The request:
I would like to try a calendar / task manager app where e.g. you have a default list of time blocks of different sizes unscheduled in a panel, and each week you drop them into your calendar. Does such an app exist? The ones I’ve seen either repeat blocks inside the calendar with no option to keep an unscheduled list, which means they’re already scheduled (doesn’t help if you have a meeting clash, but also it means when you have a full week it’s not easy to review what will have to be dropped), or expect you to create new blocks from scratch each week (unnecessary admin), or only let you plan by day (no good).
Ideally such an app will sync with existing calendars (GCal and iCal for me), and be available in MacOS and iOS (I possibly can live without the latter, if a MacOS version is amazing).
I know I’ve been vocal about being anti-subscription and anti-locked format, but I suspect I can’t have those principles for this app, so for now I will look at anything.
If someone has a cool workaround for an existing app that doesn’t offer this out of the box, I am interested in that too.
The detail:
I’m changing role slightly at work, and we’re re-focussing my time on “priority” projects. The only way I could see to deliver this fairly for the different people I work with is to schedule X hours per week to a project. I have mapped out what a week therefore needs to look like in terms time blocks, and ideally I’d now like some kind of calendar app that allows me each week to drag these blocks from my “default list” plan and fit them into my calendar around my meetings.
What I’ve already looked at:
Noteplan - I currently use this as my task manager. Doesn’t provide a week view. Even if it did, time blocks have to be scheduled one at a time as far as I’ve noticed.
iCal - I can set recurring time blocks in a calendar but they’re always scheduled - there’s no way to keep a list of time blocks and drop them in each week. I’m wary of going down this route (have done it previously) because it’s hard to assess the week and see what’s missing.
BusyCal - same as iCal with regards to this request - no option to maintain a list of blocks you can drop in.
SuperPlanner - seems to offer the list function I am after, but doesn’t offer a week to view, which is essential (possibly the closest I’ve seen though)
Excel - haha this wasn’t a serious consideration, but I was trying to think outside the box of what apps might be used to present visual information in a structured format. If computers didn’t exist, you could for example do this with a whiteboard of a week and post-its. Each week you’d just move the post-its to the available time slots.
I’ve not seen an app that does this, but it seems like something a small niche group of people might need and it might exist? So I’m hoping you great folk have spotted something in the wilds!
If memory serves well, Amazing Marvin could allow you to schedule time blocks arbitrarily (you drop them in a weekly calendar) and inside these time blocks a smart list of tasks (selected by project, tag, etc.) would be available for you to complete. And 2-way calendar sync works with Google Calendar.
The main caveat with AM is that it is extremely deep so it’s easy to get lost and while you can pick and choose some features (“strategies” as they call it) the interface is not exactly attractive and the mobile app is useable for basic task management and inbox capture but it’s mainly desktop centric.
I think Fantastical might be worth a look, although it clashes with your stance about subscriptions. However:
“you have a default list of time blocks of different sizes unscheduled in a panel, and each week you drop them into your calendar.” I can see a few ways to do this in Fantastical. You can use templates that are specific to calendars and have specific periods of time associated with them. I think templates are on a per task basis, rather than for a week, however. This app also has good Shortcuts support, so I could imagine using Shortcuts to drop a whole week of blocks on a calendar, although I’ve never done it.
I time block myself and much of my week is the same with some variability, so typically I just copy and paste much of last week’s blocks on to the upcoming week and then fine tune the rest of the schedule, and that works for me. (You mentioned admin, but that copying-and-pasting of tasks takes seconds.) But you could have a separate ‘template’ calendar you draw upon to do this with your preferred blocks. Just an idea. Per my settings, my time blocking calendar set is mostly something separate from the calendars that I use for actual events and periods when I’m busy, and without going into too much detail, I think this allows for flexibility in terms of the schedule/unscheduled distinction you mentioned.
I originally used Fantastical to combine Google, MS Exchange, and iCal in one, so syncing with existing calendars works fine. (I now combine Google and iCal calendars without problem.)
The Mac version is slightly more robust and/or takes advantage of OSX features that iOS lacks, but basically the different versions of the app have parity.
Darn it. That video on the page you’ve linked to looks almost perfect for what I’d like. I couldn’t click with Amazing Marvin when I tested it before, I think it was just a bit too complicated for me - there were a lot of menus and settings and buttons. I don’t mind complicated apps (I use DT ), but the basic UI needs to be clean and simple and I struggled with using Amazing Marvin a bit. When I reviewed it previously I was also reviewing it as a task manager (rather than a time manager) and the lack of feature parity across MacOS and iOS was an issue.
I’m not sure I actually want to change task manager, I have a good system going in NotePlan. I was thinking I’d be using the new app only for scheduling my time.
Thank you for the Fantastical suggestion, it’s really helpful. The templates function in particular is interesting, I’m surprised more calendar apps haven’t developed this actually because many of us probably have ad-hoc repeating meetings that it would make sense to template rather than write from scratch!
Does Fantastical have a function that shows you how your scheduled time is distributed? GCal, for example, shows you a pie chart of your week by colour/type of meeting, and I noticed in the video @pantulis linked to that Amazing Marvin also shows how the week’s schedule is broken down. I currently have a BusyCal subscription, which doesn’t offer this function.
Following your comment I remembered that you can drag and drop items from Apple’s Reminders into iCal, so I am wondering whether to have a list in Reminders of time blocks, which I can then drop into iCal each week. (The immediate problem I hit when I tested it was over-scheduling my week and not noticing, hence my question whether Fantastical offers any time analysis.)
Look at Amazing Marvin. You can make time block templates and apply them each week and then drop tasks into the blocks. Crazy steep learning curve. Start by only turning on one or two “Strategies” and only add more as you need them.
Does Fantastical have a function that shows you how your scheduled time is distributed?
Basically, no, although you might write them and ask about that to nudge them in that direction. However, for what it’s worth, I time block my weeks and have a dedicated time blocking calendar set for that, and I use colors for different areas of my life, so when I look my time blocking calendar, I do see how time is distributed by area. (If I was really into this, I might create a Shortcut that combined Fantastical templates with time tracking in Timery/toggl, and then I could see those two things aligned. But that’s a bit of extra work!)
Following your comment I remembered that you can drag and drop items from Apple’s Reminders into iCal, so I am wondering whether to have a list in Reminders of time blocks, which I can then drop into iCal each week.
I don’t really use Reminders, but in Fantastical you can have Reminders show up (or not) in your calendars. It’s pretty customizable like you could have specific calendar sets incorporate specific lists of tasks from Reminders, while others don’t.
I’ve never used Amazing Marvin, so I can’t really comment on that, but I can say that everything I’ve described above wouldn’t have much a learning curve to do in Fantastical.
), but the basic UI needs to be clean and simple and I struggled with using Amazing Marvin a bit. When I reviewed it previously I was also reviewing it as a task manager (rather than a time manager) and the lack of feature parity across MacOS and iOS was an issue.