Subtasks feedback - please chime in

[Cameron]

On Friday I added the new subtasks feature to GQueues. If you haven't
tried it already, watch the video at the link below and give it a
shot.

http://www.gqueues.com/help/videoTutorials#gqSubtasksVideo

From the initial comments I've received, it seems as though I may have
missed the mark with the user interface for subtasks. So I would
really like your feedback so I can get this nailed down correctly. If
you can comment on any of the following I would appreciate it.

1. What do you NOT like about subtasks (how to add them, move them
around, etc...). What does NOT seem intuitive. What seems odd or
clunky.

2. Any ideas you have to make it more intuitive, more natural. If
you could make subtasks the way you wanted, how would they work?

3. Any bugs you've noticed while using subtasks. Functionality that
is broken, as opposed to just hard to use.

The community of GQueues users has helped make the product what it is
today, so I'm hoping your feedback again will help make subtasks a
really solid feature that is useful and easy to use.

-Cameron

[Cameron]

I will collect your comments over the next couple of days and then
start making improvements to subtasks in the upcoming week.

[Buffalo]

Cameron:

I am just playing around with subtasks, and have created several for
one category in one Queue. When I view "All Items", these sub tasks
are not below the Category, but are listed separately. I assume this
is not supposed to happen this way?

Also, it would be nice to have the option to "show all tasks..." etc
either attached to each item individually, or travel down the page as
we progress to items in the bottom of the list. (In order to try and
see the subtasks noted above I had to keep paging up to the top of the
page to try and toggle "show subtasks", etc.)

Thanks for doing this part of your app. Once you tweak it, I will
fully immerse myself into the subtasks world of GQueues.

Rick

[Buffalo]

Cameron:

Is there any way subtasks or notes can be viewable in Google Calendar?

Thanks,

Rick

[Buffalo]

Cameron:

Should subtasks be accessible/viewable in the "Due in a week" Smart
Queue?

Thanks,

Rick

On Jan 16, 10:29 am, Cameron <came...@gqueues.com> wrote:

[talshani]

Hay Cameron
in over all this feature seem great
the only thing i find clunky is adding a current item as a subtask
while using s + dragging
its not quiet intuitive
i would prefer just simple drag and drop: laying an item on another
one
(maybe on a specific point, i understand why s as an informative queue
is required but it just takes a while)
maybe dragging to reorder + left q right click ?
alt + shift + s is great and makes sense
thats it from what ive noticed till now
thanks
tal

[jcorapi]

Thank you for the subtasks, this is greatly appreciated. The only
suggestion I have for the subtask feature is to add an "indent" button
(s) on the task item so that you can more easly make a task a subtask.
Holding down the "a" button and dragging only works for the first 2
levels of subtasks.

My other suggestion regards the reminder and repeat features. I would
prefer to not see every copy I've made of a task.

For example I want to create a new cleaning list every sunday based on
the original list I created. But I do not want to see 52 copies of
this cleaning list in my queue. I would prefer that the copy only
appear or get created on that Sunday. I'm not sure if I'm explaing
this right, but please contact me to discuss if you need clarification
or futher explanation.

Thanks again Cameron

[jyoseph]

Cameron,

For a new user, clicking "s" or "a" wont be intuitive. This type of
functionality would require the user to watch the video. I watched the
tutorial and it makes enough sense to me, it is very simple. But
thinking in terms of people who start using your app for the first
time, I'm not sure that adding sub tasks will be clear to them.

Suggestion, can you use the number (.gq-i-order .gq-i-order-handle) as
a handle to reorder tasks, while using another handle to move a task
to different levels? Here's an example: http://i48.tinypic.com/jacsau.gif

So right now you're probably listening for the S key and a mouse drag
event in order to allow a task to be made a subtask. The solution I
outlined means you would just listen for the drag of the arrow
graphic.

On the flip side, you could show an arrow (pointing opposite way) on
hover of a subtask. Dragging that would be the same as "a" and the
drag event. Example: http://i49.tinypic.com/zsq24x.gif

Hope that makes sense.

Joe

[Fred]

Hey Cameron,
first i would like to thank you for the great work. I´ve tried 30 apps
(online and offline) and just stopped searching when I found yours.
The keyfeatures for me are:

1. TASK ENTERING (quick and easy)
2. ICAL FEED (easy setup)
3. CATEGORIES (easy to add and manage)
4. TAGGING (Queues)
5. FILTERING (Smart Queues)
6. WEBBASED
7. MOBILE VERSION
7. FREE

AND NOW: SUBTASKING (For me the killing feature to kick off all the
other apps from Tadalist, HiTask, todoist, todoledo, GTDagenda, the
hot list, things, Ominfocus)

I missed all this features together in one webapplication. I hope you
go on with developing and free status. Then I promise you Gqueues
grows to a huge use.

So thanks for this great subtask possibility.
In the moment no more wishes.

Manni

[Paul]

I like this post: I had to watch the video a couple of times to get
how to make and move subtasks. Also, it's a little tricky on some
keyboards to use the alt shift s and other shortcuts.

[Jacob Floyd]

I like this solution. Using Google Chromium in Gentoo Linux, holding
down the s or a key causes some kind of loop and it takes quite a
while for the drag-n-drop operation to work. I'd like to avoid holding
down some key while doing dragging things around.

As an extension to what Joe suggested, perhaps the interface could be
something like:

<[1]> Description of list item.

The arrows would only appear on hover. if you just clicked (no drag)
the left arrow, it would bring that item up one level in the hierarchy
(with one exception. On the root level, just clicking the left arrow
wouldn't do anything, because it's already at the top). If you click
the right arrow, it becomes a subtask of the item immediately
preceding it. If you click and drag the left arrow, you duplicate the
"a" mode you have now. If you click and drag the right arrow, you
duplicate the "s" mode you have now.

Right now you have the right arrow showing if there is a subtask for
that item, but it is not showing. That should work fine, but highlight
the arrow on hover so that people know they can still click and drag
it (and move all of the subtasks at the same time). The arrow at the
bottom when the subtasks are shown still works fine where it is.

As long as you're reworking the interface of the arrows, something
else that would be very handy, is having a "+" appear when you hover
on the space in between the items, that way we can add items inbetween
the other items (or add a subtask to an item...) I'm not sure exactly
where the "+" would show up, but something like that would be great.

Thanks again,
Jacob

[Fishman]

First off, I *love* the new subtasks feature. After watching the video
it is fairly easy to work with the subtasks, but I also think that the
methods suggested here by jyoseph would be more intuitive for those
who hadn't watched the video and easier to remember even for those who
had.

For example I use the keyboard shortcuts in gMail to perform all kinds
of actions (delete, archive, compose, etc.) but when I try to explain
those to non-technical people in my office all I get back is a blank
stare. On the other hand when gMail instituted drag and drop they
could all comprehend the dragging of a message onto a label. In the
case of gQueues I think it would be more obvious to drag a task onto
an arrow then to have to remember a key to hold while you're doing it.

That said, keep up the good work, subtasks are an excellent
improvement to an already excellent app.

On Jan 17, 12:46 am, jyoseph <jyos...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Herby]

Hi Cameron,

I found your programm today, because of your link in the google task
help. Google Task works fine for me, but it does not have the feature
of expanding or decreasing the levels of the Categories/Queues/tasks/
subtasks/subsubtasks etc.(Btw: why do you use all these names?
Basically they are all entries at different levels). Instead, it
features an indefinite number of levels, which is nice, too. And it is
very very fast, at least compared to gqueue.

Now, Qqueue does exactly that, but without being able to watch the
videos, it was not intuitive for me! Only by reading these posts did I
find out about pressing keys while dragging and dropping. I did find
the other keyboard shortcuts, thow, because there was this very
helpful link under the queues/tasks and subtasks. So for an immediate
improvement, I would suggest to add a short explanation at the
"keyboard shortcuts", and maybe renaming these to "Hints and Tipps".

On the long run, real drag-and-drop will definitely be the method to
use, since in an GUI, the G stands for "graphik", and that does not
mean "keyboard + graphic" ;-)

I have another wish for a feature, though, I do not like the igoogles
gadget, because because I can only look at the tasks, but not work
with them (i.e. edit/add). I would very much appreciate an igoogle
gadget just like the mobile version (or as with google contacts,
google tasks or google calender. I use my igoogle page as a starting
point for all my PIM-Jobs, and gqueue does not yet quite fit in there.

Finally, is there hope, that gqueue will become faster in the future?
That typing without seeing what you type, because gqueue is still
working three tasks behind you, is annoying.

But above these few suggestions (you asked for them), you did a very
fine job with gqueue, I will keep observing it and using it parallel
to google task.

Best regards from Germany

Herby

On 16 Jan., 16:29, Cameron <came...@gqueues.com> wrote:

[Language Resource Center Mount Holyoke College]

Yes, I agree with the others that the shortcut keys + dragging aren't
at all intuitive, and I agree with the idea of having an indent (or
really promote/demote buttons--like most users are probably used to
from word processing software).

I like this mock up that jyoseph has drawn up, but I wonder if the
idea of dragging from an arrow also would be a bit counterintuitive.
What comes to my mind first is that I would drag the task under the
item that I want it to be a subtask of, and then I would press the
arrow as a button to demote it to sub task. Or, if a list of subtasks
already exists under the parent item, then dragging another task to
any location within that list of subtasks would automatically make it
a subtask as well.

Thanks for all of your work--now that I've watched the subtasks video,
I'm looking forward to working with them!

[Nik]

I second the comment. The keys complicate the use too much.

Is a pure drag and drop solution programmatically difficult?

An intuitive drag and drop solution would be to:
- Drag a task 2 on top of task 1: task 1 becomes the main task and
task 2 a sub task (Task 1 gets the triangle thinggy)
- Drag the task anywhere in your task list to
-- promote it form a sub task to a task
-- to move it around in priority within the sub-task queue
-- to move it to a different task list.

.. no need for keys really... To simplify the dragging you could
implement a feature I like in Safari's or Firefox' organizing
bookmarks window. Whenever you drag an item, a line appears showing
you where the item you are dragging will land if you let go of the
mouse key. If you drag it on top of a folder (in your case any task)
it highlights the folder so that you know that the dragged item will
fall into the folder.

The hierarchy in your system is intuitive:
Queue
- Taks
-- Sub-task
You implemented the drag and drop for tasks into queues. So my
suggestion is really to maintain the same control at all levels. That
would keep it really intuitive.

Using keys:
I think a good analogy to what I would consider an intuitive use of
key controls is how many text editors have implemented bulleted lists:
- Tab to demote the task to a sub-task
- Shift-tab to promote a sub-task to a task
- Enter to create a new task at the same level
... the challenge here is that you already have a keyboard shortcut
using tabs. Here I would suggest to change the use of the tab keys to
promote or demote tasks and the use of arrow keys to maneuver between
tasks (any level)

The beauty of Gqueues is the simplicity of use and the clean
interface. It is going to be hard to maintain that with more and more
features, but I strongly believe it is possible - particularly with
your ARMY of product managers (I mean us... the guys who know it all
better ;-). Requiring a combination of keys and mouse gestures I think
makes the UI too complex and not intuitive. Keep it simple!!!

Nik

[xero]

Subtasks currently feel like a hidden feature. It would be nice to
have a button to do it or to have a specific drop point on another
task the makes it a subtask instead of reordering them. Having to use
two hands kind of sucks.

Otherwise, I think they're great.

- xero

[Josiah]

I am loving the new subtasks. the one thing that I would really like
to see added is the option to show all subtasks by default. It is a
bit annoying to have to click to show them all the time. For that
matter, I would like to see an option to show all notes by default all
the time.

josiah

[Shawn Morrissey]

Again, I love the App. WRT sub-tasks, I think they are a great
addition. My comments echo the ones by "Buffalo".

With that said, my biggest grip is how sub tasks appear when I report
on a category. I use this feature to report to upper management on
progress of projects I run. It would be best if sub-tasks were always
associated with the super-task.

Thanks for the great work - Shawn

[Pierre]

More intuitive with tabulation tab like gtask

[Massimo47]

Good evening sir, One suggestion. Is it possible to make the graphic
of the tasks more sober, smaller lines and smaller characters.? Thank
you

[Buffalo]

Please don't change them, I like them the way they are!

Rick

[Riz]

One thing that I noticed which I believe happened, was that I
accidentally checked out off the
Parent of 5 sub tasks, which moved it to completed, but when I went
into completed and unchecked it,
it came back to the Open list, but the subtasks were MIA, no longer
under the parent task, and not under
open or completed.

Has anyone else seen this?

I just tried it again, and it looks like clicking the parent
completed, marks all the Subtasks as completed, but
un-checking as complete does not uncheck the Subtasks.

One way to handle it would be that you cannot check a parent unless
the Subtasks are all complete, or when you
mark a completed task as Open again, it moves the Subtasks back to
Open as well.

Mike

[Cameron (GQueues Team)]

Mike,

The subtasks are not missing, but admittedly hard to find.  There is a magnifying glass that should appear on the open parent task (next to the calendar and notes button).  If you click this you see an overview of the task which shows the parent task open and all the completed subtasks.

I like your suggestion that opening a parent task opens all the subtasks too.  What do others think?  

I'm fixing gadget authentication issues the next couple of days and then will compile all the feedback on subtasks and start working to make improvements to this feature.

-Cameron

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[Riz]

Thanks for the quick response, I did find them in the item details
screen. I had never been on the
screen before and never saw them. But I do see now how I can re-open
the items that have been
marked as completed.

Thanks and keep up the great work and quick responses, this is one of
the best Task management tools
I have seen/used.

Mike

On Jan 26, 3:07 pm, "Cameron (GQueues Team)" <came...@gqueues.com>
wrote:

> > gqueues+u...@googlegroups.com<gqueues%2Bunsu...@googlegroups.com >

[LDent]

I find I cannot enter subtasks by holding "s" on my Acer Aspire 1
using Firefox. I don't know if its a setting in the Synaptics driver
or something in Firefox. When I hold the "s" key I can't move the
pointer with the touchpad.

Also, I can see tasks with subtasks in the mobile browser view (Palm
Pre).

[LDent]

That should have said I can't see subtasks in the mobile browser....
But, I spoke too soon, before my mobile browser page updated. I can
see tasks and subtasks in my mobile browser!

[Jeremypope]

Cameron,

Thank you SO much for this killer app. I was using rememberthemilk
until you came along with this, and I liked them, but you won out due
to simplicity. BIG plus for me.

And now, you just blow them out of the water due to the features you
offer! I love this app!

My suggestion/request: Pure drag-and-drop is much easier for this
'fasttasker' than combinations of keyboard shortcuts AND mousework.
Either/or is good, but I find myself shying away or forgetting
combinations.

Keep it up! You're totally supercoolz!

[Buffalo]

+1 re: opening a parent task opens all the subtasks
too

On Jan 26, 8:48 pm, LDent <leon.d...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Zachary]

I love the subtasks feature, but would like to would like to see
subtasks being copied along with the main task when using the
duplication feature.

[Dan]

To save typing, I'll simply reference the google task subtask
interface. It's simple, intuitive, and clean. If we can get that kind
of functionality, I think we'd be there.

[Rod Barnes]

In general, I like the substasks a lot. It allows me to categorize my
tasks to a greater degree instead of just having a queue and then
items in the queue. Clunky UI? I don't know -- maybe. Getting used
to the ALT-SHIFT-S and tab is a little odd but I adjusted okay.

[mb01915]

Ditto on this feature request.

On Jan 27, 12:28 am, Zachary <zak...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I love thesubtasksfeature, but would like to would like to seesubtasksbeing copied along with the maintaskwhen using the

> duplication feature.
>
> On Jan 16, 7:29 am, Cameron <came...@gqueues.com> wrote:
>

> > On Friday I added the newsubtasksfeature to GQueues.  If you haven't

> > tried it already, watch the video at the link below and give it a
> > shot.
>
> >http://www.gqueues.com/help/videoTutorials#gqSubtasksVideo
>
> > From the initial comments I've received, it seems as though I may have

> > missed the mark with the user interface forsubtasks.  So I would

> > really like your feedback so I can get this nailed down correctly.  If
> > you can comment on any of the following I would appreciate it.
>

> > 1.  What do you NOT like aboutsubtasks(how to add them, move them

> > around, etc...).  What does NOT seem intuitive.  What seems odd or
> > clunky.
>
> > 2.  Any ideas you have to make it more intuitive, more natural.  If

> > you could makesubtasksthe way you wanted,   how would they work?
>
> > 3.  Any bugs you've noticed while usingsubtasks.  Functionality that

[jrbofhqt]

Cameron,

I can't add subtasks.  I have looked at the help section, dragging and dropping into the parent task and slt-shift-s aren't working.  I would like to be able to just drag and drop, including the recurring tasks.

The way i use tasks and subtasking... my son requires management.  He has something called morning routine (parent task).  His morning routines are recurring, such as making his bed and hanging his towel (sub-task) after taking a shower.  I would like to see this the parent task and subtask to have the ability to recur daily, weekly, monthly, yearly, similar to google calendar.

I would also like to see where if a recurring task is marked completed, it only marks that particular task and not the whole series.

Am I making sense?  I hope so.

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[mwilday]

Cameron, I think it would be great to add some settings options to
either have subtasks always open or closed... that way some people,
who like to see subtasks... don't have to expand everytime, and those
who don't like to see subtasks can also have it automatically closed
every time.

I think another great setting would be see notes, always expanded, or
always closed.

For me, its one more operation I always have to do... one more click I
would have to avoid.

Mike Wilday

On Jan 16, 7:29 am, Cameron <came...@gqueues.com> wrote:

> On Friday I added the new subtasks feature to GQueues.  If you haven't

> tried it already, watch the video at the link below and give it a
> shot.
>
> http://www.gqueues.com/help/videoTutorials#gqSubtasksVideo
>
> From the initial comments I've received, it seems as though I may have

> missed the mark with the user interface for subtasks.  So I would

> really like your feedback so I can get this nailed down correctly.  If
> you can comment on any of the following I would appreciate it.
>

> 1.  What do you NOT like about subtasks (how to add them, move them

> around, etc...).  What does NOT seem intuitive.  What seems odd or
> clunky.
>
> 2.  Any ideas you have to make it more intuitive, more natural.  If

> you could make subtasks the way you wanted,   how would they work?
>
> 3.  Any bugs you've noticed while using subtasks.  Functionality that

[Anne Dunham]

I have just started trying GQueues and have used it for about 3 minutes, but here is a comment. I added a task. I then added several subtasks and put dates on them. But when I add a new subtask at the top of the list, if I click on the calendar to add a due date, the new calendar that pops up obscures the date on all the other subtasks. It cannot be moved out of the way so I can work out the appropriate due date in relation to the other subtasks. It would be helpful to me to be able to see the dates that have been set on the other subtasks in the list.

[Peter S. Shenkin]

I would like to see such an option, too, but more importantly for me, I'd like an option or preference to always see Tags.

-P.

On Wednesday, February 10, 2010 at 12:44:33 AM UTC-5, mwilday wrote:

Cameron, I think it would be great to add some settings options to
either have subtasks always open or closed... 

 

I think another great setting would be see notes, always expanded, or
always closed.

[Peter S. Shenkin]

Cameron,

I've recently started using GQueues and I'm impressed that you've done so many things right. By "right", of course, I mean, "Just the way I would like it." :-)

Here are two things I don't like about the current handling of subtasks, though.

A. If the parent task has a Tag, I would like all subtasks to be displayed in that Tag's Tag View, even if the subtasks don't have that Tag. (Note: I don't think the reverse should be true; that is, if only a subtask has the Tag, I like with the current behavior, which is that only the subtask is shown in that Tag's Tag View.)

B. I would like the ability to add subtasks right in the Tag view. I realize that I can go to the Task Overview and add the subtask there, but it's a large number of clicks for such a common operation.

As justification for B, let me give an example. I very often refactor my Task hierarchy. A very common operation for me is to create a task and later realize it should be a subtask of a larger task. Real example from today:

I had a task: "Call insurance company and ask for quote", with a Tag called Urgent. Then, I looked  at my Urgent Task View and called them. They said they'd send me a quote. Now, instead of declaring this done with, I wanted to keep something in there as a reminder that I need to follow up later. So I created a subtask and moved the previous title and description to the subtask, and retitled the task "Get insurance", removing the Urgent tag. Then I could happily check off the subtask and have the master task wait around until I get the quote. I might later add subtasks as needed; like, after getting the quote, I might want to call other companies to get competitive quotes. I suppose the alternative is keeping just the master Task and adding notes as the stages progress, but then I would miss the satisfaction of marking a (sub)task completed, which I find helpful to my morale and well being. ;-)

When looking through a task list, I often notice a bunch of opportunities to refactor tasks in a similar manner, and it kind of disturbs the train of thought when performing a sequence of repetitive operations to have to click through a bunch of stages (going into Task Overview in this case) in order to do so. 

I should say that though I've just started using GQueues, I've been keeping my ToDo list in a multi-level bullet list in Evernote for years. That becomes unwieldy for a variety of reasons (mainly the inability to hide tasks and levels), but on the other hand, the kind of refactoring that I'm used to is a convenient cut-and-paste operation in that environment.

Thanks,

-P.

[Cameron (GQueues Team)]

Thanks for the feedback, Peter.

We'll consider these when making improvements.  I think adding the ability to take action on several tasks at once (ie. apply a tag to many tasks at once) may help with A).  This development isn't scheduled yet, but it's an improvement we already have on our list.

Regarding B), if it helps there are some keyboard shortcuts that may speed things up.

https://www.gqueues.com/help/keyboardShortcuts#current

Typing "g" and then "o" will go to the Task Overview for the current task.

There you can add your subtasks, and then type "g" and the "b" to go back to your previous view.

-Cameron

--

Cameron Henneke

Founder, GQueues

"The leading Google-integrated task management service for people and teams."

[Peter S. Shenkin]

On Mon, Oct 31, 2016 at 6:06 PM, Cameron (GQueues Team) <cam...@gqueues.com> wrote:

Thanks for the feedback, Peter.

We'll consider these when making improvements.  I think adding the ability to take action on several tasks at once (ie. apply a tag to many tasks at once) may help with A).  This development isn't scheduled yet, but it's an improvement we already have on our list.

Thanks. Something else that might help would be a button or option to propagate all parent tags to subtasks, or a button on a subtask to propagate parent-task tags to that subtask.

-P.

[N Larkin]

Hi Cameron. In smart queues, the parent/sub task hierarchy is messed up. I was hoping, upon clicking "All Items" to see all my queues and each item under each queue, which I do, but the subtasks are not nested visually under their parent tasks. Ideally, the sub tasks would be nested in order under their parent tasks and hopefully indented a bit.

[Rick W.]

Ditto N Larkin's post. Subtasks really do need to be nested under parents in Smart Queues. Is there a technical reason why they can't be?