The built-in iOS Reminders app has two big advantages: it’s ubiquitous, and it syncs flawlessly between devices. This makes it a great back end for other apps’ reminder systems, which is handy as the reminders app is a nightmare. Viewing and checking off completed tasks is fine, but creating them? Even Siri starts to seem attractive.
Luckily, you can now use an app called This Week to create and use your reminders. Better still, it excels at adding and managing due dates, which is the weak point of Reminders’ already weak task-creation offering.
The interface consists of a calendar up top and a list below. The calendar can show weeks or months (of the former, it becomes a row of seven dates). To add a new entry, you pull down and release. To move between months or weeks, you swipe left and right.
You can go the old-school route and just add the task, and then switch to the (optional) “details” view to quickly add times and priorities, but I prefer the neat direct entry method: long tap on a day in the week/month calendar and the task-entry screen opens up. The due date is pre-set to the day you tapped, and the time to the default time (specified in settings).
The whole thing is pretty slick and easy to use, and as it uses the built-in Reminders, it syncs with any other app that uses them.
Other niceties are the ability to toggle which lists are shown (I have mine only to display reminder and shopping lists, leaving out specific project lists), and an instant, reminders-wide search that narrows the results as you type.
The color scheme is a little dull: I’d prefer the individual lists to take on their assigned colors for easier identification. As it is, the name of the list is written under each and every entry in that list in the list’s color.
Still, updates seem to be coming fast, and the app is a mere $2, which is worth it even if you use the app for no more than task entry. Available now.
Source: iTunes
Thanks: Tiger!
