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The Hit List takes aim at OmniFocus and Things

by Brett Terpstra Dec 18th 2008 at 4:00PM

The Hit List, from the Potion Factory, is a new task management application set to go head-to-head with Things and OmniFocus. We haven't seen a lot of waves in the advanced, visually polished task manager wars lately, but this one is going to storm the gates. I tend to get overexcited about new productivity apps, but after test driving the beta release of The Hit List for a day, I'm convinced it's worthy of all the excitement I can muster. A few of us here at TUAW, in fact, have been trading notes and are in agreement that this one is a serious competitor.

The Hit List combines my favorite aspects of Things with some of the niceties of OmniFocus, and then adds some visual polish and usability tweaks. It works in a single, tabbed window; nice, because I've always been bothered by the floating palettes in OmniFocus. Beyond my personal tastes, though, the interface is beautiful both in aesthetics and simplicity. I can see immediately what each item on the screen means and infer what each button is going to do. For those with advanced needs, The Hit List provides a full-fledged tagging system, filtering and sorting, contexts and projects, notes, links ... the only thing I haven't seen yet is repeating tasks, but the application is still in development. Despite its beta status, though, it's been stable and highly usable.

The system-wide Quick Entry window is as simple and powerful as any on the market, and the tagging and context system is based on keyboard symbols ("/" and "@"), so adding them is easy: you just type them at the end of your task name. The interface is almost 100% keyboard-navigable; tasks can be moved and filed with a few keystrokes, and tags, contexts, start and due dates can be added to a highlighted task with their respective shortcuts.

A projected retail price of $70 places it between Things and Omnifocus on the cost scale. Given the features and ease-of-use it provides, I'll gladly pay in that range. The biggest problem for The Hit List is going to be that most of its target users have probably already shelled out for Things and/or OmniFocus. I think that a test drive will prove pretty convincing for a lot of folks, though.

The Hit List just went into private beta recently, but Andy from the Potion Factory is welcoming new testers. If you have the time to file bug reports and feature requests, head over to Google Groups and sign up for the discussion and get the download. [Google Groups link fixed, sorry!]



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The Hit List, from the Potion Factory, is a new task management application set to go head-to-head with Things and OmniFocus. We haven't...
 

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KenBotwinick

I admit at first glance it looks like this would be fun to tinker with, but I don't think I would prefer it more than Things. The whole reason I like Things is that I never wanted to tinker with it at all. It's so simple and elegant, it just did it's job and got out of my way and I started getting things done. And that was a first for me...

I've tried LOTS of productivity apps: Life Balance (for quite a long time), MyLifeOrganized, OmniFocus, Midnight Inbox, and I'm sure others. I always ended up wasting more time setting them up and tinkering than getting stuff done. And this screenshot is pulling my attention all over the place, so I figure I'd end up doing the same with this.

I have actually already bought Things. I was going to even if I changed products, since I used their public beta for a full year at least. I felt guilty not paying for it, considering how well it works for me. And I really really really love Cultured Code's style. Not just the GUI, but their whole process, the way they make decisions... There's a serious Zen/Taoist wisdom going on there... :-P

Anyways, good luck to these guys too. Competition is always good.

December 31 2008 at 3:38 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
adam

Could anyone share a link to download this beta? Please :)

December 19 2008 at 10:40 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Greg Jones

re: "However, unless THL gets MobileMe sync [easy to do with Things]"

Actually Things/Mac does not sync directly with MobileMe, it syncs with iCal. If iCal is not set to sync to MobileMe, tasks created in Things will not appear on MobileMe. Not a big deal, at least for me, with Things/Mac, but support of MobileMe syncing between Things/Mac and Things/iPhone is one of the most often requested features on the Things forum.

December 19 2008 at 6:00 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Hiram

Does THL have dependencies (i.e. tasks that do not become available/visible until a prior task has been completed)? This, I think, is vital. It's the reason I use OmniFocus now, instead of Things.

December 19 2008 at 5:39 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Hiram's comment
Alan

THL has hierarchical subtasks (unlike Things) but it doesn't have dependencies using your definition.

I think THL is a pretty good effort. The tabbed interface is essential... OmniFocus should always have been designed like that (I suggested it multiple times during the OF beta... either tabs, or if it was too much work, as a drawer) rather than the clunky way Perspectives are implemented now. You pretty much have to devote a whole Space to OmniFocus just to keep a bunch of windows open with different perspectives. On the other hand, THL doesn't bring a lot new to the table. Doesn't allow mixing plain notes and tasks (OmniFocus could *really* use this feature too, as could Things) which would fit THL's notebook metaphor really nicely. Unfortunately only Mail.app "Notes" and Circus Ponies Notebook seem to allow mixing of arbitrary text and tasks.

It's strange there are so many task managers and yet they all basically have similar limitations. What I'd really kill for is a port of emacs "org-mode" to OmniOutliner. The org-mode engine is incredibly powerful... it does all that OmniFocus does and much more, but being stuck as plain text in Emacs is frustrating for average people.

December 19 2008 at 6:14 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Olga

Great news for all lovers to organize your life.
I still prefer using http://Task2Gather.com its a better and cheaper task manager for collaboration.

December 19 2008 at 5:17 AM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Allan Moult

Been playing with it for a little while. First impressions are that it is very pretty and intuitive.

However, unless THL gets MobileMe sync [easy to do with Things], recurring tasks, and a price drop, Things is going to take it to the cleaners


December 18 2008 at 11:44 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
dan

"Things only has the former."

And Things is still in beta while omnifocus has been out for a while. You're comparing apples to oranges.

December 18 2008 at 11:11 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
dan

"The Hit List is going to be that most of its target users have probably already shelled out for Things and/or OmniFocus."

Impressive, considering Things hasn't reached 1.0 yet and isn't accepting money yet.

The hit list looks like a Things ripoff. I'll try it out, but a screen shot doesn't tell you much.

December 18 2008 at 11:09 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to dan's comment
Megan Lavey-Heaton

I had actually started trying Things when THL came along, and I personally think it's a lot better. Already in beta, it's ironing out some of the quirks that were bugging me with Things - like the inability to drag and drop in the left-side task bar.

December 19 2008 at 4:21 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Ryan

Regardless how much devotees of Things may love it, they have not "shelled out for Things" already. Things Touch (for iPhone) is the only paid for option at this point from Cultured Code. Things for the Mac is (and has been) in a free public beta - the 1.0 release targeted for Macworld Expo. So the argument that The Hit List has an uphill battle with Things due to money already invested is false.

December 18 2008 at 10:57 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Ryan's comment
Brett Terpstra

This is true. I was thinking I had pre-ordered Things at $39, but have apparently only signed up for the newsletter. I pre-ordered OmniFocus, which was probably what I was remembering.

December 18 2008 at 11:14 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
Bryan

I've been beta testing the program this afternoon, and I have to say I am very impressed so far. I am a heavy user of OmniFocus, and I've tried Things in the past. THL seems to combine the best of both programs. I love a lot of the little details, like tabs. It is also very easy to get around and do everything using just the keyboard. One of the best features is the "Quicksilver" like function it terms of getting around the program.

As soon as they have an iPhone app, I will probably switch to THL from OmniFocus.

@Brad, moving tasks around is very easy, they can either be dragged and dropped or you can use the keyboard and "file" tasks.

December 18 2008 at 8:48 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
1 reply to Bryan's comment
adam

Any chance anyone would be willing to share a DMG link? =D Would eagerly love to try this out tonight! I'm currently and Omnifocus user but would love to give this a spin, sounds like some OF users are already convinced a switch is in order...

December 18 2008 at 11:04 PM Report abuse rate up rate down Reply
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