OmniFocus: the interface is weak but the project is willing

As an OmniFocus user and follower of development, I'd like to help with some of your concerns:

1) The lack of sync is important, but it is coming with the forthcoming native iPhone OmniFocus. See <http://blog.omnigroup.com/2008/03/06/omnifocus-coming-for-the-iphone/#comment-64332>

2) OmniFocus has pretty sophisticated handling of e-mails that can be converted to one or more tasks. Check out the "Mail" section of the preferences pane.

3) OmniFocus _can_ filter by multiple criteria in Perspectives, including flagged/unflagged and “due soon.” I agree that some kind of query language might be nice, but the interface is simple and not underpowered.

4) You give a fair criticism of the calendar widget, BUT I have yet to use that piece of interface to enter a date. OmniFocus has a very forgiving text parser for dates: tom, tomo, +1, 1d all mean tomorrow. I can say "next wed" for next wednesday, 1w for one week later, etc. That is _the_ way to quickly set due dates when entering a task, and that syntax is also supported by the e-mail interface I mentioned above.

I hope that helps in your evaluation of OmniFocus. It gets the heaviest usage of any of my applications apart from chat and mail.

At 2:47 AM -0700 5/3/08, Chris Goedde wrote:
>One of the failings Matt failed to mention was OmniFocus's treatment
>of repeating actions, especially repeating groups. That part of
>OmniFocus needs a lot of work. I won't mention all my gripes, just a
>couple. First, while you can have actions that repeat daily or weekly
>(or monthly, or every other day), you can't have them repeat every
>weekday or every MWF or every TuTh. (You also can't have them repeat
>the first Tuesday of the month, etc.) I think those things are pretty
>important---I have a lot of those actions. As a result, if you have
>actions that you want to repeat every weekday or every MWF, you have
>to readjust the due dates by hand every week or deal with other ugly
>workarounds.

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that one. My ugly workaround is to have
multiple copies of the action, one for each day of the week that I
want it to repeat on. I ended up putting all of my repeating actions
in one project so that I can keep track of them.


>The other problem I have is that if you complete a repeating action,
>then uncomplete it by clicking the checkbox a second time (either
>intentionally or accidentally), the action gets duplicated. I've been
>told by the folks at Omni that I've been doing things wrong and that I
>should use undo (cmd-z) to uncomplete a repeating action. I've been
>having a hard time retraining myself to do that, though, and it
>doesn't help in the case that I accidentally click the check box of an
>already completed action. The problem is compounded because the
>duplicate action is often not visible at all, due to the current
>filter settings. In fact for a long time I thought there was a bug and
>that OmniFocus was randomly duplicating some of my actions before I
>realized that this was a side effect of clicking that checkbox twice
>in a row.

Yet another feature I forgot about! :)

Cheers,

Ken P.

Some quick comments on the first "I hate this interface" video… there is one ESSENTIAL element of OmniFocus that your video did not touch upon that is, I believe, a very standard part of any Mac interface: "Cmd-Z" for "Undo". ALL of the actions that you take in the program can be immediately undone with something just about as simple as "Escape"; if you mistakenly enter, delete, or alter something you don't like, just undo it. I'm not sure how infinitely it can undo, but I've needed to go at least five or six steps back when I've really done something wrong. [As an aside, Chris Goedde comments that "I'm having a hard time retraining myself to use Cmd-Z"; all I can say is that I find that reflex to be essential in many different Mac apps, and find myself similarly frustrated when I run into a program that provides little or no support for even a single undo… YMMV]

I agree with the comment regarding the text-parsing in the date field… the only time I ever use the date pick-list is to adjust a date I've already entered. If I need to enter something new for the first time, it's always something in relation to "now", so it's easier to just enter "1w fri 11:" for "May 16, 2008 11:00". It's a very powerful tool in a GTD app.

Finally, regarding the "why do these ghost icons show up?" critique: while I may just be poorly coordinated, when I've got my entire action plan laid out, with all of the columns active, I personally would find it incredibly hard to hit the exact location for the "due" column vs. the "start" column in a row at the bottom of the screen based upon the heading at the top. While you might argue that the shadow "hinting" should just be present all the time, I prefer to only have it show up where I need it, i.e. right where I'm about to click.

As you might guess, I am a VERY committed user of this software, and I'll freely acknowledge that I may simply have trained myself around its foibles. However, the overall tone of the complaints did strike me as being overly harsh.

J

Thanks, Matt, for helping me to understand why I've been dissatisfied with OmniFocus. Your esxplanation of how it's supposed to work is the clearest I've seen. I suspect it wasn't easy.

I especially appreciate the screencasts, which reassured me that I wasn't losing my mind, it's the UI that has some "issues".

Now, maybe I can make it work for me :-)

OK! I can see that for people who think in text; maths; legal concepts and unnatural languages: OmniFocus does an excellent job as is; that the comments in this thread help to focus in. There seems to be sync between Focus, Mail andiCal: asking for integration with apps on other computers is a big step forward; beginning with OmniFocus-iPhone.

If practitioners of GTD only use text they are slamming the door in their own faces, however. All of the emotion; colour; movement of the real world is lacking. That can be partially recreated with sketch; draw; graph; video. We ARE talking Mac and iPhone apps, here, aren't we? I see import and export with Inspiration and Mind Map apps; Linux, Win and web. An OmniFocus Insert Menu item that includes graphic formats. Well, there is Attach, which places a link to a movie or other file in Notes, that can be felt to be so much more alive than plain dumb text *(^ <> ^)*

As we are using Mac let's include it: for being 200 - 800% more effective than text for the 40% or so of 'The Rest of Us' who have great difficulty in using text at all, when it is isolated from life. This is a call for understanding of varied intelligences in a very diverse democracy. A widening of the scope of a very promising application of GTD.

George

A slight correction to Matt's excellent review of Screenflow, and I can't help but interject that I was a mere child at the time (I hate to give away my age), but I spent a lot of time on this account on my first job in ad sales. "Blow Away Guy"¯ ad he mentions is considered one of the best ads of all time (Apple's "1984"¯ is widely acknowledged to be the best. It was created for Maxell audio tapes, then considered to be the coolest home entertainment technology, in the late 70's by Scali McCabe & Sloves, who are also remembered for Hebrew National "Higher Authority"¯ campaign, and launch campaign for Purdue (though they only used Frank as the spokesperson on his insistence).

A version of photo used in the original print ad is here:

http://www.pdngallery.com/20years/advertising/16_steve_steigman.html

An iteration of the original commercials:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DP89iMe0BY

Though CDs and DVDs were yet to be a gleam in anyone's eye, the campaign was resurrected for the digital age by Maxell for their CDs a few years ago, even featuring the blow away guy as the hero of an online game on the Maxell site:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/05/business/media/05adco.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

In the original ad, the model sat opposite a BIG speaker (supersized stereo equipment ultra cool, a mark of an audiophile). He wore bell bottomed slacks and a skinny tie. Shooting the print and commercials was a big challenge, and editing was done with razor blades and fine paintbrushes by super-skilled artisans.

BTW, I'm going to check out Screenflow - it sounds great.

Marilyn

On or about 5/7/08 8:33 AM, thus spake "mmatty" <mmattynyc.rr.com>:

> A slight correction to Matt's excellent review of Screenflow, and I can't help
> but interject that I was a mere child at the time (I hate to give away my
> age), but I spent a lot of time on this account on my first job in ad sales.
> "Blow Away Guy"¯ ad he mentions is considered one of the best ads of all time
> (Apple's "1984"¯ is widely acknowledged to be the best. It was created for
> Maxell audio tapes, then considered to be the coolest home entertainment
> technology, in the late 70's by Scali McCabe & Sloves, who are also remembered
> for Hebrew National "Higher Authority"¯ campaign, and launch campaign for
> Purdue (though they only used Frank as the spokesperson on his insistence).
>
> A version of photo used in the original print ad is here:
>
> <http://www.pdngallery.com/20years/advertising/16_steve_steigman.html>
>
> An iteration of the original commercials:
>
> <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DP89iMe0BY>
>
> Though CDs and DVDs were yet to be a gleam in anyone's eye, the campaign was
> resurrected for the digital age by Maxell for their CDs a few years ago, even
> featuring the blow away guy as the hero of an online game on the Maxell site:
>
<http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/05/business/media/05adco.html?_r=1&oref=slogin>
>
> In the original ad, the model sat opposite a BIG speaker (supersized stereo
> equipment ultra cool, a mark of an audiophile). He wore bell bottomed slacks
> and a skinny tie. Shooting the print and commercials was a big challenge, and
> editing was done with razor blades and fine paintbrushes by super-skilled
> artisans.
>
> BTW, I'm going to check out Screenflow - it sounds great.

Thanks, Marilyn! What's great about the TidBITS community is that you often
get the word "from the horse's mouth" (that's meant in a complimentary way).
I also heard from the fellow who built the set that the model is sitting in.

It's kind of disappointing to learn from the NYT article that hairspray and
wires were used; naturally I assumed they had a gigantic wind machine
offstage left!

I too remember the pre-computer days of manual paste-up with razor blades
and paint (I had an artist girlfriend who made big money temping on jobs
like that)...

Okay, so there's no dog. And it's a speaker, not a computer. So my
description wasn't accurate (though it was accurate enough that you knew
what I was talking about). Still, I can't help feeling that there may have
been parodies (visual snowclones), so one mustn't rule out the possibility
that I may be remembering something I did actually see.

But in any case, when I first used ScreenFlow I really did instantly feel
like the guy in the ad! Except for the hairspray. And, uh, the hair. m.

PS Thanks also to all others who wrote in with right and wrong answers...

Matt,

Thanks for your review. Bravo!

You nailed almost every issue that I've reported to the developers.

One commenter complained that you were a bit harsh. I think that you were extremely fair. It is obvious to most people that only someone who cares would make the effort to present such a good report. Also, too many people nowadays view any kind of feedback or criticism as an attack on his/her core identity.

In my reports to OmniGroup support and posts to the OmniGroup forums, I was met with considerable conceit and a healthy dose of dismissiveness, both from the more expert OmniFocus users and the developers (and I was always polite in my communication).

To me, the OmniFocus interface is way too convoluted and finicky. It should help you do what you need to do, and keep everything clear. The small size of "target areas" (areas in the interface where mouse clicks are active) is horrible GUI design, and there is no excuse for that kind of thing.

The guts of the program are probably very rich (i.e., full-featured), but the interface should be scrapped. I tried in earnest for several weeks to learn and use OF, many times reviewing the screencasts and the getting started document. In the end, I decided that the application annoyed me too much and was too confusing to use regularly. The OmniGroup needs to take notice of all of your points.

And, I suspect that most people psychologically become co-dependent with their software (for a lack of a better term, and no flame intended), so they are less likely to view things objectively. I would argue that a very good, detailed to-do list with dates is about 95% as effective as most every GTD application. It's more likely that using any kind of list/action/project tracking system, even just paper and pencil, is the main benefit here for most people, and not the fact that they are using some sort of fancy software application. In other words, most of the GTD "thang" is actually just becoming more organized and keeping better track of what you need to do in life. Yeah, it's that simple (though most computer geeks will bristle at that assertion). Any particular project that is very complex should be managed with something like OmniPlan (which is a delight to use).

I honestly hope that the OmniGroup takes your review and gives great weight to everything you've said, and perhaps has you report other things about OF that you find need improvement. Heck, they should hire you to give formal feedback and to write the documentation for the next version (or you could do a "Taking Control" book, or even write a more full-featured manual that has an index, etc.).

Thanks again.



-Dave

I too agree with the main points of the review.

I do like OF though - not enough to use it but enough to see it's
potential.

Here's some feedback I sent to Tim Woods (the head of software
development there). We usually charge some good coin for this kind of
consulting but I thought I'd send it to them so perhaps I could
become a user.

-------------


Hello

One of the services we offer our clients is user interface/ user
experience optimization. I'm really liking where OmniFocus is
heading, but I have a few suggestions to counter some of the tidBITs
criticisms (many of which I do agree with).

I'm sending this pro-bono so OF can really shine (I've been using
LifeBalnace for about 7 years and really getting tired of it's
shortcomings)

I think once you implement these, most folks will be happy:

1) your outline list text is too small and too light. Even on our 17"
CRT 1024x768 test screens, it's too small. I'd increase it by 1 or 2
pixels (that's often all you need to really change a user experience).

2) on your side bar all your icons are crammed up against the edges,
this will make everything look crowded and hard to use, even if there
is only one or two items. If you give the whole thing a padding of
3-5 pixels it will look much more relaxed.

3) you need more (not a lot but more) contrast between the text on
the side bar and the background. This is always a tricky point, and
often we've had to increase things by 1% increments with repeat
testing on all the screens to eventually arrive at the correct ratio.
The changes to the user are dramatic though.

4) long names in the side bar should wrap. One rarely will run out of
vertical space.

5) for the sidebar/outline focus issue, just add a light border via
Interface builder to the selected panel, even when the border is
barely perceptible, there is often enough feedback for the user to
know where he is at.

6) the "dots" and "select triangles" widgets are way too small. They
look nice but get real frustrating real fast. They should really be
only 1 or 2 pixels less the line height. That will also help in the
horizontal relationship issues which are quite problematic in OF.
They will be easer to interact with as well.

7) The "selection dots' once they are bigger, can be given more
utility: they should be hollow when rolled over, solid when they're
selected, coloured when dragging.

8) if you make your nice hi-lite box extend to your left-hand margin
- you can add a 7-10px shaded bar that can act as a handle to make it
easier for folks to drag the thing around.

9) the coloured outline text items are a nice idea. However, when one
is editing the text (since its then "active") the text should be
black. Press enter, it goes back to the grey or the color.

10) In general, there is weak horizontal relationships between your
outline task item names and the rest of the columns (especially when
the name is very short). I would suggest using either a very light
alternating journal style to enhance the horizontal relationships or
adding a very light horizontal lines (via Interface Builder). Nothing
too harsh.

11) people think of the word "Parallel" as horizontal, I would change
the "Parallel" widget arrows to be horizontal and keep the sequential
arrows on the 45 degree. This will also make it easier to see which
mode one is in.

12) the note icon is very weak - it needs to be more descriptive in
appearance - perhaps just a blank document with the folded corner
when there is nothing there, then if there is some text to see - the
same document icon with lines on it

13) you always need to have the column names to show up at the top of
outline window - it keeps on disappearing and it's just weird.


Any ways, keep up the great work!

thanks

Matt, thanks for articulating something that (apparently) many of us have been experiencing. I bought OmniFocus when it first came out, and have gone through 3 rounds of dumping in tasks and trying to use it. It is just too strange.

I sent them feedback. I hope they make it more usable.

Nick Pappas

Like others here, I put some serious dedication into trying to love OmniFocus only to find that I was spending too much time trying to bend myself to its design, rather than feeling it would ever bend to mine. There are, of course, some aspects of the program that I found absolutely wonderful--date parsing and autocomplete, for example--but I find I can live without those things more easily than I can live with the annoyances.

Matt's done a fabulous job of delineating many of the little niggles that have turned me off, but for me there are a couple of core issues that may keep me from ever using OmniFocus for my GTD.

HIERARCHIES, PROJECTS, AND ACTIONS. My interpretation of David Allen's philosophy, and my personal approach, is to think of every Project as being a sub-project somewhere on the Big Hierarchical Tree called, "Life." Any _physically actionable_ Project is, by definition, a leaf node on this tree and, thereby gets to _also_ be called an Action. Thus, "Life:Type some thoughts about OmniFocus on TidBITS Talk," or "Life:Stay healthy:Eat well:Buy veges at Farmer's Market." Sometimes my Actions are one-off Projects that I don't have time to explicitly link to a larger Project/goal, while other Actions serve me best when carefully organized.

My complaint here is two-fold. First, I find it frustrating that OmniFocus introduces Groups (a concept found nowhere in David Allen's GTD), and that the hierarchy is arbitrarily 1 deep. For the correct implementation, OmniGroup need look no further than OmniFocus' own implementation for Contexts, which they allow (needlessly, imho) to nest arbitrarily. Second, Projects, Groups and Actions can't be converted one to another with sufficient transparency. Why not simply define everything with a description as a Project, and anything without child Projects as an Action?

MINIFOCUS AND LISTS. OmniFocus seems to take its own name a bit too much to heart, which is surely unintentional. What I mean by that is that it's all too easy in OmniFocus to focus on all things at once. You can see all contexts at once, or all Actions with a certain status at once...but what happens when you want to _truly_ focus on just one Action at a time? What happens when you want to minimize your focus to the bare essentials?

My preference when working on Actionsā€”whether in Projects (aka Planning...yech) Mode or Contexts modeā€”would be to have an option to have only one Action presented to me at a time. A simple interface (buttons/keyboard shortcuts on the Mac, swiping sideways versus vertically on the iPhone) would then allow me to snooze the Action or mark it complete. (If I'm working on it, it would simply retain focus.) This is what I truly wish the Focus button would do in this application, but instead it reduces unwieldy lists to somewhat-less-unwieldy lists.

On this point, I'd like to see OmniFocus, and indeed other list-based applications, take a hint from LifeShaker. It might seem strange to compare such a feature-limited application (LS) with one so complex (OF), but I actually find myself wanting to return to LifeShaker more and more because of two features. First, it presents Actions ("Steps," in LifeShaker parlance) for review _outside_ of the usual list format. Second, it allows Actions/Steps to be snoozed via the Backburner feature. Both of these innate "focussing" features, along with LifeShaker's almost stubborn simplicity, seem to keep me from building up a resistance to using it consistently.

http://www.funkycloud.com/lifeshaker/

In the end, any GTD system is only effective if reviewed frequently. This applies to OmniFocus, LifeShaker, Life Balance, or even just blank paper and a pen. So the big question, and where YMMV, is whether you find yourself drawn back into OmniFocus enough to keep things up-to-date, or whether you find yourself avoiding it until it becomes just another place to store (and avoid) Stuff.

I have been using OF since the beta, and I have to agree with everything in this thread. Despite Omni's claims to the contrary, OF supports a very particular workflow which is unique to the program. The principle seems to be that the program is based on certain "best practices," and a user will be well-served to adopt these practices. Doing so will make them more effective. (There is some room for customization, but only within well-defined boundaries)

I believe that this is true to a great degree. OF enforces good management of tasks and projects (things simply do not show up on your to-do list unless they are properly filed), and it encourages you to focus on specific areas where you can accomplish something, thus eliminating the distractions and conflicting priorities when you're in the mode to Get Things Done.

This methodology and its incorporation into the application must be learned. It is NOT obvious from the start, the way most other to-do programs are. And this rigorous approach is not ideal for everyone -- it's too heavy for many (most?) people, too detail oriented for others, and perhaps too unforgiving as well.

I think this concept is interesting, and seems to be prevalent in a lot of GTD-type applications; which, if nothing else, require the user to adopt a GTD approach of projects and actions and next actions. On the other hand, the interface and approach is at some level cluttered and unfriendly, especially to a new user. Omni has a history of making very powerful and feature-packed applications that are extremely usable and easy to learn. OmniFocus is feature packed, but it is hardly easy to learn, and its carefully crafted interface is somewhat cluttered with features.

-- Nik

nikinik.net | http://inik.net | http://notions.inik.net

I have heard the ways that Omnifocus is not in the GTD style, but is
there a Mac program that can be used that way? I saw a beta of
something called "Things" a few months ago, also, a search for "GTD"
brings up 38 hits on Versiontracker. Is anyone using a program that
does work in the GTD style?

Ray

At 1:46 AM -0700 5/15/08, Ray Kloss wrote:
>I have heard the ways that Omnifocus is not in the GTD style, but is
>there a Mac program that can be used that way? I saw a beta of
>something called "Things" a few months ago, also, a search for "GTD"
>brings up 38 hits on Versiontracker. Is anyone using a program that
>does work in the GTD style?

If you use Entourage, the David Allen Company has a white paper that
specifically addresses how to implement GTD in Entourage. (And 2008
is not very different from 2004, so this 2006 paper would still
apply.)
<http://www.davidco.com/store/catalog/GTD-and-Entourage-p-16209.php>

I've been using LifeBalance for years - but you really have to twist
it to get it to work GTD style - the company isn't really open to
suggestions from their user base - I've been looking to change to
something that will sync to iCal well (LB finally kinda does sync
but it's dumb they way they did it).

I was very impressed with iGTD

http://www.igtd.pl/iGTD/index.html

the developer was going gang busters for a while, but things are not
moving as swiftly as I hoped. It's also 10.5 only and I'm still 10.4
for a number of reasons.

So far OmniFocus has the best chance of hitting the mark, once they
get the details worked out - I'm waiting till v2.0 myself (should
work on an iPhone as well)

p

On 15-May-08, at 1:46 AM, Ray Kloss wrote:

> I have heard the ways that Omnifocus is not in the GTD style, but is
> there a Mac program that can be used that way? I saw a beta of
> something called "Things" a few months ago, also, a search for "GTD"
> brings up 38 hits on Versiontracker. Is anyone using a program that
> does work in the GTD style?

You can try NovaMind Mind Mapper if you like graphic applications.
Most people on TidBits seem not to so I have copied you directly, Ray.

NB. David Allen webcast with MindManager: "iMindMap gdt" perversely
brings up MindManager ;--)
<www.davidco.com/mindmanager/mm_replay.html> A David Allen WebEx
archive of GTD on MindManager Mac: two industry standards combined.
<www.davidco.com/MindManager_event.php> Small image may need the
virtual magnifyer.

NovaMind in combination with Merlin project manager might be great
for the right people who see the world that way. You would be making
your own GTD patterns, though; so they could be as individualised as
you wish.

Googling brings up many combinations you may look through: "novamind
gdt"

<www.novamind.com/> <www.iMindMap.com> I use iMindMap for beauty
but may go back to NovaMind for export compatibility and on to
WebMindMapping for collaboration. <http://mindmapping.typepad.com/
the_mind_mapping_software/2008/05/the-online-mind.html>
<mindmapping.typepad.com> Mind Map software blog.

<www.whatsthenextaction.com/>

<http://pascalvenier.com/blog/?p=180>

<www.davidco.com/forum/archive/index.php/t-2204.html>

Something that really bugs me is the GUI Desktop. If it was real
it could be in the form of OmniFocus; which would really turn you
on; or off: but would not leave you in neutral. Another Real
Alternative GUI would be an acrylic painting.

As all of us are fundamentally similar and very different at the same
time: how many ways of putting the same Desktop into alternative
containers are there, to suit 'All the rest of us ?' I know someone
who used Google Search as their desktop. It all came about by
accident as their HDD got overcrowded, in XP. Search was all that
was left and they worked with that until the whole thing, HDD and
all, fried itself up. The tears shed were not in time to put the
fire out. Search as a TxtUI was what suited them, personally.

Is there any real reason that would make it impossible for OmniFocus
to be available as the desktop when working in that idom. I know
that I would love to have iMindMap as my Desktop much of the time and
can only see 'Unreal Reasons' for it not already having happened.
NumbersUI Desktop; RevolutionUI desktop; OmniGraffle...

How would this make OnmiFocus better? You can all think of your own
ways, but at least, when the Finder / Desktop gets updated, OmniFocus
would get updated, too: we would not have to take the chance of
having to do it by hand. We would be using OmniFocus in parallel
with several other Apps, wouldn't we ?

George

yeah

I aways wanted iCal to work as a Desktop background

no THAT would be useful!

p

On Thu, 15 May 2008, Phil Emery wrote:

> So far OmniFocus has the best chance of hitting the mark, once they
> get the details worked out - I'm waiting till v2.0 myself (should work
> on an iPhone as well)

The release notes for the just-came-out 1.0.2 strongly imply that when
version 1.1 comes out in late June (they hope), synchronization and
iPhone support will be part of the update.

I'm hoping. I tried some of the hand-rolled sync schemes I found on
their forums, and boy were they flaky.

    Over the last few months, most of our attention has been focused on
    OmniFocus 1.1, where we've been adding support for synchronization,
    and on writing OmniFocus for the iPhone. We plan to release both
    OmniFocus 1.1 and OmniFocus for the iPhone in late June (if they're
    ready!).

http://www.omnigroup.com/applications/omnifocus/releasenotes/

Also take a look at the screen shot here:

http://blog.omnigroup.com/2008/05/09/omnifocus-sync-its-alive/



--
Chris Devers

At 2008-05-15 01:46 -0700 Ray Kloss wrote:

>I have heard the ways that Omnifocus is not in the GTD style, but is
>there a Mac program that can be used that way

>Is anyone using a program that
>does work in the GTD style

Ray - there are lists of some GTD programs with brief comments in the
latest ATPM (About This Particular Mactintosh), volume 14, #5 by a
guy who seems to know what he's talking about.

regards

Rowland
--
| Rowland Carson ... that's Rowland with a 'w' ...
| <rowlandcarsongooglemail.com> http://home.clara.net/rowil/