Use bug tracker to get things done and manage personal tasks? [closed]

Question

This is slightly off-topic, but can only be answered by programmers and is useful to many programmers:

Do you think it is useful to use a bug tracking system to keep track of personal todo items and to Get Things Done? I have not tried that; in fact, I don't have much experience with bug tracking systems. For my todo lists, I have played around with Google Tasks and Remember The Milk, but both of them have shortcomings:

Google Tasks: I like that you can create todo lists easily, can reorder items in the list and easily create hierarchies. But it is way too simplistic and does not allow to tag tasks or move tasks from one list to another.

Remember The Milk: It is nice and sleek, but you cannot create hierarchies of tasks, cannot arbitrarily reorder tasks and cannot set dependencies of tasks.

That's where a bug tracking system should come in:

Since I think (maybe too much?) like a programmer, my tasks have a natural hierarchy and a tree of dependencies, like in a Makefile. Here are two examples:

• The task of writing my thesis is done when several milestones are done. Some of these milestones can run in parallel (writing background chapter, running experiments A, running experiments B), others depend on each other (writing main chapter depends on first getting results from experiments A).

• The same is true for more personal goals: I want to host a dinner party, which requires finding a good date, finishing the guest list, making invitations, finding nice recipes, cooking, ...

For me, all these tasks involve hierarchical dependencies and milestones that bug tracking systems should be able to handle?

Here is an article that explains how to do advanced GTD with Remember The Milk, but he has to use several workarounds: (1) add a general tag 'wait' to tasks that are waiting for others to be completed but you cannot enter the IDs of the tasks that they are waiting for, (2) starting some special tasks with "." so that they are at the top of the alphabetically sorted list and signal that others are 'below' it as subgoals. Bug tracking systems should be able to handle these things much more naturally?

Does anyone have experience and can recommend a lightweight bug tracking system that might be good for this? Other requirements: Should run as web app, should allow me to tag a task with several tags (like 'work', 'fun', 'short-task', 'errands', ...).

Answer 1

I have used quite a few bug/issue tracking systems and also task management and project management systems so far for professional purposes. Personally I am big fan of Getting Things Done, time and task management. For Getting Things Done, I also had my time with Google Tasks and Remember The Milk. Although they simply do the work, they have several shortcomings, as you mentioned before.

I have tried several things and within the scope of this question I will try to breakdown my experience with this tools based on your requirement.

Bugzilla

Bugzilla is a mature product which has several features, it is a great bug tracking software. You can easily create a demo instance if you want to give it a try. But based on your requirements, I don't think it is the best fit.

Redmine

I have played with Redmine, it is OK as an issue tracking system but I was not very satisfied with its usage. You can have a look at the demo page.

MantisBT

I also happen to play with MantisBT and in my opinion MantisBT is a barely OK bug tracking system and I don't think it will be the best fit.

Team Foundation Server

I use TFS on a daily basis, but mostly for version control and it is many things besides version control. Work items can be used as bug tracking and it a great tool for team management but it is not lightweight and I also don't think it is the best fit.

Wunderlist

Wunderlist is a great tool for GTD. It is very simple and list based. You can create several lists, you can create reminders etc. For personal use, this is my favorite choice for GTD, up to now. Although pro version has a few more features, it won't solve your problems based on your requirements.

Basecamp

I have used Basecamp, mainly for project management, task and issue management. You can create projects, and create tasks for each project. It is very easy to use and if you want to collaborate it is very easy. But it has its shortcomings.

In my humble opinion conventional issue tracking systems are no good for Getting Things Done. From what I understand, you need a simple yet powerful project management tool. Which brings us to our winner.

Trello

Trello is a web-based project management application developed by Fog Creek Software

Some of the features are:

• You can create projects. Projects are shown as lists.
• Create tasks. Tasks are shown as cards. You can also assign tasks to other individuals.
• You can move cards easily from one project to another, i.e. from Doing to Done.
• You can use tags, attach files and create checklists and etc.

It is very well explained in this short video : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xWiunIolf4s

Also @JoelSpolsky explains it in detail here : http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aaDf1RqeLfo

In my opinion Trello would cover exactly what you need, most probably even more.