Check List Pro v3.0 (www.dreameesoft.com)

 

 

Since moving to the Pocket PC platform I have been searching high and low for a product that would help me get organised, keep lots of bits of information and generally house data for the web site, finances, personal stuff and various other bits and pieces under one application. Another requirement was a desktop companion for quick data entry and the ability to create detailed notes from other sources such as word and emails via copy/paste.

 

Lots of searching on PocketGear and various other sites gave me nothing- programs like PhatNotes etc. are all very competent but did not work for me as my mind tends to work visually rather than through reading lots of data.

 

I stumbled across Check List Pro which is $15.99 including both the desktop companion and Pocket PC application and my original thoughts were that it was too cheap to be any good especially when compared to comparable products on the market. Installation was straightforward and surprisingly the Pocket PC side only takes up 243kb and the Desktop side is under 500kb in total which is amazing considering what this program does.

 

What does it do?

 

At its most basic level it could be described as a simple check list application (hence the name) but I personally believe that this does not do it justice. The features available to the owner are as follows-

 

Unlimited number of child entries- you can have child below child below child etc. etc. This is especially useful for keeping your finances, passwords etc. organised in a structured, visual format.

 

Icons- there are 132 detailed icons included in the Pro version and they are well designed adding substance to your entries. Most uses are covered including finance (credit cards), personal (home, leisure) and almost anything else you can think of. There is a very minor niggle with these icons but I will explain that later.

 

Colour coding- the priority given to the entry will also define what colour it is given. You can choose the default colours for low, medium and high priorities and simple as it is, this works well for me. I cannot explain why but colourful tree charts get into my brain and enable quicker realisation of what needs to be done.

 

Export to HTML- the ability to export a check list to HTML is very useful. If you are away you could upload it to your own web space and check it anywhere or even better make it available to other people. Obviously you will view your list via the Pocket PC when out and about.

 

Notes- each item can have a text note attached to it. This is necessary when adding large amounts of data and works well- it will be interesting to see how this changes with the next version which is due soon.

 

Options- included are the standard options to move items around and change the appearance of the application but these are self explanatory and not really worthy of going into detail.

 

Benefits

 

This is the first Pocket PC / Desktop program I have seen that looks ‘exactly’ the same on both platforms and the reason for this is because Dreameesoft have kept the look simple as they have the programming. It’s solid as a rock, extremely easy to use and has become my most used application. It even occupies first place in my iLauncher list which is an honour I can tell youJ

 

Examples

 

Without doubt I am not using this program to its full ability (yet) but tend to use it for collecting data and having a structured information store to rely on. In the example image below you can see how it is being used to track the various aspects of my life.

 

 

Conclusions

 

I can’t recommend this application highly enough- it currently does everything I need and the prospect of Word and Excel support among many other improvements in the next release (should be soon) are mouth watering. If you are considering it give the Lite version a try (it’s free) and I’m confident you will want the pro version with the free desktop client and nicer icons etc.

 

Pros

 

Value for money

Ease of use

Overall design

Flexibility

Stability

 

Cons

Notes field could do with being larger (may be solved in the next version)

Icons dialogue needs tidying up

These are tiny points which do not really affect the application’s usefulness.

 

 

PS. Apologies to Neil for not using his standard reviews templateJ