Forum Posts Feed
The Rise and Fall of Getting Things Done
< Next Topic | Back to topic list | Previous Topic >
Posted by Amontillado
Nov 26, 2020 at 01:37 PM
Wow, that Pomodoro article wandered a bit, didn’t it?
Not that there isn’t precedent in some of my own work, and culinary tasks can sometimes benefit from exactly that organizational technique. Just add some tomato sauce and a few meatballs, and that identical structure makes a nice bowl of spaghetti.
One of my most powerful problem solving techniques is to walk away from challenges. I often work to get something finished, then wake up the next morning with a solution in a fraction of the code. My inner nerd is a pretty hard working guy. Sometimes I need to get out of his way.
Kind of like, “Ok, boss, what you need here is heuristic recursion leveraging reentrant self-modifying predictive code. The answer is at the end of about 30 miles of rough fire roads. I’ll crank up my dirt bike and come back with what you need.”
I wish I were kidding, but I find it’s best to just keep my methods secret.
Posted by 22111
Nov 26, 2020 at 03:35 PM
The basic fault in GTD was the misuse of the term “Context” for “To Do Context” (instead of “Doings”?), “contexts” being the (in case, multiple) contexts in which some “item”, some “sub-tree” could appear. On the other hand, Allen made millions, probably even multi-millions, by his idea that even disparate “context works” should be grouped on their own whenever they didn’t take more than some (2, 3?) minutes to spend on them, and with all due respect to “critics” of all boards, that’ some achievement… all the rest being blah-blah.
And for practial things: MLO is deemed, by some, to not be without “bugs” (even losing your “work”, some guys say), and it’s without formatted text (i.e. it’s “plain text”, even in late 2020)... and then, and albeit acknowledging that MLO might be the “best” GTD applic, NOBODY out there ever resolved the problem that, be it MLO or for any other “TTPM (time-task-and-more-or-less-personal-project-management) system”, you’d need all “the files, the folders, the core matter” within.
As said, coders are conceptual illiterates, and that, up to now, very unfortunately comprises “outliner” and “IM” (information management) coders.
Posted by 22111
Nov 26, 2020 at 03:38 PM
Sorry, I meant, for about 98 p.c. of them. Sorry again.
Posted by MadaboutDana
Nov 27, 2020 at 03:58 PM
While finding the perfect time management app is, I suggested, a losing game, I’m always impressed by apps that make the effort to appeal to EVERYBODY!
Take the humble TickTick, for example. It started off as a simple web-based to-do app. Nothing complicated, apart from a rather useful ability to convert tasks from lists of to-dos into a written screed.
Since then, however, it has steadily evolved. Over a period of around 4 years, it’s gained: macOS/iOS (and I think Windows/Android) apps, nested subtasks, sharing, Calendar view, folders, (excellent) markdown support, separate notes (as opposed to tasks), attachments, tags, sections, summary reports, colour filters, customisable smart lists, and a running log of activities (created/modified/deleted). And most recently, a (rather good) kanban view.
It wouldn’t surprise me if GANTT charts were on the horizon. You’ll find a subset of the above list of features in excellent task managers like Things, Todoist, NotePlan etc., but you won’t find all of them.
For a very modest subscription, it’s one of the most comprehensive task managers around. We’re re-examining it as a possible collaborative platform, having been impressed (but then somewhat overwhelmed) by Pagico. Which is very good, but – what’s the fairest summary? – too fussy, perhaps. TickTick isn’t beautiful (although it’s not ugly); it “just works”.
But on personal stuff, they’ll have to prise NotePlan from my cold, dead hands… ;-)
Posted by satis
Dec 5, 2020 at 05:35 PM
The humble TickTick is a Chinese app with a nominal California headquarters, from what I can tell. Given what we’ve learned about Chinese governmental influence and access with social, video, drone and other apps, I have a lot of hesitance with keeping my data in a cloud and company that isn’t strictly in my country, with its protections, or isn’t allowing me to use the cloud service of my choice.
I feel a lot more comfortable using an inferior tool like Microsoft To Do, or a more competitive product like Todoist, which is headquartered in Barcelona and supports EU privacy rules.