« jet-propelled skydiving | Main | a man of few words »
April 9, 2007
igtd - getting things done on a mac
Okay, I'm officially in love with a new personal management app. If you've hung around me in person at all, you probably know I'm a fan of David Allen's 'Getting Things Done' (i.e. GTD) system, and use my own version of his methodology to manage my life/workload/clients/etc. I have a bit of a bug up my ass about other systems (Franklin, DayRunner, etc) that seem more geared towards selling you their own tools - whether it be software, physical day planners and 'refill' pages, et al. GTD has always been very agnostic with the tools (heck, you can use plain vanilla file folders and sticky notes if you want), while very specific with the methodology- which is why I like it so much. Lets me mold the actual workflow to my own life, not buy a new 'planner system' and adapt to it.
For quite a while, I've mainly had a need to:
- Manage my to-do list in a centralized place on my laptop
- Have an easy way to add items/check them off
- Not have my system dependent on a computer
(i.e. I don't want to have to be plugged in to access it) - Synchronize my lists to my phone/mobile devices
- Keep maintenance costs to a bare minimum
I'd been using Kinkless GTD for some time, which is basically a set of free scripts you add into the commercial list management product OmniOutliner that lets you manage tasklists easily. As I already owned OmniOutliner, it was a no-brainer back when it was the only game in town. But Kinkless GTD's got it's issues- primarily a kludgy synch process in order to 'update' the lists on a regular basis. I know that OmniGroup is working with the Kinkless folk to build a new app - OmniFocus - that will address all of the shortcomings, but it's a ways off. What's a guy to do?
Well, in comes iGTD. iGTD does everything Kinkless does - with even some new twists - and it's free. Well, you should of course donate to the project if you like it (which I do, and have), but there's no cost of entry. And it's a native Mac application, not a set of add-on scripts for another app. Bonus.
I moved my lists over three days ago, and have been taking an objective 'deep dive' into iGTD, and can say that I love it. Immensely. Reasons why:
- Very flexible sorting/filtering options
- Auto-sync (yeah!)
- Darn near seamless Quicksilver integration
- Easy backup via iBackup
- It's a native Cocoa application!
- Ability to attach Address Book contacts to an item directly
- Attaching hotlinks/files to an item directly
Out of all of these, what I'm diggin' the most is the Quicksilver integration.
If you're not familiar with it, Quicksilver is an indispensible Mac utility for everything from file/application launching, to application control, and a whole lot more. I basically rely on QS for a lot in my daily life, and with iGTD I can - for example - very easily hit the QS hotkey and type in not just a to-do item, but it's due date, project, additional notes, and have it automatically added to my GTD inbox in iGTD for processing.
OmniFocus may have some twists in store too, but honestly it's got a good fight ahead of it in the free iGTD application. I'm a believer.
Posted by Scott at April 9, 2007 1:19 PM