Kanban Board
Lay your work out on a board and see, at a glance, what you’re doing right now.
The kanban board is the heart of toodoori. Work flows through Planning → In Progress → Finished, and dragging a card between stages makes your progress plain to see. If kanban itself is new to you, What Is Kanban? is a good place to start.
Why a kanban board
A to-do list shows you what needs doing, but not how far along each item is. A kanban board splits the same work into stages, so you can read at a glance what is in progress and what has stalled. For the difference between a list and a board, see To-Do List App vs. Kanban App.
Groups and stages
- Groups: Planning · In Progress · Finished — the same flow on every board.
- Stages: finer columns within each group. Split ‘In Progress’ into ‘Deep Work’ and ‘Waiting for Feedback,’ for example — shaped to the way you work.
- Inbox: a place to collect whatever comes to mind before you organize it. Toss an idea in lightly, and pull it onto the board when you’re ready to work on it.
One card at a time — WIP limits
Setting a limit on how many cards can sit in ‘In Progress’ keeps you focused on the one you picked instead of starting many at once. Finishing one at a time also reveals where work tends to get stuck. Managing Flow goes deeper.
Other ways to view
Look at the same work differently, using the tabs above the board.
- Board: the default screen, cards laid out by status. Depending on project settings it opens as a kanban board, a list, or margin.
- Timeline: for work with start and due dates, across time.
- Past Work: for reading the history of what you finished, period by period.
- Pattern: for seeing the stages your finished tasks passed through, stacked as bands of color.
How the “Board” tab opens is covered in Make It Yours; past work and pattern are covered in Looking Back.
You choose today’s cards
toodoori does not carry unfinished work over to the next day automatically. Because you pick today’s cards yourself, the board stays a flow shaped to where you are now, rather than a list that only piles up.
Getting started
To build a kanban board yourself, follow the Getting Started with toodoori guide. For the background behind personal kanban, read What Is Personal Kanban?.