A REVIEW OF DAILY PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH USING TODO MANAGER

e-ISSN: 2582-5208 International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering Technology and Science Volume:02/Issue:12/December -2020

Impact Factor- 5.354

www.irjmets.com

A REVIEW OF DAILY PRODUCTIVITY GROWTH USING TODO MANAGER Suyash Kejriwal *1, Vaibhav Vishal *2, Aastha Gulati *3, Gaurav Gambhir *4 *1,2,3 Student, *4 Assistant

B. Tech CSE, Panipat Institute of Engineering & Technology, Samalkha, Haryana, India.

Professor, CSE Department, Panipat Institute of Engineering & Technology, Samalkha, Haryana, India.

ABSTRACT We present a daily To-do manager to efficiently manage daily goals and tasks. Our system will help to create and track daily tasks bounded in long-term goals which the users can securely access anytime from anywhere via the Internet. The Daily To-do Manager not only keeps track of the goals and tasks but also tracks the task completion of user by dividing task into smaller parts. It also provides means to analyze day to day tasks efficiency via reports displaying complete statistics of tasks achieved as well as total tasks planned along with daily streaks indicating no. of consecutive days for which task efficiency is good. In our study we found that in the general To-do manager applications, tasks are listed in binary form - completed or uncompleted. But contrary to popular belief, people do not complete their task in one go. Instead, they prefer to divide the task in smaller chunks and want their partial completions to be managed by To-do manager. By tracking out partial task completions of user, we hope to provide a solid base for laying the design of a daily To-do manager.

Keywords: Task management, to-dos, goal progress, daily target completion, task reports.

I.

INTRODUCTION

These days people are quite busy and due to this they are not able to remember everything they have to do in their daily day to day life. So, they need something online which can be used anytime & anywhere. As the solution we can use an application which can keep notes about all the necessary tasks they have to perform. So, the idea of developing a Daily to Do Manager application can be useful to avoid deadlock of tasks. We are trying to help people to prioritize their day-to-day tasks and long-term goals. It’s more important for us to prioritize tasks and work on those that are most important, rather than focusing on deleting small items from our To-do list just for the sake of appearances.

DARPA [1,7] has done some research work on task management during the last previous years. To support busy professionals in managing and even performing their official tasks DARPA has taken some crucial steps.

Task list manager system (TLMS) can be one of the possible representations of this type of system. It could help users manage and execute their to-dos. Such a system would: ●

Store the user’s daily tasks.

●

Prioritize, manage, and reason about tasks.

●

Update the daily task efficiency based on the number of completed tasks.

●

Show tasks report for daily, weekly, monthly or yearly.

The aim of this app is to provide us an analysis of daily efficiency and time utilization in completing day to day tasks and checking the daily progress. It also helps in maintaining a daily streak of successful tasks completion in order to achieve a long-term goal. It further provides motivation so as to increase our progress and not get distracted on social media and use that time to complete our tasks. When we have a better sense of daily efficiency of tasks and goals completed, along with the number of tasks completed, we are able to achieve our long-term goals more efficiently.

II.

LITERATURE REVIEW

We studied the research paper "Studies of Task Manager" [1]. It has been referred to in 166 papers till now. The aim of this paper was to find the factors which influence task completion and provide a strong foundation for design of personal to-do list manager. It was found people do not correctly explain their task in case of offline or manual To-do list. It was found most of the people prefer email and formal reminders to complete their task. It was found that tasks with high priority or urgency have more probability to be completed within the time. The www.irjmets.com

@International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering, Technology and Science

[969]

e-ISSN: 2582-5208 International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering Technology and Science Volume:02/Issue:12/December -2020

Impact Factor- 5.354

www.irjmets.com

main findings of this paper were that people prefer online To-do list managers and complete tasks which have higher priority.

We studied the case study titled “The best to-do list app right now” published on theverge.com [4]. Its main aim is to compare the popular to-do lists app in the market and give them a score based on the user preferences.

The approach is simple that the best to-do list is the one which perfectly maps individual meets. The other parameters were to check it is accessible on phone, daily encouragement to execute the tasks not just plan things and a simple user interface to make the user understand easily. The main finding from this website is to prepare a to-do list which will fit most of the user’s needs.

We also studied the article from orange scrum [5]. It states that there are few problems if we do tasks manually.

The problems discussed are given below: ●

throw the project off-track

●

demotivate team members

●

add to customer dissatisfaction

●

probable loss of business

The major findings from this paper were: ●

Get Organized

●

Align your Processes

●

Communicate Effectively & with Ease

●

Execute as a Team

III.

A STUDY OF TODOS

Earlier To-dos were made to only provide clues of the given task but they were not elaborated enough that they can give a proper idea about the task. For example, one to-do was some text on a piece of paper where it was written 'Akash the Grocery shopkeeper.' The Explanation was, "A reminder to call him and ask him about [...] groceries. But I can't remember what to order." The task was not defined well so we weren't able to memorize for a long time and only effective for a limited period of time. In some cases, an item such as a book or a pile serves as enough of a clue to recall the task, without creating a note.

To-do can be used in multiple ways. Sometimes they are part of a list that provides a sense of the amount of work to do. Sometimes they are resources supporting daily routine tasks, work progress, work life balance, efficiency tracker & as well as displaying abilities to perform tasks.

Fig.-1: Handwritten To-Do. Many To-dos are notifications which when placed in-the-way are reminders of the daily routine that must be performed at the right moment for the to-do to be completed. For example, “When I go to the library, ‘I must take that book to the library.” Tasks left in personal diary also helps to see the task which are left to perform in daily routine www.irjmets.com

@International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering, Technology and Science

[970]

e-ISSN: 2582-5208 International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering Technology and Science Volume:02/Issue:12/December -2020

Impact Factor- 5.354

www.irjmets.com

One problem is that while writing To-do lists in offline mode, people prefer to write To-do in short forms without any detailing. But with online to-do list users can quickly type in all the details of To-dos. As you can see from Figure 1(top right), there is no level of detailing in the handwritten To-do list.

All To-do tasks are not done in one go. People procrastinate about some, consider some of not much importance and prefer to do some tasks in phases. So, the To-do list used to manage must take into account the fact that tasks can be completed in phases. According to phases completed, the progress of the task must be also visible.

It should also provide provision to filter tasks based on their priority so that a person can see and perform tasks accordingly. Overall, a good experience of managing To-do lists must be provided.

IV.

RESEARCH

We have spent a little too much time thinking about the process of making a Task Manager app. The first and foremost thing before developing an application is to brainstorm about the whole idea and discuss possible solutions. So, when we started working, we discussed it with a few of our colleagues to have some great ideas and have a deep discussion so that I can get maximum understanding of to-do manager concepts and give a possible solution to the task manager.

While discussing, we decided to gather all possible requirements of the users from To-do manager and created a questionnaire to ask about their preferences. Most of the people preferred the online To-do list because of their easy accessibility as you can see in the figure below.

Fig.-2: A snapshot of the user’s preference on To-do list After gathering all these requirements, we started working on the database and implementations, for this process too, we had mood boarding and an excellent discussion. And we got so many ideas for implementing the features. The first confusion was to decide whether it would be a To-Do list app or Just the Task Manager, let me describe both here: To-Do List Apps: As the name suggests To-Do is an ordered list of items or works. We can build a flexible UI environment with the help of a To-Do list application as it lists up the things properly. Unlike Task Managers, it tells us about what we have to do, not how to do.

Task Manager Apps: Task Management applications have been built for structured collaboration. They provide us the functionalities of reminders, due dates, priorities, task descriptions & statuses, etc. They also manage different levels of actions and offer complete workflow management. www.irjmets.com

@International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering, Technology and Science

[971]

e-ISSN: 2582-5208 International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering Technology and Science Volume:02/Issue:12/December -2020

Impact Factor- 5.354

www.irjmets.com

Comparative Analysis

Fig.-3: Bar Graph showing ratings of To-do apps via verge.com Table-1: Comparison Table of To-do Manager and other general To-do applications.

S. No.

Features

Daily To-do Manager

Other Apps

1.

Register

✔

✔

2.

Sign-in

✔

✔

3.

Add Goals & Tasks

✔

✔

4.

Goals Menu

✔

✔

5.

Calendar Menu

✔

X

6.

Report Menu

✔

✔

7.

Priority Significance

✔

X

8.

Target Completion Indicator

✔

X

9.

Current List Stats

✔

X

10.

Data Management

✔

✔

To-do

The unique feature present in our To-do list application is that users can complete the tasks in phases and therefore can track their task completion accordingly. A calendar menu is also present which shows green or red background colors on dates depending on the result of comparison of that day's task efficiency and target set by the user. www.irjmets.com

@International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering, Technology and Science

[972]

e-ISSN: 2582-5208 International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering Technology and Science Volume:02/Issue:12/December -2020

Impact Factor- 5.354

V.

www.irjmets.com

CHALLENGES

As we have seen the task efficiency problem in existing applications, now the challenge was how to implement that feature in such a way that it is simple to understand as well as gives complete analysis of task efficiency for different kinds of users, who can be good or bad in percentage calculation. In the end, we decided to keep things from both the cases.

VI.

PROPOSED SOLUTION

Creating and memorizing lists would be an easy task now by using this app, as is setting up deadlines for getting them done and reminders to ensure you’re not caught out. It shows which task you have to do in a given time of the day in order to complete each of your tasks effectively and in time.

Whatever your task is like accomplishing projects, managing daily tasks, work To-dos, learning languages, mastering skills, sports or travel, this app will help you to collect, keep, organize and remind you about all your tasks you have to do on that day.

After the analysis of preliminary investigation, the researcher has spotted and identified some of the main problems which are solved by implementing certain features which are briefly described below: ●

Partial task completion: Users can enter the specific number of times in which they want to complete the task in smaller chunks in a particular day.

●

Task efficiency: Users can thus improve their task efficiency by seeing the total no of completed as well as pending tasks. The percentage completion of days according to the start date of the goal are also shown.

●

Target Completion Indicator: The user can set a target percentage manually which will be compared with the daily task efficiency. If task efficiency is greater than the target, then a green background is placed on that date indicating success on that day.

The solution for the current system is to develop a system which will implement above features removing out all the existing problems. The proposed system will work upon the current issues and will overcome the problem that it consists now.

VII.

CONCLUSION

Every human being wants to achieve a certain goal in their life. The goals may vary from person to person like “start your own business” or “increase productivity in work”. But one thing is common, most of the people are not able to follow the required course of actions for achieving their goals. Most of the time, people would start down a course of action for a few weeks or even months. Then they would just begin to skip taking action every day until one day the action just stops.

In order to solve the above problem, this system will act as a virtual reminder to people to keep performing their actions. This will help them to list all their necessary and it will be checked off the list once the person completes it. When persons complete the list of actions for the day a green check mark is placed on a calendar for that day. That green checks act as a motivator for them to perform their action consistently.

VIII. [1]

REFERENCES

What a to-do: studies of task management towards the design of a personal task list manager(January,2004). https://www.researchgate.net/publication/221518959_What_a_todo_studies_of_task_management_towards_the_design_of_a_personal_task_list_manager

[2]

Barreau, D. & Nardi, B. Finding and Reminding: File Organization from the Desktop. SIGCHI Bulletin, 27, 3 (1995), 39-43.

[3]

Covey, S. The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People, Simon & Schuster (1989)

[4]

https://www.theverge.com/2017/9/8/16273422/best-to-do-list-app-android-iphone

[5]

https://www.orangescrum.com/blog/how-to-stay-focused-with-task-management-software.html

www.irjmets.com

@International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering, Technology and Science

[973]

e-ISSN: 2582-5208 International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering Technology and Science Volume:02/Issue:12/December -2020

Impact Factor- 5.354

www.irjmets.com

[6]

https://blog.prototypr.io/todo-b6c608656211

[7]

https://medium.com/@annchichi/cast-study-a-simple-todo-app-5f0c69b5a2ee

[8]

DARPA IPTO BAA 02-21: http://www.darpa.mil/-ipto/Solicitations/open/02-21_PIP.htm

[9]

https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/221296.221307)

[10]

https://zapier.com/blog/best-todo-list-apps/

www.irjmets.com

@International Research Journal of Modernization in Engineering, Technology and Science

[974]