OpenTodoList: a FOSS ToDo List

Just a few days ago, I lamented about FOSS lacking a decent ToDo list app. As luck has it, I now stumbled upon the OpenTodoList project, which seems right up my alley.

I've only spent a couple of minutes playing with it, but so far, it seems to have some features that are missing from StandardNotes:

• Due times: Each task can have a due date and also a repeating pattern attached. This allows for stuff like

  • Take out the trash (daily)
  • Water your plant (weekly)

• Subtasks: Each task can have an infinite hierarchy of subtasks, each with its own due dates. I have not tested how the heritage of due dates works. An interesting bit, however, is that completing all subtasks will not automatically complete the parent - OpenTodoList will show a pop-up and ask if you want to complete it.

• Tasks and Notes are sorted into "Libraries." Each Library can live either on your local device or on Dropbox, Nextcloud, or any WebDav service. From my experience, I totally see why the developer warns about WebDav, though—syncing might be spotty, depending on the server's feature set. I've tested Dropbox, and it works okay.

Some things I didn't like at first glance:

• No inherent collaboration features. This may or may not be not a big deal:

  • All tasks are individual objects, represented by individual files. There were no conflicts when I simultaneously created and modified different tasks in the same list.
  • Each library has its own storage location. You could share a Dropbox account with someone you want to collaborate with and keep your private stuff in your own library (on your own storage target)

• I had a syncing error out of nowhere, and I was only told: "Sync got stuck." That's neither helpful nor confidence-inducing, given my short time with it.

• No notifications, as it seems. While there's an agenda view for all the tasks, I haven't found any way of getting notified about it. It's not too big of a deal; it just positions the app firmly apart from reminder apps.

• Search can't access subpages of notes. It correctly finds the note but doesn't bring you to the page.

• It's not storing anything encrypted.

Ok, let's stop ranting about OpenTodoList here, I'm actually very delighted to have found it. Googling shows that there's incredibly little talk about the app, which is surprising given that it is available on Android, iOS, Windows, Mac, and Linux. It's also far from abandoned, having received a major overhaul just at the end of 2023.

I will keep a close eye on it. I'm not ready to quickly switch from my current solution (TickTick), especially since I moved away from self-hosting Nextcloud a couple of years ago. Using Dropbox would not give me an edge in privacy over TickTick. But it might be the perfect solution for someone out there and I think more people should know that it exists.