TaskPaper3.8.10

I use it all day with a daily work plan file and separate files for major tasks/projects. Lots of useful features

I use it all day with a daily work plan file and separate files for major tasks/projects. Lots of useful features

TaskPaper, what it is and what it isn’t. I use TaskPaper, a lot. But, I am using it for slightly different reasons than what it was designed for. Many people use TaskPaper for keeping track of tasks. They use date functions and all manner of things to do this. TaskPaper is very good at doing this. I cannot comment on this type of workflow using TaskPaper as, ironically, that is not what I use TaskPaper for. I use TaskPaper for helping me to breakdown complex ideas. As a writer I have trouble with getting bogged down in all sorts of areas. This has been especially true when I have been researching arguments in a legal document. TaskPaper has tools that I make much use of. It uses internal tags which is, anything that is proceeded by the “@” symbol. The tags go at the end of a paragraph. I don't have to set up that tag anywhere in preferences, I just start using it anywhere. Then, anytime I click on a tag, TaskPaper instantly searches for all tags that are the same. As tags are at the end of paragraphs, the found set shows all the paragraphs with the same tag after it. If I am doing research in a long document and I think, this section is about pointA, but it also has a meaning when examining pointB and pointC, then I can use as many tags after that section (paragraph) as I like, pointA, pointB, pointC. Then I can either click on any instance of PointA and see all paragraphs in my document of PointA, or, I can create or embed a search for Point A which will appear on the sidebar. The same is true of pointB or pointC of course. Sidebar searches are easy to set up. If there is a part of my document that I want to go to a lot, then I can set that up as a search term in the sidebar. This works for tags but it also works for specific sections in the document. Plain text. The only regret I have with TaskPaper is that it is totally plain text. I can't paste graphics anywhere in TaskPaper. But, I can add style to my documents very well. OK, I can't add style to specific words (can't bold a word) but, I can style a document by what is under what level of a heading, notes styles, tasks style, and anything I want to style using a tag. This includes page color, text color, line height, font style (for the whole paragraph or section), etc. TaskPaper does this by using something similar to a css file for each document. If you understand what a CSS file does then you understand what TaskPaper styles can do. I know that the developer also sells similar apps with slightly different niches. He sells a writing app for example which is primarily what I am using TaskPaper for. But, for whatever reason, I find TaskPaper very easy to use and very configurable. I also read a comment that the developer does not support his products very well. I think that is a bit unfair. I don't know the history of this developer although I have been using TaskPaper for the past three or so years. He has continued to update and to upgrade TaskPaper in that time. I have no worries that this is going to be in any way unsupported as an app. Bottomline is that, there are more robust apps for task and file management. Those apps use database approaches and I am not knocking them if that is what you need. I use BusyCal for my calendar events. I use NVAlt for my daily tracking of things I have done. I use Nisus for my writing. Eventually I plan on moving to Scrivener for my writing. But TaskPaper works and it works well. I find that I use Taskpaper for most of my fleshing out of ideas when I write. It’s great for creating drafts as it makes finding the parts very easy and it also expands and collapses sections which I do or do not want to look at while I am concentrating on other things. I wish Nisus could do that. TaskPaper is a great app for gathering ideas in an outline format. And yet, it does this not in a database layout such as Omni, it does this as a completely text based writing (text) style format.

Very useful. Works great. I use 2 TaskPaper files every day. One is a daily work plan that includes daily calendar entries. The other is a project list that is partly tied to calendar entries. ★★★★★

Pros: - Easy to manage long lists with extra info by collapsing items - Reordering items is simple Cons: - Default is to archive making list cleanup cumbersome I've been using this app for 3+ months and finding that it is good for keeping a detailed to do list and keeping notes. My to do list is always open daily and is organized into 5 major categories. The ability to expand and collapse those categories makes it easy for me to hide these long lists so I can focus on one project at a time. Items can be dragged up and down so I can reorder my tasks on a whim. There is a small learning curve for the markdown formatting, but the app does a good job of making the tutorial available as text in each new file so if I ever forget I can hit command+N and see a quick reminder. Overall, the app does not have a large number of available features, which is a good thing as I just need it to keep my personal tasks organized and my occasional notes looking clean. It does that very well!

Macupdate: The purchase link actually goes to the demo version. The MAS is https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/taskpaper/id424281111?mt=12, where we can read: "README PLEASE: I expect to release TaskPaper 3 in early January as a paid upgrade. TaskPaper will be $14.99 on release and then $24.99 final price. I've just lowered TaskPaper 2 pricing to $4.99."

Nice app. The possibility to adjust the color of the background and the font is a big plus for me. Easy to use and intuitive. The only minus is a bit complicated process of synching but it doesn't really spoil the overall good impression. Give it a try, it can do a lot of stuff.

Great app. I'm a list maker, and this is the creme de la creme. Simple and intuitive. You won't be disappointed!

usually i try out software for at least a couple of weeks, but i bought taskpaper after only 1 day. it's right down my alley; i don't have an actual need for anything more complex with bells and whistles -- i just get distracted by customizing my task manager, *wry grin*. this is minimalist and doesn't need any fiddling whatsoever for diving right in, but it has the main features for me to keep track of the gazillion things i need to. and the scriptability makes it perfect -- i wrote a small script for inserting dates right away. i can think of a few things i'd like it to do it doesn't do now (repeating tasks, some basic date handling), but it's even more suited for me than "things" which i used previously. because it is so minimalist, the price might seem on the high side, but i don't think it's too expensive for what i am getting. small aside: i like that on his website the dev recommends specific other programs if taskpaper isn't quite what one is looking for. you don't see that often.

didn't the last version allow you to set a document to open when the app is launched?

Don't upgrade to 2.2.6. The program will trash your existing formatting. Overrated software.

A perfect app. Simple, clean, elegant. Some great themes available also (I like the Helvetica one). Seeing as it outputs a text document it can be shared with anyone.

The current price on the App Store and at Hog Bay is $29.99.

extra-simple, powerfull, light, flexible, auto-sync with web, sync with iPhone

what a breath of zen fresh air taskpaper is. I'd ignored it for a while and got caught up with programs that were much sexier and much more complex. My mind found them more satisfying, but my body never got around to most of the tasks they contained. I think the turning point came when I realised that under pressure, when time was really short and many deadlines loomed, I'd resort to a simple written or computer based text list. So I returned to have a proper look at taskpaper and am so glad I did. In fact, I almost live in it. Some of the ascetic nerd types talk about living in a text file, which sounds very barren and, when you read all the workarounds and adjustments, plain impractical. But here I am, virtually living in one myself. I can clip on the fly when in other programs, I can hoist a project when I need focus, I can use multiple tags and view my data in various ways in different tabs, I can drag files or folders or URLS onto it to create links, and if I want I could even add scripts for sophisticated start and due dates. In all this the program never strays from the utter simplicity of a text file. Everything else looks garish and overbearing by comparison. The same can be said for the iphone app - quick, simple, reliable. Om.

After getting tired of waiting for "The Hit List" devs not only to keep improving the Mac version, but mainly to launch the iPhone one I decide to take some time and really try to use all the alternatives that I could find. Even though there are some really good ones out there (Omnifocus and Things to name a few ones) they are overkill to someone who just want to quickly scribble some notes on the 5 minutes that I have before my memory wipes them out. I was almost giving up when I found this cool app. TaskPaper strength is exactly its simplicity. Don't get me wrong. TaskPaper is powerful and allows an easy use of tags and breaking projects in sub-projects among other things. But it's also quite simple to use. I can add the basic info on my iPhone and later at home using the Mac version, simply add some extra notes or fine tune the ones already there. There's still plenty room for TP to grow (printing templates, for instance) for even as it is, it's my favorite app for helping me put some order on all those random (but often important) thoughts that every so often appear on the most unexpected occasion. Basically it's another example that good apps don't need to have hundreds of options with dozens of buttons.

For a simple app, it sure is taking a long time to get the website/syncing capability released. I haven't tried the developer versions. It's a nice app though for someone who doesn't need the complexity of OmniFocus for example.

Get 2.1.1 for a startup crash with Snow Leopard.

I have been looking for a simple to do list app for a long time. Up 'til now I've been using Check Off, but the two problems I had with that app are that it's tied to the menubar (getting in the way of other apps), and there's no easy way to sync the data between my Macs. I finally stumbled across TaskPaper, and I love it! It floats in its own window, so I can position my to do list anywhere on my screen. I'm a Dropbox user, so syncing is as easy as saving the to do list to my Dropbox. Most of all, though, I love the clean interface and simplicity of use. The screencast on the developer's website is a great intro to TaskPaper. One extremely useful thing the dev doesn't mention in the screencast, but which I found in the (very good) user's guide is that you can use the Tab key to indent tasks and notes, which will then be attached to the parent task (and move with it). I also like that the appearance can be easily customized. The only tweaking I had to do to the "Standard" template was to bump up the base font a bit, and change the colour in which tags are displayed. One minor complaint is that although I used the preferences pane to tweak the font sizes and colours, I would have preferred to edit the template file directly, but could not find any documentation on the codes used in the file. All in all, a fantastic app which has made it much easier for me to organize tasks.

Simple, speedy and flexible. The TaskPaper upgrade to 2.0 makes the difference between night and day for me. What was just an intriguing concept - a simple paper-look to do manager - is now my default note taking and to do manager. I started out with iGTD, but got overwhelmed by the endless forms to fill. I like "Things", but never quite got comfortable with it. I tried OmniFocus, but Things and OF became ends in themselves, constant temptation to overfocus on the process and not on results. I love TP2's speed and flexibility. It doesn't tax my aging PowerBook, it gives me very little to distract me, yet makes it easy to customize tags on the fly. The ability to narrow my focus is essential, and TP makes that easy. Jumping back and forth between individual projects or contexts and the project list is smooth and fast. Thanks, Hog Bay, for making the upgrade from 1.0 to 2.0 free. I wasn't even going to try it out, but the online tutorial sold me. If you haven't watched it, do so now! Then download the demo and try it yourself.

I would really like to see a TaskPaper iPhone app.

It would be nice to have a global hotkey to toggle visibility of TaskPaper. I would like to use F16 for that.

Any chance that an 'Archive Done Projects' feature will be added before the 2.0 update? I have a bunch of empty projects I have to scroll through to reach others now, since all their tasks have been marked done and moved to the Archive. The only clean-up option I can find is to drag the cursor over the project's name (since a double-click triggers the single-click phenomenon) and hit delete to remove them entirely. Given that tasks can be archived, is there no better way?

TaskPaper is the ToDo list I've been looking for: It actually replaces the pocket-sized notebook I've kept on my desk for years -- and is just as simple to use. It doesn't do a whole lot (thankfully!), but what it does do, it does great.

TaskPaper is an excellent alternative to the new swarm of GTD apps hitting the Mac market. There are some great choices out there. Personally I have been an iGTD user since the start, but this one really is simple and allows you to organize your tasks quickly and get started on them. It helps to avoid the hassle of over-organizing things. TaskPaper is really in its infancy still but it is backed by a very responsive developer who is burning the midnight oil to make it better constantly. Version 1.1 is supposed to bring some huge improvements and new features. Can't wait! There are a couple features that it is missing that would make it an absolute top contender (most are echoed on the Hog Bay forums). It really needs sub-tasks, drag and drop reordering of tasks and projects, iCal syncing, and .Mac support. Aside from those few shortcomings, I enjoy using it.

I like it immediatly... Easy, fast, clear ! But i would not use it. For what ? There are lots of little bugs in it, sa with the preferences loading, crash when opening the file with another editor at the same time, ect... I think the support of XML would be the missing value. At minimum, the possibility to export as xml format. Maybe the possibility to read xml... And in the same way, it could be really a great improvement to have multiple task level in a "Project". And then, with all that, i will found it usefull as a very simple xml editor. (or a very simple task manager ;-)) As i've say at the beginning, i like it. But for the value, 18$ is far too much !!!

After trying it out just for a few minutes... something kept nagging at me, until I realized that this really reminds me of VoodooPad. http://trichech.us/?p=12#more-12 Is a GTD bridge for VP, and quite similar to taskpaper at first glance. I wonder if it can be expanded upon... Don't get my wrong, TaskPaper looks great, but I've already paid for VP and 20 bucks is a little steep for me!

Genius Like the other reviewer I have tried several GTD apps before, and all seemed overly complex, and incredibly rigid for my needs. Your needs are probably very different than mine, and a task management program / methodology is a very personal thing. There are no right and wrong ways, only ways that work and don't work for that particular user in their particular context. What sets TaskPaper apart from all the other GTD / ToDo / task management programs is that it does not impose a strict structure on you. By liberating you from someone else's strict structure you are also liberated from having to tab from field to field and feeling like you are doing data entry. Entering information is just like writing notes. TaskPaper is is based on an incredibly easy to learn syntax that you type like punctuation. Projects are denoted with a : at the end. Tasks have a - at the beginning. Contexts or tags use a @. Thats it. Nothing more to learn. TaskPaper then takes care of all the formating, allows you to search in multiple ways, presents projects in different tabbed views that behave in much the same way as Safari tabs. Click a project and you view only that project in the current tab. Command click and your project opens in a new tab. A couple of pull down acts like bookmarks letting you go directly to a project, or tag view. Unlike any other so called productivity app, TaskPaper lets you change fonts, font size, font color and background colors. You can personalize it to look right for you. No more forms, with distracting fields all over the place, or columns that are too wide or narrow. It looks like a well formatted intelligent list, because thats what it is. The back end of TaskPaper is a plain text file. You can move that file to any device, email it in the body of your email, view it in a web browser and even edit it on a PC. Because the syntax of TaskPaper is so transparent you can even create your tasks on a PC then view them on a Mac. Price: If this sold for $1.00 someone would still be complaining it was too expensive. I guess those people just don't value their time, or feel like anybody should be able to make a living from their programming skills. If I consider how much time TaskPaper has saved me, it pays for itself in hours.

I tried a number of GTD software, and obviously many of the apps out there have a WAY larger feature set than TaskPaper. But that was exactly my problem with them. I ended up editing this and that and spent far more time organizing than actually doing. Read the description on the website, it summarizes the differences between, say OmniFocus and TaskPaper very well. The simple structure is as follows - if you add a : behind at the end of a sentence, it becomes the "header" (or marks the beginning of a new Project). If it has a - in front, it's a Task. Everything else are notes. And if you start a word with @ in a task, it becomes a link/keyword. The file is an actual text file that only has this structure. So you don't have to follow a database logic or file structure, but you can just type your list in any form or shape that you want (within those four parameters). It's actually pretty powerful, because the software only "understands" the text in a way that makes it easier to view and edit and "deal" with your notes. But the actual note-taking is very, very simple. Type. Done. I agree that some features - such as web-integration - are still missing, but they are available in some form (only not for the regular user who just wants to use it) already (scripting, web). Given the previous rate of development, v1.1 can't be that far away. And with it comes a plug-in structure, so folks can add a lof of different features. I came back to this simple approach, because in the end a simple list, just dotted down, allows you focus on the important stuff and not to dabble with "if I set this up now in this way, it will automatically do this in 3 weeks together with..." So I gave a "4" for features - not for amount or depth, but rather of effectiveness of the features. Give it a shot. It's not for everybody. But if the other GTD or To Lists out there don't really work for you and regular handwritten, simple lists work oddly enough really well for you when you shop, for example, then give this a try. It's WAY more powerful than handwritten notes but it's simple enough to dabble with it in the rawest of formats - text - and still make sense of it.

nice, but not worth the 19$. tools like these should better move to the web (hogbay actually has one available)