate that on some other workflow (like committing to git, or importing into obsidian).
Yes, it seems there is a strong preference for a one-time purchase over a subscription, so I'll definitely give that serious consideration as we figure out our business model. My prototype for NowDo (which ran on i3/linux) uses Notion as a back-end.
> Another thing I might pay for is a iPhone app so I can mark todos completed on the go, but it’s probably very difficult to to a always on window there.
I think iphones now support widgets, similar to Android - so I think we can do something similar to NowDo's always-on-top. Iphone and Android versions are on our roadmap.
There are plenty of free mac apps, most just aren’t on the official Mac App Store because it requires a paid license. I use mac exclusively and I pretty much only use free productivity and development apps.
Sorry to hear that, could you elaborate on what bugs you encountered or what else made it unusable?
> Can't see where the task goes once added!
The task is added to a task queue, the displayed task is the oldest unsnoozed not-done tasks. Is this a problem with the UI not giving better confirmation that the task has been added?
1. The default message "nothing to do" shouldn't be automatically added to the tasks every time. 2. It would be great if, after snoozing, we could see the top "n" tasks in the main app itself. 3. Please add a feature to select multiple tasks at once. 4. Instead of a subscription, it would be better to have a one-time payment for the premium pricing.
Thank you!