(Re)introducing Jott Express
September 3, 2008Why give the new Jott Express a try? It’s everything you need right on your desktop!
It works in offline mode.
You aren’t always connected to the internet, so why should your notes and lists have to be? Cross off completed items, add new items, and manage your lists even if you’re on a plane. Once you’re back and connected to the web, the changes you made will sync with your account online.
It’s lightning fast.
If Jott Express were an Olympic athlete, it would beat Phelps and Bolt. Update and manage lists, mark items as complete, set reminders and add to-dos all faster than any other world record breaking desktop app.
It syncs with the iPhone app.
What could possibly make your iPhone better? If you answered longer battery life, you haven’t tried Jott Express yet! It’s the desktop app that syncs with Jott for iPhone, so all your notes are available no matter where you are!
Take a look…
Allow me to explain how one of my typical Jotting sessions goes:
Jott: “Who do you want to Jott?”
Me: “Outlook Task”
Jott: “We’re sorry, we couldn’t find that name in your contacts. Who do you want to Jott?”
Me: “Outlook Task”
Jott: “We found more than one match. For Outlook Drafts, press or say one, for Outlook Tasks, press or say two.”
Me: “Two”
Jott: “I’m sorry, I didn’t quite get that.”
Me: “Two”
Jott: “Who do you want to Jott?”
Me: “Outlook Task”
Jott: “We’re sorry, we couldn’t find that name in your contacts. Who do you want to Jott?”
Me: “Outlook Task”
Jott: “We found more than one match. For Outlook Drafts, press or say one, for Outlook Tasks, press or say two.”
Me: “Two”
Jott: “I’m sorry, I didn’t quite get that.”
Me: “Two”
Jott: “Outlook Task. Beep.”
At this point, I’m usually so frustrated that I’ve forgotten why I’ve called Jott in the first place.
In my opinion, Jott operates backwards. Let me explain.
The way I see it, Jott is a collection tool. By David Allen’s GTD standards, I should collect as soon as I have the thought. Say I have the thought “Call Rob and ask him for his address.”
With the Jott procedure described above (the one I seem to be locked into everytime I use Jott), it takes me a full minute or so to get to a point where I’m ready to capture my thought, if I can still remember it. First I must interrupt my train of thought to place the call to Jott; there’s really not anything you can do about this, it’s a necessary evil (though a Jott client for Windows Mobile would soften the blow *wink wink*). Then I must further interrupt my train of thought to decide what to do with the item that hasn’t even been collected yet.
The method I would propose Jott function in would be as follows:
Jott: “Begin Jotting. *beep*”
Me: “Call Rob and ask him for his address.”
Jott: “Got it. Where would you like to put this?”
Me: “Task”
Jott: “Outlook Task?”
Me: “Yes”
Jott: “Jott sent.”
There’s two additional features to this:
1) Notice I said “Task” and not “Outlook Task.” I should be able to customize the Spoken Name as I can for Jott Links. This is a no brainer. If we already can and I’ve missed it, then I apologize.
2) Something not evident from the above transaction would be my ability to hang up after I’ve said “Call Rob and ask him for his address.” This is because my profile should include a default location when one isn’t specified. I use Jott 99% for Outlook Tasks. If I just want to Jott a task, I shouldn’t have to run through the gauntlet of specifying a recipient each and every time.
I am a paying customer, but I should let you know that I expect to see usability improvements over current functionality in the next year, or I will not elect to resubscribe. I think you have a great product here, it just needs a little tweaking to remove the frustration factor.
Comment by Brian — September 4, 2008 @ 6:28 am
Sorry to hear you’re having such trouble with the differentiation between drafts and tasks. Speech recognition can be tricky since every one of us pronounces things differently. The best suggestion I can give is to enunciate the word as if you are speaking clearly to a child- nice and slow and easy, but without evoking a radio voice.
To answer your specific points…
1) You can’t customize the names of those lists specifically because of the add-in. You can customize the names of Jott Links because they work essentially like a contact, but the Outlook add-in is different and has needs to follow different guidelines in order to work properly. You actually shouldn’t be able to just say “Tasks” and have it appear in your Outlook. I just tried to reproduce this and couldn’t. Do you have a desperate list on your Jott account called tasks?
2) This is good feedback and something we’ve thought about- the ability to set hotkeys or something along those lines. Right now we have hotkeys for Jott Notes (1), Reminders (4) and for different Jott Feeds. Thanks for letting us know that’s something you’d like to see as customizable for our other features as well.
Comment by kate — September 4, 2008 @ 4:29 pm
The hotkeys don’t do much for me for a couple of reasons: I have a Windows Mobile phone and in Microsoft’s infinite wisdom (/sarcasm) they remove the dial pad once a call is connected, and I usually Jott while driving. This is why I’m trying to speak “one” or “two” instead of pressing it.
An alternative to these hotkeys might be to have separate inbound numbers that are associated specifically with Tasks or Drafts. This would bypass that portion of the call. They don’t need to be toll-free numbers as I use my cell phone almost exclusively and get charged the same either way.
I do urge you to consider reversing the process tho. It makes far more sense to record the thought that prompted you to call in the first place immediately and decide what to do with it afterwards. A default choice then makes perfect sense, shortening calls and freeing up that bandwidth for additional customers.
Comment by Brian — September 5, 2008 @ 11:41 am
Just a nitpick… It’s “Lightning” fast, not “Lightening” fast. The latter (what is currently in the post) suggests that the service is getting visually lighter (and thus harder to see).
Comment by Voyagerfan5761 — September 5, 2008 @ 7:03 pm
Agree with Brian for recording the msg initially, however it probably should be an expert option, since the current prompt method is necessary for newbies.
Comment by Hersey — September 7, 2008 @ 10:02 am
I agree with Brian on this and I think, kate, you should re-read his post, because his most important point was completely missed.
And to re-emphasize the David Allen-style approach, it would be really useful if you could shoot out multiple unsorted thoughts, each separate from each other of course and then later be able to go back to them and put them where they should.
( And Brian’s “default location” would then just be a pile of items to sort and you’ll be happy for getting everything off your chest. )
So don’t just reverse the process like Brian says, but allow for the freedom to talk everything out of your head.
Comment by Michal — September 7, 2008 @ 10:46 am
@voyagerfan - Nice catch! Thanks, I made the edit.
@Michael & Brian - It’s definitely good feedback and something to consider for power users. It would be tough to implement that for new Jotters though. Maybe an option to look into for the future!
Comment by kate — September 7, 2008 @ 2:36 pm
I think reversing the delivery of the Jott is an EXCELLENT idea. I would rather say my message/appointment first. I’m not sure why this would be difficult for newbies?? I mean if there is actually someone who can’t figure it out after trying a Jott, just make one of your little videos.
You can start with: “Please speak the content of your Jott.” You could also have a novice mode if you really think someone can’t handle this like… “Please speak the content of your reminder. For example, for an appointment, say the subject of the appointment such as ’sales meeting downtown’… etc.”
Follow that with the “Who do you want to Jott” deal.
Much better when it’s reversed.
Comment by PaulQ — September 10, 2008 @ 12:46 am
Aside from that - I actually have a Jott Express question (the topic of this post)….
1) How often does it sync with the server? There is an option to sync on the upper-left menu. Do I need to click this every time I make a change?
2) Can you mark more that one item completed at a time? I had to check off and trash about 20 items and I checked each one individually.
Thanks!
Comment by PaulQ — September 10, 2008 @ 12:51 am
oops. I meant upper-RIGHT menu
Comment by PaulQ — September 10, 2008 @ 1:32 am
@PaulQ
You can press the Control key and click on multiple Jotts to multi select. Then you can do a group action, whether its move to trash, mark as complete or move to a folder.
(Replace control with Apple key on a Mac).
Comment by SHRED — September 10, 2008 @ 12:39 pm
I’ve wanted to become a paying customer, but just too many issues. Jott Express is entirely buggy on my Mac. It crashes/freezes when left up all day and required a forced quit. I have a task that’s been marked as [local copy] since the moment I added it. It won’t sync with web, nor can I delete it. Unfortunately, Jott Express is the only one of the three choices for viewing my tasks (web site, iphone, express) that shows all my priority tasks in a single list, which to me is the most important list of all.
Jott on my iphone has let me down a couple times… the recording feature, specifically. I’ll record a couple things hurriedly, then go back later to find a message that says “message couldn’t be transcribed… please listen”. I then go to listen to my recording and find it completely blank. Arghhh!!
You guys seem very close to knocking one out of the park. But right now this just ain’t ready for prime time.
Best of luck.
Comment by Mark — September 13, 2008 @ 11:26 am
One more thing about Jott Express. I go in and make changes to my Jott tasks on Express, and five minutes later the tasks have “intelligently” synced with web… and so my changes are gone. I really think Jott needs to patch Jott Express before doing any more promotion about it. It’s a disservice to have folks downloading and installing it.
Comment by Mark — September 13, 2008 @ 11:55 am
are u currently planning on lunching this service in europe? i am from germany and would love to use it! keep the good work up!
Comment by Niki — September 18, 2008 @ 4:06 am
@Mark - that message comes from the audio quality being poor. Are you recording these messages in a place with lots of background noise? Also, to save changes in Jott Express hit enter or return on your keyboard, and then sync.
@Niki- someday we’d love to offer the Jott serivce in Europe, but we haven’t set a date for that yet- when we do, we’ll be sure to let everyone know!
Comment by kate — September 18, 2008 @ 10:20 am
“I do urge you to consider reversing the process tho. It makes far more sense to record the thought that prompted you to call in the first place immediately and decide what to do with it afterwards. A default choice then makes perfect sense, shortening calls and freeing up that bandwidth for additional customers.” ~ Brian
‘What he said.’ ~ Mike
Also, a thought of my own; oh, never mind.
Comment by mike — September 21, 2008 @ 2:37 pm
+1 for message first.
I use Jott for my GTD inbox when I am in transit and want to jott a note to myself. By the time I get to the message, I am sometimes a little flustered and can hardly remember what I wanted to record. In fact, for most jotts I leave, I just want it to go to my default list (Jott Notes).
Comment by Jeff — September 22, 2008 @ 8:35 am
I used to recommend Jott to all my friends, but with the introduction of paid Jott plans, I won’t be doing that anymore. Charging to receive your notes in your email? Really? I hope you’ll reconsider this position.
Comment by Anthony — September 23, 2008 @ 12:30 pm
The link for downloading Jott Express doesn’t work. It appears to be broken. I do have Adobe Air installed on my computer, by the way. The other apps (e.g., Jott for Outlook) download and install just fine.
Comment by Jim Garven — September 26, 2008 @ 10:32 am
@Jim - It should be working now! Thanks for letting us know.
Comment by kate — September 26, 2008 @ 2:17 pm
I’d love to be able to even try it. I’ve hit download on the Jott Express page at least 20 times with no result other than a pop-up with Chinese characters and nothing happens when I click on the blued button. I’ve tried Firefox, I’ve tried Safari. Neither works. All software is up-to-date. MacBook with 10.5.5
Comment by Jeff — October 5, 2008 @ 5:50 pm
@Jeff- Hm, that is very odd. I checked and it appears that no one else has reported that problem and we cannot reproduce it, which makes me think you might have a virus of some sort.
Comment by kate — October 6, 2008 @ 9:28 am
Jott Express is broken with the new version of AIR.
Comment by Steve — November 25, 2008 @ 8:28 am
@Steve - Hm, it worked for me. Are you on a Mac or a PC?
Comment by kate — November 25, 2008 @ 9:43 am
Mac.
Comment by Steve — November 26, 2008 @ 1:18 pm
OK, did some digging and it looks like there have been some intermittent problems with the AIR update. Right now it looks like this might be an issue with AIR, but we’re investigating and will let you know when are positive of the issue. In the meantime, if you’d like to fill out a support form, we can track your issue with the update as well. Thanks!
Comment by kate — November 26, 2008 @ 2:54 pm
Here’s some more info on the AIR update issue:
http://jott.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=34&t=1302&sid=f37b64cebc79d4f197282d3abd57e67c
Comment by kate — December 5, 2008 @ 3:27 pm