48-Hour Days

I’m really getting into using Remember the Milk for my tasks. I’ve even gotten my boss, Tom, into it. I love that I can share my work-related list of tasks with him so he can adjust priorities or add information as needed. Also, he has a real-time look at what I’m working on without me having to update something else or put extra effort into it.

But, organizational freak that I am, I’m always looking for ways to use the service better. Enter the Remember the Milk Tips & Tricks Forum. There is a lot of really good stuff in there. Below I’ve detailed some of the posts that I’ve found useful and how I’ve adapted those techniques to my workflow. I have a caveat, though. Like all good organizational processes, this is a work in progress. I expect it will be for quite some time. However, I really think I have the basic flow nailed down and it seems to be working well. As with any advice, your milage may vary.

Projects

I keep all of my work-related tasks on one list and personal tasks on another. I have shared my work list with Tom and kept the personal list private. However, the tasks on these lists beg to be broken out into projects. RTM doesn’t support hierarchies, though (well, not yet). What to do?

I found this post in the forum and decided to use it as the start of my system.

For each project, I create a task tagged “project”. At first, I followed the poster’s advice and prefixed the task name with two hyphens. This allows the project tasks to be sorted before the actual action tasks, since the hyphens get put first alphabetically. However, I found that I don’t like seeing the overall project task in the same list as the associated action tasks. It was a distraction for me. So, I removed the hyphens from the project tasks and now I just create them without any sort of prefix.

For each project, I create a tag that is in the format “p-code” where “code” is just a one-word short code I use to identify that project. For example, my tag for all of the things I have to do for Riemer Week is p-riemerweek. These tags are applied to the action tasks for the specific projects.

You’ll notice that in my system the action tasks are not directly related to the project tasks. They are in my mind, but not in the actual task lists. I like it this way. I only use the project tasks to prioritize the projects as a whole and keep a high-level view of what I’m currently working on. The action tasks are for my “what’s next” moments. Thus, I’ve created two Smart Lists: one for projects and one for next actions.

A Dash of GTD

One of the ideas I took away from David Allen’s Getting Things Done is putting tasks in lists according to context. So, all the phone calls you have to make are in a list by the phone, all of the errands you have to run are in a list in your purse/wallet/diaper bag, that kind of thing. It makes perfect sense. I haven’t been able to do it yet.

I’m trying, though. To this end, I have context tags in RTM. These tags are prefixed with a “@”. So, I have @office and @errand so far. Since I work from home, there are tasks that I pile up and do the next time I’m in the office. This makes it easy to pick those out. If I decide to go run errands with the kids, I can get a quick list of all of them. Extra bonus: using the Location field to map out the store for that particular errand. Now, if I can find a mash-up site that will spit out a complete driving directions itinerary with each errand’s location included and everything put in a logical order so that I’m not doing any backtracking.

Keep ’em Separated

Now that I have formats for specific tags, I wanted to organize my tags (is there no end to my mania??). That’s where another post in the RTM Tips & Tricks forum comes in. The poster came up with a way to create “separator” tags that span the entire width of the tag cloud. The trick is to use the same prefix as the tags, then add a bunch of underscores and an optional label.

I’ve created a special task in my Inbox that only holds the separator tags (tags must be assigned to a task in order to exist).

Next Actions

So, on these monolithic lists of tasks now sorted nicely into easy-to-find projects, how do I determine what my next actions are? Priorities, baby!

Just about everything I have to do needs to be done ASAP. This makes adding due dates pretty useless as everything is due now. This is where priorities come in. For each project, I pick out the very next thing I have to do. That gets assigned priority 1. Then I pick out the next task. That gets assigned priority 2. Finally, I pick the next task after that and give it priority 3. This gives me the next three actions for each project.

I then have a Smart List that only displays tasks that are not tagged with project and that have a priority set. Bam! My list of things to do today.

I mentioned that I like to keep the projects separate. I have another Smart List that has all tasks tagged project. This allows me to assign priorities to the projects themselves. When I view all of the priority 1 tasks on my Next Actions list, I can do the next action for the highest priority project.

Conclusion

This probably all seems overly complex, and perhaps it is. But it works for me because it allows me to break really big projects into small tasks, then figure out which task needs to be done next. Keeping track of this in a concrete way is a must because I only get to focus on work in short bursts during the day. I can track where I am on a specific task using the notes field, so it is always easy to figure out where I am. I’ve also begun echoing the same tag structure in my EagleFiler libraries. Consistency is key to making an organizational process work.

Like I said, this is all a work in progress. However, since I set it up a few weeks ago, it has been a lifesaver. It really seems to be working and I’ve only changed a few minor things along the way.

Just found this: if you drag a file from one library to another, the tags and other metadata are transferred with it. Tags, title, note—everything.

This is just too cool. This means that I can easily consolidate libraries because I won’t have to recreate all of the hard work I’ve done tagging up the files.

Thank you, Michael!

Last night, Bridget and I screened Pitch Black. I’d seen Chronicles of Riddick and, to my surprise, I really liked it. So, I was dying to see the first movie.

Not that I was disappointed, but it is a completely different type of movie. About all the two have in common is Riddick, Jack, and the Imam. Pitch Black is more of a horror movie, whereas Chronicles was a sci-fi, drama movie. Chronicles had all kinds of subplots and things going on in the background, Pitch Black was missing that. It was more in the genre of the Alien series.

Spoiler Alert!

Don’t read any further if you don’t want to know what happens!

The basic plot is that a ship with a bunch of people on it goes off course and crash-lands on a deserted planet. They can’t find any of the inhabitants and quickly find carnivorous and appropriately fanged aliens living underground (surprise, surprise). They feel safe, as the planet is in constant daylight and the aliens must stay in the dark. Until the eclipse. With the planet bathed in darkness the nasty creatures have complete freedom.

Riddick is pretty much the same Riddick as he was in Chronicles. He is cool, calm, collected, and quiet in the face of certain death. Of course he performs amazing feats of strength and agility in order to lead the survivors to safety. He gets some great lines. He is a paradox, alternating between cooly watching the aliens tear people apart and braving danger himself to save the others. In a few places his facade does crack, and we see (in Bridget’s words) a fuck-you-gun-in-your-face Riddick. This seemed like a complete departure to me. It was totally out of character. These fits of anger were always directed at the cop chasing him, Johns, so maybe there was something going on there that just pushed Riddick over the edge. Perhaps if that had been explained better, Riddick’s unseemly show of emotion would have sat better with me.

Conclusion (Okay, you can read now)

I liked this movie, though not as much as I liked Chronicles. It’s a great movie when you are craving a good horror flick. It doesn’t have the complexity of Chronicles, though, so don’t expect a whole lot from it. The acting in some parts is kinda forced, but I thought on the whole it was good. These two movies are the only ones I’ve ever seen Vin Diesel in and I think the guy has talent. He’s perfectly suited to this role, in particular.

Overall, I liked this movie. I’m not sure that I would watch it again, only because now I know what happens, so the excitement is gone. However, Riddick’s character itself might be enough to draw me back in.

Last night’s meeting was another huge success. Brad Colbow took us back to the basics of HTML and CSS with a great presentation. He used a design that he’d been working on with the client’s permission to demonstrate how he broke up and styled the pieces of the page. When he showed the design, my jaw dropped. Now there is talent. I was also keenly interested in how he broke up the page, which sections were which. It was enlightening for all, I think.

Following the presentation I got to talk with some of the other members, which is always fun. I am learning that I know more than I thought. When I initially joined the group, I was really unsure of my techniques and I really wanted to find out what best practices the pros used. I’ve found that a lot of what I am doing is The Right Way, which is really an ego boost. I’m also learning about how others solve the same problems I’ve run into, or at least that I’m not an idiot because someone else actually did have the same issue.

Chris Hattery and Bridget Stewart talked abut their experience with Dreamweaver, which is something I’ve heard of, but never used. Sounds like it has a lot of the features I love from TextMate. I had thought that Dreamweaver was strictly WYSIWTF, but apparently it is a really good IDE for XHTML and CSS. Who knew?

Next month promises to be another fabulous meeting. Joseph announced that we’d be doing a CSS tips ’n tricks session, with anyone who wants to presenting on a technique they’ve used. I can’t wait!!

Anyone who knows me knows that I am an organizational freak. A place for everything and everything in its place. I drive my husband nuts nagging him to put his shoes on the shoe rack and to hang his towel on his hook and not mine, stuff like that. Even the kids’ toys are anally sorted in to separate boxes: Little People in a separate box from the Weebles, Pop-onz in a different box from Duplo blocks, etc.

I’ve learned over the years that it really takes quite a long time to find an organizational system that works for you. You can’t really pigeon-hole yourself into one system, but every one of them has something to take away. I went to a seminar on organizing files several years ago. I dimly recall the speaker instructing us on tickler files and color coding, but what I really took away was this phrase: “Usage determines storage”. That has become a mantra for me ever since.

It is only natural that I feel an overwhelming need to organize all the digital pieces of my life, especially since my job is almost entirely bits and bytes. I’ve had some success with this. For instance, I’ve become really good about putting all appointments and time-sensitive tasks into my Google Calendar. I dutifully file away in del.icio.us any sites I find that I want to find again later. But, that is about it.

One of the big problem areas for me was the multitude of bits and pieces, tips, references, notes, articles, etc. that I had collected. I desperately needed a way to find this stuff again. Many of them can be filed under several different topics, so a normal directory structure was just not cutting it. I could use grep, but that was only if I knew a specific phrase and the document I was looking for was plain text.

Enter EagleFiler. Since I have bought it, my life has changed. I can dump anything and everything into it and I always find it later. EagleFiler doesn’t store your documents in a proprietary database, but in a regular old directory structure. That means that I can still get the documents out in the same format I put them in. That also means that, should anything happen to my EagleFiler library, my files are still fine. The best is that I can tag things as well as organize them in a file hierarchy. Searching just rocks and has saved my butt more times than I care to admit. That means that even if I don’t file or tag it, I’ll still find it.

I’m learning that it might be better to not tag and/or file things right away. I pay attention to where I think the file should be or what I think it should be tagged with, then handle it once I find it via a search. This is actually starting to lead to a cohesive, consistent system of tagging/filing. It is really slow going, though.

Another great feature of EagleFiler is the ability to have multiple libraries. I not only have a catch-all Reference library, but I also have begun creating libraries for every project I work on. Then I can dump all e-mail correspondence, notes, files, web pages, etc. into my library without worrying about whether I’ll be able to find it again. I’m beginning to wonder, though, if I shouldn’t have one huge library for all projects, since there are files that belong to more than one project (e-mails especially). EagleFiler allows you to open multiple windows for one library, so this might be a better way to go. Time will tell.

I can say that EagleFiler’s developer, Michael Tsai, is super responsive and totally open to new ways of using his application. This is rare among the developers of these brain-dump applications. He’s great and I can’t say enough good things about EagleFiler, so if you are in the market for an application like this and you have a Mac (you do have a Mac, don’t you?), you must check it out.

What I Haven’t Been Able to Organize

There are things that I haven’t been able to successfully organize and I am floundering. The biggest issue for me is e-mail. Since I telecommute, I get almost all direction via e-mail. Inevitably, one e-mail will contain information on more than one project. This means that I either keep more than one copy (one in each project), or have one copy and somehow tag it for the projects. This is the main reason why I am seriously considering one really, huge EagleFiler library containing all files for all projects.

I did begin archiving e-mail into a local mailbox in Thunderbird. For me, there is no better e-mail client than Thunderbird. I’ve used it since something like version 0.5. I’ve tried others, I really have. I’ve tried to like Apple’s Mail.app. But, no other e-mail client comes close to making me as happy as Thunderbird.

That said, Thunderbird’s tagging support is buggy and simplistic, and searching for something is painfully slow and usually doesn’t yield results. I need to move the archives into EagleFiler, but the question is: keep a separate library for e-mail or go to the one monstrous library paradigm?

Seems like the decision should be easy, but it isn’t quite that simple. I do have metadata associated with the files already stored in EagleFiler libraries and I don’t want to have to recreate it. It might be that I can move files between libraries and EagleFiler will transfer the metadata; I need to test it. If it doesn’t, then I hope Michael is reading this!

The next thing I have yet to successfully organize is my task list. I just spent the better part of the weekend creating a system in Remember the Milk that I really hope will help. For me, it makes no sense to put due dates on things. My job is pretty crazy and inevitably I don‘t get to work on what I planned to work on at any given moment. I’m much better off just having priorities. What is the next action that must be taken on a particular project? That is all I’m interested in.

This means a hierarchical system of projects and tasks. Unfortunately, RTM doesn’t really support this. You can fake it, though, as someone posted in the forums. I’ve used this post as a guide in creating what I hope is a system that will work. I have tasks for projects that are preceded by two hyphens and tagged “project”. I then create the tasks for the projects themselves and tag them with a tag that follows the “p-projectcode” format. Instead of entering in due dates for tasks, I’ve picked the next three actions for the project and assigned them priorities 1, 2, and 3 in the order that I want to get them done. I have smart lists that show me just the tasks for a specific project and one that shows me all of the projects. I’ve even prioritized the projects themselves, so that I can tell exactly which next action I should be doing.

What I am really missing is a view that would show me all the prioritized tasks automatically prioritized in order by the project. I need all of the top priority tasks put in the order that I’ve given their associated projects. Does that make sense?

Also, I’ve found that I have really big projects that are broken out into smaller projects. My question becomes: do tasks for the subproject get tagged with the subproject and the parent project, or just the subproject? I may be overthinking that one a bit, though. Time will tell.

A friend of mine mentioned that Outlook allows her to break a task up into steps, then has a progress meter that shows exactly how much has been done toward completing that task. I would love to have this functionality!

I really don’t want to go looking for another project-management/to-do tracker type of site. I like RTM. They have implemented Google Gears, so I can have my task data backed up, they have a widget for my iGoogle page, my tasks show up on my Google Calendar, etc. It integrates so well with what I was already using! Recently, RTM began offering a Pro version, which is available for a small fee. I haven’t ponied up yet, but I’m just biding my time, waiting to see what Pro members will get. Right now, it is just an iPhone-compatible site. If, however, they implemented some advanced features such as the progress meter or hierarchical tags, then I would fork over the cash in a snap. Perhaps these are things in the works.

This begs the question: why not create separate lists for each project? Again, some tasks actually can pertain to more than one project, so where is the division? Also, I need to allow my boss access to my task list so he can add new things or help me rearrange priorities, or just see what the hell I’m doing. I really don’t want to have to remember to share multiple lists. Having one big list for all work-related tasks means he has access to all of that.

Last, but not least, is CSS. How the hell do you organize a stylesheet so that it is easily updatable and debuggable? When I first started a recent project, I organized (loosely) by section. This seemed to be wasteful because there were lots of properties that were being added several times because they pertained to several sections. So, I completely rewrote the final stylesheet, organizing by property instead (box model, visual effects, font, etc.). This didn’t really end up in a more usable stylesheet. So, what’s the trick here? How do you do it? What am I missing?

I’ve written a book at this point, but it does give you a feel for my mania. I’m always looking for a magic bullet that will instantly pull my several different schemes into one cohesive system. I really doubt that it is there, and I really should know better. I know that getting a system in place that works is a very personal thing. You have to let it grow, learn what you’ll use and how you’ll use it. It takes time, but soon you find yourself doing it without thinking, and when you do, you’ll know that you’ve got it right.