Suggestion for new version...
Today and Doit Now features seem very similar to me and very confusing. If something has been added to the "Today" list, then why would you have an additional area within the same list called "Doit Now"? If you have something on your "Today" list then you can prioritize the list based on the Priority level of the task. Having another aspect that is "Doit Now" just complicates things.
It would be much more cleaner, simpler, and intuitive if you changed the "Today" list to just called "Doit Now". It can have all the same attributes of the current Today list but it would allow for all the tasks to be manually sorted. That way you can manually sort the important ones to the top of the list, or sort it with the sort features that exist such as deadline, priority level, start time, etc.
I think by consolidating the "Today" list with "Doit Now" (and thus just having one list called "Doit Now", you have a much more simplistic and intuitive feature set. Actions can be added to the new "Doit Now" list by starring them, or clicking the lightening bolt icon like today, or automatically appear when an Action is due (or past due). A person using the App will review their Next Actions list and select actions they want to work on that meets their specific context or focus needs for any given day and put them on the Doit Now list and then work from that to complete the tasks.
I know that everyone has a different opinion on what the "ideal" system should look like. I just believe that having a Priority setting for an action item (which is a killer feature given that there is color coding), a Today list, and a Doit Now feature just really complicates things and I'm not sure which one I should be working on. By having 1 consolidated list called Doit Now, and the Priority level for a task, should be enough for anyone to be productive and it's extremely intuitive.
Thank you for your consideration.
It is not confusing for me, but I can understand if it is perhaps a bit confusing for others, and agree that the Lightning is not as necessary as Priority and Star, but I do use all three of them, as follows:
- Priority, for me, is a fairly stable setting for each task. It has nothing to do with the order in which i will do the task today. It rather reflects the importance/urgency of the task in a "these next few days" perspective. I use it for review purposes and for tentative task selection purposes on the Next list. http://help.doit.im/group/topic/55. I would not want to mess with the Priority just for changing the task's placement on the Today list (especially if I have to unstar it later; in which case I want it to keep whatever priority it had).
- Starring, for me, means I will tentatively but seriously consider doing something about this particular task today (and if I do not, I will simply unstar it later if I discover that I will need to do something else instead). I usually keep my Today list sorted by "main context" (context), and within each context I will often have starred tasks that match each other in terms of "minor context" (tag) such that they can be done efficiently at the same time.
- Doit Now, for me, means I will actually do these tasks right now (e.g. a few errands). By placing them at the top where I can see them it is easy to check them off afterwards. I do not have to change the sorting order or anything, and it is totally reversible, too, if I get interrupted - if I remove the Lightning the task will jump right back to where it was. I like it very much.