THE Lowly Peon

2Do: Indie Development at its Finest 
10 December 2009, 2:17pm

I downloaded an app today called 2Do, per the suggestion of a site called beautifulpixels.com. The app is great. But the customer service was incredible.

I don't usually write about iPhone apps — or at least, I try not to — but this story requires a bit of background first.

A while back, I read a post on daringfireball.net that suggested using a to-do list app called Things. It's a simple app that helps manage your todos, and syncs with the overwhelmingly expensive ($50) desktop app the same name. It was $10 in the app store, and given the positive reviews I'd read elsewhere, I figured $10 is only two pints of beer, so I got it. And I've been using it ever since.

There are a few things I dislike about Things. First, the desktop app is just too expensive, which, for me, makes syncing impossible. Which means no archiving, no desktop searching. And, at the time, since I was jailbreaking my iPhone, it also made any hope for keeping my list from one iPhone firmware to the next impossible. Additionally, it's not that intuitive, despite what so many UI people have raved.

Fast forward to this morning, when I was a bit bored at work, and reading my RSS feeds. Beautiful Pixels, a design/UI site which just started up recently, wrote a review of another ToDo management app called 2Do. There's a "lite" version — which, in the iPhone app world, means it's free but missing features — so I downloaded it and gave it a shot.

The UI is a bit busy, but it's got a few key features:

• It syncs with Apple's native iCal. This means no backup issues, I can easily search old ones, etc. Additionally, this means that it syncs with my MobileMe, which then syncs with Google Calendars. Wow.
• It only asks for basic information at first, and requires a tap to enter more. I like this kind of design, because it doesn't make me feel like I'm spending my money on a chicken salad when I only want to eat the green stuff (which is obviously more delicious).
• It has push notifications (or email notifications) to remind you if you want it to. Previously, I had to set an event in my iPhone calendar app, which doesn't really make sense. daisy sets an alarm, but I don't like that as much because an alarm should be repeating (I think).
• It has a special feature in which you can add an action to the todo. For example, if you need to call your grandma to thank her for the Thanksgiving card, you can add an event to call her, which makes the actual getting done much easier (though you've put it off until then).
• Repeating tasks. Seems obvious, but Things didn't have it.

There was one thing that was missing, however. One thing that was particularly important to me. There was no way to archive accomplished tasks. This means that once you mark it done, after a designated amount of time (set in the preferences), the task is gone forever. I don't like that idea.

So I wrote the guys over at [GuidedWays] (guidedways.com], the developers, if there was any work around.

Within four hours (keep in mind that most of you are sleeping while I'm awake), someone wrote me back with a little cheat. A way to "hide" done tasks, and then you can set it to never delete. Kindly, they said they'd consider it for the next update. Works fine for me. So I wrote back, happily, a thank you for the quick response, solid app, and great service, and thought it was over.

Then an hour later, they wrote back. Basically, they thanked me for the suggestion, and said they just put it in the next update!

So WOW! I simple question, within a few hours, became part of the next update. So buy this app and support these guys. I can send you screen shots if you want to see. Or mosey on over to the Beautiful Pixels post about it for some shots.