You may have read this over at 43 Folders, but for anyone who missed it, we're super-thrilled to announce that Ethan Schoonover is going to be joining The Omni Group in the next few weeks. As some of you know, we've been working with him for quite a while during OmniFocus's development, and having him actually in the same building as us is going to be awesome.
Well, awesome for us, anyway. Ethan's probably going to run screaming after a day or two. Oh ha ha ha, I kid, we're not that bad.
(ETHAN: YOU MIGHT NEED A LOT OF BEER).
Ethan will officially be on board at the start of September, he just has to move his family and belongings from Hong Kong to Seattle first. Which should prep him nicely for the feat of helping us heave OmniFocus towards a final ship date.
And speaking of OmniFocus, we have another good bit of news: we're all caught up with issuing sneaky peek invitations, and we've configured the mailing list to automatically send invitations within 24 hours of signup.
It almost sounds like this is now a public beta, doesn't it? Not quite yet. As I understand it, the reason we're not just making everything instantly available—without the added process of joining the list—is that first we want the app to be stable enough so that people can download it once and not worry about updating the build. Currently, the sneaky peek page has the last 5 builds available at all times, and we're encouraging everyone to continually get new updates.
If you'd like to give OmniFocus a try, you can certainly do so—just keep in mind that it's still a work in progress and you'll probably need to stay on top of the new versions we keep posting. That way you have access to the latest bug fixes, new features, improved UI, and occasionally, things that are horribly horribly broken in a number of mysterious and painful ways. O, the joys of building software!
On the other hand, if you'd like to wait until we release a version that you can use for more than a few days at a time, hang in there for the public beta. The timing remains uncertain, but we are certainly working our butts off on reaching that milestone.
I should clarify that by “we” I mean “everyone except the office cat” because her main job lately seems to involve producing repulsive horked-up hairballs in various, easily-stepped on places throughout our offices. And with that:
Welcome, Ethan! We're so excited to have you. Watch out for cat barf.
I recently stumbled across a very cool blog post during my regular aimless web surfing diligent Omni-related research, and I thought some of you might find it interesting—especially if you use OmniGraffle for wire framing websites (did you know you could use OmniGraffle for such a purpose? You totally can! OmniGraffle: Not Just For Adding Amusing Word Bubbles To Your Photos).
Check it out: Creating prototypes with OmniGraffle. “With this simple process you can create working prototypes with exported PDFs or HTML with clickable images/image maps.”
You OmniGraffle fans probably already know about Graffletopia, which hosts a tons of cool stencils for your downloading pleasure. We've also got quite a few linked from the OmniGraffle extras page, and of course it's super easy to make your own stencils by selecting New Stencil from the Stencils menu and dragging in images.
Currently we aren't including very many ready-made stencils in the app itself, though, so we're going to be working on adding more Omni-created stencils to Graffle's built-in library of objects (and updating a few of the existing ones).
Here's where you can help: what sorts of image collections would you like to see in the app? I am personally voting for a Macworld booth layout stencil (complete with $100-per-day rented trash can!), some cool photo borders, and maybe some DVD/DVR/remote icons (so when my in-laws visit we can create a foolproof graphical set of instructions to help them operate the television without accidentally resetting everything to Spanish, adding a season recording of “Deal Or No Deal?”, and turning the screen magenta), but I figure you guys might have some ideas that are even MORE useful.
Post your stencil requests in the comments, and thanks for helping us out!
Last I heard, we've added 82% of the total mailing list subscribers to the OmniFocus Sneaky Peek List, so if you subscribed before June 6 you should have received an invitation by now. If you signed up more recently, hang in there—we promise we'll add you soon! We try and add a bunch more people each time we notice that the sobs and desk-poundings coming from the support room have quieted down a bit.
In the meantime our graphics guru has created a spiffy desktop design for OmniFocus, should you wish to bask more fully in All Things Omni (next up: Omni-branded blinking pens, novelty trucker hats, foundation garments, etc). Why, you can even put it on your iPhone, you wacky customizer you.
MEDICAL NOTE: people with extreme aversions to purple should avoid this graphic, along with Prince, “Grapelicious” tanning lotion, and dopey talking dinosaurs.
iPod-sized graphic (click to embiggen):
Grab the rest of the sizes here.
Videos often answer questions better than words (except in this notable case, which is driving me out of my tree, WHAT IS IT GRRARRGH), so if you've been sitting around hoping we'd post some short overview videos on how OmniPlan works (gosh, and who hasn't?), today is your lucky day! Tasks, dependencies, baselines . . . all the rich, creamery project management goodness—in four handy files.
Thanks to ScreenCastsOnline, we now have video overviews for OmniOutliner, OmniGraffle, and OmniPlan. Take a look if you'd like to get a nice little tutorial for any of those apps.
Our intrepid James has been toiling behind the scenes for many weeks now to convert Omni's website into something a little less baroque, content-management-wise. I don't know all the technical details, but he seems to have streamlined a giant pasta-dish of code into a far more accessible system that can actually be updated without doing the web version of Twister. Plus, we have finally gotten rid of the dreaded FRAMES that earned us one of the more entertaining flame mails I've ever read (it involved many, many exclamation points).
Please take a look around when you get a chance, we're hoping you let us know if you encounter any glitches.
Hey, what are you doing Thursday, June 21st? If you're in the area, you should come by the San Francisco Apple Store around 7 PM, because we're going to be showing off OmniFocus.
(“Showing off” = “fervently praying the app doesn't crash”, of course.)
Our pal Merlin Mann will be presenting, so even if the topic of personal productivity normally bores you to tears (gosh, I can't imagine why it would; now let us discuss the finer points of Moleskine notebooks for twelve straight hours) you should still show up, because Merlin is almost frighteningly entertaining. He's the kind of speaker where first you're laughing, then you're nodding, and before you know it you're chugging the funny-tasting Kool-Aid, you know?
He'll be talking about productivity tips in general and discussing how OmniFocus fits in his workflow, so it should be more fun and interesting than your basic software demo. You should definitely come by and say howdy.
OmniFocus Presentation:
Apple Store SF, June 21 7 PM
One Stockton Street
San Francisco, CA 94108
(415) 392-0202
(map)
If you're on the other coast, never fear! We're tentatively planning a visit to New York in the next month or so.
Also: if you're planning to be at WWDC next week, and you'd be interested in an informal OmniFocus meet-up, let us know. Leave a comment or email us.
Take a break from checking your email for OmniFocus beta invites (we are adding people as fast as we can, I swear) and behold: new screencasts are now available for OmniGraffle.
Not only that, but there's a new OmniPlan screencast that you can watch from the ScreenCastsOnline website.
Enjoy!
Boy, I can't tell you how much I've been looking forward to writing a blog post that mentions OmniFocus but doesn't include yet another wishy-washy (and ultimately inaccurate) guess at a beta timeframe.
Folks, we are unleashing OmniFocus into the wild TODAY, starting with a subset of the OmniFocus mailing list. We aren't seeding the whole list yet because among other things we want to make sure our password system doesn't explode, sending database shrapnel all over our office, but if you're on the list you'll eventually receive an email from us with the information you need to access the beta.
Heads up for those of you who signed up early, since we're starting with the first subscribers. Check your email for a love note from Omni! For everyone else, over the next several days we'll be expanding the sneaky peek pool, so hang in there—we'll be in touch very soon.
If you haven't signed up on the list, now is the time to do so! The time for doing so is now! We're heading into Pre-Release Madness, and we want to take you with us.
Hey, does anyone smell that? It's . . . why, I think it's the smell of vaporware, floating away in the breeze.
“OmniPlan has a clean, smooth interface, and all of its controls are available from easily accessible control panels. You can control and tweak almost every aspect of the design; this makes for a superior on-screen experience. The program offers the core, basic feature you’d expect to see in project-management software: the ability to easily create project schedule outlines in Gantt format, with activities and milestones indicated. You can also add and track resources (both people and things) and view a workweek calendar. The application’s set-up and tracking functionality is solid and straightforward, allowing you to quickly and accurately schedule an entire project.” ...read more.
Reviewed 4/13/2007.
