Things needs no introduction. It had been in the forefront of Mac productivity since the day the world saw it. The team at Cultured Code has carefully executed one of the most beautiful and powerful GTD app systems on the Apple platform. They started with the Mac, in late 2007. They then combined it with an iPhone version of Things. Cultured Code again brought forth something amazing for mobile device, preserving the look and feel of the Mac version yet fitting right into the iPhone form factor. To say they’ve greatly improved the iPhone version would be an understatement. When it shipped, it didn’t even sync with the desktop; now it boasts a feature set that makes it almost as powerful as the desktop.

After two years of using it, it became clear as to how these two apps played separate roles in ones life. I used the desktop to enter in tasks, quickly sort them out, and generally treated it as a place I could dump things in I wanted to consider later. The iPhone on the other hand helped me actually process those tasks. The iPhone is great at doing such tasks. I’d be stuck at some place where I’d fire up Things, and mark tasks I’ve completed already, and have an overview of how best to plan my day ahead. It was my way of getting things done.

Things’ one big weakness showed up the day they released the iPhone version. It didn’t have over-the-air sync. The Cultured Code team has promised this feature, and they keep reassuring us that they’re working on it harder than you’d imagine, but it’s still a major feature deficit. I have so far managed, but every once in a while, I find yourself with an outdated set of tasks, and that is just not acceptable in this day and age.

Things for iPad review starts here

So when the iPad version showed up, you can imagine how it affected the whole workflow. Now I had to manage a third device in this workflow. The iPad version doesn’t sync with the iPhone version; they both have to go through the central Mac.

Don’t get me wrong. Cultured Code has done a splendid job getting the UI to feel just perfect on the iPad. I could go as far as saying it’s the most beautiful app on my iPad. I like that they didn’t go with the dual column approach of Mail, and instead went with the more organic approach of the Notes app. More developers need to follow this approach to designing their split column landscape apps. Everything on the iPad app is so readable. I feel like I’m glancing through a real notebook, except here my handwriting is actually legible.

Projects look real awkward, with varied font sizes

From a workflow perspective, I think they’ve still to realize the iPad as more of an organic platform than a traditional computer. To add a new task you need to tap the plus button, enter the name, then confirm—not as painful as I make it sound, but not as sweet as it could be either. Compare that with Sorted, where you just double tap on a line and it adds a task for you. Even organizing tasks could have used the drag and drop approach in addition to the traditional method of tapping around [1. Is it just me or is there less "Minority Report" drag and drop on the iPad than one might have imagined? So far the only thing I've seen is organising slides in Keynote and landing planes in Flight Control. Maybe I'm wrong.]. There are certain other issues I have with the app. The page flip animation gets really annoying after a minute of being amused by it. The thumbnail view for projects also feels a little extraneous, although I see how it might help if you have more than 15 projects you’re working on concurrently. Personally I have less than 5 going on at any given time, so I shifted them all to Areas of Responsibility and made my peace with that.

Sorting tasks is one tap at a time

Due to the nature of the iPad, Things is not so capable at rapidly entering tasks like on the desktop, since that level of multi-tasking and integration is not present on the iPad. It’s also not nearly as portable as the iPhone version, where I’d be wondering what I needed to buy from the supermarket. What it is great at doing, is sitting back and figuring out how to plan your days ahead. The display is so crisp, and the urge to touch so great, that it feels natural—I’m still talking about the iPad here. It could have had better organisational features though—that drag and drop that I mentioned—as the iPad really is the device you have when your mind is lazy and idle.

But…

I don’t really know why it happened, but I started seeing less and less of the Things ecosystem after getting the iPad. The addition of the iPad app completely threw off my original workflow. Having three devices to keep in sync is more difficult than I had thought, and over the last two weeks I find myself slowly giving up. It wasn’t very conscious—I wasn’t even thinking of this review—but over time I found I launched the apps less often than before, and as of now no new tasks being added for an entire week. I’ve instead found myself using Simplenote to have a plaintext list of tasks and links, effortlessly synced around all my devices. It’s not nearly as elegant as I’d like, but at least it’s usable. The only thing I do use Things for, and only on the desktop, is for creating (and hopefully completing) desktop-based projects.

A lot of people have been wondering whether to spend the $20 (Disclosure: Cultured Code sent me a review copy, so I didn’t pay for mine). If I were to be made to buy it myself, I wouldn’t. I haven’t launched the app for over a week (and don’t intend to in its current state), and this is a system I’ve used for almost two years straight now. Which is sad, considering how beautiful the app is—I really like beautiful apps.

I’m sure there are people who have been making it work, and if you think you can, the app really is quite good. And it’s only going to get better, now that Cultured Code has an actual device to test it on. Moreover, they are working on OTA sync, so someday in the future you’re probably gonna get your money’s worth (no word on how much OTA sync is gonna cost). Just that as of right now, I’m not an active Things user.

Things is $50 for the Mac version, $10 for the iPhone, and $20 for the iPad.

[For a view on how the app works and feels, you must check out their stunning promo video]