[Editor’s Note: This is part of the “To-Do or Not To-Do: My Search for To-Do Task Management” series.]
The second week on my quest for just the right task management solution, I exclusively used Google Tasks. If you want to find-out what I’ll be using this next week and make a recommendation of a great to-do task management app for me to try, please do!
I had a feeling going into this week, that Google Tasks was going to fall short, so my expectations were fairly low to begin with, but by the end of this week, I was fairly impressed.
My Impressions
Will I be going back to Google Tasks after reviewing all of these to-do task management apps?
No, but maybe.
The only way I would seriously use Google Tasks as my go-to to-do app, would be for them to push it past the “beta” feel it has. It’s so close to being a solid, polished tool. Perhaps we’ll see improvements to Google Tasks as many of Google’s products are seeing subtle improvements all around.
Google Tasks
Has Google Tasks been hiding?
I use Google Apps and have been using Gmail since the dawn of time. Suddenly, as I’m using Google Tasks, I realize this handy little tool is embedded in both Gmail and Google Calendar. I was disappointed it wasn’t embedded into Google Apps. I think it would be really handy in there.
Since most tasks center around dates and times, your task list is always displayed on your Google Calendar page. This is really great, if you use Google Calendar on a regular basis.
With Google Tasks embedded in Gmail, you can easily pull it up, and it rides in your Gmail screen, much like Google Chat does. When you have an email pulled up, “Add to Tasks” is one of the options listed under the “More” pull-down at the top.
Watch Google Tasks in action, as it flows between your Google mail and calendar:
[tentblogger-youtube qrka_3jui8M]
I didn’t find it to run quite that smoothly. You can rearrange your tasks easily by drag and drop, but I found it a tad clunky. However, I will say the keyboard shortcuts are pretty slick:
In Gmail | Shift + T | Create a task based on the open message |
G and then K | Open Tasks, or shift the cursor from Gmail to Tasks | |
In the Tasks Window | Tab | Moves task right (“subtasks”) |
Shift + Tab | Moves task left | |
Ctrl + Up | Moves task up | |
Ctrl + Down | Moves task down | |
Shift + Enter | Edit task details, including due date or notes | |
Esc | Close Tasks | |
Shift + Esc | Shift the cursor from Tasks to Gmail |
Extension
Since I love Chrome extensions, I hunted down the official Google Tasks Chrome extension right away.
Very nice.
You can easily rearrange your tasks, and you have all of the other nifty options without having to have your Gmail or Google Calendar open. This is very handy when needing to add tasks on the fly, so you don’t have to switch tabs every time. Also, with the Google Task extension, you can highlight text on any web page, right click and add that text to a new task.
With Google Tasks integrated into Gmail, Google Calendar, iGoogle and my browser, Google Tasks was always a click away.
Mobile
This is nice. Really nice.
[tentblogger-youtube AbiMbmq3JG4]
Again, sweet integration on Google’s part.
Conclusion
Even as I write this review, I’m compelled to use it. They’ve done a really great job.
So, what’s my hang-up?
It’s the polish I was talking about. If you want to cruise with one list, it’s great. If you want to have more than one list, forget about it. I was using about 4 to 5 different lists, and every time I accessed my tasks, it would default to my main personal list. It would be nice if it would remember the last list you accessed. I know it’s only one extra click to select the list of your choice, but it really became annoying this week.
It also lacked a few other nice features that are found in other apps, like re-occurring tasks and sub-tasks.
So close, yet so far.
Maybe next time.
On a scale of To-Do or Not To-Do, Google Tasks is rated: Not To-Do
Learn more, on the Google Tasks webpage.
Aaron says
I can’t remember if Tasks is an extra permission that has to be granted by the Administrator or not, but has been working on our church Apps account. Now that Apps is migrating to Google Accounts, it should be integrated in every Apps account soon (again, if the Administrator allows).
Eric Dye says
That’ll be a strong addition. It would be nice to pull up tasks while working on … well … TASKS!