Problem
One of the obvious missing items from the iPhone (and Mac for that matter) ecosystem is Tasks. The iPhone has mail, calendar, and contacts but no tasks. Sure there are plenty of online task applications such as Remember the Milk, Ta-Da List, and Gubb among a lot of others. These really do not work for me because I live and breath in Outlook and none of these solutions sync with Outlook (although Gubb can import/export tasks).
Problem #2
Another issue of my task management strategy in addition to Outlook syncing is that I like having a mobile solution for creating tasks. The iPhone can accomplish this through the use of the Safari browser. All of the online task applications that I mentioned before do have a mobile (and is some instances an iPhone specific version) of their application. This is nice but again these do not sync with Outlook.
So what is my solution? How did I get my tasks in Outlook when I enter them in my iPhone? Read on...
Solution
Enter the new Plaxo. Plaxo used to be just a contact management system but now recent updates have them more of a social network aggregator. One of the new features that they offer with their 3.0 beta is a technology called Sync Points. You can sync your address book, calander, and tasks between several sources including Outlook, Google, LinkedIn, and Yahoo. This is a really nice feature because now your PIM information can be synced between Plaxo Online, Outlook, Google, and Yahoo. The best part is that you can have multiple Outlook sync points so you can sync your work and personal Outlook information for example.
The Way I Make It Work
The way that I use this to sync my tasks with the iPhone is that I installed Plaxo on my Outlook. Outlook gets my task information from my hosted Exchange server. I can add a task via Outlook, Plaxo Online, or my Outlook web access and they are all synced. I can also go to the mobile version of Plaxo (no iPhone specific version yet), enter a task there and it will be synced with my Exchange server once my Outlook syncs it via the Plaxo plugin. Plaxo only allows you to enter a date and a title for a task but you can at least capture the task and add additional details if necessary when you get back to Outlook or OWA. It is very seemless.
No iPhone SDK Challenge
Another challenge when entering tasks on the iPhone is the lack of a true SDK. Bringing up the browser, navigating to Plaxo mobile, and entering a task can be time consuming (especially when using EDGE) and not always appropriate in certain situations (like when driving). This sometimes gets in the way of capturing information when I think of it and sometimes it causes tasks not to be captured. The way that I get around this is to use Jott. Jott is an awesome application. It allows you to call a number from your phone and leave a message for yourself. Jott then transcribes this to text and emails you the voice message with the body containing the transcribed text. I use this to leave myself a reminder to "Pick up the milk" and I let Jott send this message to my Outlook. In Outlook, I create a Task from the message by dragging it to the Task list or use ClearContext. This task is then synced with Plaxo and all my other sync points. Very nice and allows me to capture everything.
Extra Jott
Jott also allows you to leave messages for anyone in your contact list or a group of people. They just added some features that allow you to create a blog post or Twitter message by calling Jott or create a reminder among other things. Best of all, it's all free right now.
This sounds great, but you didn't say if the tasks/todos are then on the iphone??
Posted by: jeff | December 04, 2007 at 09:00 PM
Yes, but like all iPhone apps (unless you jailbreak your phone), the tasks can be accessed via a web site.
You can view your tasks on the iPhone from the browser and point it to http://m.plaxo.com which will give you a small, compact mobile list of your tasks.
The mobile version of Plaxo was built for "standard" phones but it is quicker to access than looking at the full plaxo interface from your iPhone.
Posted by: jwright | December 04, 2007 at 10:58 PM
I have the same problem - and just came across this site:
http://www.chapura.com/keytasksiphone.php
Who knows when it will go live though
Mike
http://www.letterperspectives.com
Posted by: Mike | July 18, 2008 at 09:43 AM
Too nerdy even for my likings! Why did Apple leave To Do Tasks out of the phone to begin with?
Posted by: Brian Costelloe | July 20, 2008 at 08:57 AM
Apple never really had a task management application. I believe they added a simple one with the Leopard release which is after the iPhone was released.
I don't know why they left them out but a great 3rd party application for Tasks is OmniFocus.
They have an excellent iPhone application as well which will sync your tasks between your iPhone and Mac.
Posted by: jwright | July 21, 2008 at 05:54 AM
It's Live! It's Live! And KeyTasks works great. Thanks for post and the info.
Posted by: TaskMan | August 21, 2008 at 02:28 PM
It is live, but I'm still waiting for category support
Posted by: Mike | August 31, 2008 at 09:38 PM
Interesting option - I've tried a couple of other things today but have had no luck as my exchange server seems to be quite heavily locked down! I've just signed up for Plaxo and am now being told their site is down for maintenance... hope I didn't break it! *lol*
Posted by: Mrs S | September 23, 2008 at 10:07 AM
Just wanted everyone to know about the application I just released called TaskData (http://www.taskdata.mobi) which does over-the-air synchronization of Exchange tasks!
It's great because it's a one time fee, no yearly subscriptions, no third party applications to install on your PC, nothing. As long as you have OWA access, your phone can sync your tasks.
Give it a try, and a special thanks to Jamie for letting me shamelessly plug my app!
Posted by: Phillip Zedalis | October 01, 2008 at 06:55 PM
It now has catagory support.
Posted by: MIKE | November 30, 2008 at 08:20 AM
I've bought the application iExchange from App Store, it syncs the Tasks and Notes with my Exchange 2007 server. I can work online and offline, and is very easy to use.
Posted by: John | March 22, 2009 at 05:15 AM
the missing sync for iPhone new 2.0 version syncs notes, documents and files (and tasks is coming soon according to Mark/Space) to and from iphone and mac (and soon PC for my Dell). you have to download the free iphone apps Fliq Docs and Fliq Notes (soon Fliq Tasks) to make the sync work but the free apps also let you do more than other apps for notes, tasks and docs.
http://www.markspace.com/iphone/mac/
Posted by: iPhoneFan | April 28, 2009 at 04:50 PM
does it support Hebrew?
Posted by: moshe | March 10, 2010 at 08:58 AM