I’ve been using this system for awhile now (longer than any other I’ve tried) and I still love it. Here are the relevant properties for the one I created: This is really powerful, but please don’t get carried away with it! To embed your todo list, create a new Shell Geeklet that cats your text file. It let you display on your desktop different kind of informations I hate having anything on my desktop so it provides added motivation.I decided to embed the list right on my Mac’s desktop. Where my todo system really shines is in its ability to remind me of tasks I’ve created without being outright obnoxious. So far this system is nothing revolutionary. I rarely allow myself to have 10+ tasks in my list at any point, so the chance of string collisions is low. In practice I’ve never run into that problem. For example, if I would have passed it the term some it would have removed both of my tasks. This is a little dangerous because it will match multiple lines so I could end up removing more tasks than intended. It matches aggressively so I can get away with passing it as small a string as possible. Be sure to set an environment variable for where the text file is todone todo So I wrote two very simple Bash functions instead. I pretty much live in Terminal.app, and with the help of the awesome Visor program I have access to it from anywhere on my system via a hot-key. I started off using Vim and TextMate to manage the text file, but even this was too much effort. I put mine in ~/Documents/todo, but I’m considering moving it to my Dropbox folder instead. They’re portable and readable by almost anything. There is no better way to store a list of things than a good ole’ text file. The third piece employs a freeware application for Mac OS X called GeekTool. The system I’m using consists of three pieces, two of which can be implemented on any stock UNIX-based operating system. And I need to manipulate that list with ease. I just need a list of things that need doing staring me in the face. Nothing Else - I don’t need due dates or nesting or task dependencies or tagging or anything else. Visibility - Having a list of things you need to do is of no value if it doesn’t stare you in the face on a regular basis. “Effort” in this context includes any steps between the task’s inception in my brain to the moment when it is fully entered into the system. Here’s what I need from a todo system:Įasy Peasy - For me to actually use any system I must be able to add and remove tasks with virtually no effort. I’m a particular guy and your needs may not line up with mine. Maybe not, but even so you can take comfort in knowing that the perfect system for you is out there waiting to be found. It’s minimal and it stays out of my way and yet it gets in my way just enough and, well, I think it’s awesome. The good news is that I found a system that Just Works® for me. This problem is so bad that there are people who make careers out of telling other people how to actually get stuff done. If we were more honest with ourselves, we might even call them todon’t lists. Let’s face it, we all spend way too much time trying out different todo systems and not enough time actually DOING the tasks we type, jot, or bleed into them.
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