Let’s talk about Actions

Take an action, reach a milestone. That’s the basic idea.

But it’s a little bit more complicated, because there are different kinds of actions—typically in the form of buttons you can click:

1. Required actions that you have to complete in order to move the workflow forward. These actions are needed to check off a milestone.
For example, in an Ebook Editing workflow:
- You have to share your manuscript with your editor if you want his help to edit it.
- You have to submit your manuscript if you want to publish it.

2. Suggested actions that you can (but don’t have to) take. These actions are optional because they aren’t needed to reach a milestone; they normally don’t affect the current workflow. For example:
- You could click to revise your manuscript after you have submitted it.
- You could click to view your published ebook on the publishing platform when the workflow is completed.

=> more on milestones next week

Let’s talk about Milestones

As you move through your workflow step by step, the system tracks your progress until you reach the final milestone and the workflow is completed.

Let’s look at the example of our Ebook Editing workflow between author and editor:

You’re the author. You want the editor’s help to make your book really great. So, the nice bot asks you to share your manuscript with your editor (see “Required actions” in Friday’s post). Good author that you are, you click the “Share Manuscript” button. Now, your action
- embeds your manuscript card in the workflow, so your editor can access it,
- checks off your first milestone,
- adds the corresponding “Milestone reached” notification to the workflow,
- updates the status of your project via progress wheel, and
- triggers the next action —in this case, a prompt for your editor to start editing your manuscript (this prompt is visible to him only).

Of course, not all milestones are reached that easily. They may require more than one click (and the completion of more than one task) to accomplish the desired check mark....

=> more on tasks coming up

Let’s talk about Tasks

Tasks in the Cardstack Workflow system are like tasks on Asana or Trello, but they are much more useful—because they are directly associated with your different workflows!

Tasks can not only be added to your personal or shared to-do list like they can everywhere else, but to a message thread as well—even to individual messages, attachments, or actions inside that thread. A colorful pointer in the thread tells you immediately what your task is about, which message it concerns, which card you need to look at, or which button you have to click. Meanwhile, you can use the expandable task list at the top to keep track of all tasks related to that thread.

Any participant can assign tasks inside a thread. You can add a task for someone else —e.g. to let your editor know that you need him to look at your outline before you can continue. Or you can add a task for yourself that only you can see—e.g. to remind yourself to check out the link to the stock image library your editor has sent you for your cover art. And once you’ve completed a task, you can check it off with one click, as you would on Asana or Trello.

In addition, there are tasks a nice bot can assign. Those are tasks you should look out for, because they are tied to required actions and tell you that someone (maybe even you) is blocking the workflow. For example, only when you’ve clicked the “Share manuscript” button (thus shared your manuscript with your editor) can the editing workflow continue.
Very convenient feature: You don’t need to check off system-generated tasks manually. They are automatically resolved once you have clicked the button that the bot asked you to click.

This is what the expanded task list at the top of a thread could look like.

The tasks for the thread are divided up into 3 sections:
- Assigned to me
- Pending response
- Completed

For context, you can just click on a task in the list, and your click will take you directly to the corresponding message in the workflow.

=> more on related workflows coming up

Let’s talk about Composable Workflows

Some workflows are simple. Others are more complex. Which is why Cardstack workflows are composable.

Say you’re done editing your manuscript with your editor. Now it’s time to involve a proofreader. So, you can simply add an Ebook Proofreading workflow into your main Ebook Editing workflow (alternatively, you could start with a complex workflow that comes with related flows already).

This related workflow will be included in your main workflow, so you can access it easily—but other participants can’t. Each participant can only see the workflow that person participates in, meaning: Your editor can only access Ebook Editing, your proofreader can only access Ebook Proofreading, and you can access everything.

Now, you can send your manuscript through a portal to your Ebook Proofreading workflow, get it proofread, then send it back to the main Ebook Editing workflow, where that action will check off your “Proofread” milestone. This way, you keep the participants separate—and yet, they work together towards the completion of the same overall project.

This composability allows you to combine workflows in two ways. You can
- nest workflows inside each other: Such “included workflows” help you to complete your main workflow, e.g. you can get chapter 1 of your ebook proofread or translated before you submit it.
- chain workflows together: Such “linked workflows” don’t affect the main workflow, but help you to keep track of your project, e.g. you can repeat the same editing workflow again for chapter 2 of your ebook.

The Cardstack Workflow is a multi-functional tool for multi-faceted work.

It makes your work life easier, because it keeps you updated on the progress of all your projects.
It makes your communication more cohesive, because you get to communicate on the same platform where you’re doing your work, so all participants can see that the work they’re discussing is actually getting done.
It makes your project management more organized, because the actions you take inside a flow organize your work for you.
And it makes everything more fun, because the pain of switching between 10 different apps every single day is finally over. All the different aspects of your workflows are combined in this 1 tool, which can be further extended to provide absolutely everything you need.

This way, you can finally leave subscription hell behind and manage your whole work efficiently, without a handful of SaaS companies holding you down. And if you want to use this workflow system on your phone, this screenshot shows you what the mobile version of the Cardstack Workflow will look like.

We will continue working hard to bring this unique workflow system to life and plan to release a video demo soon. Use cases of the Cardstack Workflow could include content collaboration, payment collaboration, contracting, governance, community formation, and much more. Stay tuned for future updates!

This article about DeFi hacks and security issues just came out, co-authored by Chris Tse and Emma Channing. Check it out: https://www.crowdfundinsider.com/2020/11/169250-defi-solidity-sees-significant-uptick-in-security-errors-in-2020/

We have a series of new videos coming up! The first one will be about our plans to grow the Cardstack ecosystem. Stay tuned.

We've published a new video, where Chris talks about his vision and strategy for Cardstack—specifically about his plans to grow the ecosystem. This is the first in a series of (both long and short) videos about the progress and the products of Cardstack that we will publish in the coming weeks.
https://youtu.be/Sd73a89K3xQ

Our work on the Cardstack mobile app is currently focused on applying the latest visual design, which contains the Cardstack branding as well as the UI components from the Boxel design system. The plan is to bring it to the live mobile app soon.

Learn more: https://twitter.com/cardstack/status/1367064015491399683

Coming up: A product talk about Card Pay! Make sure you join us for the premiere on Monday, 9 a.m. EST / 3 p.m. CET / 10 p.m. SGT.
https://youtu.be/zeGxShpQHWI

Our development of the $CARD Protocol is focused on the build on top of the smart contract, and L1-L2 bridging that is already in place, to add support for decentralized commerce (dCommerce) features.

Learn more: https://twitter.com/cardstack/status/1367429622367801350

We're excited to share our new partnership with Innovion!

We believe that Cardstack is the interface layer for the next decade. What's coming in the 2020s is a version upgrade in the tech that we use, in the business models we pursue, and in the way that culture is defined.

Learn more: https://twitter.com/cardstack/status/1367841962297073668

Remember to tune in today, at 9 a.m. EST / 3 p.m. CET / 10 p.m. SGT, for our product talk about Card Pay by Chris Tse. Make sure your alerts and notifications have been set. We look forward to seeing you then!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeGxShpQHWI

The premiere of our Card Pay video starts in 5 minutes! Be sure to tune in:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zeGxShpQHWI

In case you missed our video about growing the Cardstack ecosystem, you can watch it here: https://youtu.be/Sd73a89K3xQ