App Review: IQTELL (with email integration)

Note: I have previously reviewed this app here, in that review I talked about how I wished that the email integration from the web service would come to the iOS app, well it finally has and that is why I am doing an updated review of the updated portions. 

Name: IQTELL
Price: Free
Stars: 4
Type: Productivity









IQTELL has been my todo list manager for quite a while now, and I feel like this update has been long in coming since representatives from the company have been assuring me that it was on its way since the app first came out. I am happy to say though that it has not disappointed now that it is here.

Email Integration
The powerful concept here is to integrate email and your todo list into one app that you have with you everywhere. It is not to make email your todo list but rather to closely integrate them so that the information from emails that should become todo items or resources can do so easily and go into the proper form to get them out of your inbox and off your mind when you don't need them. 



How does this help you get the tasks off your mind? By putting them into a system that you know will surface at the proper time and place. That way you no longer need to try and keep track of them mentally. For a full explanation of this you should read David Allen's book "Getting Things Done". 

Swipe Controls
There have been a lot of todo systems that have used email as a way to add items. In fact IQTELL has offered this for a long time through their email gateway option. So, what is special and different about this new option? The answer is the ease with which it can be done now by using swipe controls.

I have written before about the usefulness of managing email from your phone, partially because of the swipe controls built into iOS directly by Apple. Last year the app Mail Box pioneered a more complete set of swipe controls for better email management. Much of that philosophy has made it into this IQTELL email app with, in my opinion, better execution.
You have two options:

• Swipe to the left: receive a set of email tools. Delete, archive, move, and reply/forward. I lave having all these options available without ever opening the email itself. Even if this were just an email app it would make reaching inbox zero much easier.
• Swipe to the right: receive a set of "macros" that will take various actions on that email, such as turn it into a action on you todo list or into a project. 

Another nice addition is that a menu hand gesture has been added when you swipe from the left edge of the screen it will pull out the menu allowing you to quickly change the area of the app that you are in.

Still Waiting
Not everything in the world of IQTELL is perfect, I am still waiting on several of the features I noted were missing in my last post, such as calendar and contacts integration which would help to really get everything in one place. I would also like to see full functionality of the web app brought to iOS, for example I still can't do things like make a repeating task or a custom macro in the app and it is annoying to have to go to my computer for these things. Of course I may just be missing how to do these, in which case I am sure someone will let me know in the comments. 

All in all this is a great app at the right price. If you need a way to integrate email and todo list I suggest you look at it. That's all for now. Remember, live better.

3 Reasons You Should Manage Email from Your iPhone

Email seems to be the culprit for a lot of wasted time these days. There is no activity more useless than staring at inbox full of emails and doing nothing. Yet so many of us spend our time doing just that. Even if we are actually working on the emails it can end up consuming our day.

Now, everybody knows that I am a fan of inbox zero, and one of the things I use to achieve that state is my iPhone. Managing email from an iPhone has some distinct productivity advantages to it, here I want to talk about three of them.

Trash It:
I consider swipe to delete one of the best improvements ever to email. I guarantee that if you manage your email from your iPhone you will start to delete more email, and that alone will make you more productive. A lot of emails never need to be opened, especially since you can see the first line on your iPhone.
Shorten It
If you write shorter emails you will be more productive, if you manage email on your iPhone you will write shorter emails. This is true simply because of the nature of the medium change from a computer to a phone. With out a keyboard we don't want to write long emails, and our brains are already wired to write short and to the point messages while on our phones.
Do It
If you manage email from your iPhone you will actually get it done because you will be able to use the tiny inbetween times when you are not at your desk to do it. When you are waiting for a meeting to start, or you are in line, or your windows 8 computer decided it had to shut itself down right then, you will be able to get your email taken care of during these little times.
There it is, three reasons you should manage your email on your iPhone. And remember, live better.

5 reasons your email cannot be your todo list

email can easily get out of hand,
because it is controlled by others

I've talked about email productivity before in my post on inbox zero. This particular post is about the very common email productivity  mistake of using your inbox as your todo list. This mistake is, in fact, so common that I find myself doing it every couple days.

You may be having this problem if you:

• Find yourself continually marking emails as "unread" so you will come back to them
• You tell people "send me an email" even though you already have all the information so you will remember to do it
• You send yourself emails to remind you to do things

You are probably saying to yourself, so, what's the problem? If email works as a todo list why shouldn't I use it as one? There are several problems:

1. Other people have control over it
2. You didn't write it down
3. It discourages the "2-minute rule"
4. You do not get an email about everything you need to do
5. You can't trust the system

Review: IQTELL (GTD app)

There has been an update to this app and my review of those updates can be found here. This article still has my feelings on many of the other features.

Note: This review is for the universal app IQTELL for iPhone and iPad, it is not a review of the complete IQTELL System which involves a web app.

Name: IQTELL
Price: Free
Stars: 4
Type: Productivity




The IQTELL app is an app based on the GTD method originally conceived by David Allen (you can read my review of his book here). It was the first app to come out to claim to be a complete GTD system. Of course I was excited when I first heard that a company was actually going to release a GTD app, but I always have some initial hesitation at switching to a new system when you already have a working one in place. I was very happy with my Todo list manager Producteev, so I did not download IQTELL right away.

Switching Over
Not long after the IQTELL app was released Producteev came out with a major new update. Unfortunately they released a little too soon and they did not migrate users fast enough, as a result after updating I was unable to access my account or even use features offline.

Well I couldn't be without a todo list so I decided to give IQTELL a trial spin while I needed something anyway. I really enjoyed it. The app lacks a little personality; it's pretty bland and flat in style. What it lacks in visuals it makes up for in functionality though.

Everything in one Place? Almost.
The IQTELL motto is "Everything in one place" and it almost is, on the web app they are really almost there. On the iOS app however there are still some features lacking:

• Email integration
• Calendar integration
• Evernote integration
• Contact integration

Once it has these features it will work very well. As you can see from the screen shot there are a lot of different options for how to mange your lists. That is a good thing but it can be a little bit of overkill and David Allen would probably say take the one or two that work for you and ditch the rest, don't get hung up on the system. You can us the configure button (red arrow) to remove most of  these options from your screen, but unfortunately on the iPhone version it does not seem  to stick once you close the app. Hopefully this will be fixed soon.



The IQTELL Team
Let me just say a word about the IQTELL team. They seem like great developers who really want to make the best productivity app out there. They are responsive to emails and really want to make the experience better. I expect to see a lot of improvements to the app in the near future.

The Good

• An app that is really based on  the GTD system
• True someday and tickler options to get stuff off your mind
• Correct use of context and projects
• Responsive developers

The Bad

• Current lack of integration (this is suppose to be fixed soon I am told)
• More robust than some people need or want
• Hard to get each of the sub apps arranged the way you want them on the page
• Slow loading time and sync
• Very tied to the web app (I wish they would just make a native mac app)

Overall the app is very good and has a lot of potential. I recommend that if you want to be using the GTD system that try out this app. It is free, so the barrier to entry is much lower than an app like OmniFocus which has been pretty much the only option in the past. I am excited about the way this app is going and expect some big updates to come soon.

What is your favorite To Do List app? Share it with us in the comments section below.
If you find this post helpful you can  , Tweet it or use one of the buttons below to share on other networks.
Thanks for reading, and remember, live better.

Goal Apps: Communication

This aspect is probably the simplest part of goal apps on the iPad, but one of the most difficult parts of goal achievement generally. The ending to President Monson's quote from my last post is this:

"when performance is measured and reported back the rate of improvement accelerates" 

This probably makes sense to you, you are much more likely to exercise if you know you are going to have to tell your friend how much you exercised. This is in fact one of the concepts that every 12 step program in the world is based on, and it has proved very successful for those who do it.

So here is where we are at in using iPads to set goals:

1. Write down goals and details
2. Track progress on goals
3. Report that progress back

In order to do this you will need an accountability partner. There are three qualifications I think you should look for in an accountability partner:

1. Someone you can help with their goals
2. Someone you have great respect for their opinion
3. Someone who loves you enough to be brutally honest

Number 1 is important because this is a partnership, you should both be in it together. You may have another person that you report back to like a mentor or a coach who is not sharing their goals with you. That is a good thing, but you should also have an accountability partner.


The nice thing about keep track of your goals on an iPad (or iPhone/iPod) is that you already have the communication right there. All you need to do is decided how best to communicate it. Some tracking apps of communication built directly into them through the share button (arrow). This is particularly useful if you want to share your progress with the world because it normally links you directly into Facebook and Twitter, for more private sharing it will also give you access to the mail and messages apps.

Essentially any communication app will do that lets you tell your accountability partner what you have accomplished: Here's a list of some useful ones:

Messages: this is just sending an iMessage to your accountability partner letting them know how you are doing. If they aren't using and iDevices you won't be able to use this option but there is a whole slew of other messaging apps (such as Facebook Messenger) that you could use.









Mail or another email app like Gmail or Mailbox can be very helpful in sending detailed information about your goal, this is especially useful if you can access it from the tracking or accomplishing app and send a report directly.








Facetime or Skype: at regular intervals you should have face to face contact with your accountability partner. This gives you both a chance to report to each other. If you can't actually get together a Facetime or Skype call will be helpful.








The important thing is that you regularly report your progress or lack there of. If you are doing goals on an iPad this does not really require anything beyond the stock apps that come with it, unless you want it to.

If you find this post helpful you can or if you think it can help others you can Tweet it to share.

To give you a simple way to remember what happened in this blog I've created what I call a summarygram of it.


Please share your thoughts on communicating your goals in the comments below.

That's all for now, and remember, live better.

Inbox Zero, the great key to email productivity

Email, its a big part of our days theses days. The funny thing about email and productivity is that it is like a microcosm of technology generally. Like an iPad or iPhone themselves it can either boost our productivity enormously, or it can kill it in an instant.

It was last summer, I was an intern working everyday in the grueling and information heavy field of the law. I was stressed out of my mind as I tried to handle projects, cases, calls and emails. I certainly needed to be productive, but in this new environment I did not know how. Certainly I knew that productivity is about the things you can control, and it did not seem to me that there were very many of them. That was when I first encountered a concept that many of you have probably heard of: Inbox Zero.

I found this life changing concept in a little ebook called Bit Literacy by Mark Hurst. I am not sure that Mark used the term inbox zero, Merlin Mann has been largely associated with coining that phrase. But Mark did introduce the concept to me:

"No message, no matter how important stays in the inbox"

A light bulb went on inside my head, here was something I could control, something I could fight. 

Inbox zero is the idea that the information in every email belongs somewhere and it is just passing through your inbox. At some point everyday your inbox should be at zero, not zero unread messages, zero period.

The problem is that people are using their email inbox for things it is not designed to do, Mark Hurst lists 5 of them, if you are not at inbox zero it is because of one these:

• Todo list
• Filing system
• Calendar
• Bookmarks list
• Address book

This is probably killing your email productivity. There is to much for you to look at to many problems and concepts jumping into your mind for you to really handle what you need to there. The idea is that all you have to do is: 

1. decide where the information from each email is suppose to go
2. put it there
3. then get it out of the inbox

That's all you have to do, and your email stress will go way down. Of course you will need good places like a todo list and calendar to put the information into. I use the stock calendar app and Producteev.

Check out the book in the iBookstore, its free, so you know, well worth the cost. Leave a comment or Tweet to @halduauthor which one of the five things you have been using the inbox for that you shouldn't.

I'm not perfect at this whole thing yet guys, I still get overloaded on email sometimes, but I have been trying since last summer and dedicatedly trying since January. I can tell you it helps out a ton. If you enjoy this post Tweet or

And remember, live better.

Apps used in this post: Mail, Blogger, Cooliris, Aviary, iBooks

How to select multiple emails on an iPad

Note: This post was written using iOS 6, the look of some icons might have changed and few features may have been added or moved in iOS 7 but for the most part it is the same.

Just a quick tip for email management on your iPad or iOS device. I will do a whole post on inbox zero and why it is a way to increase productivity later. But we will have a hard time achieving inbox zero from an iPad is we don't know how to select multiple emails at a time.

The reason for doing so is that you can do three things faster:

• Move multiple emails into folders
• Mark multiple emails as flagged or unread
• Delete multiple emails

You have to do this all by hand if you don't know how to work with multiple emails at a time. This can be very time consuming if you deal with a high volume of email.

Here's how you do it:
Tap the edit button in your top toolbar (red arrow)

Your email list will change so that you have these options on the bottom: Delete, Move, Mark (orange box). You also now have the little select bubble (yellow arrows) next to each email.

Select all the emails you want to apply something to by tapping the bubble next to it, a check mark will appear. Then either delete, move, or mark them as you desire by tapping the corresponding button at the bottom of the screen.

There you have it, speed up your email processing, be more productive.

And remember, live better.

Apps used in this post: Mail, Skitch

Setting up Email, Calendar and Contacts on the iPad

Note: This post was written using iOS 6, the look of some icons might have changed and few features may have been added or moved in iOS 7 but for the most part it is the same.

Really your iPad is suppose to help you be productive, it can help you do that by allowing you instant access to such basic productivity tools as your email, your calendar, and your contacts. Now you could just go through the iPad's safari web browser to whatever your preferred productivity suite's website is and access them that way, but it is far more productive to use the iPad's stock apps(mail, calendar, contacts), or another app of your choice from the app store.

I prefer to use apple's stock apps, I have tried other apps, especially calendar apps, and nothing seems to work as well for me as the ones that just come with the device. Some people do not like the interfaces of these apps and so they choose to go with a different option, some email providers such as gmail also have dedicated apps for the iPad. Regardless of what option you go with you are going to need to set up your account(s) from the settings page.

We will be dealing with the two options inside the red box today. The most simple option by far is to just use or set up an iCloud account. Since iCloud and the iPad are apple products working together, this option seems to work well (although not always flawlessly). It is an easy process, just click on the iCloud tab and enter your apple iTunes account information (if you do not have an iTunes account now would be a good time to set one up since you will need one to get any apps on your iPad) it will then either log you into your existing iCloud account, or walk you through the process of creating one.

After logging in you will be able to toggle on and off which services you would like synced through that account.

Now if you are a mac user, or if you have decided to forgo a computer completely and just use an iPad, than you could feasibly use only iCloud and be fine. But most people have a work email account, or another calendar account, etc that they would like synced with their iPad. This can be done through the Mail, Contacts, Calendars tab. Click the add an account button, shown in the orange box above. You will then see these options, select your email server by clicking on it. If your server is not listed select "other."

Then you simply enter in you email address and password for that account, they will also ask you to give the account a name and a description but that is only necessary if you are going to have multiple email accounts on your iPad. The iPad will check it and once verified it will as, you what you would like to sync with that account (email, contacts, or calendars). Turn on the feature you desire and poof! your iPad will sync them over and they will appear in the standard Mail, Contacts, and Calendar apps. The account will now appear under "accounts" and you can change the settings for it or delete it at any time by clicking on it.

Fantastic, if you have an questions just put them in the comments below and don't forget to share if you know someone who need a little help.

That's all for now, and remember, live better.