6 ms·

Show HN: Pintask, the hackable task tracker

50 points by DenGorbachev 12y ago

PeterWhittaker 12y ago
It looks interesting, but not enough for me to login, yet. You need to add a few screen shots, demos, etc., to show me why I should consider this instead of Huboard or Trello (you don't need to compare yourself to these, just have some simple workflows with the free tool to make it clear why pintask is better). Also, while it is "free for life" you should "respect" current conventions for sites like this: You need a pricing link, a page on which you reinforce that basic functionality is free, and that extensions are what people buy. People are used to those conventions, it makes it easier for them to absorb your message without forcing them to think too much, without violating their expectations in a current website. Speaking of this, I should be able to browse the extension store without logging in. Also, pricing needs to tell me if the extension price is per user per month, per project per month, per enterprise per month, etc. If those prices are per enterprise, they seem like good deals, but if they are per user, they start adding up so fast that free seems more like a playground gateway drug than anything else. Finally, enterprise customers WANT to pay for your basic service: They want to give you their money to guarantee uptime, have a number to call, etc. (Personal irritant: You may require cookies to get something done, but not to browse - the page loads blank when cookies are disabled (I used a cookie manager; I'm in the minority there, but I'm the kind of user you want early on :->). Require cookies only when they are actually required - and be sure to indicate that your site uses them, so that you remain on the good side of the law in various jurisdictions). tl;dr: Looks good, too little there to incite me to actually take the action. Don't go overboard, though, you're almost there.
- karmajunkie 12y ago
  All of that. I shouldn't have to give you my information to see what's for sale—you haven't come close to convincing me you're selling anything I want to buy yet.
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  Actually, there are demo videos, just scroll down the page. Thanks for the tip, I'll make a separate page for pricing. As for browsing extensions store: I've already made landing pages for the best extensions, yet they don't comprise a full store-like experience. I guess you're right, there should be a full storefront for those who want to check it out without logging in.
  - lbotos 12y ago
    A quick fix is to grab the video and throw it right on the top of that page. I have 27" Mac Display and I still had to scroll below the page to see your sell. I was also confused by the 2 offers. What was the difference? (Please take this constructively. I think you have something that looks smooth once I saw it.)
    - DenGorbachev 12y ago
      Thanks for tips, I appreciate those very much. I've just tried doing it the fast way, but videos just popped out of nowhere, lowering aesthetic value. I'll definitely ask the designer to do something about it, so that videos show up on the first screen. These are 2 different extension. One is mirroring, a very powerful tool (like symlinks, but even easier). The other is time tracking without pressing any "Start"/"Stop" buttons.
  - subpixel 12y ago
    I had no idea those were videos, b/c they don't have affordances that tell me they are videos until I hover over them (which I did not).
    - DenGorbachev 12y ago
      Of course! You're right, I'll add the "play" buttons for better visibility.
  - Guvante 12y ago
    Demo videos are for extensions, I have no way without logging in to see what the tool does.
ohfunkyeah 12y ago
Great interface, and I can definitely see the advantage of being able to add extensions so that it is customized to the specific workflow I am looking for without the junk I don't want. I think this is one of the first commercial quality meteor applications I have seen, which says a lot of the dev team but also shows meteor is a platform capable of at least getting the job done if not doing it well. Question: Do you anticipate allowing people to write their own extensions / having some sort of API?
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  Thanks! Meteor really proved itself as a capable platform. We hit a few issues, but those were resolved rather quickly. Yes, we already allow people to write their own extensions. For quick stuff, there's a built-in code editor: http://joxi.ru/SFJNUxjKTJBvQrogwYE http://joxi.ru/SFJNUxjKTJBvQrogwYE. And for large extensions, there's an "Add your extension" button in the Extensions store. In fact, we'll allow people to monetize their extensions, in a micro-App-store fashion.
  - ohfunkyeah 12y ago
    Ok, that's fricken cool.
pdq 12y ago
How is this different than Trello? It looks almost identical at first glance.
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  1. You can write your own extensions using JS + Meteor API. MongoDB access in browser included. 2. Mirroring extension solves the hottest issues on Trello dev board. Here's how you use it: http://joxi.ru/lFFNUxjKTJCFQk-Gd9Q http://joxi.ru/lFFNUxjKTJCFQk-Gd9Q
  - pfraze 12y ago
    How are the extensions secured? Are they sandboxed in the live environment, or is there an auditing process to get into your store? (Cool project Den - best of luck!)
    - DenGorbachev 12y ago
      Right now extensions are just loaded as external JS files. In near future, they will be loaded inside iframes with "sandbox" attribute + specific APIs injected into iframes. There will also be an auditing process if you want your extension to be featured in the store. But you'll always be able to just add an extension and send a link to friend. (Thanks for kind words!)
jeremyw 12y ago
Interesting price hack: $1/mo (1 left), $3/mo (5 left). Are these escalating, à la Pinboard? Useful for price discovery, though up-from-the-bottom nudges artificial asymptotes (see pricing discontinuities).
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  Yes, they escalate up to a predefined list price (also shown on extension card). I just wanted to thank early adopters by giving them a discount. Do you think it's OK or not?
  - jeremyw 12y ago
    I think it's great. As I say, I'd use the opportunity to learn about uptake and natural price boundaries, while awarding early customers.
donut2d 12y ago
Is there any way to share a board via URL, without requiring users to sign in? I don't want to make it public or have it show up in search results, I just want to be able to share it with people who just need to view it but wont want to mess with creating an account. If that's available (and I just can't find it), then this would be a great solution for me!
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  Thanks for the idea! It's not available right now (you can either invite or make it public), but seems to be a good addition, so it's possible to see that in future.
owenversteeg 12y ago
Looks interesting, but many Trello users have tons of loyalty to Trello. Getting them to switch is going to be difficult. There are plenty of Trello clones, and you don't offer any screenshots or examples.
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  Thanks for advice! I'll surely add more videos to main page, some featuring the product itself, some featuring extensions.
mc_hammer 12y ago
wow the ui is really nice - i built my own tool exactly like this but the ui didnt end up as beautiful. i know other tools have some accessibility problems and built my ui similar to yours to solve them. this looks really cool. i couldnt figure out how to monetize my app - i have to say the plugin store is a good idea. gj!
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  Glad you like it! I'm sure you had some ideas for your own app — would you like to wrap them as a plugin?
phryk 12y ago
How exactly is this hackable? Where do I find the documentation to look into whether I can do interesting stuff with it?
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  There is built-in code editor: http://joxi.ru/v3lNUxjKTJA4Eous4Gs http://joxi.ru/v3lNUxjKTJA4Eous4Gs Right now, it lags sometimes, but we'll migrate to Meteor 0.8 and this issue will be resolved. Also, at the bottom of editor, there is a link to http://wiki.pintask.me/wiki/How_to_write_an_extension http://wiki.pintask.me/wiki/How_to_write_an_extension with some info to get started. If you have specific questions, please reach me: Denis.D.Gorbachev at gmail
- codez 12y ago
  Have a go with tyto if you want something completely hackable. Http://jh3y.github.io/tyto
ericHosick 12y ago
Out of curiosity, why do you have this as one of the first things people read on your site: "Pintask promise: we will always keep the service running. And if anybody tries to shut it down, we will open-source it."
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  We're small guys, so we wanted to assure people it's OK to put data into Pintask: it will always be supported.
  - mrmondo 12y ago
    What's stopping you from open sourcing it now?
anigbrowl 12y ago
The mode could be a bit more obvious, ie whether you're using the Move or Embed tools is signified only by a subtle border line, so it took me a while to figure out how to embed cards and I can't really tell what mode I'm n from a casual glance. This will become more important as more tools are added, I'd imagine. Color coding seems pretty arbitrary as the labels aren't descriptive, and there's no filtering. But I guess these can be hacked into being :) Code editor look spretty bare, although I appreciate the Wiki link and again it's early days. Maybe have a little 'Hello World' code by default, or even a few lines of advice as a comment so the window doesn't look so empty? Casual hackers such as myself have a phobia of blank pages because it's not obvious where to begin. One small annoyance: Initials. I have a double-barreled name (Firstname Surname-Surname) but it rendered my initials as FS, which was quite confusing because I'm not used to seeing that letter combination at all, and it wasn't until I added an avatar that I realized it was my initials. That little nitpick aside, I like it a lot!
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  Thanks for thorough feedback! We'll surely work out these details. And yes, it's possible to hack label names :) By the way, how should we render initials like yours?
  - anigbrowl 12y ago
    I'd do it as FSS, ie filtering on capital letters rather than the first letter in a string. But I'm sure someone else would want it as FS-S or something.
    - DenGorbachev 12y ago
      That was my first thought, but there's a catch: user avatars or initials should be same width. Is there a way to both fit your and designer requirements?
      - anigbrowl 12y ago
        My answer to such questions is always 'fire the designer,' but I suspect that is not helpful to you :) TBH I could live without the initials altogether and just have a blank avatar - not least because your upload process is already super-transparent, I appreciated being able to connect with so many services 'right out of the box'.
codez 12y ago
I instantly got a headache, viewing this on a mobile device
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  Sorry for that! We'll make separate apps for mobile devices.
korjavin 12y ago
I really like time-tracker feature!
- DenGorbachev 12y ago
  Glad you do :) Hope it actually saves time!
codez 12y ago
I'd say extendable not hackable.
- codez 12y ago
  Hackable would be if it was OS IMO like the other Trello clones which are completely OS like tyto being able to host your own and tweak everything to your needs.
kevohagan 12y ago
great example of a production meteor app!! Beautiful work!
thisispraveen 12y ago
Seems I am wrong somewhere. Reached this discussion as part of google search and found accidently I have used the same name and similar concept :(. Anyway this is just my hobby program and no plans to commercialize it. Let me check the name if I start getting users - http://www.secfor.net/ http://www.secfor.net/ Again, it is also may be hackable as I was not so serious about coding and was concentrating just about making it a reality.

50 points by DenGorbachev 12y ago

It looks interesting, but not enough for me to login, yet. You need to add a few screen shots, demos, etc., to show me why I should consider this instead of Huboard or Trello (you don't need to compare yourself to these, just have some simple workflows with the free tool to make it clear why pintask is better). Also, while it is "free for life" you should "respect" current conventions for sites like this: You need a pricing link, a page on which you reinforce that basic functionality is free, and that extensions are what people buy. People are used to those conventions, it makes it easier for them to absorb your message without forcing them to think too much, without violating their expectations in a current website. Speaking of this, I should be able to browse the extension store without logging in. Also, pricing needs to tell me if the extension price is per user per month, per project per month, per enterprise per month, etc. If those prices are per enterprise, they seem like good deals, but if they are per user, they start adding up so fast that free seems more like a playground gateway drug than anything else. Finally, enterprise customers WANT to pay for your basic service: They want to give you their money to guarantee uptime, have a number to call, etc. (Personal irritant: You may require cookies to get something done, but not to browse - the page loads blank when cookies are disabled (I used a cookie manager; I'm in the minority there, but I'm the kind of user you want early on :->). Require cookies only when they are actually required - and be sure to indicate that your site uses them, so that you remain on the good side of the law in various jurisdictions). tl;dr: Looks good, too little there to incite me to actually take the action. Don't go overboard, though, you're almost there.

karmajunkie 12y ago
All of that. I shouldn't have to give you my information to see what's for sale—you haven't come close to convincing me you're selling anything I want to buy yet.
DenGorbachev 12y ago
Actually, there are demo videos, just scroll down the page. Thanks for the tip, I'll make a separate page for pricing. As for browsing extensions store: I've already made landing pages for the best extensions, yet they don't comprise a full store-like experience. I guess you're right, there should be a full storefront for those who want to check it out without logging in.
- lbotos 12y ago
  A quick fix is to grab the video and throw it right on the top of that page. I have 27" Mac Display and I still had to scroll below the page to see your sell. I was also confused by the 2 offers. What was the difference? (Please take this constructively. I think you have something that looks smooth once I saw it.)
  - DenGorbachev 12y ago
    Thanks for tips, I appreciate those very much. I've just tried doing it the fast way, but videos just popped out of nowhere, lowering aesthetic value. I'll definitely ask the designer to do something about it, so that videos show up on the first screen. These are 2 different extension. One is mirroring, a very powerful tool (like symlinks, but even easier). The other is time tracking without pressing any "Start"/"Stop" buttons.
- subpixel 12y ago
  I had no idea those were videos, b/c they don't have affordances that tell me they are videos until I hover over them (which I did not).
  - DenGorbachev 12y ago
    Of course! You're right, I'll add the "play" buttons for better visibility.
- Guvante 12y ago
  Demo videos are for extensions, I have no way without logging in to see what the tool does.

ohfunkyeah 12y ago

Great interface, and I can definitely see the advantage of being able to add extensions so that it is customized to the specific workflow I am looking for without the junk I don't want. I think this is one of the first commercial quality meteor applications I have seen, which says a lot of the dev team but also shows meteor is a platform capable of at least getting the job done if not doing it well. Question: Do you anticipate allowing people to write their own extensions / having some sort of API?

DenGorbachev 12y ago
Thanks! Meteor really proved itself as a capable platform. We hit a few issues, but those were resolved rather quickly. Yes, we already allow people to write their own extensions. For quick stuff, there's a built-in code editor: http://joxi.ru/SFJNUxjKTJBvQrogwYE http://joxi.ru/SFJNUxjKTJBvQrogwYE. And for large extensions, there's an "Add your extension" button in the Extensions store. In fact, we'll allow people to monetize their extensions, in a micro-App-store fashion.
- ohfunkyeah 12y ago
  Ok, that's fricken cool.

pdq 12y ago

How is this different than Trello? It looks almost identical at first glance.

DenGorbachev 12y ago
1. You can write your own extensions using JS + Meteor API. MongoDB access in browser included. 2. Mirroring extension solves the hottest issues on Trello dev board. Here's how you use it: http://joxi.ru/lFFNUxjKTJCFQk-Gd9Q http://joxi.ru/lFFNUxjKTJCFQk-Gd9Q
- pfraze 12y ago
  How are the extensions secured? Are they sandboxed in the live environment, or is there an auditing process to get into your store? (Cool project Den - best of luck!)
  - DenGorbachev 12y ago
    Right now extensions are just loaded as external JS files. In near future, they will be loaded inside iframes with "sandbox" attribute + specific APIs injected into iframes. There will also be an auditing process if you want your extension to be featured in the store. But you'll always be able to just add an extension and send a link to friend. (Thanks for kind words!)

jeremyw 12y ago

Interesting price hack: $1/mo (1 left), $3/mo (5 left). Are these escalating, à la Pinboard? Useful for price discovery, though up-from-the-bottom nudges artificial asymptotes (see pricing discontinuities).

DenGorbachev 12y ago
Yes, they escalate up to a predefined list price (also shown on extension card). I just wanted to thank early adopters by giving them a discount. Do you think it's OK or not?
- jeremyw 12y ago
  I think it's great. As I say, I'd use the opportunity to learn about uptake and natural price boundaries, while awarding early customers.

donut2d 12y ago

Is there any way to share a board via URL, without requiring users to sign in? I don't want to make it public or have it show up in search results, I just want to be able to share it with people who just need to view it but wont want to mess with creating an account. If that's available (and I just can't find it), then this would be a great solution for me!

DenGorbachev 12y ago
Thanks for the idea! It's not available right now (you can either invite or make it public), but seems to be a good addition, so it's possible to see that in future.

owenversteeg 12y ago

Looks interesting, but many Trello users have tons of loyalty to Trello. Getting them to switch is going to be difficult. There are plenty of Trello clones, and you don't offer any screenshots or examples.

DenGorbachev 12y ago
Thanks for advice! I'll surely add more videos to main page, some featuring the product itself, some featuring extensions.

mc_hammer 12y ago

wow the ui is really nice - i built my own tool exactly like this but the ui didnt end up as beautiful. i know other tools have some accessibility problems and built my ui similar to yours to solve them. this looks really cool. i couldnt figure out how to monetize my app - i have to say the plugin store is a good idea. gj!

DenGorbachev 12y ago
Glad you like it! I'm sure you had some ideas for your own app — would you like to wrap them as a plugin?

phryk 12y ago

How exactly is this hackable? Where do I find the documentation to look into whether I can do interesting stuff with it?

DenGorbachev 12y ago
There is built-in code editor: http://joxi.ru/v3lNUxjKTJA4Eous4Gs http://joxi.ru/v3lNUxjKTJA4Eous4Gs Right now, it lags sometimes, but we'll migrate to Meteor 0.8 and this issue will be resolved. Also, at the bottom of editor, there is a link to http://wiki.pintask.me/wiki/How_to_write_an_extension http://wiki.pintask.me/wiki/How_to_write_an_extension with some info to get started. If you have specific questions, please reach me: Denis.D.Gorbachev at gmail
codez 12y ago
Have a go with tyto if you want something completely hackable. Http://jh3y.github.io/tyto

ericHosick 12y ago

Out of curiosity, why do you have this as one of the first things people read on your site: "Pintask promise: we will always keep the service running. And if anybody tries to shut it down, we will open-source it."

DenGorbachev 12y ago
We're small guys, so we wanted to assure people it's OK to put data into Pintask: it will always be supported.
- mrmondo 12y ago
  What's stopping you from open sourcing it now?

anigbrowl 12y ago

The mode could be a bit more obvious, ie whether you're using the Move or Embed tools is signified only by a subtle border line, so it took me a while to figure out how to embed cards and I can't really tell what mode I'm n from a casual glance. This will become more important as more tools are added, I'd imagine. Color coding seems pretty arbitrary as the labels aren't descriptive, and there's no filtering. But I guess these can be hacked into being :) Code editor look spretty bare, although I appreciate the Wiki link and again it's early days. Maybe have a little 'Hello World' code by default, or even a few lines of advice as a comment so the window doesn't look so empty? Casual hackers such as myself have a phobia of blank pages because it's not obvious where to begin. One small annoyance: Initials. I have a double-barreled name (Firstname Surname-Surname) but it rendered my initials as FS, which was quite confusing because I'm not used to seeing that letter combination at all, and it wasn't until I added an avatar that I realized it was my initials. That little nitpick aside, I like it a lot!

DenGorbachev 12y ago
Thanks for thorough feedback! We'll surely work out these details. And yes, it's possible to hack label names :) By the way, how should we render initials like yours?
- anigbrowl 12y ago
  I'd do it as FSS, ie filtering on capital letters rather than the first letter in a string. But I'm sure someone else would want it as FS-S or something.
  - DenGorbachev 12y ago
    That was my first thought, but there's a catch: user avatars or initials should be same width. Is there a way to both fit your and designer requirements?
    - anigbrowl 12y ago
      My answer to such questions is always 'fire the designer,' but I suspect that is not helpful to you :) TBH I could live without the initials altogether and just have a blank avatar - not least because your upload process is already super-transparent, I appreciated being able to connect with so many services 'right out of the box'.

codez 12y ago

I instantly got a headache, viewing this on a mobile device

DenGorbachev 12y ago
Sorry for that! We'll make separate apps for mobile devices.

korjavin 12y ago

I really like time-tracker feature!

DenGorbachev 12y ago
Glad you do :) Hope it actually saves time!

codez 12y ago

I'd say extendable not hackable.

codez 12y ago
Hackable would be if it was OS IMO like the other Trello clones which are completely OS like tyto being able to host your own and tweak everything to your needs.

kevohagan 12y ago

great example of a production meteor app!! Beautiful work!

thisispraveen 12y ago

Seems I am wrong somewhere. Reached this discussion as part of google search and found accidently I have used the same name and similar concept :(. Anyway this is just my hobby program and no plans to commercialize it. Let me check the name if I start getting users - http://www.secfor.net/ http://www.secfor.net/ Again, it is also may be hackable as I was not so serious about coding and was concentrating just about making it a reality.