The "Info Pane"

[#1]

Here's a thing. If you add up the different places in ACT! that you can find things, the results are quite scary. For example, there are now four main detail screens (Contacts, Groups, Companies, and Opportunities) with a total of forty-three (yes forty-three) tabs, so that's forty-seven different  places to both enter and look for information before we even start to count the areas within the tabs, such as Notes, History and Web Info. And that adds up to a whole lot of clicking and screen changing in order to get to the information you need.

This, frankly, is a problem. The only redeeming factor is that most people don't use all the available options. No, they are selective. If I think about the way I use ACT! for example I realise that I use Groups every day, but only to pull together contacts that are related in some way. I never, ever, use the fields in the Group Detail View.

Now, I have no doubt that somewhere out there in the ACTmosphere there will be people who do exactly that and use the Group fields all the time, which just goes to show that we are all different, and we expect our databases to easily yield different pieces of information relevant to our personal or business needs.

What we need is a simple way of mining and displaying that information in a format that suits each user, and which doesn't require any additional clicking at all.

I would therefore like to suggest that what ACT! requires is an optional, customisable "Info Pane".

I see the "Info Pane" as a vertical window, to the right of the main screen that works is a similar way to Dashboards, but without having to click into the Dashboards area. Is there room? Well, not always, but the laptop I'm using now has a screen resolution of 1680 x 1050, and the fields in the standard 1024 x 768 layout barely cover half the screen.

What would I like to see in the Info Pane? Almost anything I want. I might choose to add some Dashboards such as My Schedule at a Glance plus the number of Calls and Meetings completed this month, and Sales this Month. These would be static and would not change when I change the main screens. I might also want to add some other components that relate to the Contact I'm looking at, such as their Opportunities or their Notes, and there's still room for the contact's Twitterings. I might also want to display my Outlook InBox or the current currency exchange rate to check if I can afford to go on holiday.

All of this would help me to get the most out of ACT! by shaping the interface to display the pieces of data that I want to see whilst minimising the number of mouse clicks required, and, in addition, would also allow me to access external information whilst continuing to work within the ACT! user interface. 

[#2]

I like this idea. Also Kudo'd for using the term: ACTmosphere - very clever.

[#3]

For anyone reading this, there's a bit of a discussion on this here:

http://www.linkedin.com/groupAnswers?viewQuestionAndAnswers=&gid=49896&discussionID=8140709

[#4]

I have to concur wiht this request.  I have used ACT! since its DOS version. 

Up to ACT2000 I was able to "Window" my calendar and tasks on the right side while viewing groups, contacts, and other data on the left side.  This was a perfect setup for me and why I kept ACT 6 until this year.

It is very frustrating only looking at one thing at a time.  Keeping Tasks and a small calendar is imperitive to efficent work flow.  PLEASE bring this functionality back!

[#5]

The other thing I would like to be able to see in the Info Pane is copies of selected fields that exist elsewhere. They might be fields that are tucked away in other tabs in the Contact record, such as Record Manager, or, more importantly,  fields from the Company record to which that Contact belongs. I could then see the Company information (e.g. Address, SIC code, Industry) alongside the Contact information.

(Yes I know that means limiting it to one Company record per Contact or designating one Company Record the Primary one, but I believe that's a compromise well worth making.

[#6]

This is a great idea based.  I find myself trying to work with one program and one screen, trying to multitask without moving too much.  A column that would allow you to personalize it with a micro calendar, task settings, and even a QUICK NOTE field that is like your personal sticky on the screen.  I related it to the web link in the contact field.  It is great to be looking at the contact and browse their web page at the same time.  This has been very powerful for me.