TeuxDeux Comes to the iPhone

How many task management applications does the world need? It seems like every day another “amazing” new GTD solution launches that seeks to outdo the others by piling on new features and introducing an ever-increasing amount of complexity.

Tags, projects, contexts, contributors, reminders, flagging, groups; what ever happened to the good old to do list? You know, something simple that acts as a memory aid without itself becoming a major task to keep up with. Recently, the TeuxDeux web application debuted and reminded us of the power of simplicity. Today we’ll take a look at its iPhone counterpart to see if the “less is more” strategy works in the realm of iOS.

Meet TeuxDeux

In case you’ve never seen it, TeuxDeux is a free online task manager that is one of those rare products that actually pulls off the promise of both beauty and effectiveness through simplicity.

The interface isn’t your typical GTD single column list of items or even a calendar screen but rather a fluid five-column list that shows the current and upcoming days of the week. Each day has a date header, input box and a simple list of lines.

The layout is very typography driven and is completely void of superfluous design. As you would guess, typing into the field at the top of a column allows you to add an item to that day.

After entering an item, you can click and drag it to rearrange its order in the list and/or send it to a different day. Clicking on an item crosses it off the list, after which you can hit the little “x” to delete the item from your list.

To edit an item, simply drag it back to the text box at the top. This feels a little odd at first (why not a double click?) but you quickly get used to it. The arrows at the left and right allow you to move forward and backward in days and the calendar icon will let you pick a specific day to jump to.

Under the day columns there is a list for your “Someday” items that don’t necessarily need to be tied to a specific date. Since you can manually rearrange your items, I like to create little headers in my Someday category to separate the content.

TeuxDeux for iPhone

After getting hooked on the web-based TeuxDeux app, I couldn’t wait to try the iPhone app. You can tell right away that the minimalist spirit of the design has been faithfully reproduced for the mobile version.

To get started, simply login to your TeuxDeux account and all your items from the web interface will automatically be imported. As you use the app, hit the “Sync” button at the top right to make sure take effect across both the web and iPhone version.

Instead of seeing five days at once the iPhone version utilizes the full screen space for a single day. Despite this difference, it really feels like you’ve just zoomed in on a column from the web app and does an excellent job of maintaining the experience.

To switch days, tap on the arrows at the top or swipe left and right anywhere on the screen (double tap the header to go to today). Just as with the web version, you can enter tasks via the entry field at the top and complete them by tapping on the name.

Along the bottom there is a nice linear date feature that you don’t see in the web version. Drag this area left and right to scroll through the days and tap on a date to make it the active screen.

To rearrange the items, tap and hold until you can freely drag it around. You can also move an item to another day by dragging it to the appropriate date at the bottom.

Editing tasks mirrors the functionality seen online, just drag the item to the field at the top, correct it, then hit enter to put it back in the list.

Someday

Tapping or dragging an item to the bar at the bottom will bring you to the Someday section. Here again we see the single column view but all of your columns are kept exactly like you’ve arranged them online so any faux categories you’ve setup are retained.

The Someday view works just like the Today view. Swipe left and right to change columns or tap a box at the bottom to jump to a specific column (dragging and editing tasks works the same here).

Multiple Accounts

The one advantage the iPhone app has over the web version is the ability to login to multiple accounts and quickly switch between them. This allows you to easily manage multiple lists for different purposes.

TeuxDeux or Not TeuxDeux?

I’m a big fan of productivity apps and love Producteev, Things, and The Hit List for their robust feature sets and great interfaces. I’m always comparing new solutions to these three apps and usually won’t even consider one that falls short of their functionality.

For this reason, TeuxDeux took me completely by surprise. The first time I saw the web app I chalked it up as an application with a neat design, but too simple for me to really get into. However, about a month ago I decided to actually give it a shot by turning it into a Fluid app and throwing it in my Mac’s dock.

I can’t believe how much I love the simplified workflow. I still use Producteev for major project management and collaborative projects but for tracking my simple every day list of things to do, I’ve come to realize that simpler is without a doubt better. The five column, web interface has changed my world and helps me focus on getting through one week at a time while giving me the flexibility to plan ahead when I need to.

Though I hate losing the five-up view in the iPhone version, I realize that there just isn’t room for it and think the developers did an excellent job of molding the experience to a smaller screen. It’s definitely a near-perfect implementation of TeuxDeux in a mobile environment. Most iPhone todo apps are a web of complicated menus and can really suck up time while entering tasks. TeuxDeux is pretty much menu-free; just enter the task and go.

I do have a few issues with the iPhone app but they are fairly minor. First, I think the app takes too long to initiate a move. I thought the move feature was broken until I got up enough patience to just hold my finger in one spot long enough for something to happen. Further, the linear date picker looks much cooler than the web version’s calendar but is much less functional. It can take forever to swipe enough to get to an event that’s a few months in the future. I’d also like to see a horizontal view implemented upon rotating your device, perhaps even with two columns.

Finally, the scrolling and swiping are fairly rigid and lack that famous iPhone smoothness in all areas but the date line. I agree that all apps shouldn’t feel the need to mimic this behavior but this is one app I really miss it in and can’t help but think it would feel more polished with these effects. You could argue that the minimalist nature of the design would clash with the idea of smooth animations but then why include them in the date scroller?

As I said, these are very minor complaints and don’t at all affect my recommendation that you try TeuxDeux out immediately, both on the web and iOS.

Conclusion

To sum up, TeuxDeux is a breath of fresh air in a world filled with cluttered and clunky todo list applications. The web and iPhone versions are seamlessly integrated, the former of which is completely free while the latter will only set you back a couple of bucks (no lame monthly fees).

I review a lot of apps, many of which I never pick up again even if I gave them a high score. This is definitely not the case with TeuxDeux, which has become an integral part of my daily workflow.

Leave a comment below and let us know what you think of the web service, the iPhone app and the integration of the two. For any fans looking for more, according to a few recent tweets, TeuxDeux will soon have both a desktop AIR client and an Android app!