How we added features in Doo 1.1 without compromising our user experience
Today I’m proud to announce that Doo 1.1 is now available. Believe it or not, this is our second release since we launched only a few weeks ago. And it’s our biggest update yet!
Our challenge was to add highly requested features like skip and priority without affecting usability. I received dozens of emails from users overjoyed by our approach, but who worried that new capabilities would make things more complicated. I’m happy to put those fears to rest. Even with big new features Doo is the same great reminders app it’s always been. Let’s dive in!
Skip! Skip! Hooray!
If you’re new to Doo, here’s how it works: each reminder you create becomes a card. When you open the app, you’ll see a stack of cards that need your attention. Swipe a card up to mark it complete or down to snooze it for later. That’s it! Doo is powerful and deceptively simple. This simplicity is what makes us special.
The earliest intention behind snooze was to hide tasks for later. Feedback from the first few versions made it clear that snooze was perhaps a little too good at this. If you wanted to hide something temporarily, you’d have to undo to bring it back.
How could we solve the snooze problem without making things more complex? We prototyped a few solutions that transformed the cards from a stack into a horizontal list after a double tap or force press. The transition was clever but unexpected. Feedback was decidedly mixed.
We also entertained the idea of adding a third buton onto cards. One big button for complete and two smaller ones for snooze and skip. This solved earlier discoverability issues but added complexity. The three buttons stole focus from our two primary actions. We scrapped both ideas because ultimately they added too much overhead. But these explorations didn’t go to waste! They lent valuable perspective on our final implementation.
Sometimes the best solution really is the most obvious. To skip a card, swipe left or right. Each time you skip you’ll see the top card animate to the back of your stack. Swiping through cards is as natural as scrolling. There’s no need for an extra button and we use an interaction paradigm that's already established. For many this is a welcome addition.
I give that two exclamation points
Priority is a feature you see in a lot of apps, and for good reason! It’s an easy way to help ensure you see the right thing at the right time.
Most priority fields give you the option of one, two, or three exclamation points. We think this has a fatal flaw. If you create more than one reminder with the same priority, the feature becomes useless. There’s no way to tell which item is more important.
Doo does things differently. Tap “Edit” or long press an item on the list view. From there you can drag tasks in your stack up or down. When you’re done, Doo interprets the order of items as their priority. Item priority is calculated in relation to other tasks so Doo always knows what you mean.
Cards that you haven’t sorted respect priority in a smart way. Let’s say you need to pick up your grandma from the airport at 10am. She’ll be glad to know that time sensitive reminders appear at the top of your stack just like they should.
To-dos with no date appear in your stack behind older items. There are two reasons for this. First, we want to encourage you to clean out your card closet. Letting things get dusty means you need a little push. Second, this prevents new cards from interupting you while you work through an existing stack.
My favorite feature of priority is that it’s entirely optional. True to our values, Doo is the reminders app that you don’t need to manage. There’s no new field to skip during reminder creation. Nothing about the core experience is more complicated. If priority isn’t something you need, you can avoid it entirely with no effort. It’s a great reminder that complex features don’t require complex solutions.
With a little help from our friends
We’re pleased to announce that a number of smaller enhancements are the direct result of Doo users who were kind enough to participate in our beta program. I’d like to highlight two of them:
- Snoozed reminders now appear in the iPad calendar. This makes Doo an even better companion for checking upcoming tasks.
- The “1 Day” snooze option is now “Until tomorrow.” This ensures that tasks snoozed at the end of one day don’t only appear at the end of future days. To-dos with an alert time snooze 24 hours from the reminder date instead of from the clock time. Open-ended tasks snooze until the first moment of the next day — usually midnight.
Special thanks to our beta test team for their fearless feedback and meticulous attention to detail :).
Just the beginning
This is a huge update that adds features fans have asked for since day one. I couldn’t be more proud of our progress after only three weeks of availability. It’s our way of showing how much we value our supporters.
Now we’ve gotten some flack for pricing our app at $4.99, but we believe the best apps put the user first. We refuse to hide valuable new features like priority behind paywalls or clutter our interface with ads. For less than a beer, you get a powerful app that’s already appeared on two App Store “best” lists. No walls, no gimmicks, and no “pro” unlock required.
We’re incredibly excited about this release and the foundation we’ve built for the future. More importantly we’re humbled by the enthusiasm of our fans. Reading your stories of personal victory and success inspires us. Your success is our success. And we can’t wait to see the mountains you climb next.
For more information check out the official Doo website.
Michael Ciarlo is a product designer turned entrepeneur living in NYC. For more writing, GIFs, and non-sequiturs follow him on Twitter.
If you enjoyed this peek at Doo 1.1, you might also enjoy reading the backstory.
