Home Delivery

The case for keeping your grocery list online

Lou Dolinar

12:53 PM EDT, March 21, 2008

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You can learn a lot about computers, software and the Internet by analyzing a simple task. Today's lesson looks at how, and why, to use a computer rather than paper to keep track of day-to-day shopping and to-do lists.

But, you ask: What could be simpler than a paper shopping or to-do list? Why bother with a computer? Piece of paper, pencil, items = list.

OK, so you can lose the list -- so buy a refrigerator magnet. Slightly more complicated: Buy a Day-Runner diary you always carry with you. Done.

Here's the case for making the shift: It is incredibly simple to write a program that keeps and prints such lists. Of course, if the list is only on one computer, that's not very helpful.

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But if you connect to the Internet and store the data and list program online, you have a whole different critter. It is available from any computer on a standard Web page that you can edit via any browser.

And you can share it with others who are plugged in to a computer all day. In their simplest form, online lists solve the "Honey Do" problem, as in "Honey, I have a list of things for you to do." I can write a list at home that my wife can read and edit at work -- how else am I going to remind her to pick up a case of champagne and bring it home to our posh digs on Fire Island? Likewise, she can jot down chores for me as they strike her fancy.

I've been fooling around with online list managers a lot lately and have settled on one of the more popular ones, Ta-da list (free at tadalist.com) from 77Signals. I've looked a half-dozen alternatives that, while more powerful, don't do any more for me. Sharing is 90 percent of the game here.

Here's why you should try it: Sign up for an account and password, get your own home page and create one or more lists. The name of every list you make is on the home page. Click on one, such as the grocery list, to open it; when you purchase an item, check the box next to it, and it dims and goes to the bottom of the list. Want to resurrect the item the next time you go grocery shopping? Click on its box and it returns to the active part of the list. After a few weeks you'll barely need to type.

Sharing is straightforward. Enter the e-mail address of the people you want to share the list with and indicate if they can edit the list or only read it. They'll get an e-mail notification asking them to sign up. Once they do, they can start making lists and sharing them with you. You can also create an RSS feed from each list so your list partners are notified any time a list is updated.

We have a grocery list. And one for Costco (volume purchases) and another for The Home Depot. Such lists also are useful for organizing online shopping projects: I was pricing and sizing some built-in electric heaters, so I made a heater list and was able to embed links to a half-dozen suppliers for pricing as well as to online calculators I used to compute wattages.

Once you get into it, you'll find other uses. When the family headed off for a vacation, I started a "Things to take" list, and shared it with my daughter at college. Of course, she had her own plans, so we were able to coordinate.

But let's get to the list challenge: What's the point of a to-do list unless you can take it with you? Until recently, you had two options for replicating information on your PC: print out the list or invest in a PDA-type device that "synchronizes" its content with your computer, via cable or wireless. The latter works well for one person, but when data's shared across multiple devices among different people, things start to get tricky: Which version of the data is the real deal? Solutions tend to be proprietary, like the BlackBerry-based smart phones that require various subscriptions, special software and monthly fees.

The alternative model is what Google's been pushing, the so-called ''cloud," for everything from e-mail to spreadsheets to calendars and is being widely adopted by many other companies like 77Signals. With this approach, everything's on the Internet and accessible to any standard browser. It doesn't matter whether the browser is on a laptop, a desktop, a smart phone, an iPhone or a tiny Palmtop like my little Nokia N800. The downside: You do need to be connected to the Internet to use your application, although software technologies are on the way that will allow for at least limited offline use.

Ta-Da list worked best for me because its simplicity allows it to fit easily on a tiny portable screen. Around the house, my Wi-Fi network keeps the Palmtop in touch. On the road, I can usually find a hot spot or, in a pinch, connect to the Net via my cell phone.

For me, at least, this is a killer application.