Habits. Next Action.

We often want to share the next new functionality with you so greatly that we do so not checking everything is ok :). That what happened when we uploaded the new version yesterday. The new update, among traditional general UI enhancements, have added a functionality which many will love - the Next Action. We released it quickly and had not noticed there was small problem. Thanks to you, we fixed shortly after - Thank You!

Next Action.

The new functionality is about your actions ordering. Usually, you place them by priority in the order you want to do.

Current sorting algorithm is as follows:
+ first actions are sorted by square: 1 -> 2 -> 3 -> 4 (or, color: blue -> red -> green -> orange);
+ next actions are separated into done / not done;
+ next they are sorted by explicit priority set: A -> B -> C -> D -> E -> F -> 'unset priority';
+ next they are sorted by goal - whichever goal was added first, its action come closer to the top;

This is how it has been working for long, just giving the details. Such system helps you manage your projects/actions by setting the natural order of the actions you want.

Now, when working on a set of related actions (usually, sub-actions of the same project or just a list of actions within a goal), what happened when you had just finished an action and checked it as done? You had to return to the goal, then again to the list of actions to see what action to do next? That required enough extra clicking to make you tired :).

So, we tried to enhance this process, first, by letting you go straight to the next action from the goal page - you could click on the Progress bar (where the Do the next text is)  and it would take you to the first action in the list of actions. If you wanted to see the whole list of actions, you just needed to click on the 'Action(s): 5 (view)' label.

Further improving this functionality, we've added the 'Next Action' notion to the Action page:

On the Action page, if you mark the action as done, the app will check if you have a next action to do and will let you go to it by clicking on the appropriate button. This frees you from a lot of extra going back and forward to see what you have to do.

Your next action is usually the action that comes next on the list at the same level - next undone action of the same goal  as current's, or next undone action for the same parent as current's. Habits will check what is next and will lead you there.

The next action feature will feel so natural to you, once tried, that you'll think you needed it all the time. I know it may sound a bit over-confident, but it is how we feel after using it ourselves :).

Navigation.

We've also added the sliding navigation menu to the main program pages. Using it you can quickly go to the Home page, the Notes or the Add Note pages. It will further be enhanced and more shortcuts will be added. The menu is triggered by clicking on the app icon in the top-left corner on those pages (the so-called home button on the action bar)

       

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Finally, we want to thank you for all the feedback you give us, the reports, letters you send, posts you write  - they are invaluable! Thanks to them we can quickly fix the problems, just as we did with this Next action early release - thanks to the error report we received! And we greatly appreciate your ratings on the play store, too!

Habits early access

Experimenting with some elements of the navigation, menu, colors + some nice new features. If anyone wants to try out the new stuff ahead of others in the Play Store, write us :) Traditionally, the number of early accessers is limited to 10.

Update + On Ads III.

This update doesn't fix much in terms of functionality or add any new features. It is mainly about the ads (sure you've guessed :) ).

As we wrote before, some users find the ads distracting and have asked for an ad-free paid version of the app. We'll release such version soon. And, as the first step, we've decided to improve the current version to make them less obtrusive:

+ we've moved all the ad bars to the bottom of the screens, where they are least seen;

+ we've completely removed the ads from the Action and FTF pages - the pages, we guess, used the most;

+ have removed the ad bar from the help screen.

We now think the app is much more useable and some of those you didn't want to see them at all might change their minds.

If you think there's more can be done (besides releasing a paid-version), we'll be happy to hear. By the way, we ourselves use the ad-version of the app, found them distracting and feel better now, too :).

Habits: Action saving on top of the screen

Have modified the Save/Cancel functionality of the Action page - moved the buttons to the top of the screen when editing the action (name and/or details). Now you can save it would first hiding the keyboard. Update is in the store, will be out soon. Enjoy!