Show HN: My first web app, DailyDo.it
dailydo.it
dailydo.it
Anyway, you might want to make the "team" thing stand out in a different way, if you're hoping to capture people interested in group features.
Impressive, to put it mildly.
What you've made is interesting, but what is even more interesting is how you managed to do all this in such a terribly short time, I think there will be plenty of people interested in the 'making of' of this neat little website.
1. What resources did you use to learn PHP/MySQL/jQuery in three weeks?
2. How are you handling passwords in the database?
I'm a chemistry major spending the summer learning to code, so this is all a learning experience. It's only been about 3 weeks so I'm happy to have gotten something functional out of it. I'm really hoping to get some good feedback from HN.
The about page on DailyDo.it genuinely describes what I set out to make. I have spent 3 years in university trying to keep track of everything I have to do; the result is usually a big mess of tasks on notepaper, my whiteboard, post-it notes, etc. I've tried using online versions, but they all seem so complicated and messy, which is the opposite of what I want. DailyDo.it is meant to be as simple as possible - the challenge of maintaining simplicity was certainly a surprise, but I think it worked out well enough.
As for the next steps, I'm aiming to have the team version (http://dailydo.it/about/team) up and running very soon. This will be a paid service that allows teams of people to share and collaborate on their tasks.
How did you code the PHP and MySQL? Was this straight into notepad or did you use a template/tool?
Like others, really interested how you picked up the skills so quickly.
As for anyone who was in my position (limited coding knowledge and not a pro-designer) I would definitely recommend starting from a cheap themeforest design and building up on that. Also, start small and focus. The idea of DailyDo.it was actually conceived last year, but I tried to do way too much with it, and ultimately it amounted to nothing of value. Just piles of bad designs and funky, non-functioning UI, never mind getting to code. This summer I started from scratch (which cleared my mind up), plus I was able to focus on it full-time, and everything just kind of clicked.
I think I just used the word "focus" three times in this post. That's the key. :)
I hear there's a nice one in San Francisco.
1.Firstly i would suggest move the task-input field to top instead of bottom. It would be much more intuitive . 2.Take the logo out of whole task window if possible. It's kind of distracting as of now. 3.Kill color from background and make it neutral. Give attention to task area as much as possible.
I think the problem with the background is that it's messy. You could go with a solid color. Textures are very popular right now and could go well with your design for a clean look. The 'about | team | philosophy' stuff really belongs at the bottom.
As far as login/register. I'd put a login panel (username/password) with a sign-up button on it. Don't make people go to another page to do that.
Congrats, great work. Out of curiousity, how long did you spend learning?
If you are building something to make money, then sure go with lean startup principles and A/B it to death. If you are building something as an act of creation, or as a tool that you want to use, and especially if you are building something that has been done 1000x before, trust your own insights and not those of strangers on a talk board.
Being different (not arbitrarily different mind you, but insightfully different) is a huge and uncommon differentiator, and can led you in amazing directions if you stay true to it.
GO WITH YOUR GUT!
The logo, yes, I'd put it above the white window, by the menu side.
Maybe fix the logo and navigation to the top of the page.
I have used many to-do lists and liked the way you stated that this is not a to-do list, but a do-it list. This gives a feel that the task won't remain undone. And of all the to-do apps I used, I realized later that the ones I have stayed with for longer times are comparatively better looking than the ones I never cared to give a second visit. So, good looking site is a definite plus.
Good luck.
Project management / todos / time tracking / and so on are often chided as being oversaturated markets. The fact is: lots and lots of people need these things, they can help increase people's income and happiness, and there's no "right" way to do it. Todo list apps are one of those arena's that can do very well financially if you target the right kind of user.
(Even if this really never makes you any money, and considering this is what you've been able to do without much real world experience, you will have no issue finding work.)
FTFY
I love being able to drag around the notes on the "future" tab, it makes it easy to cluster tasks without lots of UI overhead. However I don't see why I can't do the same thing with today's tasks. I also can't send a task to the future tab and vice versa.
In the UI, it would be helpful if a user's email address is shown in the top right or somehow otherwise provide (obvious) confirmation that the registration worked.
I would add a "today" button in your calendar popup, so a task can quickly be moved to today.
1) get people to interact with the app straight away (aka. lazy registration)
2) keep words away from the homepage, they can go in the /about page
3) get a design
Lazy registration is also a good idea probably. I never once built anything that used any registration and I'm embarrassed to say I'm not sure how it works. I'm sure 5 minutes on Google would get me going though.
Only one suggestion for usability -- autofocus the "Add a task" input on page load, so the user can begin typing without an extra click upon arrival (think Google.) I think this convention works well with any app which expects text input as its immediate feature
As a compromise I implemented arrow key functionality. The down arrow focuses the input field when you're on the Daily tab. The left and right keys also scroll between days/months. I realize that at this point there is absolutely no indication of those features on the site, so consider it an Easter Egg for now. :)