ProductiveFirefox

As promised, here’s the latest update. It’s kind of an interim to 2.1, but roughly here is what has improved:

* More robust. Preview and other functions should work consistently. It should also load properly everytime.
* Lighter. Load time has been improved; less resource intensive as it runs.
* Preview multiple messages in a thread - you can now scroll between them.
* The UI has changed for adding/removing labels, using much tidier drop downs.
* Pre-labelling has been temporarily disabled. Might sneak this back in during a patch update.

So what is still to do? Well, the UI hasn’t been given enough attention. I hope to (pay a professional to) fix that up, but it will be during the 2.1 beta period. Other than that, it’s pressing on to 2.1.

A quick recap since there will be some new faces here, of things that aren’t so obvious about GTDInbox:

* You can right click labels and names to get a menu with additional browsing/retrieval options.
* You can double click the GTD icon in the inbox/search-results, and it will archive the message (double right click will delete it).
* You can ‘bump’ a message using the regular Gmail drop-down when viewing a thread/conversation. This will send a message back to the top of your inbox.
* In the inbox (or search results), when you right click to bring up the Preview box, if you double click a status label, it will apply it and then archive the message. So, you can right click to bring the Preview up, then double click Action to mark it as an action and archive it.

I also want to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has written and donated. I’m still trying to balance my time better, and haven’t been able to reply to everyone; but every message has been read. I will endeavour to get back to everyone eventually, but - as we no doubt all know! - emails tend to come in faster than they get dealt with. GTDInbox should really do some magic for that

Ok, so here it is: GTDInbox 2.0.9b1
How to install? You need to open the file with Firefox (either download it to your computer first, or just open it direct from this page); and Firefox should begin the install straight away.

I’m going to Cornwall this weekend for two days of rest, but I’ll be back on Monday and I’ll upload to Mozilla then (with any issues dealt with!). You may wish to wait until then to get it (it will update automatically).

Hi everyone,

I gather Gmail has fluttered and broken 2.0.8.4 for some people (and probably more to follow!). It’s not yet affecting me, so if anyone is affected and can help me fix it, please send an email (with screenshots!). It would be super helpful if you also feel confident testing extensions.

2.1 has had a temporary set-back, purely due to my crazy time constraints, but it’s still very much in progress. Amongst other things - like better contact handling, file lookups, better UI, etc - it also fixes the problems with Auto-Labelling and Preview that afflict some users in the 2.0.* range (a total re-write).

As 2.1 is still at least two weeks away; I’m proposing to release a 2.0.9 that will be a bit of a step back, but should be more stable. It will (temporarily) disable auto-labelling, attempt to patch up Previewing, and fix whatever the current issue that is affecting some users.
I appreciate it’s a pain to experience a loss of functionality, but to make up for it I will share the very first preview of 2.1 with all of us on the blog and in the forum the second it becomes remotely stable.

I have asked one of the really helpful guys inside Gmail to see if I can get priority access to Gmail updates; which means I’ll feel any GTDInbox problems the second they happen (rather than facing a lag, like I do now).

Eta for 2.0.9: Friday 18th July!
Please do get in touch if you’re suffering problems and feel confident helping me tackle them!

Andy

“Erk”, is all I can say right now. Please read on!

Yesterday I started to spot forum/email and chat messages indicating a new Gmail change sweeping through the userbase. The problem was most irritatingly manifesting itself as the Welcome screen reappearing. With the help of Harvey Bock, Frank Schneider and as ever, Paul Thompson aka Captbunzo (who went as far as to give me access to his Gmail, which was key in fixing the problems!), the Welcome screen issue is now resolved.

So that’s the good. The bad is, it would appear that for the most part, Preview/Auto-Label has died. I’m not sure why this is yet, but I’ll begin looking into this in earnest over the coming days. I’m concerned, though, that it is serious, ugly even….

You see GTDInbox 2.1 has been steadily progressing for over a month now. It’s much much more useful, but it relies more heavily than ever on close access to Gmail. I’m deeply unsettled that the thing that has broken 2.0.8.2 has broken 2.1, and isn’t in anyway easy to remedy

So here we are. Please download 2.0.8.4 to deal with the Welcome Screen, and wish me luck while I set about figuring out how to resurrect Preview/Auto-Label and ultimately 2.1.

In what must surely be MeeTimer’s first update in a year (it has its problems, but I’m impressed it’s lasted that long without a hiccup - that puts GTDInbox firmly in its place!), it’s had the necessary surgery to make it work with Firefox 3.

You can download it directly here (click MeeTimer 0.22), or wait for Mozilla to update it on their servers.

Several months ago a good lad called Abhijeet Mukherjee got in touch to ask for a little help promoting his then brand new blog, http://www.jeetblog.com/. I was genuinely impressed with the lengths he’d gone to to finance it and the effort he put into it, and pencilled him in for a blog post to give him a little boost

However, time conspired against me and it kept slipping back & back, and so this is a very belated effort on my part! The good news is JeetBlog has been flying along on its own, so he doesn’t really need this

Regardless, as a fellow GTDInboxer, a fellow striver, and someone who cares deeply about productivity, I hope the audience here will find the tips & material at JeetBlog enlightening! All the best Abhijeet.

Over the last few weeks I’ve been squeezing in functionality updates where I can; and something interesting is starting to happen… GTDInbox feels like it has undergone a ’step change’ improvement, and it’s noticeably more powerful. So, the next release will be 2.1, and I hope it’ll be the last major visible design modification GTDInbox has (of existing features).

I’m not quite sure when it will be ready - the development version is a pretty ugly right now! But I’m hoping soon. I’m aware that in recent releases GTDInbox has continued to essentially be a beta product, and is still a little rough around the edges (although I like to think it’s getting better!). So, as of 2.1, I want to properly split GTDInbox into 2 streams - a ’stable’ release stream, and a ‘development’ release stream. So people who want to experiment and take risks with it can; and those who just want a peaceful existence can do so more easily. (Props to captbunzo for busting my chops on this).

As 2.1 begins to stabilise, I’ll start doing some previews of the new functionality - I hope you can wait until then!

I actually forgot in the last post about some other new features I added, both found when viewing a thread/conversation…

Reply to Self (found near the ‘Reply’ box)
Clicking this will send the reply you’re writing to yourself, specifically, to the end of the thread. It’s used to add detail to existing tasks, or to add private notes to discussions you’re having with other people.

Bump (found in ‘More Actions’ drop down)
This is a quick way to add a blank reply to the thread, causing the message to jump back to being the first item in your inbox. It’s a useful way to ‘retrieve’ a message that is sinking into your inbox.

Ok, I was lucky (which meant Sarah was good enough to grant me time off for good behaviour) to sneak some extra hours into GTDInbox, to compensate for the time lost to handling clients. And I’m even more pleased to say, this is a pretty big update.

Most significantly, the contentious Dashboard has been removed. Many of you said it took too much space; so I replaced it with a drop down menu instead (props to Paul Thompson/captbunzo for further refining the UI design). Next, I made Reviews (aka saved searches) fully customisable - and even use some special sauce not normally available in Gmail (such as relative time to the current date) - so you can create your own. Finally - and perhaps most significantly for many of you - we finally patched up problems with other addons (and added some advanced options to make sure that you have greater control over GTDInbox’s behaviour in future).

Oh, and the single coolest addition? You can double click stuff! So, when processing your inbox, you can double click the GTD icon (on each row) to Finish it and double right click to Delete it (or shift + double left click to Delete it).
And when you toggle labels using GTDInbox (e.g. add S/Action to a thread), if you double click rather than single click, it’ll toggle the label and then auto-archive it. So you add project/context/reference labels, then double click on S/Action to apply the status and move it out your inbox.

You can download from http://gtdinbox.com/#install or download direct from (http://gtdinbox.com/gtdinbox_2-0-8-1.xpi).

(Additional props go to Máté Rémiás who was very helpful in pre-release testing and pinpointing problems with other addons - cheers Máté!).

Update #1 01/05/2008
Hold on to your horses! It looks like there is a small glitch here where the default Reviews are not added (+ Betty is having some Label display problems I’m investigating). 2.0.8.1 will roll shortly…

Update #2 01/05/2008
Okay,  2.0.8.1 is ready. Sorry to those of you who just downloaded 2.0.8, I only noticed the glitch when Betty emailed!

Just a quick note to apologise for the fact I’ve not been in the forum as often as I would have liked, or rather, I’ve not been talking as much as normal. I have been listening! The reason is simply that time is really tight at the moment, and I’ve been using every spare minute to actually work on GTDInbox, which will pay off with the very imminent 2.0.8…

It’s no secret that I think GTDInbox and RememberTheMilk work well together, with GTDInbox providing much needed structure and faster handling to the inbox; and RememberTheMilk for general tasks.

However, it seems our two addons fight over the same bit of territory in Gmail. Prior to 2.0.7, that meant GTDInbox lost out, and for affected users Preview/AutoLabel would not work. I thought I’d fixed it in 2.0.7, and indeed, I made GTDInbox more stable; but broke RTM in the process.

I’ve emailed RTM several times to try and resolve this. GTDInbox is open source, but RTM encrypts their code. Therefore I’m very much fighting the issue blind. Unfortunately, right now RTM do not wish to let me look at their code, or nor does it seem fixing the issue is a high priority for them. I hope this will change, but regardless, with the release of an improved Gmail API all problems should vanish anyway.

In the meantime, as of 2.0.8 (coming soon) I’ve added a new option to GTDInbox. You will be able to choose whether GTDInbox is dominant (and more stable); or whether it plays second fiddle to other addons, making them more likely to work; but at the expense of possibly losing the Preview/AutoLabel features.

I apologise again for the slower rate of development, I still have another few weeks of intense client work - but I managed to squeeze in time over the weekend; so I hope to get the next release out this week!

Update 28/04/2008
John Wilson, a well-known former London VC has a more personal take on this situation over at Remember The Milk’s Gone Sour