Review: Vitalist, a new GTD application
The race to produce a good GTD application continues. And, I have to say, the results so far are pretty underwhelming.
A recently-launched contender in this field is Vitalist, based very closely on David Allen’s Getting Things Done methodology.
The interface is clean, listing Inbox, Projects, Actions, Waiting, Someday, and Reference tabs. Making heavy use of Ajax, the system moves pretty smoothly between capture (inbox), sorting (projects) and doing (actions).
And, to be honest, if you’re the kind of person who is always connected to the Internet and doesn’t mind fiddling around with endless clicks back and forth, Vitalist is probably going to be a really good option for you.
For me, though, it’s just too involved. Let’s go through the process of capturing a new action (‘phone hi-fi store’) into my ‘new sound system’ project in Vitalist:
- In the Inbox, we click ‘add an item’, and type ‘phone hi-fi store’ into the text box that appears. If you press enter, though, nothing happens, so we have to mouse over to the very small and obscure-looking ‘save’ button to continue.
- Wait while the item is stored
- Click item again. Nothing indicates that this is what you need to do, which is a problem. This selects the item and gives us the option to delete it or to edit it. We click ‘edit’.
- Now we’re cooking. We now have the option of moving this item to ‘Projects’, ‘Actions’, ‘Waiting’, and so on. Since we know this is going to be an action, we click the ‘Action’ tab.
- Now we choose a context for the action. Let’s type in ‘@phone’, as we haven’t got that one stored yet. Problem: every time I type in the box, a helpful popup appears to allow me to choose a context. Since I don’t have any, the box is blank and is covering up what I’m trying to type.
- Next we’re asked for a due date. This is a bit outside the scope of a next action in my opinion, but since Vitalist doesn’t have a calendar, let’s put it down for tomorrow.
- Finally we can click ‘Move’. Nothing happens.
Leaving aside the initial input, and the fact that for some reason Vitalist won’t process my action, that’s seven clicks, plus some typing, just to move something from the inbox to a ‘next actions’ list.
Of course, you can start at the projects tab and add actions directly to a project that way, but that rather defeats the purpose of an Inbox.
Summary
So, what’s my conclusion? Well, it looks good, the Ajax interface is well done (albeit with some strange icons), and it’s certainly clutter-free. It looks a lot more professionally designed than others I can think of, like iCommit, but the underlying system doesn’t seem up to the task just yet.
It’s painfully slow to refresh, and I couldn’t even get it to process a single item from my inbox into a project action.
It turns out that you have to create a context before you can put something into it, which seems a counter-intuitive restriction. It would be much better to be able to create contexts on the go, especially in the early stages of setting it up.
Another minor quibble: in GTD-speak, contexts are usually preceded with an ‘@’ sign. Vitalist adds this in automatically, but doesn’t explain this — so, when I typed in my new context of ‘@phone’, what I ended up with was ‘@@phone’.
There are a few rough edges to be smoothed out here, and for me to consider using it full time, it would need to have significantly fewer ‘clicks’ associated with each action.
Comment
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David,
Great new blog you’ve got here. I know that a lot of GTDers out there have been looking for something Web-based, but I’m begining to feel like I’ve got too much out there already. I was looking for something that could run on Windows (at work) and Mac (at home) and found ThinkingRock. It saves all of the data in an xml file so I can either email it to myself or transfer it between computers using my memory key. And it’s free so that got it even more points in my book.
I also like that I can print out my next actions in PocketMod format, which fits nicely in my Moleskin.
— Heather · Jan 2, 00:20 · #
I agree with you: Too slow. But promising interface if it was fast enough.
My main concern about online GTD “apps”: How do you take your tasks with you? It’s either printing or syncing. And both have it’s problems…
See my Vitalist review here:
http://brilliantdays.com/gtd-online/
— Oyvind · Jan 2, 01:49 · #
Heather — thanks! ThinkingRock sounds like it could be intriguing: I’m in the same position as you with Windows at work and Mac at home. To be honest, though, I think paper is the way to go — look out for my series on making paper work with GTD!
Oyvind — yes, the interface itself is excellent, especially compared to some of the other GTD apps out there.
I share your concern about keeping this stuff online. I want something I can pull out of my pocket whenever I want to and check stuff. Maybe digital paper will be the answer, but I’m not holding my breath...
— David Mackay · Jan 2, 13:05 · #