Posted by pneumaticteam 10/24/2024
I'm one of the co-founders of Pneumatic, an enterprise-grade workflow software designed for small, fast-growing startups.
Yesterday, we released Pneumatic under the Apache 2.0 license.
If your team has used Trello, Basecamp, or Asana before and you're now looking to implement a more structured, mature approach by building repeatable task sequences, you should try Pneumatic.
Here's what Pneumatic offers:
- Task sequences defined by templates. Design a template once and run multiple instances of a process based on this reusable template—manually, via API, or with a public share kick-off form.
- An intuitive, user-friendly Workflow Template Editor.
- Workflow conditions to skip tasks or create branches.
- Dynamic task performer assignment: defined by the template or variable, based on conditions.
- Email, mobile, push, and REST notifications for all major events, such as when workflows start/stop, tasks start/stop, mentions, and more.
- Support for parallel tasks. And much more.
Some of the most popular use cases include chains of approvals, employee or customer onboarding, software development and design processes, and content creation workflows for teams.
I’d love your feedback and questions. You can reach me at anton.seidler@pneumatic.app
In other words, Pneumatic ensures that each task, as part of the workflow sequence, is delivered to the user precisely when it's time for them to take action. This removes the need to constantly monitor a Kanban board and guess what needs attention.
Additionally, it creates a queue of similar tasks, enhancing focus and productivity, such as a list of phone calls to make (complete with pre-filled information) or a list of blog posts to approve.
Quick q: about integrations, I have seen the Zapier features, but can you invoke external systems via api on a specific task? (Eg client files complaint process, pull all orders from that client and display on screen so I can select the affected one and move forward)
Thanks!
Just curious, how do you differentiate from other open source competitors like n8n and Active pieces?
You are my open-source Godfather ;) Our discussion was one of the final pushes in my long-debated decision to go open source. And your awesome launch of Skyvern on HN today inspired me to make a similar announcement. Thank you for your inspiring work!
I see n8n as an open-source, self-hosted alternative to Zapier, essentially orchestrating how systems communicate with each other. Pneumatic, on the other hand, focuses on human input and helps people navigate complex processes. In fact, many of our existing users use Pneumatic together with Zapier and n8n (mostly in Europe).
ActivePieces seems like a cool product I hadn’t seen before. I’ll need some time to play with it before I can form an opinion.
Step 1. Expense is submitted. Step 2. Initial review. Step 3. Direct manager approval. Step 4. CEO approval. Step 5. Payment is made.
From the manager's perspective, each task has:
- Its own performer, which can be hardcoded or dynamically assigned based on conditions. - A clear definition of "done," i.e., a set of data inputs required for task completion, such as file uploads or specific selections. - Its own dynamic due date, based on variables and conditions.
From the performer's perspective, they receive a convenient list of similar tasks to complete, such as a list of expenses to review, phone calls to make, or customers to interview. They don't need to worry about SOPs, like where to submit information for the next step. They simply hit "complete," and the process moves to the next station or person in the queue. Alternatively, if they hit "return," the task goes back to the previous station.
1. In a nutshell, Asana and Monday are board-based tools suited for project management, where people can see most tasks simultaneously and then choose what to work on.
Pneumatic, on the other hand, builds sequences, so my task only comes to me when it’s time for me to act. This templated sequence can be run repeatedly (manually or triggered by external events) to achieve predictable results.
2. We use Pneumatic to manage our development process :)