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Put Things Off, an app by Spiffing Apps, is available for US$2.99 at the App Store.
Once you've set up MobileMe, Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) Sync or any other syncing service to wirelessly coordinate a desktop calendar to the Calendar app on the iPhone, it's easy to start entrusting your every waking task short of heartbeat and respiration to a "ding!" and a pop-up notice. Instead of just remembering to do things using your frail, gooey little brain, you can hand it over to the phone, forget about it, and just do what it tells you to do every time the chime goes off.
However, despite Calendar having saved me quite a few times in matters concerning rent, insurance payments and birthdays, it's an imperfect system when it comes to making to-do lists of tasks that need to get done eventually, just not necessarily right away.
The iPhone does also come with a Notes app, but that one barely edges out a pen and a piece of paper in terms of features and functions. Several specialized to-do list apps can be found in the App Store, one of which is Put Things Off.
Procrastinators: The Leaders of Tomorrow
With a name like "Put Things Off," this app sounds like it was tailor-made for slackers and lazy people. Not so. Slackers and lazy people, by definition, lack motivation to plan for, organize and actually do things. Maybe it's a character flaw, or maybe it's a sort of Zen virtue, but it's not the kind of thing Put Things Off is made for.
Instead, Put Things Off is best for really busy people who need an easy way to manage tasks, figure out which ones need immediate attention, and put the rest on the back burner without abandoning them completely.
The app is laid out as a set of four wooden boxes like you'd find on an actual desk: Inbox, Today, Put Off and Done. Hit the "+" sign in the upper right corner to create a new task. You can either assign a specific due date, or save it in your Inbox with no date assigned. Giving it a due date of today saves it in your Today box, and any date in the future sends it over to you Put Off box. When the date changes at midnight, everything with a due date for today gets moved to the Today box.
So far, this sounds like nothing that can't be done in Calendar, but there's one feature that makes it stand out a little. Any to-do item can be immediately put off using a single button press. Its due date will be set back anywhere from one to 31 days (you can set this default number of days in the setup menu), and it'll pop back into your Today box when the new, procrastinated date rolls around.
Sure, when you get a reminder in Calendar, you can view it, edit it and assign a new time. Put Things Off's approach just lets you do that a little easier. Choose the tasks that need immediate attention; save the rest for later without risk of losing them. Things will only be trashed when you actively throw them away.
Wake Me Up on Thursday, Please
Graphically, Put Things Off is well-polished. The developers could have easily made the UI very bare-bones and still kept the functionality, but instead it has some good animation and a nice wooden desk background with off-white note paper. Even the icon looks nice, which is something I wish more developers would pay attention to. It's a detail, it's minor, and it won't turn a poorly designed app into a good one, but if you have a good app, why make the icon look lousy?
Unfortunately, there is no landscape typing mode.
I also wonder whether this app might be improved by adding some sort of time-of-day element to the mix. Put Things Off is more polite than Calendar because it won't barge in and remind you of what you need to do with a chime and a message at the moment you set it for. Instead, you have to actively open the app each day to see what's on the agenda. Sometimes, though, I need to be barged in on, I need a wake-up call, and adding the option to make any task buzz in and demand your attention at a given time on its set due date would be very helpful, as long as you could still use that Put Off function.
It wouldn't even need to be as active as a beep and a pop-up. Apps like Mail, App Store, Facebook, and lots of others use a little red badge in the upper right-hand corner to notify you of items in need of attention. Perhaps Put Things Off could use one of those for its Today list.
Bottom Line
Against Notes, Put Things Off is a superior app for the purpose of making to-do lists. Against, Calendar, though, it leaves something to be desired, especially if your Calendar is set to wirelessly sync with your Google, Yahoo (Nasdaq: YHOO) or iCal calendar.
Perhaps, then, Put Things Off is made for the serious taskmaster who will religiously check today's goings-on every morning and does not need a beep and a pop-up missive. If that's you, and you want a way to easily save tasks for later without deleting and re-entering them for a different date, Put Things Off might possibly be worth the $3.
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