Develop Bugs

Tasks (To-dos) & Notes in WP7

As far as I can work out, WP7 will not support Outlook Notes and Tasks (To-Dos) or the synchronization of Notes & Tasks.
As I understand it, synch of email, calendar & contacts will happen via your Windows Live account (Windows Live will be an Exchange server soon), which can then synch to Outlook using the Windows Live Connector, but Notes and Tasks are absent from this setup.
There will be no native Notes or Tasks apps on WP7. There will be One Note, but that's a different animal and you have to purchase the PC version to be able to see your OneNotes on your PC.
Unfortunately, for me at least, Tasks is the app I use most on my phone. Since WM5.0, Microsoft crippled Tasks by removing the ability to filter out Tasks with a future Start Date, so I moved to using Pocket Informant which provides this essential feature.
Pocket Informant will not be developed for WM7 if news I've read on the Net is correct. This may be partly due to WM7 having no Tasks database, thus forcing any developer to create their own database engine for Tasks, and in any case there would be no synch with Outlook.
If all this is true, it will prevent me from moving over to WM7. My personal and business life revolve around my task list and I'd be lost without it.
Does anyone have any more information on this, especially any that shows me to be wrong?

Don't know about tasks and notes, but you can connect to any Exchange account you want.

http://www.ahead-app.com/

vangrieg said:
http://www.ahead-app.com/
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impressive app!
clear, simple! exactly what i need
i hope other apps will be as good as this one (maybe i should start developing wp7 apps too..)

warenbe said:
impressive app!
clear, simple! exactly what i need
i hope other apps will be as good as this one (maybe i should start developing wp7 apps too..)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yes you should

yup but i've no good idea right now

warenbe said:
yup but i've no good idea right now
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
if i think of something ill let you know

That Ahead app is more like a Project manager than a simple task manager. It only seems to support priorities called "Urgent", "Later", which doesn't tie in with Outlook's three priority levels. Also it only supports a due date, but no start date. Start date is really important, as a recurring annual task to get my car MOTed should have a start date of a couple of weeks before its due, so it doesn't appear in my task list all year round. It also needs to support lots of different types of recurrance - yearly, monthly, every weekday, every 2nd Friday of the month etc etc.
Also, Ahead App doesn't do Notes or synch them.
Whilst I appreciate the link, I'm afraid it's not what I'm looking for. All I need is an app that replicates all the functionality of Outlook's Tasks and Notes and synchs them.
I can't believe this functionality, which is present by default in every version of Windows Mobile, will be absent from WP7.
I'm going to keep my fingers crossed these two essentials appear in the final release of WP7, otherwise I'll have to stick with WM6.5 and Pocket Informant until they finally do appear, whenever that may be.

Jim Coleman said:
Whilst I appreciate the link, I'm afraid it's not what I'm looking for.
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Yes, I know. These tasks also won't be synced with Exchange and can't trigger alerts on the phone, so that's not what I need either.
This is very unfortunate, but neither the iPhone nor Android have tasks, so it looks like a trend these days.

tell me if i'm wrong, but with wp7 we will not be able to create an app wich can copy tasks from outlook?
if yes, we have to create a service wich send tasks on internet and then retrieve them on the phone...

Yes, that's right, you will need to install a connector on your desktop to sync tasks with Outlook or have an intermediary server to sync with Exchange for now.

vangrieg said:
This is very unfortunate, but neither the iPhone nor Android have tasks, so it looks like a trend these days.
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Google have started to integrate Tasks into Google Calendar, but thus far it is extremely basic and again doesn't incorporate Start Dates. But I think the direction Google is moving in is to incorporate Tasks into Android and use Exchange Synch.
Notes is another issue though.
IPhone is.......well, let's just skip over that one.

Jim Coleman said:
Google have started to integrate Tasks into Google Calendar
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Actually, Microsoft has done that already on Live Calendar, so maybe that's the direction they'll go with WP7, too. When I asked the Office guy directly about Tasks he said "can't comment at this time".

The Answer to Outlook Tasks and Notes
The Answer to Outlook Tasks and Notes
is
1)wait for WP7 Windows Phone 7 to get up to speed
2) WM6.5 Windows Mobile 6.5
run it on as fast a processor as possible (like maybe the HD2)
(no keyboard but you can get used to it)
with as big a display as possible, again the HD2 (same pixels as the tilt2 but more room)
the latest manila / sense, 2.5 ish is now nice and the vendors are supporting the download
co0kies home today v2 is looking very nice, tasks on the home screen.
we who use Outlook for calendar, contacts, notes, tasks
have a single app sync, and we want it not to go away.
maybe we can live with getting exchange accounts, but we're really hoping for a wm7 windows phone 7 activesync.
until this gets in shape . . .
we wait.
looking @ manila/sense with co0kies home today on a fast cpu with a big display,
we're not waiting in that much pain . . .

After almost 17 years on AT&T I moved to T-Mobile
I just got so tired of AT&T lagging on the vendor relationships with HTC and Microsoft.
I upgraded the TILT2 to the latest rom so that I could Finally get tasks on the home page
(I am a long time a complete Outlook user, Requiring Notes, Task, Calendar, Contacts, with a single simple complete sync to the phone).
Co0kies Home Today 2 is marvelous!
The rom started crashing every few hours
CHT put manilla/sense over the memory edge.
it too 45 seconds for manilla to return from sending an sms.
AT&T has no solution.
The HD2 has no keyboard (something i was very worried about)
I dove in.
WHAT A CHAMP this HD2 is.
clock Twice the speed of the Tilt2
tons more memory
a screen of a size fitting the number of pixels available
and after a few days, guess what . . . i am over my keyboard phobia ! ! !
phone number xfer in just a few of hours.
knock on wood, nice transition so far!
only irritating thing is tmomail.net
seems too eager to convert to MMSs, just because they're over 160 bytes.
(small point, that)

[Q] Syncing Tasks on Outlook and Exchange with OneNote on WP7?

So it looks like there is no way to sync Tasks from Outlook on the Desktop or from an Exchange Server to Outlook in WP7
I'm looking for a solution and I think that it may be possible to use OneNote for this. However I'm not sure if OneNote on WP7 will support Tasks; also I'm not sure of what will be required elsewhere for this to happen.
Firstly does anyone know if OneNote if OneNote on WP7 supports Tasks and Task syncing (with the online version of OneNote)? If it does does anyone know if it will be possible to use the online version of OneNote to sync with Tasks on an Exchange Server and then to OneNote on WP7 or would I need a desktop installation that would sync to my Outlook and then sync online?
Also if anyone has another idea I'd love to hear it
Thanks.

Thats not what onenote is for. Thats why outlook exists. No...
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

I forgot all about tasks and notes
Are they sync'd using Exchange? I don't have my phone yet so don't even know what the phones functionality is in this area

N8ter said:
Thats not what onenote is for. Thats why outlook exists. No...
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App
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This is why Outlook AND OneNote exist on the Desktop but on Windows Phone 7 there is no syncing of Tasks (or Notes) from Outlook/Exchange, even with Exchange 2010.
On the Desktop OneNote does handle Tasks and it can sync Tasks with Outlook, with OneNote on Windows Mobile (although the WM version doesn't really know what to do with anything other than normal text or a list) and with OneNote in The Cloud.
I don't know what the OneNote version on WP7 can do (other than sync with The Cloud) or if it can handles Tasks but I do know that there are no Tasks in Outlook on WP7 or as a separate Microsoft application.
chubnut said:
I forgot all about tasks and notes
Are they sync'd using Exchange? I don't have my phone yet so don't even know what the phones functionality is in this area
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Notes and Tasks in Outlook/Exchange are not synced at all with WP7. This is the problem.
You can transfer your Notes to OneNote and use that rather than Outlook/Exchange for notes and that should sync with the cloud and with your device but I don't know if it will work for Tasks. [I think that you may need the desktop version of OneNote installed to transfer the notes across.]

Thanks for that.
I'm in the process of putting SBS 2008 on one of my machines at home which I think comes with Exchange too. If not I'll bung ES 2010 on there too and do some testing once I stick One Note on the machine.
So there are no tasks at all on WP7?

chubnut said:
Thanks for that.
I'm in the process of putting SBS 2008 on one of my machines at home which I think comes with Exchange too. If not I'll bung ES 2010 on there too and do some testing once I stick One Note on the machine.
So there are no tasks at all on WP7?
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Yes, SBS 2008 comes with Exchange but that is Exchange 2007. Exchange 2010 has a lot of new features but one that is of most interest to me is that it can finally sync Notes OTA via ActiveSync to a client, which would be perfect... if WP7 supported it.
There is a beta program for the next release of SBS, which includes Exchange 2010.
As for Tasks, no there are no Tasks in WP7 at the moment and no information as to if or when they will be added. You should be able to use OneNote on WP7 for Tasks as long as it has been improved over the Office Mobile 2010 version.
BTW I'm interested to know if I can search a server using ActiveSync from WP7. Engadget said that you can't but I got the impression that they were using Gmail, which isn't a complete implementation of the features of Exchange so if you have a handset or if you are about to get a handset, I'd love to know.
Thanks

A workaround for Tasks / Todo List users

If, like me, you use Outlook's task (to-do) list, and have upgraded from WM6.5 to WP7, you're probably disappointed that there is no solution for syncing tasks onto an app on your shiny new phone.
I use a workaround that seems to be OK, and will tide me over until proper task syncing comes along, as I'm sure it will soon.
I use Windows Live Mesh to sync a folder on my Pc, containing spreadsheets, to Skydrive. You can navigate to that synced folder on your phone by pointing your browser to http://devices.live.com/Sync, and going into the folder in question. You can pin the page for the folder to your start screen for quick access.
I created a new spreadsheet in the synced folder called Tasks. What I now do is, each morning while munching my breakfast, I review my tasks in Outlook. They're filtered such that only today's tasks show on screen. I press CTRL-A to highlight them all, then CTRL-C to copy them. I then open the Tasks spreadsheet, clear it out and paste all the tasks into the sheet, then close it. Windows Live Mesh then syncs the spreadsheet into Skydrive. I then access it on my phone and save it to the Office hub.
I now have all my tasks for the day in the sheet. I can add filters to the sheet and filter by, say, category, and I can modify the status of each one to add in notes or say it has been done.
Then the following morning while reviewing my tasks over breakfast once more, I start off by looking at the Tasks spreadsheet on my phone and marking up the previous day's tasks as complete, or modifying them as my notes dictate. Then I paste the new day's tasks into the spreadsheet on the PC and the cycle continues.
Have a go, it's not perfect but it's the best I can come up with.
Unless you have a better suggestion?

Thanks, not a bad solution.
Another method would be to copy your list of tasks into the Onenote webapp on skydrive. This can be set up to sync to your phone automatically. So you would avoid having to use live mesh, but you would still have to copy your tasks from outlook into Onenote.
Obviously neither solution is perfect.
I would even settle for a RTM or Producteev app so at least tasks could be synced to the web.

There are a few task apps on the market place. I haven't tried any of them yet but there's several available.

greener88 said:
Thanks, not a bad solution.
Another method would be to copy your list of tasks into the Onenote webapp on skydrive. This can be set up to sync to your phone automatically. So you would avoid having to use live mesh, but you would still have to copy your tasks from outlook into Onenote.
Obviously neither solution is perfect.
I would even settle for a RTM or Producteev app so at least tasks could be synced to the web.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The problem with doing it via OneNote is the tasks have no structure, they're just lines of text. In Excel, the fields go into columns an you can edit them and filter them, which is way more useful. But yeah, you do need Live Mesh.

Ren13B said:
There are a few task apps on the market place. I haven't tried any of them yet but there's several available.
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Yeah but they all use local storage, so you can't sync with your Outlook tasks. Plus, none of them support start dates and/or recurring tasks so they're pretty useless really.

I know that this is not an outlook task based solution, but if you need some sort of task function, get a free remember the milk account then download the WinMilk app.

True MS tasks have start time & end time & reminder. MS says tasks are NOT supported in MP7

"I use a workaround that seems to be OK, and will tide me over until proper task syncing comes along, as I'm sure it will soon."
What makes you think Tasks will come to WM7?

Poppapete said:
"I use a workaround that seems to be OK, and will tide me over until proper task syncing comes along, as I'm sure it will soon."
What makes you think Tasks will come to WM7?
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Tasks are already supported in Windows Live Hotmail, I can sync my WM6.5 device's tasks to it. I would have thought MS would write a tasks app that can sync to that in the same way calendars and contacts do. At the moment they're focussing on consumer stuff, but in the new year I understand they plan to start rolling out business oriented stuff like Skydrive support for Word & Excel, and I'm hoping tasks will feature in there somewhere.

Poppapete said:
True MS tasks have start time & end time & reminder. MS says tasks are NOT supported in MP7
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Can you give me a reference for that assertion?
Plus I think it's obvious they're not supported *now* but have Microsoft made a definitive statement regarding the near future?

karelj said:
I know that this is not an outlook task based solution, but if you need some sort of task function, get a free remember the milk account then download the WinMilk app.
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Just had a look - it's an interesting solution. It's a shame it doesn't support Start Date and the WP7 client doesn't allow repeating tasks to be created though. I'll look into Milksync too.

Tasks / Todos...Progress

There's some progress on the synced Task list front.
Appa Mundi Tasks does at least sync with Exchange Server tasks lists, which is a start. Unfortunately it doesn't support recurring tasks, so you can't use it for your annual MOT or your quarterly VAT return.
Also, strangely, tasks with a start date in the future appear in the list of "Active" tasks, which is just plain wrong.
Anyway, I remain hopeful a tasks app will become available soon which does support recurrances, filters active tasks properly, and syncs with Hotmail tasks so we don't have to purchase an Exchange service online.
Keep your eyes peeled and post on here if you spot anything.
I was looking at Remember the Milk as well but it doesn't support start dates or recurrences either.

Ever try Toodledo?
I used Toodledo when I when from WinMo to iPhone and really needed tasks. It's a terrible web UI, but has a full featured iPhone app that would sync with Outlook tasks. I'm working a WP7 app right now. Not sure what other sync capacity it has, but it's MUCH better than Remember the Milk.

http://photon.funkymule.com/post/photondo-sneak-peek-1.aspx
Keep an eye on that for PhotonDo, it's a task app that syncs with ToodleDo. Then again, why didn't MS allow Live Hotmail to support tasks and we wouldn't have to wait for a tasks app.

Hotmail tasks are pretty bad. Better than Goigle, but nithing comparable to Outlook/Exchange tasks...
Sent from my SGH-T959 using XDA App

Just had a look at toodledo.com and it seems to do what I need. Until Photondo comes out, I can probably handle using the mobile version of the site, toodledo.com/slim
I'm going to import my Outlook tasks to toodledo tonight, and start using it for a bit to see how it goes.
Thanks for the tip.

FYI... I just purchased "To-Do Tasks" in the marketplace. Nice app that seems to be well supported. Synchs with Toodledo perfectly.

Frank_Toronto said:
FYI... I just purchased "To-Do Tasks" in the marketplace. Nice app that seems to be well supported. Synchs with Toodledo perfectly.
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Click to collapse
I imported my outlook tasks to toodledo last night, all looks good. Am downloading To-do Tasks and will give it a spin.
Edit: The trial doesn't support sync so I can't really see how it works. Can you tell me, does it support recurrances and start dates? Doesn't look like it does. Do tasks with a future start date show up on-screen? I need future tasks to be hidden. The upcoming PhotonDo should do all that I think.

Suggest me a Tasks app

What features I need:
Must have a reminder, set date and time
Should be FAST, clean and easy to use.
I tried Todo with alerts. Not very fast, 1 of my task got disappeared, don't know what happened. Overall, its average.
I would prefer an ads-free free version, if available.

lamborg said:
What features I need:
Must have a reminder, set date and time
Should be FAST, clean and easy to use.
I tried Todo with alerts. Not very fast, 1 of my task got disappeared, don't know what happened. Overall, its average.
I would prefer an ads-free free version, if available.
Click to expand...
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If you don't need it to support Exchange, I'd recommend giving "So what's today" a shot. It's clean, easy to use and gets the job perfectly done.

What Im missing here? You have integrated tasks in your calendar where you can set reminder?

Loco5150 said:
What Im missing here? You have integrated tasks in your calendar where you can set reminder?
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Thats what I use. Love it.

I also use the calendar to do list. Works great! Integrated reminders, etc.

stock calendar app?

svtfmook said:
stock calendar app?
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Yes the calendar built in to the OS. When you open it, swipe over to the "to do" list. Its an excellent place to create quick, clean, reminders.

Yes the integrated to-do list is good. Clean & fast. The only thing I would ask MS is that they would add active task count to the calendar tile... Please MS please

I also use Agenda live tile, which shows your next four appointments from the calendar on a live tile

Inbuilt calendar app is best.

Loco5150 said:
What Im missing here? You have integrated tasks in your calendar where you can set reminder?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately the Tasks from Windows Live do not support recurring tasks. If that is OK with you then you don't have to look any further.
Same goes with Google Tasks.
I ended up using To-Do Tasks. It is a paid app and it can work with Toodledo. It can also use tasks with a local (phone) database but when I tried that the repeat feature was not available.

Fuzzy John said:
Unfortunately the Tasks from Windows Live do not support recurring tasks. If that is OK with you then you don't have to look any further.
Same goes with Google Tasks.
I ended up using To-Do Tasks. It is a paid app and it can work with Toodledo. It can also use tasks with a local (phone) database but when I tried that the repeat feature was not available.
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FOr the recurring element, isnt that where the actual calendar comes into play? Outlook of the PC doesnt have a recurring tasks feature....

morpheus1982 said:
FOr the recurring element, isnt that where the actual calendar comes into play? Outlook of the PC doesnt have a recurring tasks feature....
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First... Outlook on the PC does support recurring tasks, with a very strong subset of recurrence options. I use Outlook 2007 and the Recurrence button is right in the middle of the ribbon when you open a task.
I know some people who use the calendar for tasks. While you can get by doing it I do not believe the calendar is the proper place. The calendar is suited for appointments. The only time time the calendar meets tasks is when it overlays the tasks on the calendar view(s) you have.

Fuzzy John said:
First... Outlook on the PC does support recurring tasks, with a very strong subset of recurrence options. I use Outlook 2007 and the Recurrence button is right in the middle of the ribbon when you open a task.
I know some people who use the calendar for tasks. While you can get by doing it I do not believe the calendar is the proper place. The calendar is suited for appointments. The only time time the calendar meets tasks is when it overlays the tasks on the calendar view(s) you have.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
"Removing" nonsense post.

Yes but recurring tasks wasnt what the OP listed that he needs.
Especially clean and fast is just what the built in task manager is.
I also tried few apps from the marketplace. To-do Tasks was the last one, but even though I paid to get it I deleted it. I hated the fact that you always have to manually sync it.
Other few task apps I tried from the marketplace were too slow.
I like the built in tasks app really much. It is missing few features and the biggest one for me is actually that the calendar tile does not show active task count.
I tried to test and set a recurring task from my outlook (I have exchange O365, so I dont sync to live), but I didnt see that option in Outlook 2010?
EDIT: OK Im blind, I just found it. Well see what happens when I set it.