We have tried to use project tracking software for our own projects but couldn’t find anything that we liked. They were either way too complex and bloated (VersionOne, Jira, Mingle) or just too ugly and no fun to use (XPlanner, Bugzilla)

We wanted something that, first and foremost, works for developers. Far too often, the tracking software solution is chosen by managers, or worse, those with very little stake in its day to day use. We also didn’t want to build a time tracking tool (Harvest does a good job with that) or a workflow tool (what is that? Sounds painful). What we wanted was a simple way to know what to work on next throughout our frequent software development cycles (or iterations).

We created Lean-to way back in early 2007 and have been using it ever since. We then proceeded to get busy with work that “paid the bills” and left Lean-to alone for a while. After all, it worked for us and we were the primary customer. But we knew other people felt the same as we did and we got feedback that it was definitely scratching an itch for them.

We just spruced it up and are eager to get more feedback on “our baby”. Some notable additions/changes we’ve made include:

• Completely overhauled user interface
• New stats dashboard display at the top of list and reports views shows pertinent stats at a glance
• Improved attachment functionality, now with image preview
• Comments have replaced notes on stories and bugs and are tied to the logged in user
• New view on plan list: Active Only – shows those stories/bugs in the current iteration that are either in progress or not started (excludes completed)
• Add/Edit actual time spent from list view or detail view
• Improved search
• The iteration list on the backlog view can now be toggled between showing all iterations and just active ones
• You can now add dates to iterations
• Improved tests (acceptance, integration, regression, etc) UI on story detail pages; can now be marked as complete
• Super cool bug fixes

You can check out the latest release notes here and here or just jump in to register for an account (for free).

You can also get more frequent (but not too frequent) updates by following LeanToApp on Twitter and/or liking Lean-to on Facebook.

Fresh out of its beta period we are proud to show off our innovation acceleration, idea management, task prioritization system, MileMarker. We’re still working on some walk-through videos and some updates to the public site.

Screenshots

Release Notes:

• Added filtering, sorting and pagination options to lists of ideas and projects.
• Added ability to save sorting, filtering, and pagination preferences.
• Archive views for projects and ideas were added.
• Added the ability delete groups, projects, and ideas (in addition to archiving them).
• Simplified the account management section where groups, projects and people are managed.
• Improved idea search functionality and added it to all pages.
• Descriptions and comments now retain carriage returns.
• Increased character limits in a number of places.
• Fixed some issues surrounding importing and exporting projects.
• Numerous formatting and style tweaks.
• Added the ability to change plans and pay us actual money. :)
• Killed over 100 bugs (and most assuredly added a few new secret ones).

We’re excited about the prospects this app holds for organizations looking to get their ideas “under control”. Hopefully we can roll out some other great features soon. On the docket are:

• Public community site
• Public idea list and voting widget
• Facebook widgets
• API hooks into some complimentary products
• Our own API to allow others to riff on our work
• Adding project packs that can be purchased without upgrading to next plan level

Ok so there weren’t all that many rumors, but we have been away (from this blog) for a long time – and a lot has happened.

For one, Scott, Jesse, and I spent a month working/playing in Mexico with our families. We rented a house right on the beach and it was a blast. Some days it was hard to get into doing work but we were able to participate in daily scrum calls and work more or less by our own schedules.

Ben, Scott, & Jesse at Chichen Itza, Mexico

So we were in Mexico, we’ve been back for a couple months, what’s all this work we’ve been doing? Here’s a rundown:

We engaged with SMBLive last year to create CloudProfile. Along the way, SMBLive and thus, CloudProfile was purchased by ReachLocal. Jesse, Scott and I are a big part of their team and are helping to grow the Reach Local Digital Presence team here in Minneapolis. If you are an experienced Java/Grails or mobile (iPhone/Android) developer you should really hit us up for details.

Luke Francl and I just wrapped the latest MinneBar (un) conference held at the Best Buy corporate campus on May 22nd. We had nearly 1000 participants sign up and more than 600 came through the doors. At the event we announced the results of the first MinneSpark grant competition where 3 winners were awarded $2000 cash and nearly $4000 in services for their compelling ideas.

We continue the work on our two products under development. The idea management application, , is set to come out of beta next month with a few enhancements, with a bigger update this fall.

And then there is . We have a very significant update coming very soon as we roll our agile project tracking application out of “beta” as well. With a complete overhaul to the interface and dozens of improvements we are excited to see what people think. We still like using it more than any other tool we’ve seen out there.

And last but not least, Refactr has hired two new software engineers: Spencer Hartberg and Steve Vlaminck. If that last one sounds familiar, well, you’ll know why when you see him. We’ll have more formal introductions in subsequent posts. We still may have additional opportunities for an up and coming mobile developer and designer with client-side development chops.

We are always developing web applications for clients or for ourselves – and sometimes some sort of combination of the two as we are doing with SMBLive and the CloudProfile platform we have been working on much of the year. It has been great but the work has afforded us precious little time to devote to Lean-to, our project tracking application, and a little something new on which we have been working.

So when Jesse asked if I was planning to bring the Wii into the office during the traditionally slow time week between Christmas and New Year’s I didn’t even pause before I said, “If I can get free to play Wii I would rather use that time to work on Lean-to or MileMarker” an innovation management app debuting today. And it was true we love building web apps and we hope that love comes through in the interactions, features, and concepts of our products.

Over the next few weeks we’re going to highlight some of the features of MileMarker and the improvements being made to Lean-to. Maybe we’ll even be able to throw in some of the exciting news on the CloudProfile front such as a partnership with a Minnesota-based electronics retailer.

Ok, so we didn’t stop signing non-disclosure agreements entirely, but what we have done is, postpone the signing of NDA’s until after we have spoken with and know the folks with the idea. All too often these days it seems people are overly protective of their ideas and want to discuss them with us before we know anything about them. From a legal standpoint, our hands could be tied if we are under NDA and non-compete agreements for every idea under the sun. But in a very practical way, it just does not make sense to treat your ideas with such secrecy.

Chances are, y/our idea isn’t even very good. Techcrunch had a post on Saturday about startups being afraid to tell “their secrets”. And it’s true. Most of the time the ideas aren’t good, or certainly are not unique. And startups and entrepreneurs are actually doing themselves a disservice by holding their product ideas close to the vest. They lose out on the important process of vetting their ideas to collegues and friends to determine how much merit it has; and on the feedback and critique that coud make the idea better. But most of the time, the folks who are so guarded of their ideas simply don’t act on them, so a product never emerges.

So, don’t be offended if we say we want to wait to sign your NDA. Come talk to us anyway. If we end up working together we’ll get all the contracts and legal stuff taken care of, but in the meantime you can be sure we’ll be open and honest with you about your idea, and its merits, feasibility, and you’ll likely come out of our discussion with an even better concept.

Our labor of love, the simpler project management tool, Lean-to got some new features this week. Scott, Jesse, and I as well as the rest of our growing team are excited to announce several new additions (and some important subtractions) to our favorite web-based software product:

• You can now attach files (images, pdfs, docs) to stories and bugs

• Stories and Bugs now have unique numbers that can be used for reference
• There are now more ways you can view your stories/bugs: From the Plan or Backlog views click “View only this iteration”.
• Burn up report now can show backlog stories and bugs or just those on plan
• You can now search within a project (plan and backlog) for stories and bugs

We also fixed a number of things that annoyed us (and probably you):

• Iteration boxes on backlog now allow you to click through to just see items in that iteration
• The UI has been modified to emphasize the project name and options and clean up interface as well as to demphasized the Lean-to branding.
• We cleaned up several workflow and interface issues
• We cleaned up some character issues in form fields

While these are the highlights there is even more to explore. And, shhhhh, don’t tell anyone but we have more on the way very soon!

Please let us know your feedback and share your stories of how you are using Lean-to. Oh, and by the way, we left one bug in there. Let us know if you can find it.

Lean-to is live! We haven’t done a great job of keeping the work we have been doing under wraps but we haven’t been promoting it either. Since we gave a demo of our agile project tracking application, Lean-to, at minnebar in May, we have been adding features and tweaking it until we were ready to start talking about it.

We wanted to let everyone know that we have pushed out some significant updates to Lean-to that we hope will get people excited. Here are a few of the highlights:

• Add people to your account and manage settings
• View plan and backlog views for your stories/bugs
• Track team progress with report views
• Get more info on list views with new context menus
• Add tests to stories in improved ways
• Assign stories or bugs to iterations from the backlog view
• Filter lists to show only those stories or bugs assigned to you
• More invite and project options
• Various interface improvements

We hope that you enjoy the new changes in this release and we ask that you don’t hesitate to use the feedback link to let us know what you like and don’t like about Lean-to.  We’ve got lots more on our own backlog, but we’d love to hear what you want from Lean-to.

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