Action Lists 2.3.0 Now Available
Posted by Charles Perry on Feb 27, 2010
I’m happy to announce that a new version of Action Lists GTD Task Manager is now available in the App Store. Highlights of this version include:
- An “Active” status has been added that will allow users to better plan out their projects. (Active tasks don’t appear in action lists.)
- Automatic task queuing that promotes Active tasks to Next Actions whenever a task is completed. (This is sometimes referred to as “sequential projects”.)
- A new “Due Soon” feature that highlights tasks as their due date is approaching.
- Localizations. Action Lists is now available in English, German, French, Spanish, and Japanese.
A full list of changes in this version is below. For instructions on how to use these new features, please see the Action Lists documentation.
Lessons Learned in iPhone Localization
Posted by Charles Perry on Feb 21, 2010
As a native of a relatively typical middle-American town, it’s easy to forget that most of the world doesn’t speak English. The iPhone is an international phenomenon though, and millions of its users either don’t speak English or don’t speak English as their first language. Even though language may separate us, the intimate relationship that people have with their iPhone is universal. iPhones go everywhere with their owners and they contain incredible amounts of personal information. People feel a connection with their iPhone, so it makes sense that they want to operate it in their mother tongue.
With this in mind, I’m translating the next version of Action Lists into a handful of languages. For those of you unfamiliar with the process, getting your iPhone app translated actually involves two separate processes. “Internationalization” is the process of tagging the strings in your program that you want to have translated. “Localization” is the process of presenting translated versions of those strings to the user. I’m not going to go into great depth about the process of internationalizing and localizing your app (Apple has pretty good documentation on the subject), but I will share some of the tips I discovered while localizing Action Lists; things that I wish I had known when I started. (more…)
50,000 Syncs and Counting
Posted by Charles Perry on Jan 15, 2010
It appears that Daze End Software has hit a bit of a milestone. When I looked at my Toodledo statistics recently, I noticed that my apps have been synchronized with Toodledo over 50,000 times in the last six months. Action Lists alone has been synchronized with Toodledo over 35,000 times during the same period. Some kill joys will point out that these numbers are but a drop in the bucket compared to those of some other productivity apps, but I have to say I find it pretty exciting that hundreds of people have used my tools thousands of times to help get things done.
Some users of my apps might read this and have some concerns that I might know a little too much about their usage habits. Let me allay those fears. The statistics that I have access to through Toodledo are only gross totals. I can see, by app, the number of synchronizations and the number of unique users, and only for the past six months. So although I can see aggregate data, there’s no way for me to tell who’s syncing or how often they’re doing it.
I find it heartening that there are so many people out there that find my tools helpful and integrate them into their daily lives. If you’re one of those people, thanks, and stay tuned. There are more good things planned for the future.
App Store B is Dead
Posted by Charles Perry on Jan 1, 2010
For this post to make any sense, you’ll need to have already read Marco Arment’s article about the two App Stores. If you haven’t read it, please read it now. It’s a pretty good analysis of the pressures facing iPhone developers.
Ok, now that you’re up to speed, here’s the thing: App Store B is dead. It doesn’t exist. At least it doesn’t anymore. The path to success using an App Store B strategy has been closed to new developers for a while. It’s closed, because even an App Store B strategy requires that customers know about your app before they purchase it, and today there’s few ways for an App Store B app to get noticed — even if it’s deserving. (more…)
