Project Management: Master Task/'To-Do' List

[Karl Ottenstein]

Do any of you have suggestions for software for maintaining a master project 'to do' list?

We're not looking for charting/scheduling/etc (e.g., Microsoft Project), simply a multi-user database of open project issues that can be accessed by anyone to add items, revise, or query. From big things down to the trivial things like "Saw that X needed to be fixed (but it wasn't in my workspace)", or "Somebody needs to sign in as TL to do x ...".

Email/verbal communication with the appropriate team member works until a team member is sick, on vacation or otherwise out of the office and other members need to know what was on that person's list to get the project out the door. A centralized list also lets a project manager see all open tasks at any time.

Personally, I've only done solo work, so haven't had to look into this management issue. I assume there are decent off-the-shelf solutions...?

What do some of you do?

Thanks,
Karl

[Anonymous]

Karl wrote:
The firm that I'm asking on behalf of uses Windows, so the Mac options that you listed won't work for them.

Hope to hear some more ideas. 😉

I've been using Microsoft's Entourage for this for several years. It doesn't track time or link to accounting but the sharing function on a network takes care of all the rest. Not perfect, but "Office" seems to be around most offices, anyway.

My main complaint is the inability to share emails. If that could be done all project emails could be accessibly to everybody in one place.

Dave

[Anonymous]

Karl,

Here is my project window for one project. The calender, tasks, contacts, clipping, and notes sections all can be shared (or not) with everybody on the project. One caution though if too many projects are being shared by one person, say the office principle, his auto-update can sometimes interfere with AC operation for a second or two. Another nice feature is that people can be added to the project as it proceeds and all the info archived at the end.

Dave

[Karl Ottenstein]

Thanks, Dave. Entourage on Mac isn't at all the same as Outlook on Windows though (it is the one program in Office for Mac that has no Windows counterpart)...but the firm might have an Exchange Server, so with custom filters/etc might be able to get Outlook to do the trick.

Thanks,
Karl

[Anonymous]

Karl wrote:
Entourage on Mac isn't at all the same as Outlook on Windows though (it is the one program in Office for Mac that has no Windows counterpart)

Should have known, except for AC, cross platform is really hit and miss.

Dave

[Karl Ottenstein]

Dave wrote:
Should have known, except for AC, cross platform is really hit and miss.

Not that bad, actually... Adobe CS3 is great on both platforms (except their video components - which have more features on Windows), Artlantis is the same (I think more responsive on Mac though), Piranesi is the same, Google Earth and Sketchup are the same...

Thanks again though!

Karl

[Anonymous]

Rob wrote:
Perhaps Mark-up tool in AC is supposed to be this kind of thing. However I have not used it to this extent.

Has anyone? I just poked at it a bit, and it seems like it could be, but it's rather tedious. If anyone does use it for this purpose, I'd be very interested to hear more info/reviews of the process.

[Anonymous]

Karl, FWIW We've been using Archioffice for several years now and find it very useful. Some irritations like all software, but its the foundation of our QA system now, used by all staff every day from mundane office diary to cost control. Our system currently is a PC server and Mac workstations. Hope this helps. Believe the software was originally developed by architectural practice.