My new favourite web app: Tom's Planner - Gantt Charts
This is one for my students mainly, but also anyone who needs to visualise a project quickly.
I haven't needed to make a Gantt chart for a long time, but I've been on a bloody training course on Microsoft Project, and even bought an epic book on that package. Today for the first time in years, I needed to make a Gantt chart. Quickly.
I no longer have MS Project, and I don't have a PC to put it on. I figured in the years since I last touched it t some sort of web app would have appeared which could do the job just as well. Sure enough a tweet later, @ganttchart sent me a link to Tom's Planner. It's a smooth interface, and for a basic project timeline you've got everything you need. I don't think it can manage some of the advanced resource management stuff that Project can do (in fact, I think it's been deliberately designed to avoid that sort of thing).
The service is in public Beta, giving out free accounts. There's going to be some sort of pay model down the line, but the website suggests that a freemium model will be included allowing one project at a time, gratis. There's also a commitment to give Beta members a year's free service:
Once Tom's Planner is released out of beta, it is our intention to extend all actively used beta accounts for a minimum of one additional year without any obligations. This will enable all Tom's Planner beta users to continue to work with and use Tom's Planner for free for at least one more year.
