At the risk of continuing to scare off potential...never mind. Anyway, I am going to continue this geeky series.
Apparently you can lose that along with your youthful eyesite. It turns out that writing things down on random pieces of paper is not as efficient as you would think.
So, I heard about David Allen's book Getting Things Done. The book describes a workflow for dealing with all the tasks that need to be done (seems self explanatory from the title, I suppose). Technically, you can use the techniques he describes with pen and paper but where is the fun of that?
Omnifocus is a program by Omnigroup in Seattle. Described in basic terms, it seems pretty simple. Type up everything you can think of that needs to be done - a complete brain dump. Then you can sort those things into Contexts (work, store, errands, home chores) and, under that, projects (build a deck, write a novel, cook a meal). When you are in a specific Context, you see your list that you've put together. Get something done, check it off.
It's a Mac program, though I am sure there are windows programs that do pretty much the same thing. As a desktop program, it is pretty useful. But I do not have a Mac at work so I needed something that I could bring with me. So, I picked up the iPhone version and the iPad versions.
The nice part about the portable versions is that they:
- Sync up together with the desktop version.
- Change contexts based on where you are (your phone knows where you are and shifts which context you are in accordingly).
If you get all three programs, it is a bit expensive. Building the habit of entering all of your tasks into the program takes vigilance and a stubborn attitude. But if you are looking for a way to build a powerful to do list, Omnifocus is the way to go.