[reesd]

Played around with Bonsai today to see if I could use it for task management instead or with MyLifeOrganized (MLO). Here are my results from some basic playing around.

Generally I found the following strengths over MLO, the first 5 of which are very important to me and have been ongoing conversation points in the MLO forums.

[*]filtering

[*]coloring

[*]icons

[*]multi-column data

[*]native and good Palm support (MLO goes through Outlook)

[*]templated export/import format (though I would rather see this use XSL than a custom approach)

Natura, note that several of these where not obvious when I first started playing with Bonsai. I strongly suggest you ship with some sample outlines showing off your features around these things.

MLO has the following advantages over Bonsai. The first is what kept me from trying to use it in earnest, but I have listed the others I noticed because they are probably important to others:

[*]Recurring Dates

[*]Hierarchial Importance computation (like Life Balance)

[*]Effort/Project fields

[*]PPC Support

Note that Bonsai key words can essentially be used to perform similar functionality as MLO places.

FYI, The basic XSL I used to go from MLO to Bonsai is available at http://www.ubiqsoft....oBonsai.xsl.zip.

d

[Dwight]

Is it possible to send the XSL from Bonsai back to MLO? Basically I am asking if it is possible to sync the two programs.

Thanks,
Dwight...

[reesd]

Unfortunately XSL is not "two-way" so a Bonsai/MLO XSLT would have to be written from "scratch". That said, it should be pretty straightforward to write one.

More complicated is syncing like you describe. That usually means looking at both of them and recognizing what has changed/added/deleted. Its doable, but more work.

One problem I know upfront is that MLO doesn't export its "IDs" to XML. Which means when you import everything is considered a new task. Its kind of annoying.

d

[Sophi]

Quote

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Originally posted by: reesd

MLO has the following advantages over Bonsai. The first is what kept me from trying to use it in earnest, but I have listed the others I noticed because they are probably important to others:

[*]Hierarchial Importance computation (like Life Balance)

[*]Effort/Project fields

[*]PPC Support

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Did you like the hierarchical importance computation of Life Balance, or find you had to struggle to make it work? Can't tell from what you wrote.

[reesd]

Did you like the hierarchical importance computation of Life Balance, or find you had to struggle to make it work? Can't tell from what you wrote.

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Sorry, my list is missing the main reason I decided to wait on using Bonsai - recurring dates. That is what I intended to list first. I've updated my original post.

I've have found that hierarchical importance computation doesn't provide practical value for me vs. filtering and categories (categories of today, week, month combined with filters around those and dates).

Thanks,

d