Yep. Another ToDo-App
I just recently decided to start a side business in 2020. As I am in the early stages of my solo bootstrap journey I decided to do something simple.
My main goal is to validate my processes, get into the habit of promoting/showing work and mainly build something on a consistent basis.
Therefore I want to build something simple.
Early last Year I got into the habit of Bullet Journaling. What really sticked with me was the process of eliminating tasks. Every evening I sat down looked at the open ToDos and had to decide if I want to move them to the next day. As this is all analogue you think twice if the task is still relevant.
This helped me with two things:
- Better understanding what tasks are important
- I learned what tasks are essential but I procrastinate on
So my idea is an ToDo app where all your active tasks for today are automatically moved into an "archive" at the end of the day. The next day you open the app you have a blank canvas. Now you have to go into your archive and decide what tasks are still important.
To move the important tasks back into your daily view you need to do some kind of "manual labor". One example that came to mind was thinking about retyping the task to move it out of the archive.
I find this step the most important because writing a task again in my notebook was the key point why the tasks stuck with me that day. Also it helped to really think if the task is still relevant.
Whats your ideas on that? Looking forward to some feedback. Nothing revolutionary, just a small project to get me going 🙂
I did the exact same thing! So my quick story to give you another data point...
I was working on a saas-y side project that wasn't ready to launch yet. I hit that downslide where you feel like you need to give up or take a break so I took a weekend off and built a todo app for my girlfriend and me to share a grocery list.
In 48 hours it was submitted to the app store, and I felt like I had 'finished' something. I did the marketing content, design, development, started iterating on bug fixes, support requests, and releases. Never more than a few hours a week, but it got me into the product flow, and diversified my brain a little.
Seeing users trickle into the app was fun of course, which kept me motivated on the saas to get those first users coming in on something that might actually make money.
A couple years later and the list app has ~5k users and turned into a fairly polished little thing. I still use it with my (now fiancee) every day. The saas, on the other hand, is coming up on 25k users so I'm glad I stuck with it! The side-side-project was just what I needed to stay motivated.
Moral of the story: little wins and routines can absolutely help. Just stay balanced and don't forget about your broader goals.
Good luck!
That is a great story, Chris!
Shows that a simple idea sometimes is everything you need. It's the little steps every day that count.
Great to hear that you kept working on your saas. Can't imagine having 25k users 🤯
Again, thank you for your motivational story. And congrats to you and your financee!
Hey Maximilian,
Is an interesting project. I developed a few years ago a very similar app, 24hDone, and got some traction at the beginning (was published on Product Hunt). You can check it here: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.wakot.todo_24hdone
For me was a small project, but I learnt a ton in the process. I recommend you to go ahead 💪
Hi Maximilian, I just start doneday.xyz https://www.indiehackers.com/product/doneday/came-up-with-my-idea-doneday-xyz, for more less the same reason as you, that to build something useful, relevant but simple. I believe that even if “another todoapp” not your top idea, it’s still help you learn the product development and solve many technical building blocks. Then for sure they are your assets to build the next great idea 👍
Please keep me in the loop and looking forward to your next update 👍
Hey Vu,
doneday.xyz sound great. Your story also reads pretty similar to mine. Always having ideas and starting to work on it and then let it go after a while.
Thats the reason I posted here to keep me somewhat accountable and finish something.
I will give an update for sure and follow you progress along, too.
I like the idea of having to retype a bullet point as part of showing your commitment to that task. You could make a "ghost" appear of yesterdays bullets by turning a switch, this way you get to trace the text easily. And once they match they lock in. That might be satisfying.
I like the idea of hitting a switch to see yesterdays/past tasks. My initial idea was to let the user go back to specific days, like in a calendar, just swipe to go to yesterday and then see what you did not complete. I will try out both for sure.
Thanks for your input, Dario.
Sure thing. You could even do a Bart Simpson mode where if you fail to complete a task you have to write it down 50 times before you can track it again. 😆
And speak it out loud while doing so. Imagine someone having to do this on public transport 😂
Sounds interesting. I'd be willing to give it a shot.
I did almost exactly this at my previous job by copying and pasting bullets points between cards that were labeled by day in Microsoft Teams. It would be cool to see it turned into an app.
Pursue it if you’re passionate about it and believe in its utility/purpose. This will come through in the design and others will be passionate about it as well.
I hope that it will. I am excited to work on it. Also it will at least fulfil my need for a more "mindful" ToDo app.
Hey I support you in this, I think many people has problems with this, just remember keep it simple
I set myself a goal to work a maximum of one week on the initial MVP. Really reducing the scope and just try the core concept of moving tasks to the archive and back to your daily tasks. That should be more than enough to validate the idea.
Agree with you , I am trying to do mvps in less than a day,
i also faced the same problem all the todo apps seemed too complicated for my requirement so i created getshitdone247.web.app, let me know what do you think about it?
This is like scrum with the usual backlog grooming, but with a daily sprint, daily sprint planning. Thought I'd say it! I can see this mentally being a good thing. Since todo lists are mostly a mental hack that's great.
Never thought about it that way but you are right. My process currently does follow the scrum principle in a much shorter timespan 🤔
If you're new to coding and using this as a learning tool, then it's going to benefit you.
As for a viable business? It's a massive waste of time. This market is totally saturated with free products that are heavily ingrained into peoples workflow and you'd benefit much more from investing your time into something that has a higher chance of succeeding.
This comment was deleted a year ago.
Wow @heylorenzut! That's awesome input. Thank you for that.
I did not know about GenialTask. I will definitely check it out. As you said it seems to be pretty similar. I really like the minimalistic visuals. Looks pretty streamlined. Reading on reviews and feedback on product hunt it seems like that people really like the idea but are scared of loosing tasks because they just disappear after two days.
As I want to move the tasks into an archive, maybe I am onto something. This somewhat validates the idea that there is a need for a simple todo app. Nice!
Your idea is very interesting. The problem is that you can not create complex tasks over several days without loosing them and with your idea the task would kept active while working on it. The first thing that came to my mind was that then maybe the task must be broken down into smaller increments. But then you would need a mechanism to plan future tasks.
One solution that came to my mind could be that the app allows for setting up projects/areas you are working on. You would then group your todos somewhat. Comes with the drawback that it will make it more cluttered and you would have to go over several areas every day.
I would love to chat about it. I think it will make sense when I have a first MVP. If you want I will keep you in the loop and let you know when I have something! 🙂
This comment was deleted a year ago.