Best To-Do List Software?

JojoLinkyBob writes "Greetings, Council of Slashdot. I am curious what everyone here recommends as their favorite organizational software. Specifically, I am trying to find a simple freeware/open-source todo list manager. In the past, I've dabbled with TreePad, Shadow Plan, Mantis, and various virtual sticky- note apps ..all with mixed success. Currently, I'm back to my old-school ways of scribbling my todo's on the back of each Daily Dilbert Calendar page, which sadly means today is June 23 :)"

Palm Desktop worth a look

[KoriaDesevis]

I am trying to find a simple freeware/open-source todo list manager.

Even if you don't have a Palm Pilot, Palm Desktop [palmone.com] under Windows isn't too bad. The price - FREE - is certainly right, too. It may not be the best out there, but it meets the basic requirements for a to-do list manager.

Apple's iCal software

[The I Shing]

I have experimented with free PHP to-do list software, but haven't found it easy enough to continue with.

What I use for my own to-do list is Apple's iCal, which has the ability, thanks to my $99-a-year Mac.com account, to put my list on the web and every Mac I use.

I must say, there is nothing quite so satisfying as checking the tiny "done" box next to an item on my to-do list. Sometimes I'm tempted to put trivial items on it like "take off shoes" or "read Slashdot" just so I'll have the opportunity to check off a done item.

http://www.bestpractical.com/rt/

[Craig Shergold]

This software has completely changed my life. I use it as a TODO list, I use to to manage developers, I use it to manage myself, and I'm now using it to manage the process of renovating my house (will eventually require my contractor to use it). I will never go back to the days of using a TODO list that's bound to a particular phone, handheld, laptop, or desktop.

Re:What's wrong with Old School?

[carlos_benj]

Those are aspects of calendaring, not necessarily todo lists.

Wiki - seconded

[coljac]

I also use a private wiki. I have a ToDo topic which is my to do list, and as a bonus I keep any other information I need there. It's perfect. I even have a couple of cron jobs set up to copy my bookmarks over and so on, so it's a great information "home base" that I can get to from anywhere, even my smartphone. I use VQWiki.

Life Balance

[Anonymous Coward]

Check out Life Balance [llamagraphics.com]. It is the first to-do manager that I've been able to stick with, and use successfully.

Dude!

[Saint Aardvark]

It's like you read my mind. Come cower before the greatness that is...JobJar! [freshmeat.net]

From the description:

Jobjar is a Small but Useful (tm) utility to manage a list of non-critical jobs to do...you know, like a job jar. You can add a job to the jar, you can remove a job, or you can just print out a job for you to do. In the grand tradition of Unix, the list is called ~/.jobjar and is a simple text file. None of your binary Windows nonsense here...no, sir! And in the grand tradition of GNU software, it's released under the GPL. What more could you possibly want?

JobJar: Because if you need more than Perl, plain text and a command line, you are a heathen and must die.

Lists and Calendars..

[cioxx]

On OSX, I use iCal. Don't think anything else comes close. With the built-in WebDav functionality, it can be combined with .Mac, or OSS PHPiCalendar [sourceforge.net] which makes a great to-do/calendar package for those who like to access their information from elsewhere. Works with Mozilla Calendar [mozilla.org] and KOrganizer [kde.org] too.

On Windows, there is a shareware app called Biromsoft To-Do List [biromsoft.com]. Pretty simple and straightforward.
I recommend it for those who are looking for a listmaker without all the bells and whistles that might otherwise come with aformentioned calendar apps.

Re:what's awful about notepad?

[nucal]

As I recall, the Win95 version of Notepad used non standard control codes and I got tired of either not being able to use ctrl-s to save files or ctrl-c/ctrl-v for cut and paste (I don't remember which and I guess this has been fixed with W2K or XP). At any rate, I switched to Metapad which still had tight code and a couple of nice features that made it easier for me to use it to edit html and text files - and I've stuck with it.

Hey, if you like Notepad, more power to you ... you won't be alone [notepad.org]!

Re:Low-tech

[headisdead]

Definitely worth checking out Danny O'Brien's (NTK [ntk.net]) "Life Hacks: Tech Secrets of Overprolific Alpha Geeks" speech (given for O'Reilly and at NOTCON '04), in which he argues on the basis of research that the most prolific programmers/hackers/geeks organise themselves via... text-based todo lists!

Check out
A summary [craphound.com] or shorter summary [boingboing.net]

Re:You are so busted.

[bhtooefr]

I thought that was just the support for creating a TODO remark that added an item into a todo list along with a line number to go with it.

Emacs Diary!

[Greyfox]

I put all my reminders in Emacs diary now. I usually have Emacs open (I read mail with vm) and it's pretty good about telling time and stuff. It'd be interesting to hack out a separate todo list generator that can export data to a palm pilot type device. Hmm... (Adding "investigate palm conduits in emacs" to todo list...)

RequestTracker

[rainmanjag]

I'm a big fan of the web-based software RequestTracker, affectionately known as RT.

Homepage [bestpractical.com]

It is similar to Bugzilla, except it's not software bug oriented so much as "Stuff To Do" oriented. It has a simple email gateway, it keeps track of absolutely everything, it allows you to add custom fields quite easily, it changes priorities of your events over time, and it allows you to keep track of how much time you've spent on various projects. Around my office, it's pretty key.

-jag

*NIX: at

[gellenburg]

If you have access to a *NIX machine, or use one for your daily work, then what I do may work for you.

I simply use the at scheduler to schedule an email to remind me on specific days. I have a rule set up to automatically flag the messages and to ensure they won't end up in my Junk Mail folder.

Something simple like:
at "6/21/2004 19:00" mail -s "TODO: TAKE OUT THE TRASH" [userid]

Of all the apps on my Mac, the one I'm in the most is Mail.

Free. Simple. Searchable (using my mail program). Not perfect, but it works.

knowit

[carlos_benj]

I've been playing with knowit [sourceforge.net] and it's pretty simple.

Re:MS Project

[Anonymous Coward]

Sounds like someone that has never used Microsoft Project before. Though it has some issues, it's a fantastic product, particularly when you run Project Server.

Re:Palm Desktop worth a look

[jackbird]

Here's how I make a text editor word as a to do manager. I use textpad on windows, but notepad or any text editor will do:

I have a file on my desktop called todo.txt

that file has a thing to do on each line.

each line begins with a character denoting the status of the item:

- thing to do
+ thing already done
~ thing in progress
X thing I decided/was told not to do
? thing I need more information to do

Priority goes to the first item with a -in front of it. Hard deadlines are annotated within items themselves.

When a task needs subitems, use tabs to indent.

I also have a clock on top of my monitor, a calendar on my wall, and a paper address book.

When one task gets so complicated it starts cluttering up the list, I start another text file. Since my text editor has a tabbed interface, it's pretty easy to keep a master list and several project-specific lists open at once.

It seems to work pretty well.