AppCenter Spotlight: Agenda

Get things done

In April and May I detailed several apps that were submitted during the private beta. Those apps have continued to improve and get updates pushed to users, but I wanted to be able to dive a little more into the specifics of apps. Today I’m going to focus in on a single app I’ve been using: Agenda by Dane Henson.

My actual to-do list in Agenda. Lots to do!

To get the full story behind Agenda, I went to the source, Dane Henson himself and asked about the backstory.

The Story

Dane is a 30-something network technician and self-described “Husband/Father, Geek, Writer, Musician” from Texas. He’s been around the elementary community for a few years, and actually joined us at the Denver AppCenter Sprint as a third-party app developer and cohost of the simply elementary podcast.

When I had the idea, it was sort of a perfect storm. I had been wanting to refresh my programming skills, make something cool for elementary [OS], and I was having trouble remembering my tasks at work. A to-do app seemed like the perfect place to start. Harvey [Cabaguio] had also made this awesome little mockup that was just too sexy not to make a reality.

That design and development work has paid off; Agenda is a pleasant little lightweight task tracking app. It’s just a single, white window with a single list of checkable items, and a text entry at the bottom. I love it for its simplicity, but some might wonder why it lacks certain features.

At first, I had to keep it feature light because my skills as a programmer. Eventually, I realized that what would set it apart from the rest of the task lists is the simplicity of it. I would much rather “do one thing and do it well” than try to outsmart every user with the coolest features.

That’s not to say Dane is necessarily “done.” He mentioned that, time allowing, he’s down to build something more while keeping Agenda more or less as-is.

It’s hard to say what’s coming next. Feature-wise, Agenda is as complete as I had originally set out to make it. However, it’s hard not to keep going. If I continue down the path of a task list, I may branch off into a full-featured planning app in the same vein as Cultured Code’s “Things.” Agenda would continue to exist as a simple task list, and I would publish a new app with a project-oriented workflow and feature list. Of course, I’m always open to suggestions from users.

Get It

Agenda is available on AppCenter today for the suggested price of just $1. You can also check out the source code on GitHub.

On elementary OS? Hit the button to get Agenda.

Be sure to hit up Dane on Twitter, Google+, GitHub, and/or his website and let him know what you think of Agenda!