What’s New In TimeTune 2.5

This new version of TimeTune brings with it a change we’ve been wanting to do for a long time: a more intuitive, visual and powerful interface for routines.

The new interface allows for actions that weren’t possible before. Actions that will make scheduling and modifying your routine faster and safer.

But that’s not the only change we made. We took the opportunity to add two important features more: a new undo system and ‘swipe to delete’ gestures all over the app.

Let’s see the new additions in detail:

1. A new interface for routines
   1. Vertical scroll
   2. Clearer information
   3. Swipe to delete
   4. Contextual menus
   5. Swap activity up & down
   6. Multiple delete for activities
   7. Advance/delay single time
   8. Advance/delay multiple times
   9. Insert gap
   10. No more FAB
2. New undo system
3. Swipe to delete everywhere

1 – A NEW INTERFACE FOR ROUTINES

The previous interface (with each routine day in a different tab) was very limited regarding user interaction. Apart from the drag & drop gesture to relocate activities, the only way to modify a specific activity was to click on it and update it manually.

The old interface didn’t really convey the notion of ‘time blocks’ either. It was more like an agenda view instead of a time-block view.

All this has changed with the new interface:

Let’s dig deeper into each section of the interface:

1.1 – VERTICAL SCROLL

Your routine is now shown in a vertical format. This provides quick access to all your activities and puts a whole new set of interactions at your disposal.

The old interface (each routine day in a different tab) required several horizontal swipes (plus additional vertical scrolling) to locate the activity you were looking for. Alternatively, you could use the ‘Go to day’ option from the submenu, which required three clicks.

Now, a single vertical scroll will take you anywhere you want in your routine. Or you can use the ‘jump day’ option from the top header to jump to any day in just two clicks.

This is the major difference from the old interface. The feedback from beta users has been overwhelmingly positive and only a few of them expressed that they preferred the old way.

If you find yourself in this situation (missing the old interface), please give the new one a chance. Use it for a while and in no time you’ll find that the new possibilities outweigh the old ones by far.

1.2 – CLEARER INFORMATION

The new interface shows where each activity starts and ends in a clearer way. Putting the times between activities reinforces the notion of ‘time blocks’ and enables handy new features, like the actions that appear when you click on long-click on the activity times.

If an activity ends on the following day, you can see it right there as well. Seeing where one day ends and the following one starts without making calculations is a nice perk:

Apart from this, we removed visual noise. Like the submenu icon that appeared on each and every activity. Those submenu actions (clone and delete) can now be done through more standard interactions.

Overall, the new look is a big win, both visually and functionally.

1.3 – SWIPE TO DELETE

Deleting activities is now simple and fun. Swipe an activity to the right and that’s it:

This wouldn’t have been possible in the old interface. Having the days in horizontal tabs prevented us from using the horizontal gesture for anything different than changing tabs.

1.4 – CONTEXTUAL MENUS

A new contextual menu will appear on the top bar when you long-click on times or activities. This allowed us to centralize several dispersed actions using a standard pattern (it provides a place where we can put future actions as well):

The contextual actions are different for times and activities. The app will switch them automatically when you long-click on ones or the others.

These are some of the new contextual actions:

1.5 – SWAP ACTIVITY UP & DOWN

This option replaces the previous drag & drop feature for activities. Unfortunately, the old drag & drop was a bit buggy. Some users ended up with wrong calculations for durations and times. That being said, we may bring it back in a future version if we find a safer way to do it.

To enable the new swap action, long-click on an activity. Then, use the arrows on the contextual menu to swap the activity up or down:

The new interface opens a new possibility with this action: now you can keep swapping an activity to contiguous days. Nice.

1.6 – MULTIPLE DELETE FOR ACTIVITIES

Besides the ‘swipe to delete’ gesture, you can delete activities using the contextual menu as well.

If you need to delete several of them, the contextual menu will allow you to make a multiple selection and delete them all with a single action:

1.7 – ADVANCE/DELAY SINGLE TIME

A single click on a single time shows this new dialog:

When you click on the round buttons, the time will change with the indicated amount of minutes. There’s no need to edit an activity anymore just to change its start time (this prevents accidental overwrites too!).

The times that appear in gray at the top and bottom of the dialog are the allowed limits for the modification. These limits are defined by the adjacent activities, so there’s no risk of losing information when using this feature.

1.8 – ADVANCE/DELAY MULTIPLE TIMES

A very similar dialog appears if you select multiple times (with a long-click) and use the ‘Advance/Delay’ option from the contextual menu:

For this option to appear, the times must belong to adjacent activities (there can be no gaps). Again, the times in gray indicate the allowed limits for the modification.

So no more editing many activities one by one if you want to advance or delay them!

1.9 – INSERT GAP

Another option enabled by the new interface is the ability to insert a gap between two adjacent activities.

To do this, long-click on a time connecting two activities and select the ‘Insert gap’ contextual action:

This will insert a 1-minute gap between the two activities (taking one minute from the first one). After this, you can use the advance/delay option to adjust the gap to your needs.

1.10 – NO MORE FAB

As you can see, the FAB (Floating Action Button) that was previously used to create new activities has disappeared.

The main reason for this is that we want to redirect all interactions to the routine itself. Instead of using a single point of entry for creating activities (which led to many unwanted overwrites), it’s better to interact directly with the part of the routine you want to modify.

Apart from this, a FAB would be confusing on the new interface. For example, if you had the end of one day and the beginning of another on screen, there’s no way to know which day you want to modify when clicking a FAB.

However, there’s a shortcut to create activities like before: click on the header for any day and you’ll be creating a new activity for that day (or use the ‘New activity’ option from the header submenu):

2 – NEW UNDO SYSTEM

In TimeTune 2.5, virtually all modifications (but most importantly, all destructive modifications) can now be undone. An accidental overwrite? Undo. An accidental deletion? Undo.

The new undo feature applies not only to routines, but to any section of the app (programmer, reminders, timers, events and tags). It will appear as a new option inside the top bar submenu:

When the option is available, it will appear as enabled. Otherwise, it will appear in light gray as disabled.

This new undo system is much better than showing a temporary ‘Undo’ message at the bottom like we did before in a few places. When you realized that was not the change you wanted to make, the message was already gone. Now the option stays there until you go to another place.

3 – SWIPE TO DELETE EVERYWHERE

Finally, we updated all sections to implement the ‘swipe to delete’ gesture. Not only you can swipe activities away, but you can swipe routines, programs, reminders, timers, events and tags as well.

An added bonus to this is that we could finally get rid of that ugly submenu icon that appeared on each list element in every section with a lonely ‘Delete’ option.

FEEDBACK

The new interface and the new changes are just a first step. Our intention is to make the whole app more intuitive and easier to use where possible, adding new features at the same time.

But nothing is perfect! If you see something that can be improved, please let us know. You know your feedback and suggestions are always welcome 😃

A big thanks to all beta testers who helped with this release. And many thanks as well to all TimeTuners who use the app every day. Nothing of this would have been possible without you! 🧡

(Illustration: App development concept with flat design, by Freepik)