[Design] Chandler as a Managed Workspace

[Mimi Yin]

I feel like we're getting stuck on the issue of defining next actions  
and lists of sub-tasks.

It just wasn't something I saw many people doing. And I don't think  
it's as simple as a lack of discipline. In other words, it's not  
necessarily a flaw to be corrected. Instead, I think people are  
lacking tools that help them DO the things they don't want to bother  
defining. It's a different way of thinking about the problem.

So the way I think of Chandler is that it creates an environment that  
provides people affordances for simply doing those next actions right  
in the app.

For example, if you have a project to pull together the next all- 
hands meeting, you could create an item to *represent* the project  
and define a series of tasks in the Notes field.

1. Set a date and put it on the calendar.
2. Brainstorm re: agenda
3. Collect input from others re: agenda
4. Figure out who needs to come
5. Send out invitation

But, do these things need to happen in order? Should you only work on  
these one at a time? Instead of creating 5 tasks and tracking them  
all, why not just have a single event item that represents the  
meeting and simply DO (on that meeting item) what needs to be done to  
set up this meeting?

An alternate way to approach the workflow would be to create an item  
in Chandler that *is* the project and then work directly in the item,  
treating it as a (shared) workspace for that project.

+ Create an event: Next all-hands
+ Put it on the calendar as an anytime event over the span of a week  
while you narrow in on the date.
+ When you've figured out a date, you define the event time.
+ To help you figure out the date, you could email the event or share  
it with key stakeholders and ask each person to list out times they  
can't make it and any other constraints they have.
+ To brainstorm re: agenda you can just jot down ideas right in the  
Notes field of the agenda. Your brainstorm will slowly evolve into  
the actual agenda you send out.
+ To collect input from others, you can email or share it with key  
stakeholders and ask them to add their own ideas to the list.
+ To send the invitation, you address it and send it out via email.
+ But even sending out the invitation isn't necessarily the last step  
because you or others could think of more things to add to the agenda  
and end up sending out a subsequent update to the invite.

All of this currently is being done with text files and lots of  
email. What Chandler offers is a 'source of truth' a single place  
where everyone can work together. It's where I was going with the  
idea that Chandler isn't so much a task manager (where tasks are  
abstractions of the work you need to do) as a work manager, or  
'managed work space' really.

The reason why we can offer this is because we're more than just a  
simple list / outliner and because we have sharing and email. If  
there's just a list, all you can do is list out the work you need to  
do because there isn't really room to spread out and do your work.

If there's an integrated calendar and email and sharing and a lot of  
real estate allotted to the details of each of the items in the list,  
you start to have a multi-dimensional work space.

Mimi