Show HN: Annex – What are you doing?

http://jathu.me/annex

by jathu • 11 years ago

10 6 11 years ago

jathu.me

mindcrash• 11 years ago

How private is the data recorded with this app? E.g. is anything recorded pushed to a online service?

jathu3• 11 years ago

Nope, nothing leaves the phone. Everything is stored in Core Data.

However, I did plan on switching to iCloud in the next version. I realized now that some people might not want their data on a server somewhere, so I would make it an option.

wingerlang2• 11 years ago

Bit strong colors perhaps.

It's a nice idea, but opening an app to record each single change in activity will be a hard sell, even with the reminders (eventually they will annoy you).

I think that if it is more effort to enter something than it is to close/ignore it - then eventually it will get ignored.

I love tracking and I find the idea of this app awesome (because I have had the same idea). A small example I have personally is "Day One" app for OSX. It pops up on my screen once every 2-3 hours asking me what to do. 75% of the times I press cancel - imagine if instead of cancel there were a number of pre-sets I could fill the date in with. I would 100% press one of those. Quite easy to implement, not sure about it on a smartphone though.

jathu3• 11 years ago

Bit strong colors perhaps.

A lot of my users actually loved the colors. Maybe in the future updates, I can let users choose their own colors. Although, I don't like giving users too many frivolous options, it would depend if I get any more requests for this feature.

It's a nice idea, but opening an app to record each single change in activity will be a hard sell, even with the reminders (eventually they will annoy you). I think that if it is more effort to enter something than it is to close/ignore it - then eventually it will get ignored.

The reason I left the activities broad and limited the number of activities allowed is because of this reason. I would get pretty annoyed if I had to take my phone out to record every time I went to the washroom, read a blog post or played a game. However, if you broadly categorize those activities, they are all "Chilling" in my view, something unproductive to my goals. So in reality, people only change their broad activities few times a day and not as frequently: sleep, eat, study, meeting and etc. I do plan on making this easier by allowing people to update it via their Apple Watch, Mac and iPhone notification center (I can't do this yet as I still have an iPhone 4, so I can't develop for iOS9- living off of student loan sucks haha).

A small example I have personally is "Day One" app for OSX.

As you said, one thing I hate about apps like this is that it requires so much effort for me to update it. The idea of updating something everyday is daunting because I have to fill a blank slate. Where as in Annex, all I have to do is touch an option. It would be easier to touch an option rather than touch cancel.

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Thanks for the feedback!

wingerlang2• 11 years ago

Where as in Annex, all I have to do is touch an option.

The issue I can see is that I need to do multiple actions.

Worst case: Pick up phone, unlock/pin, find and open app, wait for a moment, find option and press it. Best case: swipe on reminder, unlock, tap option.

The issue with the best case is that the 'cancel' action still has way less friction than the other. It is zero friction to ignore it but still 1-2 steps to do it.

The optimal case would be to be presented with the options on the lockscreen.

Perhaps you could schedule a minimum amount of notifications and display them at the same time?

Like at 7pm:

I am cleaning.

I am making dinner.

Etc. This way only one swipe would trigger the action (+pin). But it might be hard to get just right. But you see my point.

Anyway good luck. And for what it's worth, I'm still developing on an iPhone 4 as well :)

Show HN: Annex – What are you doing?

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