[HN Gopher] Launch HN: Routine (YC W21) - Tasks, notes and calen...
___________________________________________________________________
Launch HN: Routine (YC W21) - Tasks, notes and calendar all in one
product
Hi HN! I'm Julien. With my cofounder Quentin, we created Routine
(http://routine.co/hn), a macOS/iOS app that combines todos, notes
and calendar for busy professionals not to waste time switching
context and as a result losing focus. I became an entrepreneur in
2010 and struggled to maintain control of my work environment which
quickly became very chaotic with many email/chats to answer, a ton
of meetings to schedule and attend, time to find to focus on
important tasks and hundreds of thoughts going through my head that
I needed to write down somewhere not to forget. Over the years I
improved my own workflow, from sending myself emails, to todo apps,
to GTD, to programming my own small tools with keyboard shortcuts.
Talking with many busy professionals (entrepreneurs, investors,
managers etc.) we quickly discovered that everybody had the same
problems: they cannot stay in control of their time, they rely on
manual "hacks" based on a single product (e.g Gmail, Google
Calendar, Notion or else) to do almost everything and they hate
context switching between apps. Given how many people are unhappy
with their workflow, we decided to build Routine to become a
productivity operating system (so to speak) and solve these
problems. In particular, we find it super annoying to be forced to
switch between todo and notes taking apps. We believe some
information is actionable (tasks) while others are not (notes). We
see no reason why they should not be stored in the same system.
This is why we decided to include notes (daily notes, meeting
notes, topic-based pages etc,) and tightly-bound them to tasks. In
Routine, tasks can be enhanced with a media-rich description (i.e a
note) but notes can also embed checkboxes which are full-fledged
tasks that can be scheduled, delegated and more. Another problem
with existing tools is that they do not take into account your work
preferences. Maybe you prefer to concentrate in the morning and
take meetings in the afternoon. Or maybe the opposite. Routine
allows you to define such time preferences when it comes to deep
work, internal and external meetings, administrative work etc.
Routine will then take those into account whenever you want to
schedule a meeting or block time in your calendar in order to work
on an important task. Think of it as Calendly for all the
activities in your life (not just meetings). We also think that
existing workflows are just too slow. Switching to your browser to
then click on the Google Calendar tab to be able to look at your
next meeting is just too much work. Likewise when it comes to
taking meeting notes or writing down a task to perform later. Such
actions should not take more than 3 seconds, in particular since
you perform them several times a day. This is why we've made
Routine controllable through a single keyboard shortcut. Just
invoke CTRL+SPACE anywhere on your desktop to pop up Routine's
console which can be used to capture a thought, create a calendar
event, glance at your calendar, take notes and more. This way you
do not need to switch apps and lose focus! By combining these
concepts, you can for example turn an email into a task and secure
time in your calendar to make sure it gets done; just invoke the
console over Gmail and type "... for 1h in Focus" (with Focus being
the name of one of your pre-defined time slots). The app is still
in heavy development. For now we've been focusing on having a
strong backbone with tasks, notes and calendar. Some of the
features above will be shipped in the next release. We have the
core concepts but we need time and your feedback to help us find
the right direction. So if you feel information is spread between
too many tools and that you are constantly wasting time switching
between apps, let us know what you think, ideas you have and
recurring problems you face. Feel free to give it a try (note that
we are in the process of rebranding and the app is not up to date
yet!): http://routine.co/hn Thanks.
Author : jquintard
Score : 74 points
Date : 2021-03-24 10:59 UTC (12 hours ago)
| chir34 wrote:
| Hi, I'm just trying it out.
|
| Few comments: - Can the Desktop/Mobile tasks/events/agendas sync,
| or is this currently being worked on?
|
| - I want to be able to add a calendar event and be able to view
| it as an agenda (on the daily agenda), viewing an event or a task
| on the side seems to be counter-intuitive.
| jquintard wrote:
| Hi. Indeed, it's far from perfect. We haven't had time to work
| on the offline/sync yet. You need to reload to get the new
| state. It's on the roadmap. Will be done soon.
| zscoops wrote:
| Congratulations on the launch. I can't find a link to the iOS
| version on your "/hn" landing page, is it already available?
|
| Also, maybe it's just the logo, but the design looks really
| similar to sorted3.
| jquintard wrote:
| No inspiration from sorted3 but similarities with the circle on
| the logo indeed. The same could probably be said of many other
| productivity tools, like Sunrise :)
|
| Regarding iOS, you can find it here: https://apple.co/399lDrW
| spooneuh wrote:
| Hi zcoops, Here's the app store link for you
| https://apple.co/399lDrW Beware that the iOS app is meant to be
| used with the MacOS app as it still miss a lot of the desktop
| features
| artembugara wrote:
| I've been looking for something like that.
|
| How do I change the Ctrl + Space hotkey? It's my language switch.
| So, I'd like to keep it and change Routine's.
| mefyl wrote:
| It's not configurable from the Settings screen yet, but you can
| set the "dashboard-shortcut" key in ~/Library/Application
| Support/Routine/config.json. In can be any electron accelerator
| (https://www.electronjs.org/docs/api/accelerator).
| 0xferruccio wrote:
| I've been an early user of Routine and have been surprised by how
| much it sticked.
|
| I like seeing my calendar, notes and tasks in the same place. I
| think that going forward contacts should also be part of the app.
| If I take notes during a meeting, they should be linked to my
| Routine
|
| Main thing I use in the app is the calendar to join meetings in a
| click
| raptorraver wrote:
| Installed it on my work machine now. We use Google Calendar at
| work and I much more rather look it using your App :)
|
| It would be nice if I could connect my Apple-calendar with it as
| that's what I'm using personally.
|
| Ctrl+space short key is nice but canceling it with esc doesn't
| work for me at least but I have to open the app to get it closed.
|
| Also - I'd use it so much rather if it would be more independent
| from google. I switched off from Gmail this year so commiting to
| Google ecosystem this way isn't so nice.
|
| Anyways, all the best for you. Let's see if this will be actually
| useful for me.
| jquintard wrote:
| Thanks for the kind words.
|
| Apple Calendar is something we are obviously considering.
|
| As for console which is hard to exit, we get that feedback all
| the time. Unfortunately, even though it looks trivial, it is
| actually not super simple to do. I suggest you re-hit
| CTRL+SPACE to hide it, it is the easiest way. Otherwise, you
| need to reput focus in the console and hit CTRL+ESC.
|
| As for the dependence on the Google ecosystem, we understand
| but, as discussed through other comments on this post, we had
| to start somewhere. We will expand later but it just made sense
| to start on Google given that we are going after professionals
| and that there are 400M Google Workspace accounts.
| dmje wrote:
| Addicted to ticktick which does all of this methinks
| jbverschoor wrote:
| Warning - google accounts only. What's the deal with all these
| google-only apps? And on the other hand the de-googling of
| everybody on HN. It's super annoying, and basically forces you to
| use a throwaway google account.
|
| Also, with the whole supplychain security, why not just _also_
| promote your webapp, instead of a bundled electron app?
|
| ###
|
| In order for Routine to provide the value you are looking for, it
| needs access to some of the Google APIs, most specifically the
| following:
|
| Google Account
|
| Google Calendar
|
| Google Tasks
|
| Google Drive
|
| Your data privacy is paramount to us. We will NEVER share, sell
| or use your data in any way that could violate your trust in
| Routine.
|
| The reputation of the founders (Julien Quintard and Quentin
| Hocquet), the investors and its employees are on the line. We
| hold ourselves to the highest of standards
|
| ####
|
| No it's not, as I have no idea who you are. Also, you might say
| you'll never share, but what about some misconfigured backend?
| The investors invest in your company and take no liability.
| That's the whole purpose of a limited liability company
| jquintard wrote:
| We prefer to warn users instead of just using their Google
| Account.
|
| As for why we use Google services. It's because most
| professionals do use Google Calendar. Some don't, we
| understand. We might serve them in the future but we have to
| start somewhere.
|
| We advertise the desktop app (instead of the Web app) because
| Routine is intended to be used through a desktop-wide keyboard
| shortcut so you can capture thoughts and tasks from anywhere. A
| Web app requires that you switch to your browser, then find the
| right tab and click it to then be able to interact with the Web
| app. We believe it is too slow for a productivity tool. But
| some people do not have a choice (Windows) this is why we've
| answered them.
|
| If you do not trust our service, we understand. We don't force
| you to use it. It's obviously your right.
|
| But just to make things clear (which we explain in the Privacy
| section), all tasks are stored in your Google Tasks account.
| All events are stored in your Google Calendar. And all your
| notes are in your Google Drive. This means we store no data on
| our servers (for now at least).
| jbverschoor wrote:
| Thank you for making clear how it works, as that was not
| directly clear. This is one of the problems with granting
| access tokens.. there's no way of knowing what'll happen with
| them.
|
| Why not just release a macOS version on the appstore? Or, if
| you've created a swift version anyway, use that codebase for
| a universal app? There are also quite a number of apps that
| allow myself to 'convert' it to a 'native' app, with the
| exception of some features of course (such as global
| hotkeys).
|
| Both desktop and webapp versions don't work for me (401 from
| google apps, not gmail), and show a blank screen. Login ->
| uncheck some checkboxes -> retry and check the boxes -> still
| blank.
|
| Note: This could be create completely (afaict) using the
| built-in cal/task integration features of macOS/iOS, and
| would allow you use all supported calendar/task-services. For
| example, noteplan simply uses that, and will support dropbox
| as storage in later versions I think (it was removed from the
| beta version)
| jquintard wrote:
| We could have released on the macOS App Store but there was
| no benefit at first. We want to control how many people use
| it at first to make sure that we fix the bugs as they come.
| We've been working on this for only a few months.
|
| Let us check the problem regarding your 401 and come back
| to you. Sorry about that.
| brudgers wrote:
| _(for now at least)_
|
| That's why advertising the service around privacy is being
| criticized. It's a business. It will do business things.
| Saying it won't do those things is a distraction...like this
| conversation.
|
| People who seriously care about privacy are not using Google
| to manage their information. They are not even your potential
| users, because they don't use Google.
|
| Not storing data on your servers is a sound way to reduce
| your liability and attack surface. But that's an operational
| tradeoff that comes with a business dependency on Google's
| terms of service.
|
| In B2B sales, not storing on your servers is a feature. But
| it's not really privacy. It's security.
| jquintard wrote:
| We are not trying to say that Routine has been built around
| privacy like Protomail could say. We do not make such
| claims on our website.
|
| But since we are asking users for their Google credentials,
| we thought it was more transparent to explain, for each
| service, why we needed it and what it meant. We prefer to
| be transparent than just ask for a bunch of permission
| without explanation as other services do.
|
| And yes we are tight to Google because it was simpler for
| us to start this way. Again, most of the professionals we
| target use Google Workspace. In the future, the service
| could evolve and support other services like Outlook.
| brudgers wrote:
| My critique is this seems a distraction.
|
| Just have standard terms of service.
|
| A snowflake is always "for now."
|
| Placating people who don't like your ToS is not
| connecting with people in your market segment.
|
| Your market segment is people who don't care. Your
| differentiation is treating them better than you can get
| away with.
|
| Again I don't have any issue with what you are doing.
|
| I think privacy theater is a waste of your time and
| energy.
| nerdponx wrote:
| Probably a stupid question: why not CalDAV?
| zaphar wrote:
| A Google Account integration is an easy and relevant MVP for
| your product. It allows you to get up and running quicker. You
| can always add other integrations and self-hosted user
| management later as you prove out your business model.
| browningstreet wrote:
| If Google Accounts, then >1 Google Accounts. Haven't looked
| yet, TBH.
| swimminginlove wrote:
| Just a heads up.
|
| My Google account only has a first name so when I tried signing
| up got this error
|
| {"reason":"invalid JSON OAuth response: missing required field
| family_name","method":"GET"}
| jquintard wrote:
| Hey. Thanks for that feedback. We're going to look into this
| and we'll get back to you. Sorry for the inconvenience.
| mefyl wrote:
| Should be fixed ! Thanks for the report.
| tudorizer wrote:
| Another app that aims to "fix" workday tasks? It's hard to see
| why this is better and choosing Electron is a red flag. Reminds
| me of the email client wars from years ago.
|
| Half an app, barely a business. Why did YC back this?
| jedberg wrote:
| > Why did YC back this?
|
| This comes up a lot on Launch HN posts. The answer is always
| "YC backs teams, not ideas". They liked the founders and think
| the founders have potential.
|
| If this is how the founders choose to use that potential, then
| so be it. Maybe they will make a success, maybe they will
| pivot. YC will back them up and help them either way.
| raju wrote:
| This looks great! I have been on the lookout for something like
| this -- Agenda (https://agenda.com/) looked like a good start,
| but it did not work for me. I couldn't quite put my finger on
| why.
|
| I am curious to what your pricing plans are (I am a tad hesitant
| to move away from my current workflow just to find out that your
| price model might not work for me.
|
| Any thoughts on this?
|
| [Edited for formatting]
| jquintard wrote:
| Hi Raju. We'll definitely put a pricing plan in place at some
| point. It will likely be something around $10/month for
| professionals. But we will almost certainly keep a free plan. I
| can't guarantee it because we are still at the beginning but it
| is likely.
| rancar2 wrote:
| Hi Julien. Did you mean "can't guarantee it"?
|
| PS excited to try the product. I will delete this comment
| after you make the edit. Cheers!
| jquintard wrote:
| Hehe sorry about that. Yes I meant cannot.
| bestinterest wrote:
| Is this a native Swift app or Electron based app?
| jquintard wrote:
| The iOS app is native Swift. The desktop app is in Electron.
|
| But we've taken another approach for the Electron app not to
| become as slow as Slack or Notion. We know many people complain
| about that.
|
| To give just one example. The parser in our console has not
| been written manually in Javascript. Instead we wrote it in
| Ocaml (https://ocaml.org/) and we generate the Javascript. This
| allows us to have a code that is more reliable, maintainable
| and faster.
|
| We do the same for many other parts of the product exactly for
| that same reason.
| mromanuk wrote:
| Speed is not the problem with JS and Electron, it's the
| broken UX and expected behavior from a native app.
|
| I've installed it and before moving it to my app folder, I
| tried to run it (I always do this with new apps). A popup
| appeared with the title "A JavaScript error occurred in the
| main process" (weird behavior), I didn't read the content at
| first, so I closed it and reopened the app again (fast
| fingers reached cmd-q). Later I read the message asking to
| move to the App folder first.
| yunohn wrote:
| As an aside, JS does definitely make things feel slower
| than native in some instances. Regardless, how does
| generating JS from OCaml make things faster, I wonder?
| mful wrote:
| I've been looking for a combined task manager and calendar for a
| long time, and have often entertained building one for myself.
| Some feedback that is preventing adoption for me:
|
| - Complex recurrence is key. I exercise 4 days per week. I only
| process my inbox (GTD-style) on weekdays. I triage bugs twice per
| week.
|
| - Need to be able to view more than one day at a time on the
| calendar, and add tasks to specific days in that view -- I plan
| out my weeks.
|
| - Looking at future dates, it still shows my tasks scheduled for
| earlier dates. This makes planning difficult.
|
| Ergonomic feedback
|
| - Keyboard shortcuts (including arrow key navigation) does not
| work if you are focused on the name field of the task in the
| list. This means I can't really navigate, open, archive,
| reschdule tasks without using the mouse. Or at least I can't see
| how to. Might have to change hotkey scheme (use control or
| option?) as well, as command+A, for example, should probably
| still select all text in a field.
|
| - I should be able to click out of the console -- I keep trying
| to click or alt-tab out of it, like it's spotlight, and it just
| hovers empty in front of my screen until I click to refocus on it
| and hit escape.
|
| - When I've thought of building this myself, a key feature was
| adding tasks to the day's calendar (like, "I plan to work on X
| from 2-3:30pm").
|
| Currently I use Asana for it's calendar view (note: this is not a
| calendar integration) and great keyboard shortcuts.
|
| Anyway, congrats on the launch!
| jquintard wrote:
| Thanks mful for your message.
|
| Recurrence is something we will improve. But you have pretty
| specific ones :)
|
| We will actually add a planning view with a full week. We are
| definitely aligned on that. Stay put.
|
| For the future dates, yes indeed it's not ideal. We are in the
| process of fixing that. Well spotted.
|
| For the navigation, again, need to improve you are right. You
| need to ESC to come back to arrow navigation for now.
|
| Clicking out of the console is not easy to solve unfortunately.
| We are on it as well. What you can do is either focus on the
| console and press ESC. Or you can hit CTRL+SPACE once more and
| it will hide the console.
|
| We do support "do something on DAY at TIME for DURATION" but
| it's still a bit buggy. We need to improve it :)
|
| Thanks for all the feedback.
| TruthWillHurt wrote:
| So you're trying to compete with Google? And with a note-taking
| app (which is the developer equivalent of making an ashtray in
| pottery class)?
|
| And YC are backing this? wassa matter? afraid to miss out on the
| next Slack?
| jonas_kgomo wrote:
| I need this on Windows/Web
| browningstreet wrote:
| Windows needs a good G/Mail/Calendar app, like Mimestream on OS
| X, which uses the API.
|
| I'm forever flummoxed that Outlook on Mac handles Gmail and
| Google Calendar just fine, as does Windows Mail, but not
| Outlook for Windows.
| mfkp wrote:
| And on Linux/Android ;)
|
| Edit: works pretty well as an app added inside of
| https://wavebox.io/
| jquintard wrote:
| Hey Jonas. Our team is too small for us to go after all the
| platforms right now unfortunately. But we do have a Web app:
| https://bit.ly/3rhkYLt
| lenova wrote:
| Ack! Why isn't the web app featured prominently on your
| homepage? I bounced when I saw the Mac-only requirement, and
| almost abandoned checking out your product any further until
| I found your comment/link at the bottom of this thread.
| jquintard wrote:
| Thanks lenova. Duly noted, we'll improve that as it's not
| the first time we get the feedback here.
| vincentmarle wrote:
| > Switching to your browser to then click on the Google Calendar
| tab to be able to look at your next meeting is just too much
| work.
|
| Is this really that big of a problem? This is the second YC
| startup in this batch that is trying to fix this. I'm usually
| already in the browser, and if not I can cmd-tab into there in
| seconds. From there it takes me literally less than 2 seconds to
| type "cal" + enter to look at my Google calendar.
| rcdwealth wrote:
| The application is re-inventing the wheel. Please look at any
| decent CRM system such as SugarCRM or Odoo or Dollibar or
| similar. Please notice that each of those systems have
| collaboration in first place and they focus on people who are
| sorted in groups or lists usually called "accounts".
|
| Notes are related to people, accounts, opportunities, or other
| relational objects. Tasks are related to people, accounts,
| opportunities, and so on.
|
| A type of a note could be call, SMS sent, received, note could be
| a task, and yes you can and should mix all the different types
| inside.
|
| In my opinion best is to make the main table to be anything, of
| any type as that way you can just add a new type and continue
| with development. An entry in the same table could be a note, but
| also task, but also reminder or calendar. And why not make it a
| hyperlink to directory, DJVU file, PDF file, specific page in PDF
| file, EPUB, "Follow-Up" related to person, assigned task related
| to person Joe while assigned to person Jane, task assigned to
| group of people encompassing Joe and Jane and relate to company
| ABC LIMITED or Markdown, or plain text, or spreadsheet, allow
| uploading of files if you have not done so previously, a message
| ID that user can click, a video, or video to be played with
| specific times, or encrypted password, or the annoted WWW
| hyperlink, or online video, etc.
|
| I can suggest to learn from other similar systems:
|
| Monica - Personal Relationship Manager
| https://github.com/monicahq/monica
|
| Joplin https://joplinapp.org/
|
| Turtleapp note taking application https://turtlapp.com/download/
|
| TiddlyWiki - note taking in a browser https://tiddlywiki.com
|
| The PARA Method: A Universal System for Organizing Digital
| Information https://fortelabs.co/blog/para/
|
| Org mode - your life in plain text https://orgmode.org/
|
| Project Xanadu https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_Xanadu
|
| Semantic Synchrony https://github.com/synchrony/smsn
|
| Cherrytree - hierarchical note taking application with rich text
| and syntax highlighting https://www.giuspen.com/cherrytree/
|
| Hypothes.is Annotate the web, with anyone, anywhere.
| https://web.hypothes.is/
|
| Doug Engelbart Institute - Boosting mankind's capability for
| coping with complex, urgent problems
| https://www.dougengelbart.org/
|
| Draft OHS-Project Plan
| https://web.archive.org/web/20070704185333/http://www.bootst...
| catchmeifyoucan wrote:
| Congrats on the launch! +100 for keeping notes and tasks
| together. I think it's an under explored area.
|
| I really like the design, and how minimal you've kept it. I've
| been working in this space with Amna [https://getamna.com] and I
| know how hard it is to get the design right. It's soo easy to
| keep building UI for everything.
|
| One thing I found frustrating was closing out of the "console"
| when I was clicking out of it. Since it was invoked with a mouse,
| my hands weren't on the keyboard.
|
| I'm looking forward to where this is going!
| jquintard wrote:
| Thanks. Regarding the console, we know it's far from perfect.
|
| For now, you can hide the console by re-hitting CTRL+SPACE.
| candiddevmike wrote:
| If you're looking for something similar to this (tasks,
| calendars, wiki), along with budgeting, recipe management and
| more, checkout Domestica: https://about.domestica.app. Works on
| web/android/iOS, can be self hosted, and google sign in is
| optional.
| alexandargyurov wrote:
| This looks great. Though it is a shame I can't use it as it's Mac
| only. I switch between OS's a lot, to have a web app version of
| your product would really make the difference.
|
| Do you have any plans towards building Routine in that direction?
| jquintard wrote:
| We do have a Web version but it is true that we do not
| advertize it very much because the desktop experience is what
| we want to push for. Feel free to give it a try:
| https://bit.ly/3rhkYLt
| orangefarm wrote:
| Awesome to see more people work on integrated productivity
| spaces! I work on something very similar at Life
| (https://life.so).
|
| Since you decided to include notes into your bundling as well
| (which I did not so far) I am curious: How do you expect people
| to switch their note-writing habits from Notion, Roam, etc. to
| your project? It seemed to me that the notes market is extremely
| competitive already.
|
| The design looks clean and beautiful. Congratulations to your
| launch and I will try to sign up for early access later.
| inthewoods wrote:
| Life.so looks very interesting. It does one thing I wish all
| task managements did: integrate calendar so that you can
| schedule tasks on your calendar. This, to me, is key to
| actually getting things done.
|
| I would love to also have notes built into it - that way I
| won't be context switching and could (presumably) add tasks
| from within notes.
|
| I've signed up for your app - looking forward to seeing it!
| jquintard wrote:
| Definitely agree. Looks like what you are describing is
| Routine (http://routine.co) :)
| inthewoods wrote:
| Yes but sadly I'm on Exchange - so it won't work for me
| right now. Otherwise I'd already be playing with it!
| jquintard wrote:
| Thanks.
|
| Notes taking app tend to be very generic. You can type text,
| create bullet points and checkboxes. But they it is for you to
| manually move stuff from one page or section to another to
| "represent" another day, time or topic.
|
| In Routine, every note (being a page or a task description) can
| contain text, bullet points, media etc. But every checkbox
| turns out to be a full-fledged task that can be scheduled,
| opened to enhance with a description (which in turn can contain
| subtasks) etc.
|
| We've basically closed the loop. Every note can contain tasks.
| And every task can be enhanced with a note. And then we tight
| those notes and tasks to what is happening in your life.
|
| If you are in a meeting, you can take notes that will be linked
| to this meeting and its participants. If you create a checkbox
| (action item) in such a note, it becomes a task that you can
| postpone for later or schedule right away.
|
| Notion is best for teams and does not have this notion of task,
| nor is it well integrated with your calendar. Likewise for Roam
| which is more for people who love to take tons of notes:
| researchers, journalists etc.
| orangefarm wrote:
| Thank you for the explanation! I'm looking forward to trying
| it out in practice
| alexandargyurov wrote:
| I built and app called Life Tracker[0] a while back, it's aim
| was to track your mood and have everything in one place. My
| blue sky goal was to reach something like life.so.
|
| It's good to see people working in this space, though I feel as
| if sometimes the scope can be wayy to big. Everyone has
| different types of workflows, so I guess for a product to be
| used by a lot of people, it has to allow for as many possible
| custom workflows. Though at the same time keeping a simple
| design and easy-to-use interface.
|
| It's hard for me to tell, is life.so Mac only?
|
| [0] https://alexandar.me/lifetracker
| orangefarm wrote:
| Hey Alex, very cool project! What made you pause working on
| it?
|
| You are making a great point. There is an inherent trade-off
| between customisability and simplicity. That is not
| necessarily a problem though because I think there are
| different target groups depending on where your product is on
| this scale. I like to think of productivity software as a
| pair of shoes where everyone has their preferred size and
| fit. That also allows different tools to successfully co-
| exist.
|
| The desktop application is Electron-based, so porting it to
| Windows will be relatively easy. For mobile we go native
| though and that's why a native Android application will take
| some longer.
| alexandargyurov wrote:
| I like that analogy. Works nicely with having multiple
| products that do the same thing.
|
| > What made you pause working on it?
|
| I lost interest in building it, I still use it everyday but
| now I'm just waiting (hoping) that I'll eventually get back
| to it.
|
| I've signed up to the beta, definitely keep me updated :)
| criddell wrote:
| Are you happy with how the application looks and behaves on
| the Mac?
|
| Apple is clearly moving to having iOS apps work on the Mac.
| Do you think the iOS Routine app would work on the Mac?
| [deleted]
| orangefarm wrote:
| Reading all the negative sentiment on HN about Electron
| beforehand I was a bit concerned about picking it for the
| desktop app but now I am positively surprised to be
| honest.
|
| I totally understand that Electron's memory footprint is
| not acceptable for very small apps that only serve as a
| utility. For Life though, which is supposed to replace
| 2-3 other apps, a memory footprint of ~300mb seems fine
| to me. In-app performance is also good.
|
| I cannot say anything about the iOS Routine app because I
| have not tried it yet.
| jquintard wrote:
| Routine's iOS app is written in native Swift.
| jquintard wrote:
| That's a very good point. Definitely Apple's direction.
|
| I think it will take quite some time to reunite both
| world. But maybe indeed, eventually, we'll have only the
| iOS app that will run on both iPhones and macs.
|
| Note thought that there will always be a big difference
| in experience. On desktop, we want the experience to be
| center-ed around the keyboard shortcut, the console and
| natural language.
|
| On iOS (at least for most people), it's faster to use a
| well-crafter UI/UX than typing natural language. Though
| again, in the future, we might go in the direction of
| voice.
|
| Time will tell :)
| criddell wrote:
| > On iOS (at least for most people)
|
| Are you assuming a phone here or including the 12" iPad
| Pro with a keyboard?
| spooneuh wrote:
| Hi criddell, I'm the iOS dev for Routine. As of now, the
| iOS application is restricted for iPhone only. Regarding
| the iPad with keyboard it is definitely something we need
| to think about, as the usage is closer to a desktop than
| a phone. As of now, if we authorized the iPhone version
| to be used on iPad it would lack the main desktop feature
| : the console.
| criddell wrote:
| If you did decide to support an iPad with keyboard, I
| wonder what the experience on the Mac would be compared
| to the Electron app?
|
| You can probably tell Electron isn't my favorite way to
| make Mac apps.
| spooneuh wrote:
| Surely if we were to have the console on iPad (and all
| the features that are not developped on iOS as of now),
| we probably could release a native MacOS app along. But
| realistically it will not be in the near future, as the
| iOS app is lagging a fair amount behind the electron app.
| As of now, we're focusing on iOS on the simplest and most
| used functionalities as well as features that works well
| with touch UI.
| simplify wrote:
| Does Routine have realtime collaboration? Currently using
| input.com for notes+tasks but still waiting for them to add
| better sharing model (they have rt collab but you have to send an
| invite for each doc, not ideal).
| jquintard wrote:
| No not yet. Definitely something we want to do but to be honest
| it won't be before 6 months at least.
| Brajeshwar wrote:
| Bug: If "Tasks" is turned off for a Google WorkSpace domain, it
| shows as an error. The error dialogue is persistent too and I've
| no option to close it.
|
| https://www.dropbox.com/s/2xxcvc7r54mrnua/Screen%20Shot%2020...
| jquintard wrote:
| Hi Brajeshwar. Indeed, we need access to Google Tasks because
| all the tasks created in Routine are stored in a specific list
| in your Google Tasks account. We do not store the tasks on our
| server.
| shoyip wrote:
| Nice app! I remember that an extremely similar product was
| Sunrise. It was a well crafted product and it was bought by
| Microsoft. The development has been since then discontinued, and
| functions were integrated into Outlook. Hope this won't happen to
| Routine. Nice work!
| wuschel wrote:
| It also reminds me of 30boxes.
| jquintard wrote:
| We were definitely inspired by Sunrise. We tried to extend the
| idea by integrating tasks and notes as well.
| Oras wrote:
| Hey Julien, Congratulations on the launch. I quite like the
| simplicity which reminds me of Todoist. I've been using Todoist
| for the last 4 years and had improved my productivity a lot.
|
| How's Routine different from Todoist?
|
| P.S: In your jobs section you're missing the how to apply part.
| Ex: https://www.notion.so/Head-of-
| Marketing-03dc3a3a6f0d45989936...
| jquintard wrote:
| Hey Oras. I've added the Apply part. Thanks a lot for spotting
| that :) apply@routine.co
|
| Regarding Todoist. It's obviously a great tool. But very
| generalist. Like Everynote for notes. We're taking more of a
| specialized direction for busy professionals: people who have a
| lot of meetings, want to capture non-actionable information
| (notes), have a lot of things going through their mind that
| they do not want to forget and a lot of tasks scattered
| everywhere, from email, chat (Slack/WhatsApp) and project
| management tools (Asana/Trello/Notion).
|
| With Todoist, everything needs to be stored as a todo. We think
| this is too constraining. Some information is actionable
| (tasks), other not (notes). Both should be in a single tool.
|
| Also, it's a productivity tool. It needs to be super fast. I
| don't want to have to switch to an app to capture something
| that is going through my mind. Or to copy/paste information
| from one tool to another. That's why Routine works through a
| keyboard shortcut that is available everywhere on your desktop.
| For now, you can only capture information, create recurring
| event, block time in your calendar etc.
|
| But soon, you'll be able to join meetings, take meeting notes,
| glance at your upcoming events etc. all through one keyboard
| shortcut.
| lenova wrote:
| Feature request:
|
| - Section: Agenda-view
|
| - Feature: in the "free time" blocks where no event are
| scheduled, have the option (+) to create a new event in that free
| block of time.
|
| - Source: viewed on web app
|
| Hopefully that makes sense!
| jquintard wrote:
| The ability to add tasks and events in the Agenda view is in
| the roadmap indeed :) Along with drag/dropping a task onto this
| view.
|
| Thanks. Very clear.
| edu wrote:
| I use NotePlan[1], which is a similar app, and it's a joy. The
| downside of NotePlan is that is available only for Apple devices.
|
| 1. https://noteplan.co/
| jbverschoor wrote:
| Been using it on/off since v1 or even before. Super fast and
| feature rich. I'm only on Apple, so it's fine for me.
| ccmonnett wrote:
| Really intrigued by the idea and anxious to try it out! After
| connecting my Gmail I can only get a white screen. How do I
| report the bug to y'all?
|
| Best of luck, many commenters on HN seem to really undervalue the
| "it just works" aspect of things. It looks nice, seems to do
| something I am really anxious for help with, and not much more. I
| can see myself paying for this (potentially :) - need to get it
| working first!).
|
| One perhaps funny anecdote for you - I am recently an engineer-
| turned-manager and this type of unified task/meeting management
| is one of the growth areas I've had to focus on most over the
| last year. Thought I'd let you in on a potential niche^2 market
| that might be a good fit for a blog post or something similar
| down the road.
| jquintard wrote:
| Thanks for your message. You're not the first one to report a
| blank screen. Very strange. We didn't see that before. You can
| send us an email at contact@routine.co and we'll try to dig
| deeper. Any help is greatly appreciated.
|
| Relating to your last comment, I would be great to chat. I'd
| love to get your input: julien.quintard@routine.co if you want
| to reach out directly.
|
| Thanks
| surajs wrote:
| one thing well, ever heard of it?
| beaconstudios wrote:
| bundling is another philosophy, like notion are doing. It works
| well because you don't have to context-switch as much.
|
| unbundled (calendar/task/notes) applications are still
| available if that's your preference.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-03-24 23:02 UTC)