I am going to start off a new series of postings called Andreview by reviewing Astrid. Astrid is a simple task manager with priorities, tags, reminders, and alerts.

Usability (4)

Astrid is very easy to use. It has a simple straight-forward interface based on lists of tasks that can be filtered by tag or other criteria. It also provides calendar integration for scheduling tasks as well as easy task creation options.

Functionality (4)

Astrid is all about task management. It is generally responsive and does what you expect from a task manager. It will also sync up with your Remember The Milk tasks, if you have an account. The only piece of functionality that I think would make Astrid better would be some sort of desktop or web-based client so that Astrid could better integrate with other systems. The RTM integration is nice, but an Astrid-specific application would be better.

Stability (4)

To my recollection after having used Astrid for a couple months now, I have never had it crash. It does currently have an annoying bug that is causing me problems right now, but I may join in with the effort to fix it (basically you can’t get a view of all tasks from the widget).

Overall (4)

Overall I think Astrid is the best task-manager I have seen for the Android OS. It’s clean, fast and simple. Also, baring the one bug I have run into, it’s stable and responsive.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Tags: Android, Review, Thoughts

I am going to start doing more formal reviews of the Android apps that I use or have tested. I will describe each app and delve into its benefits and drawbacks based on three main criteria: usability, functionality and stability which will each be given a rating of 1 to 5. At the end of the rewiew I will summarize with an average score as well as an overall rating for the app; the overall rating will be based on the average of the other three scores with a bump up or down (+/-1) based on my overall feeling of the app. This overall score gives me a little leeway for times when the average may not really reflect the actual feeling of the app (for better or worse).

Usability

The ease of use and how the user-needs are met in a simple straight-forward manner.

Functionality

Does the app do what you would expect for an app of its type?

Stability

How often does the app crash, if ever? How peppy is it?

At the bottom of each review I will add a simple score card with additional information about the app. It will look basically like this:

If you have an app that you would like me to try out and review, please feel free to let me know.

Popularity: 1% [?]

Tags: Android, Review, Thoughts