4 ms·

I can't stand using Asana. The search sucks, the organization sucks, you can never find what you're looking for, the UI has some of the worst SNR I've ever see.

I can't stand using Asana. The search sucks, the organization sucks, you can never find what you're looking for, the UI has some of the worst SNR I've ever see. I hate that I'm forced to use it, and that it's being used as a horrible ticket management platform. VC money is a hell of a drug.

jonathankoren 6y ago
Asana feels like some designer got drunk on the minimalism kool aid. I just want a ticket id, not a 128 bit guid.
- zadokshi 6y ago
  What does minimalist design have to do with database sequence number generation? Or am I incorrectly assuming that once sentence is intended to flow on from the previous one and they are just two separate random thoughts. I do agree with your assessment that the UI is a bit too slick for its own good. Slightly annoying in fact.
  - jonathankoren 6y ago
    As a general observation Asana feels intentionally stripped of features for aesthetic reasons, rather than any actual process reasons. A specific casualty of this “Remove all the things!” approach is ticket ids. Perhaps the logic was that since you have a title and a link, that’s all you need. Well, no. Titles can change, but ticket numbers tend to be fixed within teams. Without a short ticket id, it is very difficult to coordinate say git branches/prs to tickets. Whereas if you had a short stable id, you can just name your branch WEB-1234, and know it is associated with ticket WEB-1234. Short stable ids also make it easy to make summary tables, text docs, sms messages, paper notes, and other forms of communication refer to the ticket without constantly copying some excruciatingly long URL, or meaningless hexcode. In my brief experience with Asana, I found it to prioritize form over function. Or as a friend of mine said when comparing to Jira to Asana, “Jira may be a hard configure mess, but at least it knows what problems it’s trying to solve, even if it’s not particularly great at it. Asana doesn’t know what it is.”
Crazyontap 6y ago
Also it's so damn slow. Feels like it downloads a movie in bluray quality when I log in. I've had so many friends complain the same, why don't they fix it and why do companies force us to use this :(
- heterodoxxed 6y ago
  Bloat is one unfortunate side effect of trying to monopolize a market. 80% of users need the core functionality, but catering to the other 20% creates a monster.
dave_sullivan 6y ago
Agreed, had to use Asana on a recent project for the most basic issue tracking. Used it for a few months, really didn't like it at all, found the interface confusing and never got used to it. I think trello is the best I've seen, but of course has issues of its own and needs add-ons to do some of the things I want.
threeseed 6y ago
Also they outsourced many integrations to third party developers. So Asana is terrible for software development as it lacks the deep integration for Github/Gitlab etc that you get with Jira. And all the third party offers is a basic sync between Asana Tasks and Github Issues.
- misiti3780 6y ago
  remember when they started, they had a few videos showing there amazing new framework "luna" that was going to change the world? https://blog.asana.com/2010/02/lunascript-our-in-house-language-for-writing-great-web-apps-really-quickly/ https://blog.asana.com/2010/02/lunascript-our-in-house-langu...
TheOtherHobbes 6y ago
It seems to be very good for creating mediocre products and/or toxic products with a high social cost. Because it's a meta-market. You don't win by providing a quality product/service, you win by persuading VCs and investors to give you money - which is a completely different game. You "win" as long as that continues. The product/service itself is just a shop front that gets investor money through the door.

jonathankoren 6y ago

Asana feels like some designer got drunk on the minimalism kool aid. I just want a ticket id, not a 128 bit guid.

zadokshi 6y ago
What does minimalist design have to do with database sequence number generation? Or am I incorrectly assuming that once sentence is intended to flow on from the previous one and they are just two separate random thoughts. I do agree with your assessment that the UI is a bit too slick for its own good. Slightly annoying in fact.
- jonathankoren 6y ago
  As a general observation Asana feels intentionally stripped of features for aesthetic reasons, rather than any actual process reasons. A specific casualty of this “Remove all the things!” approach is ticket ids. Perhaps the logic was that since you have a title and a link, that’s all you need. Well, no. Titles can change, but ticket numbers tend to be fixed within teams. Without a short ticket id, it is very difficult to coordinate say git branches/prs to tickets. Whereas if you had a short stable id, you can just name your branch WEB-1234, and know it is associated with ticket WEB-1234. Short stable ids also make it easy to make summary tables, text docs, sms messages, paper notes, and other forms of communication refer to the ticket without constantly copying some excruciatingly long URL, or meaningless hexcode. In my brief experience with Asana, I found it to prioritize form over function. Or as a friend of mine said when comparing to Jira to Asana, “Jira may be a hard configure mess, but at least it knows what problems it’s trying to solve, even if it’s not particularly great at it. Asana doesn’t know what it is.”

Crazyontap 6y ago

Also it's so damn slow. Feels like it downloads a movie in bluray quality when I log in. I've had so many friends complain the same, why don't they fix it and why do companies force us to use this :(

heterodoxxed 6y ago
Bloat is one unfortunate side effect of trying to monopolize a market. 80% of users need the core functionality, but catering to the other 20% creates a monster.

dave_sullivan 6y ago

Agreed, had to use Asana on a recent project for the most basic issue tracking. Used it for a few months, really didn't like it at all, found the interface confusing and never got used to it. I think trello is the best I've seen, but of course has issues of its own and needs add-ons to do some of the things I want.

threeseed 6y ago

Also they outsourced many integrations to third party developers. So Asana is terrible for software development as it lacks the deep integration for Github/Gitlab etc that you get with Jira. And all the third party offers is a basic sync between Asana Tasks and Github Issues.

misiti3780 6y ago
remember when they started, they had a few videos showing there amazing new framework "luna" that was going to change the world? https://blog.asana.com/2010/02/lunascript-our-in-house-language-for-writing-great-web-apps-really-quickly/ https://blog.asana.com/2010/02/lunascript-our-in-house-langu...

TheOtherHobbes 6y ago

It seems to be very good for creating mediocre products and/or toxic products with a high social cost. Because it's a meta-market. You don't win by providing a quality product/service, you win by persuading VCs and investors to give you money - which is a completely different game. You "win" as long as that continues. The product/service itself is just a shop front that gets investor money through the door.