mcogilvie
Registered
This is a mini-review of The Hit List was recently released in versions for mac and iPhone; it had been in beta for a very long time. Because the reviews specifically mentioned fast over-the-air sync, I took a quick look at the trial mac version. The Hit List knows about projects and tasks. Projects can be in folders, and rudimentary smart folders, which are effectively saved searches, can be created as well. Tags begin with '/', and contexts are just special tags that begin with '@'. There is a list view and an item view. In addition to tags, each task can have start and due dates, an estimated time, a 0-9 priority, and a note. Overall, I would say this is software that would appeal to people who like Things, the program to which it is most similar. Like Things, it is nice to look at and has a sense of good design. Also like Things, it doesn't really let you sort lists by your chosen criteria- at least there's no way I could find. Documentation is sparse, consistent with The Hit List being the product of a one-man shop. Keyboard bindings include vi and emacs style cursor movement, as well as regular letters like 'f' for file and 't' for today; editing is therefore modal. Pricing is $50 for the mac version and $10 for the iPhone version; there's no iPad-specific version at this time. Over-the-air sync is $2/month or $20/year. Overall, I think it is a competent competitor in the gtd-friendly todo-list space. There's a lot of enthusiasm among early adopters or maybe people who hung on during the long beta. It may get some switchers from Things, if Cultured Code can't move OTA sync out of beta quickly. There's always some churn among people who have not settled into a gtd list manager when a new program comes out, but I don't think The Hit List will get much traction with people who are happy with Omnifocus or most other well-regarded options.