Review: Agenda Fusion 8

This is part 1 of 3 in our Personal Information Manager Smackdown, check back later for the rest of the series.!

At it’s conception, the Windows Mobile operating system was designed for use as some type of Personal Digital Assistant (PDA). These devices have gone through multiple evolutions as both the hardware and software mature. Many of us (whether we use it as such or not) use the organization features of these devices to justify the somewhat high price tags. While some use these features more than others, Windows Mobile offers some great tools to manage your calendar and contacts. But what should you do when the built in feature set falls short of what you would like to be able to do?

In this corner is Agenda Fusion 8...

Basic Details

• Current Version: 8
• Price: $29.95 (from the WMExperts Store)
• Compatible With: Windows Mobile 6 Classic, Windows Mobile 6 Professional Windows Mobile 5 Pocket PC, Pocket PC Phone Edition (Includes Palm Treo 700w/750) Windows Mobile 2002/2003 Pocket PC, Pocket PC Phone Edition (Not compatible with non touchscreen devices, although DeveloperOne does offer a separate product called AgendaOne (also $29.95 from the WMExperts Store) that is compatible with both touchscreen and non touchscreen devices)

Contacts

Though it does not replace the default contacts application, Agenda Fusion builds onto what Microsoft has already done with the Contacts application on Windows mobile. In addition to being able to filter your contacts by typing in their name, you can also sort them by various categories. You can also assign a picture to your contact in order to be able to quickly identify them. For phone enabled devices, the contacts application also includes a call log, which gives you such information as how many total calls, the amount of time spent on incoming vs. outgoing calls, and details on each call that was made to or from that contact.

One of the things that I noticed right away that Agenda Fusion does that was a new way of thinking for me (as far as Personal Information Managers anyway) is that there may be relationships between any piece of information. Any item in Agenda Fusion can be linked with another item. For example, if you have a task that needs to be completed for a meeting, and you have other people that are involved in that task, you can link the people to the task, and the task to the meeting. This gives you the ability to complete a train of thought without jumping around trying to match things together.

Calendar

The Calendar is where I see the biggest increase in features between the standard application and the Agenda Fusion version. The sheer number of ways that Agenda Fusion allows you to view the items on your schedule is a huge improvement. Another feature that is new to me is the ability to add secondary alarms. Have you ever had occasion to begin preparing for a meeting an hour ahead of time, and then leave for the meeting 15 minutes prior to the meeting? Agenda Fusion allows you to set two separate alarms for the same meeting, giving you a large amount of flexibility with your scheduling.

I always love it when a developer includes a feature that I have been wishing for. Agenda Fusion did it with their Template feature. Templates allow you to enter in whatever data is common to the calendar items that you are going to be creating a lot of, and then start a new calendar item with that data already filled in. (Notice that this is different than re-occurring appointments, because they may or may not be on a schedule.)

Tasks

While it doesn’t add a whole bunch of new features, Agenda Fusion refines the interface for tasks, as well as allowing for better integration between your tasks and other information types. As with the other modules, you can create Templates for your tasks, as well as link contacts or appointments. You can also manage re-occurring tasks, and convert a task into an appointment.

A couple other features that are used throughout Agenda Fusion are worth mentioning here. In addition to being categorized and linked, you can also utilize custom icon sets, allowing you to quickly identify relationships between information without actually linking them. For example, anything related to a specific project, could have the same icon (which could be saved in a template). Also, the “Power Text” feature, recognizes that many people struggle with typing in data on a small device, and allows you to customize a list of commonly used words or phrases in order to reduce the amount of time to create your task (or appointment).

Notes

The folks at Developer One recognize that there are some things that will fall through the cracks with any kind of Information Manager. The Notes application shows that they don’t take this feature for granted. In addition to being able to write out quick notes, this application also allows you to create bulleted lists, attach files, and even include drawings within your note. The Notes application also allows you to choose where to save individual notes in your devices memory, and even allows you to set an alarm to remind you of your note. As previously mentioned, notes can be linked to from within the other applications, which gives you an avenue of quickly saving information that is needed for your appointments or tasks.

Other Features

Agenda Fusion allows includes a “Project” module, giving you the ability to track the amount of time worked on a particular project. You can also use this feature as another means of grouping your other information by creating a project, and then linking your other information to that project.

Summary

Even with all of the features that I have mentioned, I haven’t really scratched the surface. Agenda Fusion has a plethora of features, is extremely customizable (I’ll touch on that more in part 3 of this series), integrates nicely with whatever data you already have on your device and is surprisingly easy to use. The only downsides that I see are that it does require a touch screen device, and may be intimidating for someone just getting started with organizing their life in this manner.