A few small fixes…

Fixed: Monthly recurring tasks date issue
Tasks were not recurring on the set monthly deadline. This is because we were calculating months as a fixed 30 days so this issue came up when months had fewer than 30 days (Feb) or had 31 days. Now, if a monthly recurring task has a  deadline of 31st October then the new recurring task will be 31st December and not November - this works the same way as Google Calendar monthly recurring events.

Fixed: Upload Files in the Issue section
Files are properly uploading to the issues section of each project. Earlier, there were issues with certain file types and names.

Fixed: Wrong deadline for GMT -5
For this timezone the deadline would come back 1 day earlier.  This has been resolved and tested with other time zones as well.

Fixed: Adding time to Tasks
The time clock icon would not show up when time was added to a task unless a page refresh was forced.

Fixed: Google Apps login help
We have added some more help and informative error messages on the login window for the Google Apps login.

DeskAway will be conducting scheduled maintenance on Saturday, October 16, 2010, between 10:00 AM and 11:00 AM IST (that is 11:30 PM Friday Oct 15th to 12:30 AM Saturday Oct 16th US EST). DeskAway.com (including all project sites) will be temporarily inaccessible during this time. This is a minor service upgrade.

We appreciate your patience and can assure you the service will be restored as quickly as possible. Please let us know if you have any questions or concerns.

Thank you,
The DeskAway Team

The world is moving towards virtual, remote, dispersed teams. I know many of DeskAway users work with remote freelancers, partners and employees. This article busting common myths on remote working might be helpful to all of you’ll (written by Avdi Grimm of wideTeams).

Working in a dispersed team has its share of challenges, but some of the fears that people have about remote work simply aren’t born out by the experience of real-world teams. Here are a few if the more common misconceptions I’ve encountered.

Working outside the office is distracting. This is one of the most persistent myths I’ve run into. Sure, working from home can be distracting. But out of the remote workers I’ve talked to, the majority find their home office a better environment for focused work than a traditional office.Which shouldn’t really come as a surprise. After all, if you work with people you like, it means that your workplace is going to be filled with people you have a lot in common with, having conversations about things that are interesting to you! While I’m not proud of it, I’ve had hallway conversations that lasted for hours at some jobs.Not to mention that when people can see you, they are more likely to interrupt you to ask you a question or get a status update. Proximity invites disruption.

Read the other 4…

The world’s largest-selling English newspaper, The Times of India, today ran a story in their business section (pg 23) on Startups usher in 3rd IT wave in India. The first waves were in BPO and the IT services (think ‘outsourcing’). Today, we are witnessing the birth of product companies from India harnessing Software As A Service (SaaS) and Cloud Computing - the 3rd wave.

We are very excited to read that DeskAway is one of these startups. In fact, this is exactly in line with my vision - of building a successful global product company from India. This is what we have held onto since 2006 - when we reluctantly phased out our service business and jumped into product development. I am happy to see other companies take the tough route to build something that will ‘build to last’.

What a better way to start a Monday morning!

Sahil Parikh’s interview is live on Zach Katkin’s Promana.net - a resource for project management related tips and software. Sahil talks about how he got started with DeskAway, what does he think about his competitors, surprising things running a web software company and future plans.

You can catch the entire interview here.