two great task managers for android

keeping an organized, accessible task list has been an often targeted, rarely achieved objective of mine. I am not a naturally organized person. there, I said it. some, including six-year-old junior miss, have taken issue with my neatness. “but I know where everything is,” I reply. the same is true with my to do list. I know where everything is. until I don’t. the cloud and a smart phone changed all that.

the first breakthrough was an online task list called toodledo. I alluded to toodledo last fall in a post about cool apps for android and promised to tell more. so now I am. I tried remember the milk and todoist. toodledo won my heart because it synchronized, more or less, with outlook. it could nag me from my sidebar in firefox. after I left outlook for a cloud-based system, it even tucked itself into my gmail screen. toodledo also plays well with david allen’s getting things done, if that floats your boat.

then came my motorola droid. could I maintain my time management mojo in android? but of course. here are the two best options I found.

first came toodledroid. the app had the same easy functionality of the sidebar version of toodledo:

the item detail example above was created by forwarding an email to my toodledo account. priority, due date, context and status can all be set in the subject line, and the body of the email is captured in the notes area. very handy for email triage!

I like toodledroid fine, but was delighted to come across another toodledo-syncable contender, got to do (g t d, get it?) parallels toodledroid in functionality, but has an extra bonus – a nice little widget.

now, those of you who have read my other posts on android apps here or on my droid-specific blog know that I am a minimalist who does not lightly add icons and widgets to my home screen. however, I found that having my to do list right in front of me helped me keep my eye on the prize. so to speak.

the item detail has all the gtd goodness that allen aficionados require; I admit I am not an adherent, but I have adopted and/or adapted the conventions to a system that works for me.

(note: the images are of the lite, ad supported version of the application. when I use an app regularly, I support the developer by purchasing the paid version if available. I bought the app after doing the image captures. I encourage you to do the same!)

I will admit that I have not tried astrid, another popular task manager for android. as noted above, I wanted something that worked with toodledo.

how does your organizational system make the jump from desktop to device? please share in the comments!

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