Headquarters Review

If you are unfamiliar with Basecamp from 37 Signals, it is a web-based project collaboration tool. It allows users to organize projects, tasks, communicate through posts, and do a whole slew of other tasks in a nice compact website. Headquarters, from Select Start Studios, is an app that is designed to work with Basecamp, providing an enhanced user interface for more streamlined use of the various Basecamp services on your iDevice.

The first thing you realize with Headquarters is that graphically, it’s really sharp. A sleek black based theme makes the app look both professional and modern. These colors lend themselves well to reading messages on the white text boxes within Headquarters as well. The darker colors provide little distraction and allows user to focus on work.

Starting up and using this app takes very little time, assuming you know your Basecamp domain name, sign in, and password. I did, and from start up to account log in, it took me no longer then 2 minutes. Multiple accounts can be uploaded, and users can seamlessly maneuver between each account with little to no complications. This is especially beneficial when working with Basecamp, as it takes some of the time out of switching between accounts.

It does take some getting used to the organization of Headquarters, but within 10 minutes I was posting, updating, reading, and navigating through my Basecamp account without any problems at all. Posting was as easy as sending an IM or posting to Facebook, and bringing up previous messages was extremely easy.

Using Headquarters doesn’t remove a lot of functionality from Basecamp, unlike similar apps for website specific services. To-do lists, milestone, and messages can all be updated and sent. I wasn’t able to find an area within the app which allowed for new projects to be started, so if there are new projects that users want to create, they will have to utilize the website at least in small part. We operate within one large project so it wasn’t an issue for me at all.

Searching information within projects is easy as well. The app allows for daily, weekly, and recently updated posts to be broken out for simple retrieval. This makes it extremely easy to navigate between important and new messages, and pick out exactly what it is that is needed.

This app is limited in who it is most effective for. Obviously if you do not have a Basecamp account, there is little that Headquarters offers for you. I would recommend, especially if you utilize large amounts of project based tasks, that you look into the benefits that Basecamp offers. We have only scratched the surface so far, but it has a lot of potential for large and small operations alike.

Without question I recommend Headquarters for those of you who do have a Basecamp account. The sleek design, the ease of use, the efficient organization of data, and the minimal limitation to usability that this app provides is a great addition to any Basecamp account. Check it out from Select Start Studios for $7.99.