Comments on: Why Cultured Code’s “Things” app can’t do GTD

By: Christopher Papastefanou

Christopher Papastefanou — Tue, 13 Sep 2011 13:02:14 +0000

Thanks for an excellent analysis!

You are right in your argument, but I don’t see it as a flaw big enough to be called “Fail”, and I still find Things to be the best GTD app out there.

However, I hope that Cultured Code implements your suggested improvement.

By: Linus Kendall

Linus Kendall — Wed, 25 May 2011 04:34:29 +0000

A way around this problem is using the ‘Someday’ category. You could mark inactive tasks that are still waiting to be done as someday, thus keeping them in your system, but leaving them inactive and not shown in your next action list.

Another way I’ve tried is to use a separate tag, I use ‘waiting for’ for tasks that are waiting for somebody else to complete, and ‘dependent’ for tasks that are dependent on other tasks that I have to do. Problem with this approach though is that you have to do some processing when deciding on next action in the sense that you have to retag this dependent task with the right context – using Someday avoids that problem.

By: L.A. Nolan

L.A. Nolan — Wed, 18 May 2011 16:27:06 +0000

To solve that problem, I tag tasked “Waiting For” if I am waiting on someone to do something first… whether it is someone else or myself.

By: Jerry

Jerry — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 13:46:55 +0000

That’s the solution indeed!

The statement in the article is not true (anymore).

For an active project actions are default Next actions. The actions that you think are not next actions you mark as Someday actions (Cmd-Y). Problem solved!

No such thing as serial, parallel actions or dependencies. Just mark as Next or as Someday or even as Scheduled. Easy as that. So with Things you can surely do GTD.

By: George

George — Sat, 29 Jan 2011 00:08:21 +0000

With both Omnifocus and Things, I found I gravitated to Things. There are quite a few good conversations about Things usage in the cultured code user forums. For me, the key is “curated” use of of the Today category — with myself as the curator. I view the GTD workflow (to the extent I understand it as unnecessarily complex.

By: Andy

Andy — Sun, 28 Nov 2010 02:59:47 +0000

I’m finally getting an iPhone to replace my first generation iPod Touch and, you know what, I still miss the clear, bloody wonderful Palm OS 5x (Garnet) task list application.

It set the gold standard for me as far as task control. (I’m avoiding calling it a task manager.) Even Blackberry’s built in task list is elegant when compared to the effectively useless Apple To Dos.

I’ve been looking for an iPhone/iPad replacement but none is as good. What kills me is also the price of Things in that you can’t buy it as a bundle. That it also doesn’t have a free-flow/got to do format is also an annoyance.

By: Andy Chan

Andy Chan — Sun, 21 Nov 2010 01:44:06 +0000

The fact that it isn’t a GTD works well for the purpose of simply marking down different tasks. I don’t have Things yet, but when I do, I plan on using it to keep track of homework and such, because there isn’t a specific order to organize homework (unless you go by priority, of course). So there are both pros and cons with the app not being a GTD.

By: Mke

Mke — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 13:12:44 +0000

“No need to write it down upfront.”

I think there is if one wants to clear onces mind. Otherwise I’d keep thinking about the things I’d need to do after the current next action. Writing all that down is one of the core parts of GTD isn’t it?

By: Cameron

Cameron — Fri, 07 May 2010 19:24:37 +0000

Erm. Sorry to necropost, but if you have 50 projects, shouldn’t you have a grand total of 50 next actions?

By: Chris

Chris — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 11:39:59 +0000

But then your today list would be overloaded with all next actions, which is not what the today list is for.

As for the menu option for hiding next action steps, the iPhone version does not provide that facility, amongst other things.

By: Justin

Justin — Sat, 10 Apr 2010 00:28:14 +0000

As a remedy to Mark’s problem….couldn’t you just add all the next actions from your various projects to the Today list. That way you could sort by context and only have the next actions available.

By: snowbag

snowbag — Fri, 02 Apr 2010 22:53:31 +0000

This problem has been addressed in Things 1.3. See the link below:

http://culturedcode.com/things/blog/2010/03/things-1-3-brings-support-for-mixed-projects.html

By: Jon

Jon — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 09:36:06 +0000

But Things does have a sequential list with drag-drop ordering. What mark is looking for is the ability to set dependencies.

Right now Things will show you the next item in sequence that is available in that context. His complaint was that it should have realized that buying the ring was dependent on calling the mother and hidden that item.

I noticed this right away too, but I see why they made the design choice. If you had full support for items to have multiple dependancies, then you might very well spend more time setting up your list than completing it… and that is what happened to me while using OmniFocus.

I now use Things because I can just skip any tasks that have a dependency I am waiting for. I would like to see support for single dependencies though (i.e. dependent on the thing directly before it).

All I can say is that it works better for me… though I tend to use it more for programming & design tasks than GTD on a day to day basis, so my needs may be different than yours.

By: Bowman

Bowman — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 03:19:45 +0000

Sure, but I found this great patch for Things called the human mind. It’s smart enough to know that that you have to dig some holes before you install a fence.

Don’t put your life on a computer.

By: Conrad

Conrad — Sun, 01 Nov 2009 21:19:23 +0000

What is so wrong about planning your projects upfront? I think it is the program’s responsibility, not mine, to suggest the next action for a given project to me upon completion of the previous action. Or notify me that there are no next actions defined for a project so that I could create one.

Or should I keep all my ideas and thoughts about a project in my head just because the program cannot distinguish between actionable items and not-yet-actionable items?

I agree with Mark in this discussion. Though I should say that Things is a very good application, definitely one of the best on the market.