Week Plan 2 and Focus Timer

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  • updated
  • Not a bug

In the new version of Week Plan, there doesn't seem to be any way to start the Focus Timer. I use the Pomodoro technique to manage my focus and I would like to see the timer back in Week Plan 2. 

App:
Web app
Avatar
Ana Loraine
  • Not a bug
Avatar
Aymeric Founder
Quote from timlloyd

Sure, how about sometime on the 3rd or 4th of Jan? Should I email my Skype UN to support?

Replied by email, thanks.

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timlloyd
Quote from Aymeric

Thanks Tim, would you be interested in having a Skype call with me to go over how we could improve WEEK PLAN from your perspective?

Sure, how about sometime on the 3rd or 4th of Jan? Should I email my Skype UN to support?

Avatar
Aymeric Founder
Quote from timlloyd

I have the Pro plan, and can use the feature, now that I know how to enable it.


As stated above, my problem was that it's not clear how to enable it.


Here's what happens:

- Log in

- Go to Account Settings

- Go to Premium Features

- See Focus Timer ... think ... "yes, that'll be useful"

- Enable it

- Go back to the Planner

- ... "hmmm, it's not available"

- Search the forum - see that at one point it hadn't been implemented in v2 yet, and assume that's still the case

- ... etc.


Should I have explored the Extensions panel, not knowing what hides inside it? Perhaps. If I had, I'd have noticed that the Focus Timer has to be enabled there as well, before it can be used.


Should the UI be designed so that such confusions don't arise in the first place? IMO, yes.


Weekplan is a frustrating app. The core concept is excellent, but beyond the main planner page the implementation is disappointingly haphazard :(


Todoist and Things 3 are examples of much better UI design and information hierarchy, but are based on the GTD approach which doesn't work for my professional time management (Todoist gets close). So I'll put up with Weekplan's oddities in spite of the worse design :)


I don't know how many users you have at the moment, or how many try it vs actually stick with it. I am very confident that you'd have many more if the UI design was cleaned up, reliability sorted out [1], the UI made snappier [2], made a bit prettier, and the mobile app brought in line (there are so many differences it's borderline unusable as a supplement to the web app).


There are so many 'productivity' apps out there and many of them are essentially the same. Weekplan is different, and needed. More people need it than are going to use it in its current form. Someone else will catch on eventually (e.g. Enulus Feather isn't too far off for iOS).


Sorry for the rant! I'll try to put together some proper feedback another day, and post in a new thread.


[1] It's disconcerting that some things can appear to have been lost when updates are rolled out. This happened to me and I nearly stopped using Weekplan as a result. I've seen other reports on this forum too. I also frequently get hangs and have to delete my browser cache (will log a bug separately once I find a recipe). Why do I sometimes get a 'type error' when attempting to sign in online? I use 1Password, it's definitely not a typo! These things should happen to the beta team, not to unsuspecting users.


[2] E.g. it takes ~3 seconds from the start of a task reorder drag+drop until it's fully complete (Safari 11.0.2). And why do all the other tasks reload visually in the planner? It's nearly 2018! Makes the app feel flakey, which puts people off. We've all been spoilt by the excellent implementation of worse ideas :p

Thanks Tim, would you be interested in having a Skype call with me to go over how we could improve WEEK PLAN from your perspective?

Avatar
Ana Loraine
Quote from timlloyd

I have the Pro plan, and can use the feature, now that I know how to enable it.


As stated above, my problem was that it's not clear how to enable it.


Here's what happens:

- Log in

- Go to Account Settings

- Go to Premium Features

- See Focus Timer ... think ... "yes, that'll be useful"

- Enable it

- Go back to the Planner

- ... "hmmm, it's not available"

- Search the forum - see that at one point it hadn't been implemented in v2 yet, and assume that's still the case

- ... etc.


Should I have explored the Extensions panel, not knowing what hides inside it? Perhaps. If I had, I'd have noticed that the Focus Timer has to be enabled there as well, before it can be used.


Should the UI be designed so that such confusions don't arise in the first place? IMO, yes.


Weekplan is a frustrating app. The core concept is excellent, but beyond the main planner page the implementation is disappointingly haphazard :(


Todoist and Things 3 are examples of much better UI design and information hierarchy, but are based on the GTD approach which doesn't work for my professional time management (Todoist gets close). So I'll put up with Weekplan's oddities in spite of the worse design :)


I don't know how many users you have at the moment, or how many try it vs actually stick with it. I am very confident that you'd have many more if the UI design was cleaned up, reliability sorted out [1], the UI made snappier [2], made a bit prettier, and the mobile app brought in line (there are so many differences it's borderline unusable as a supplement to the web app).


There are so many 'productivity' apps out there and many of them are essentially the same. Weekplan is different, and needed. More people need it than are going to use it in its current form. Someone else will catch on eventually (e.g. Enulus Feather isn't too far off for iOS).


Sorry for the rant! I'll try to put together some proper feedback another day, and post in a new thread.


[1] It's disconcerting that some things can appear to have been lost when updates are rolled out. This happened to me and I nearly stopped using Weekplan as a result. I've seen other reports on this forum too. I also frequently get hangs and have to delete my browser cache (will log a bug separately once I find a recipe). Why do I sometimes get a 'type error' when attempting to sign in online? I use 1Password, it's definitely not a typo! These things should happen to the beta team, not to unsuspecting users.


[2] E.g. it takes ~3 seconds from the start of a task reorder drag+drop until it's fully complete (Safari 11.0.2). And why do all the other tasks reload visually in the planner? It's nearly 2018! Makes the app feel flakey, which puts people off. We've all been spoilt by the excellent implementation of worse ideas :p

Hi,


We appreciate your time coming forward to share your feedback with the app.


Our team is continuously working on improving the interface and adding functions to Weekplan.I'll be glad to share this with the dev team and our founder.

Avatar
timlloyd
Quote from Ana Loraine

Hi there!


You should be able to use this when you have a PRO plan or Ultimate plan. May we have your email address so we can check?

I have the Pro plan, and can use the feature, now that I know how to enable it.


As stated above, my problem was that it's not clear how to enable it.


Here's what happens:

- Log in

- Go to Account Settings

- Go to Premium Features

- See Focus Timer ... think ... "yes, that'll be useful"

- Enable it

- Go back to the Planner

- ... "hmmm, it's not available"

- Search the forum - see that at one point it hadn't been implemented in v2 yet, and assume that's still the case

- ... etc.


Should I have explored the Extensions panel, not knowing what hides inside it? Perhaps. If I had, I'd have noticed that the Focus Timer has to be enabled there as well, before it can be used.


Should the UI be designed so that such confusions don't arise in the first place? IMO, yes.


Weekplan is a frustrating app. The core concept is excellent, but beyond the main planner page the implementation is disappointingly haphazard :(


Todoist and Things 3 are examples of much better UI design and information hierarchy, but are based on the GTD approach which doesn't work for my professional time management (Todoist gets close). So I'll put up with Weekplan's oddities in spite of the worse design :)


I don't know how many users you have at the moment, or how many try it vs actually stick with it. I am very confident that you'd have many more if the UI design was cleaned up, reliability sorted out [1], the UI made snappier [2], made a bit prettier, and the mobile app brought in line (there are so many differences it's borderline unusable as a supplement to the web app).


There are so many 'productivity' apps out there and many of them are essentially the same. Weekplan is different, and needed. More people need it than are going to use it in its current form. Someone else will catch on eventually (e.g. Enulus Feather isn't too far off for iOS).


Sorry for the rant! I'll try to put together some proper feedback another day, and post in a new thread.


[1] It's disconcerting that some things can appear to have been lost when updates are rolled out. This happened to me and I nearly stopped using Weekplan as a result. I've seen other reports on this forum too. I also frequently get hangs and have to delete my browser cache (will log a bug separately once I find a recipe). Why do I sometimes get a 'type error' when attempting to sign in online? I use 1Password, it's definitely not a typo! These things should happen to the beta team, not to unsuspecting users.


[2] E.g. it takes ~3 seconds from the start of a task reorder drag+drop until it's fully complete (Safari 11.0.2). And why do all the other tasks reload visually in the planner? It's nearly 2018! Makes the app feel flakey, which puts people off. We've all been spoilt by the excellent implementation of worse ideas :p

Avatar
Ana Loraine
  • Under review
Quote from timlloyd

Just a note to say that, IMO, it's highly unintuitive that we must enable the feature in our plan and then turn it on in a different place.


This may be stating the obvious, but I would expect it to be available as soon as it's selected in Account Settings > Premium Features. Are they 'features' or 'extensions'? Sub-optimal UI IMO.

Hi there!


You should be able to use this when you have a PRO plan or Ultimate plan. May we have your email address so we can check?

Avatar
timlloyd

Just a note to say that, IMO, it's highly unintuitive that we must enable the feature in our plan and then turn it on in a different place.


This may be stating the obvious, but I would expect it to be available as soon as it's selected in Account Settings > Premium Features. Are they 'features' or 'extensions'? Sub-optimal UI IMO.

Avatar
Ana Loraine
  • Not a bug
Avatar
Ana Loraine
Quote from timlloyd

Great news, thanks! :)

You are most welcome : )