The Omni Group

Years ago I worked for a Very Bad Software Company (no, they weren't located in Redmond). My job involved creating millions of graphics-heavy PowerPoint documents with little in the way of information but lots and lots of colorful stock art depicting great success for the company we were pitching to. We offered several different “technology solutions” that were “powerful and extensible”. Oh, and they also “engineered a rich, sticky shopping experience”.

(I am not even making that up. Rich. Sticky.)

It took me a while, but I finally figured out we had no actual products. What our company owned was some proprietary knowledge about delivering media over the internet, and around that nebulous concept a number of solutions were dreamed up by the CEO, who either truly believed they existed or thought they could be built immediately after a purchase was made (I was never quite sure which it was, I think it depended on the alignment of the planets and the amount of reality distortion in the man's head at any given moment).

Those products were vaporware, pure and simple. They did not exist, the “features” they offered varied based on who the salespeople were talking to, and the half-built, buggy technology that was supposed to be the base of all these fantastic offerings did nothing more than crash your entire system and maybe the computer of the person sitting next to you for good measure. Then it went and kicked your dog.

In its current state, OmniFocus is a little bit crashy, too. Okay, maybe our internal nickname for OmniFocus is Crashy Von CrashaLot, That-Which-Triggers-Kernel-Panic, but hey, that's why it's not in beta yet.

But it's not vaporware. It's just not completed. There's a difference, and it has to do with being sincere about what we want to offer, and not touting magical features that we have no idea how to build.

The reason we've been open about the entire process isn't to generate hype (goat trail: the Segway was hyped. Zune was hyped. Mentioning a product a few times on a blog with a readership of…well, a smallish readership? Not hype, unless you want to greatly elevate my contributions marketing-weasel-wise, which is fine by me but then we'll have to discuss a new benefits package involving chocolate covered pretzels delivered to my desk on a weekly basis); it was initially to gauge interest and figure out if this product was a good investment for us. We could have done research on our own and maintained radio silence about OmniFocus, but we wanted to start a dialogue about it and get your feedback early on.

We are not trying to persuade you to avoid looking for other solutions, and we're not trying to unreasonably build up your expectations. I don't consider what we've been talking about with OmniFocus to be a pre-announcement, which is something typically designed to generate early interest in a product and hopefully build momentum towards the final release.

Being upfront about OmniFocus was not a PR activity, or a strategic marketing decision, or anything involving a slide presentation and the word “paradigm”. It was rewarding to tell you we were thinking about working on it, and it was awesome to get all your positive feedback, but now we're in the boring part of the process where we feverishly code and have UI meetings and chew the ends of pencils and there's just…not much news.

Think of OmniFocus like a movie that's being filmed. You read who is starring in it, you maybe see some stills from the sets, you forget about it for a little while, and all of a sudden it's in theaters and people are writing comments all over its IMDB page debating whether it sucks or rules.

Or something.

Anyway, I wanted to let you know that we enjoy interacting with you guys, that's why we started this blog. It's not solely a vehicle for Official Product Announcements, and I hope you can appreciate some of the more informal conch-bleatings. It's more like we're talking with you instead of just issuing press releases, you know?

Now, let me just wrap things up by saying: we are still considering the “Feed Rowan the Disgusting Food Item of Your Choice!” booth display at Macworld, so I hope you plan on coming by and visiting.

We've received a number of…um, spirited requests lately for an update on OmniFocus. As it turns out, when people are excited about a product that's under development, they really don't want to hear about your Wii-outings.

They probably also don't want to read an ongoing series of blog posts titled “Will Rowan Eat It?” (with apologies to Steve) featuring random disgusting food items being offered to Rowan, our developer who claims he can eat anything, with photos and zany commentary, and for that I say WELL THANKS A LOT, there goes my whole blog raison d'etre for December.

You people, with your demands for “actual news” and rejections of “filler content”. God.

Anyway, so OmniFocus. Okay, the news is this: we're still working on it.

The end!

(Now do you see why I had dreamed up that whole distract-them-with-Rowan thing? We were going to make him eat a live squid!)

Seriously, that's about all the news I have. Work continues. We're pretty slammed right now, resource-wise, with trying to get the final version of OmniPlan out the door, so hopefully once Plan ships we'll be able to ramp back up on OmniFocus. We do have two full time developers on OmniFocus right now, though, so there is progress basically every day.

We want to get a working version of Focus in your hands as soon as possible, something that provides the same basic functionality that Kinkless, Quicksilver and OmniOutliner do in one intuitive app, but this is Omni, and so we're also trying to curb our desire for OmniFocus 1.0 to include more of the in-depth functionality we really, really want it to have.

Just to make everything more confusing there are lots of features in Leopard that would help OmniFocus immensely. If, that is, 10.5 were available, and everyone was using it.

Anyway, please do stay tuned. We are hoping to have a little more to talk about during Macworld. Or maybe we'll just bring Rowan to our booth and let people feed him things.

Oh crap, you mean you're actually going to ask, like, real questions? Well FINE. Make me work, why don't you.

(Note: if you need technical support on any of our apps, it's best to send it to our support team using Send Feedback.. under the Help menu in your software. I may not get to *everyone's* question this week.)

Richard asks, How can I get OmniWeb to open up RSS links in Vienna, my preferred RSS reader?

We have a current OmniWeb bug described as:

“Request: Allow news icon to send RSS feed subscriptions to outside program/external viewer [newsfeed default]” 

This should be implemented in 5.5.2, an update that should be available soon (I'm not sure exactly when, but not too long from now).

Matthew has some Omni software on his laptop, and now that his employer has provided him with a PowerMac, he wants to know how to use those same apps via network licensing.

There is a lengthy explanation of our different licensing types here, but in a nutshell, you'll just need to install your Omni application of choice on your Power Mac (grab the download from our website), then use the same license you've been using on your laptop. You cannot, however, run two copies of the licensed software using one license at the same time – otherwise, both of your computers will explode.

(Okay, they won't technically “explode”, but it would violate our licensing policy and that would mean that somewhere, a kitten would cry. Won't you please, please think of the kittens?)

Edward would like to know, Are there any “secret” ways to get OmniWeb to run quicker?

Down at the lower righthand corner of the screen, there is a very, very small button that's labeled “TURBO”. Click it, and –

Okay, I'm making that up. I wish I had some kind of cool answer like that, but unfortunately there's no simple response to that question. There are too many variables to consider, like when you're experiencing the issue (I assume you mean that the browser is running too slow at times?), what else you have going on, etc. You are running 5.5, right? If so, I suggest using the Send Feedback…option to tell us more about this so we can look into it, or email us.

BZ asked a LOT of questions, JEEZ. I'll answer two of them for now: When is OmniFocus coming out and who do I have to kill to be on the beta?

To be 100% honest, we don't know when OmniFocus is coming out. There is a team working full time on developing this product, but it's just too early to make predictions. We all really want to get it in your hands as soon as possible, though. As for the beta, when the time comes we'll be asking for volunteers. If you want to get your name in the hat now, subscribe to this list and we'll get in touch with you as soon as it's Beta Time (like Hammer Time, except with slimmer pants).

Stack said, Tell us a little bit about OmniFocus.  [...] The GTD system gives you breathing room to be implemented in a few different ways, but aside from interface stuff I don't really see how your product can distinguish itself from its competitors in the market.  How will OmniFocus be different?

I can't make any commitments yet on specific features that will be included in OmniFocus (I know, I'm all “ask us anything!” and then I give you, “errr…except that”). We're still defining how features will work; figuring out implementation and UI, and creating crazy mockups using OmniGraffle (oh, OmniGraffle, is there anything you can't do?).

I will say that the “interface stuff” – how the software looks, the way that it works, the experience you have when using it – is exactly what can distinguish one app from another and make all the difference in its value. If OmniFocus ends up being a joy to use, if it seamlessly integrates into your workflow, if it stays out of your way but provides you with what you need, then we'll have accomplished some of our biggest goals.

Our friend Corentin (who has done countless French localizations for us, merci!) asks, in part, What's planned for OmniWeb 5.6? When will a beta be out the door?

We are planning for 5.6 to be a WebKit update. As for timing, we have to get through 5.5.1 (currently in beta), then 5.5.2, then revisit the WebKit situation so…in short, we're not sure when 5.6 will be available, but it shouldn't be too long of a wait. *knock wood*

Daniel says, I'm playing through Oni at the moment, and I've found a few bugs. If I report them, do they have a chance of ever being fixed?

Well…probably not. That's what I'm told, anyway. We did the game port many, many moons ago and no longer have anything to do with Oni, which is now owned by Take 2 Interactive. You could contact them with your bug info and request an update, but it doesn't sound very likely that it will happen. Sorry, I wish I had a more helpful answer.

WHEW. That's all for now, folks, I'll try and answer more tomorrow. Oh, and for the record, we have one cat. Her name is Lotus. She's kind of mangy and makes horrible yowling sounds, but she is loved nonetheless.

Gosh, I just can't tell if there's enough interest in OmniFocus...maybe we should scuttle it in favor of OmniCrashDoubler 1.0, the app that crashes when you try and enter descriptive text about why your original app crashed in the first place! But only after you hit the only button available, which is helpfully labeled “crash”.

OmniCrashDoubler will retail for $249.95. No volume discounts. OmniCrashDoubler Pro includes a second button labeled “manifest odor of startled skunk”.

In all seriousness, thank you so much for all of your comments and emails regarding OmniFocus. We really, truly appreciate it. A couple folks asked when we might have an early beta to share; while I wish I had a timeline to give you, that's just not something we can even guess at yet. I mean, we could guess, but we'd probably be wrong. Then you'd be all ticked off, and if there's one group of people we don't want to anger, it's the extremely productive folks who are both 1) poised to spring into Next Action and 2) armed with index cards that can be folded into little throwing stars at a moment's notice.

We're going to be as open as possible about our development progress with OmniFocus, so I expect that we'll be asking you more questions in the future (and maybe sharing some screenshots at some point). Thanks for all your participation, and stay tuned.

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