Getting Things Done: Reviewing GTD in a complicated organizing program

Source: PixelLight.com

Introduction

I have an artist friend, Mark VanderSys

Source: BetterLight.com (2/3 down the page)

who runs a small, extremely high-touch graphics business: PixelLight.com. By extremely high-touch I mean: gigapixel pictures with digital scan backs, heavily customized web sites, and seemingly impossible pictures without parallax (i.e., the entire width of the picture is taken at a perfect 90 degree angle to the subject) and …

extremely clean low-retouch photography

New Addition:
The picture at the top of this post is an un-retouched image taken of objects spinning. It was taken with a BetterLight.com digital scan back in a standard 4×5 industrial bellows camera, Mark gave a tutorial at BetterLight where he showed step by step how the picture was taken. Click here for the magic pixie dust demo via an .mov file that shows the process.

Mark and I have been implementing Getting Things Done together for several years. Mark uses a customer requirements planning program, Asana.com, to organize, share, and track his work. Mark and I just spent two hours looking over his implementation of Asana, and reflecting on how GTD lives in very complicated, very powerful systems like Asana.

Lessons Learned

• Using Skype to share screens is easy!
  1. Get your Skype session going.
  2. Click on the plus thought bubble at the bottom of the screen
  3. Click share screen in the pop up:
  4. Continue your conversation while sharing your screen!
• Complexity of the tool, Asana, Omni-Focus, whatever, expands like a gas to fill your energy and memory, leading to feelings of being overwhelmed. And,
• … complexity crowds GTD logic out of your mind.
• When GTD gets crowded out by a tool, we naturally stop managing self-expectations. You are now standing at the top of the GTD off-ramp.

How to implement a new program

• Get some work into the system. Don’t worry be crappy.
• Get to know the system, really try to make it work. But, relax. Rome was not built in day.
• When you get frustrated, talk to your GTD buddy. Getting started with GTD is much easier when you have a buddy. Mark VanderSys is my GTD buddy.

What your GTD buddy will tell you:

• Slow down.  Rome was not built in a day.
• Go back to basics. Now that you know a bit about Asana (or OmniFocus, or whatever) it is time to re-read the first three chapters of Getting Things Done. As you go through the chapters s-l-o-w-l-y, write ideas on 3×5 cards, page by page through chapters 1 through 3.
• Focus on how the program allows each of GTD’s tools to be implemented. Make notes of next actions for doing GTD more fully.

Organizing Work with Hierarchy … and in an Intertwingled World

 

Source: Preface Intertwingled

 

• Organizing tools allow different kinds of organization. In particular, different kinds of project-next action relationships.
  • Paper
    … with a next action focus, manila folders, creates an implicit one-to-many work hierarchy. One project, one manila folder, and inside many next actions. All the next actions relate only to the project indicated by the folder’s name.  
  • Outline tools
    … like OmniFocus (built around OmniOutliner), Evernote, and OneNote use an implicit one-to-many work hierarchy. That is, you start with a project, and then create N next actions to complete the project. But advanced tools like OmniFocus go a bit further. Next actions can relate not only to projects in a hierarchical way. Next actions can also relate to contexts. So the simple one-to-many hierarchy of project and actions, begins to fray. GTDers are coached to think of projects and contexts as a kind of matrix organization structure, and then next actions live at the intersection of project and context.
  • CRM (Customer Requirements Management)
    … systems like ASANA however, are not limited to one-to-many work hierarchy. Yes, you can create a project and then a task underneath the project. But in addition, Asana tasks can be related explicitly to multiple projects.

    This is a many-to-many link which CRM systems have evolved so that a next action can be tracked in relation to many projects. With many-to-many relationships, CRM allow GTDers to use “more colors of the rainbow” by tracking multiple projects that a next action relates to, but CRM systems shatter top-down one-to-many work hierarchy that a GTD person is used to seeing, and substitute an extra step of running queries, to see the full status of a next action against its projects. Very disorienting … at first.

• Ugh, I’m feeling scared. Overwhelmed, dizzy. What can I do if I need to use a CRM system to implement GTD in my intertwingled life?
  • Go back up to what your GTD buddy told you above:
    
  • Just be aware of what the electronic system can do. And use GTD within that electronic system, as fully as you can. Don’t force yourself to use too much complexity.
  • Wait. Over time, as you keep your eye on GTD inside the system, you’ll have ideas. For example, you might have the idea in Asana, of doing a query that shows you the next actions in the system, that will move the most projects forward. Might be useful to try!
  • Experiment. Let these ideas come, and then experiment with them.

Thanks Mark VanderSys for a fun afternoon of GTD buddy check in!

bill meade

Evernote Bugs … or bad Evernote weather … or an uninitialized variable (file name?)

Introduction

In the past week I’ve noticed problems with Evernote capturing from Web Clipper and Clearly. For example, go to this WIRED article on an artist who did a self portrait with GPS equipment and DHL taking the equipment around the world.

Wired

When I opened the article in Chrome for Mac, Evernote Web Clipper, and clicked Save:

Evernote said that it saved the clip:

 But … the clip did not appear in Evernote on my Mac after I synchronized.

WARNING!!!

GTD Evernote users, *might* want to check that web clippings are actually being captured. Just to be sure.

Fast Ways To Double-Check-Web Clipper:

• When Web Clipper displays the confirmation that your note has been captured:
  Click on the title of the article to open the note in Evernote, to make sure the note is there.
• Or, instead of using Web Clipper, capture the note with Clearly. I’ve had no trouble with Clearly capturing notes this week.
• Open Evernote on your computer, click the Sync icon
  And then click on the “All Notes” (or “Clear” icon if you have run a search) and then scroll to the top of your notes to make sure the note Clearly or Web Clipper says it captured, is there.

This might be a problem of capture (from Web Clipper or Clearly) or it might be a problem of synchronizing. I’m using Evernote Mac 5.6.0 which I think is a beta release.

ScanSnap GTD Tricks #1: Next Action Stamp

As I was depositing a check with my ScanSnap this morning, I had the idea that I should post a few ScanSnap GTD tricks. Then Joe Terrana posted a comment to the 2014 Getting Started with Getting Things Done post, with a cool *new* trick.

Source: Amazon.com

Go to Amazon, then order this custom rubber stamp, and then follow the instructions to “Contact Seller” and send them “Next Action” as the message for the stamp.

Then once the scanner arrives, you can stamp paper with “Next Action” scan the paper into Evernote (Click here to subscribe to Evernote), and then after Evernote does optical character recognition (OCR) on the stamped part of the note, you can search for “Next actions” and find all of your scanned next actions.

Very slick.

Very Simple!

Thank you Joe for the ScanSnap GTD Trick #1.

bill meade

p.s., I had the idea, since Evernote also attempts to recognize hand-written characters, that I could scan a note card with “Next Action” on it, and perhaps achieve the same result as using a custom rubber stamp. Here is what the card looks like:

Expecting Evernote to be able to read my handwriting is not a fair test, I know. But, it seemed like a fun trial. Evernote’s explanation of how OCR works says that it take a “few minutes.” I’ve always assumed that Evernote takes “over night” to complete OCR operations, so we’ll see how long it takes for this note:

• 1st check on indexing status: 20 minutes later … not indexed.
• 2nd check on indexing status: 11 hours later … not indexed.
• 3rd check on indexing status: 23:10 later … not indexed.
• 4th check on indexing status: 33 hours later … INDEXED!!!!

However long it takes, I’ll update this post after Evernote indexes the card to see if it is possible to simply write “Next Action” and have OCR recover the magic GTD words.

You can tell if an Evernote note has been indexed by clicking on the i at the upper right of the note:

And then looking at “Attachment Status” 3/4 of the way down the dialog box (red arrow).

While it is true that GTD indexing can be measured in minutes 33 * 60 = 1,980 minutes. It is not a safe workflow to depend on Evernote scanning documents immediately.

Success … kind of

After my index card was OCR’d by Evernote, I am able to search for the word “Next” but alas, “action” in my hand writing was not recognized. :-(

I was not able to determine precisely how long it took for Evernote to do the text recognition.

Lesson Learned:

You can buy a self inking stamp, and Evernote will read it. Thanks again Joe Terrana for giving me the stamp idea, so I could have the stepping stone idea of just writing “next action” on the card.

It would be smart to create a sample card for yourself, scan it, and then see if Evernote can recognize your hand writing. In fact, if you’ve already written “next action” on a 3×5 card that you scanned into Evernote, you might be able to test this out today. Just search on the GTD Magic Words! 

Quick Index of Most-Read Posts

• What is Getting Things Done (GTD)?
  • Getting Things Done (GTD) Technology Notable (PDF)
• RestartGTD.com = where this blog came from:
  • GTD: My Start
  • Bill’s before and after GTD story
  • GTD Time Lapse – 5 years of GTD desk/system evolution
    + a blog comment from David Allen!!!
• Getting Started with GTD
  • Getting Started with GTD: The Buddy System
  • Getting Started with Getting Things Done 2014 in 28 Steps
  • Simple GTD Startup
  • 3×5 and Manila Folder GTD Startup
• Restarting GTD
  • Evernote GTD Restart and Restart GTD with Evernote Clearly
  • The Bow Wave
  • Sleep
  • How I restart GTD 
• GTD Technology
  • Number 1 reason GTDers don’t use Evernote … After Installing Evernote
  • Evernote GTD Restart
  • Evernote v. Dropbox
  • OneNote vs. Evernote vs. Dropbox
• Anchors that keep you on the wagon
  • GTD Anchor #1: Reference Filing
  • GTD Anchor #2: One Idea, One Piece of Paper
  • Natural Planning Model: Silent Secret Weapon
• Desks
  • The Perfect GTD Desk Version 1, Version 2, Version 3, Version 4
  • No money down GTD desk
• GTD for students (OK, these are not popular, but I WISH)
  • Part 1: Infrastructure
  • Part 2: Don’t worry be crappy
  • Part 3: Organizing Functions

Number 3 Reason GTDers Don’t Use Evernote … after installing Evernote

TLDR: Why people set up and then don’t use Evernote

1. The first reason is that implementing GTD changes too many things at once.
   So, Evernote, even if it is installed and working, won’t be used. Evernote is a sub-casualty of the 83% failure rate of GTD implementations.
2. The second reason is because we blow off the GTD weekly reviews, infecting our GTD system with guilt that comes into focus (like a magnifying glass starting a fire) when we sit down to use Evernote. End result is we stop sitting down to our computers and stop using Evernote. *Note* This is also why people stop using Outlook, Omni-Focus, etc. for GTD.
3. The third reason why GTD people don’t use Evernote after implementing it, that Evernote can be implemented in too many ways. And, … no two ways to implement Evernote agree. Too many choices to an overwhelmed brain = no choice. So, stop web surfing about Evernote, and start experimenting with your own work.

If you too have abandoned Evernote while trying to implement GTD, please share why?

Done! Good! Now go buy something to organize with, on Amazon! Invest in organization.

Introduction:

Why GTD people stop using Evernote is a surprisingly popular topic. So, I’m going to identify a couple more of the big reasons that GTD people stop using Evernote. This post is about reason 3, how the many alternative ways of implementing Evernote, stop people from using Evernote.

Source: .com

The perfect illustration of a GTD user implementing Evernote is not just a deer in headlights. The perfect illustration is a deer in a dozen of the spot lights used in police helicopters to run down fugitives.

User: “I think I’ll try using Evernote”

• {event} Client installation on an iPad happens
  (10% of users who attempt to install quit here)
  • Wait, what? Why aren’t people installing Evernote on their PCs first? Seems that the PC is passing in influence. See RestartGTD’s Browser De Jure page for GTD viewership. GTD like it or not is becoming an iPad thing.
• {event} Account setup happens
  (50% of potential users quit here)
• {event does not happen} Opening Evernote for the first time on iPad
  (25% of potential users quit here)
• {event} User opens Evernote for the first time

Even if we give Evernote 100% of the loyal users who open Evernote on their iPad for the first time, Evernote has still lost 85% of its users by the time a user opens Evernote for the first time.

Worse success rate than a David Allen GTD seminar!

Of course, I could be wrong about the percentages above. Still … Evernote is computer (desktop or laptop) first. With its new users swarming in from iPad and iPhone land, there are going to be a lot of wasteful problems (from the perspective of GTD).

For example,

• once the person who has followed the steps above sees their Evernote account, what will they see? None of their existing information. = #EvernoteProblem
• how can we fix this?
  • By installing Evernote Web Clipper and Clearly for a week or 10 days, so the user has some web-browsing history built up, that s/he will recognize when Evernote first opens. = #EvernoteProblem
  • By *distracting* the user to next import their paper with a scanner (scroll down to the file cabinet picture) before they open Evernote. Oh, crap, this requires Evernote to be installed on a PC with a scanner. Oops. = #EvernoteProblem
  • By scanning directly from scanner to Evernote on iPad or phone.
  • Without something drastic, can we fix this?

Hypothesis:

= #EvernoteProblem * #GTD Problem = .15 *.17 = Success Rate of Evernote & GTD

.15*.17=.03 Or, 3%

Ouch!

How can trying to implement Evernote with GTD be a good idea if it kills off an additional 14% of successful GTD users beyond what David Allen’s Company experiences?

1. Once a GTD user puts their information into Evernote, it becomes easier to do reference filing correctly, than to not do reference filing. Reference filing is a keystone GTD skill. This helps *a lot* with people staying with GTD!
2. Those 14% of GTD users were going to fade anyway. I *think* this because I talk to people who are “formerly known as GTD users” and they say “I use about 50% of GTD. I was really into it at first, but then it became too much to keep up with.”
   • Why? When I ask, “Do you use Evernote web clipper?” they invariably say “What is Evernote Web Clipper?”
   • Hypothesis: 14% of GTD users would be saved if they tried Evernote for their reference filing.
3. Evernote is a platform, not a well-known, habitually used product. So what?
   • So … the marketeers at Evernote are clueless at how to help people who have a dozen police helicopter spot lights in their eyes. Platforms give markets new-to-the-world-capabilities, marketing people are trained to more efficiently sell old-to-the-world-capabilities.
   • So … in GTD terms, a new platform allows us to experiment with new degrees of freedom in organizing. The way our brains work with new platforms is trial and error. Our brains will try using the electronic tools, then pull back and compost on how the new platform *feels*. Then, confidence in a new way to use the tool appears from nowhere, and we implement the tool. And iterate improvements from there.

BIG Evernote LESSON FOR GTD USERS:

Don’t web surf to figure out how to use Evernote. Experiment with your own next actions, projects, reference filing, and inboxing. See what pleases you and run with that. When you feel *hindered* by Evernote, stop doing that. 

You can start with paper, that worked for me! See GTD Time Lapse for my 5 year history of GTD evolution.

• Nice post on “just do it” getting started with GTD
  • My post on 3×5 card + manila folder GTD Startup

You can go all digital. That did not work for me. I went back to paper + Evernote.

The trick is to start. Don’t think “I can’t start without the perfect system.” Think, what can I improve the most, with the least effort. Or, better, what would be fun to really focus on and improve? After 200+ MBA students, I think getting a ScanSnap and Evernote going as your reference filing system can’t be beat.

Whatever you do, keep evolving your GTD. GTD is like a bicycle. When you stop moving, you fall over.

bill meade

Evernote Two Factor Authentication: Part 2 Step-by-Step

Introduction:

This is the 2nd post in a 2-part series on Evernote 2 factor authentication.  The first post (here) explains what 2 factor authentication is and why it is good.  And then this post points you to a Rick Broida eight step set-up procedure for Evernote’s 2 factor authentication at PC World, and then … adds a few instructions where I *suspect* people might experience confusion.

Step 1:

Hardest part of any step by step is the first step. Rick’s first step is to sign into your Evernote account. If you do not yet have an Evernote account, you will need to go to Evernote and sign up, before you can turn on 2 factor authentication.  Click here to do so.

Also, you will need some way to read a QR code on your phone. So if you have an Android phone go here and pick a free QR Code reader and install it on your phone. If you have an iPhone click here.

Step 6:

Rick’s step-by-step flows smoothly until he gets to step 6 where account verification rear’s its head.

Account verification is simply using the 2nd factor in 2 factor authentication. Evernote has set up two ways to verify your identity when you open Evernote in a fresh computing environment (new computer, new phone, web-surfing-in-from internet cafe, etc.). Either authentication method you choose, you will begin the authentication process by opening Evernote and seeing this:

• Way1: text messaging.
  If you choose text messaging to obtain your 2nd factor, when you attempt to log into Evernote, you’ll see the above screen, and then wait with your phone in hand, to receive the 6 digit code.
• Way2: using Google’s app for authentication (for Android, iOS, and Blackberry).
  If you choose to obtain your 2nd factor via a Google app (which I showed in the previous post) you will need to pick up your phone, start the Authenticator App, and then copy the 6 digit number for Evernote from the phone into the dialog box on the screen above. Here is what I see (because I use 2 factor authentication on Gmail as well as on Evernote):

Both ways produce the same 6 digit code, no big deal. Only difference is how you receive the code.

Discussion:

Day to day, using Google authenticator on your phone is the best way to go because:

1. Google’s app is *instant* while text messages takes extra time
2. Text messages have a likelihood of disappearing in direct proportion to the urgency with which you need to access your information.
   • So, the more urgent it is for you to get into Evernote, the more likely your text authentication code will be lost.
3. Authenticator apps are clean, you open them and look at your code. Text apps are spaghetti monsters.

BUT…

Evernote has positioned text messaging as a premium service. Wait, what? Perhaps texting is the premium service because if you use text messages you will not have to install Google Authenticator on your phone? I don’t know. My advice is to set up Google Authenticator on your phone.  How?

Setting Up Google Authenticator for Evernote:

Step 1: ON YOUR COMPUTER Go to Google’s Authenticator install page and read the step-by-step for installing Google Authenticator on your phone (Android, iOS, Blackberry).

Step 2: ON YOUR COMPUTER Log into Evernote via web browser, go to account settings, security summary …

Step 3: Click on Google Authenticator and you will see this dialog box:

then click on the appropriate operating system for your phone. Here is what I see when I click on Android:

Now, take a picture of the QR code (*Note* This QR Code will not work for you, each QR code is specific to one Evernote account). And your Evernote 2nd factor authentication key will be added to your Google Authenticator account. 

THERE!…

OK, I *think* I’ve got all the confusions to setting up 2 factor authentication in Evernote, covered. If not, email me (bill@basicip.com) and let me know what I missed!

bill meade

 

 

 

 

 

Evernote Two Factor Authentication: Think (again) like an Evernote programmer!! Part 1

Source: Bill Meade taken in Boise ID

Introduction:

The efficiency/security tradeoff has changed! Well for me at least. Until now I’ve deliberately risked using Evernote as my reference filing system, knowing that if someone guessed my password I would be hosed. The “Evernote deal” seemed to be capturing the value of increased efficiency now, at the price of possibly getting hacked later.

This “Everyone has been hacked. Now what?” attitude is calculated. Our IT infrastructure is what it is. I may be hacked and not know it. As long as I can use Evernote to keep track of my stuff, do I really care? If I start obsessing about my net-connected infrastructure too much, the profit of using computers will quickly become a loss. I mean it is pretty clear why all my computers have been so slow all these years: the NSA! Hacking! Botnetting!

Locks were invented to keep honest people honest. Determined criminals find ways in.

So I’m excited to start trying out Evernote’s two-factor authentication: A padlock for Evernote.

What is it?

Two factor authentication is one step up in security, from using username+password protection. In two factor authentication your password is used same as normal (the username+password is factor 1 of 2) and then a second special password is used in addition (the special password is factor 2 of 2).

The idea is that while a criminal can easily guess your username from defaults (Unix “admin” or Windows “Administrator” or your email address), and then either steal or “break” your password. A criminal will need to go to a whole new level of effort in order to get your phone. What makes stealing the phone essential is that the special password changes every few seconds on the phone. But I am digressing into the next question about 2 factor authentication: How does it work?

How does it work?

The special password generated on your smart phone is dynamic. It changes every  60 seconds. To find your dynamic password, you use the Google Authenticator app on a smart phone.  Here is what Google authenticator looks like on my smart phone:

So when you need to authenticate into Evernote, you start Google Authenticator, and then you see your password of the current moment. Here is what I see on my Google Authenticator:

The red arrows point to countdown timers showing you how much longer the 6 digit passwords will work to authenticate you into Evernote/Google.

So, because the passwords are constantly changing, a casual criminal will have to obtain your phone, and then break into it (you do have your cell phone password protected don’t you :-) to log into your account.

QUESTION: Do I have to authenticate every time that I start Evernote on my computer?
ANSWER: No

We now come to the how does it work … hands and knees perspective.  In a wonderful BYTE magazine article in 1989 Peter C. Olsen articulated a theory of how to hire programmers: send them to Africa and tell them to hunt elephants, and then watch the algorithm they use.

*Note* that assembly language programmers execute the basic algorithm … on their hands and knees. So in the rest of this article I’m going to emulate an assembly language programmer in trying to go slow, be very careful, to take each step one at a time.

What were we taking about?  Oh yes, authentication. You will have to authenticate to Evernote when:

• Case 1: Logging into Evernote from the web. Here is the log-in screen you’ll see using evernote web:
  Note that you can check the box and not have to re-authenticate for a month on the computers you use to access Evernote web. But, if you log into Evernote from friends computers, you will have to have your phone available from now on.
• Case 2: Setting up Evernote on a computer for the first time (duh). Here is what the dialogs look like on a Mac:First, the normal dialog asking for factor 1 (Username+Password)
  Next, a pop up dialog asking for the factor 2 (from Google Authenticator on my phone):
  Note that the new dialog asking for the number gives you a hit with a phone icon with Google Authenticator’s thumbnail graphic. You type your 6 digit number in here and then you enter Evernote as usual.
• Case 3: After you log out of your Evernote account on your computer. *Note* I had never logged out of my Evernote account before playing with Evernote two factor authentication. So this will likely be no big deal. After enabling two-factor authentication I tried to trick Evernote into annoying me by asking for authentication. I quit Evernote, restarted, re-booted, etc. and Evernote did not ask me to authenticate. *Note* two factor authentication is smart but not paranoid.
• Case 4: After you log out of Evernote on your spouse’s computer. *Note* anything that can go wrong will. If you turn on two factor authentication and share your evernote account with someone, you will have to authenticate for them on their computer, or they will be locked out of Evernote at the most inconvenient time. Plan on it.

This is all the cases I can see where Evernote users will have to authenticate. Note, if I have missed a case, email bill@basicip.com and let me know, I’ll add your case to this list.

What is the strategy?

2013 was the year of security on the internet. We are all red queens now, our security skills and infrastructure are going to have to run, in order to keep us in a place where computers remain profitable to use. The strategy of introducing two factor authentication is a step in the direction towards keeping computing profitable for its users. 

Will computing ever be secure? Probably not. There are too many evil geniuses. In a way the deal of using computers will always be a bet on the value of using technology today, against the eventuality of being hacked. Should this deter us from using two factor authentication? No. We are stupid not to use very slick, very simple tools that at the least, will shift bad hackers to softer targets.

What are the objections?

Objection: “I will have to authenticate every time I use Evernote!”

The reality is no. You will have to authenticate to Evernote every time you change the computing environment where you are using Evernote.

• When you get a new computer.
• When you log in to Evernote from a coffee shop or a friend’s computer.
• Or when you give another person access to your Evernote data store.
• Or when it has been 30 days since you last authenticated via the web.

*Note* I personally think that Evernote’s marketing communications on this two factor authentication objection, are confusing. If I were Evernote I would have said:

• “Evernote’s 2 factor authentication works just like Google’s 2 factor authentication.”
• The average user will authenticate about once a month during the first year they use 2 factor authentication.

Signalling that people can re-use what they learned getting Google authentication working, and that we are all marching into a common, reasonable, computer security future.

Objection: “Evernote two factor authentication is too hard for a normal person to set up!”

Probably false. Two factor authentication is a new use model for end users to learn. But, it is not if we end users will need to learn to set up two factor authentication. It is a when.

My next blog post will be a step-by-step on setting up Evernote two factor authentication on Macintoshes with Android phones (A totally recessive combination I admit!). Take a peek at that next week and see what you think. I’m a marketer, I set up 2 factor authentication. As any enginerd will tell you “If a marketeer can set it up, any user can!”

Objection: Anyone who steals my phone will have access to my Evernote account.

True … if you do not have your phone password set. :-) But, this is true even without two-factor authentication today! If your phone is wide open, and you have logged into evernote before you lose the phone, whoever has your phone has access to everything in Evernote.

Personally, I find Evernote on my Android to be about .6 of the way to a 1.0 that is compelling to use. My short term security plan with Evernote is to take Evernote off my phone.

Then, if someone steals my phone, they will have access to my special password (authentication factor 2), but will still have to guess/break my Username+Password. My theory is that when I notice my phone is gone (God’s way of telling you to get a new Android phone! :-) I’ll log into Evernote on my computer, change the password, and then log into my remote wipe on Android and zap the phone. Safe! Or at least, safe enough.

See you then!

bill meade

Perfect GTD Desk +2: Desktopia Redux

See also: The Perfect GTD Desk +1

See also The Abomination of Deskolation Redeemed 

See also: The Perfect GTD Desk

Introduction:

Perfect GTD desk +1 has been refactored once again.  The above action shot displays several changes:

• The monitor arm has switched ends of the desk
• The cable access door in the Ikea Galant Conference Table has been filled in with wood
• Gave up on mounting the Fujitsu ScanSnap on the monitor arm.  It was cool to look at, but even cool stuff is clutter when you are trying to get work done.  So I resurrected a shipping box and mounted both the ScanSnap and the Brother label printer on the box.  So far so good, the box has not interacted with the chair legs.
• Screwed the chair mat to the floor in the correct location with 4 2″ drywall screws.  *Bam* no more wandering chair mat!!!
• A 15.5″ semi-circle has been cut out of the center front of the conference table.

• To create a 15.5″ radius, the conference table was slid forward until the back edge of the desk was flush with the Galant support frame.
• I also slid the conference table surface to the right until the left edge of the work surface became flush with the left side of the Galant support frame.  Here’s an action shot of the top left corner of the desk:
• 

• Power adapter moved from underneath the work surface to Galant table legs.  With diagonally crossing cable ties it was simple to mount the power adapter and then slide it around to readjust it.
• A cordless remote control light switch was added (mid right hand of the back of the iMac) controlling the keyboard light, the floor lamp over the desk, and the floor lamp in the corner of the office.
• The “un-drawer” was shifted left and canted at a diagonal angle from lower left hand corner of the desk, to upper right hand corner.  This removes the un-drawer from constant collisions with knees.
• The purpose of the undrawer is to hold all the items that need to be at hand, but that clutter up the desk surface.  I have stapler, tape dispenser, utility knife, a 10 port USB hub, flash light, and my Plantronic USB headset (wireless headsets suck!).

• Action shots:

• USB and power were added to the right hand end of the desk (form the semi-circle side of the desk).  While I wanted usb and power plugs available, I need them to be out of sight, and they can’t be mounted under the surface without cables working their way out with gravity.  So I turned both poet and USB adapters 90 degrees and mounted them with cable ties and cable tie anchors.

• Action shot:

 Results:

When I sit at my desk now, I’m in the semi-circle and can rest both elbows on the work surface at all times.  I can also reach a much larger proportion of the work surface.  I especially noticed the altered surface to volume ratio of the desk when I wiped it down with Windex to shoot the pictures in this blog post.  Standing in the semi-circle it is easy to wipe down the entire surface of the table.

When people try the desk out, the first word that comes out of their mouths is “Game changer!” and then “I’m going to do this to my desk!”

The monitor arm now swings the iMac completely out of the way of the desk.  Action shot:

And when sitting at the desk, it looks like this:

How To Section:

I started with this configuration:

This worked OK, except that it began to bug me that the cable access door in the work surface did not do anything.  If a feature is not doing work then it is clutter by definition.  So I stripped the monitor arm off the desk, removed the power outlet and the IKEA cable management baskets, and then the un-drawer which you can just see peeking out under the work surface by the red mouse.

Then I detached the work surface, and laid under the desk sliding the surface to different places and then seeing how it *felt* from beneath and above the desk.  I had the idea to slide the desk forward and to the right to maximize the work surface overhang.

Next I started drawing curves on the surface of the desk.  Because it is a whiteboard, I was able to draw, look, erase, redraw, and play with the shape in my mind.  I like the idea of reshaping the desk with bulbous organic curves at the corners like this:

Source: Modenus.com

But, I was too chicken to cut very much out of the desk.  Because desks are experience goods, you can’t think your way to what you will love.  You have to generate and test.  So I decided to start simply with a semi-circle cut out.  Starting out the project looked like this (mr. batik supervising):

I decided to cut the cable access door plug from the semi circle and marked it with whiteboard marker.  Then I drew a 15.5″ radius semi-circle from the measured center of the front edge of the work surface.  Then cutting began with a jig saw and after the semicircle was cut out, I hustled the iMac back on to the left side of the desk this time.  I don’t know why I tried the left side of the desk.  Just happened that way.  At this point the project looked like this

Once I re-mounted the iMac on the monitor arm, I was delighted to see that shifting the work surface forward created an opening between the desk and the wall, that allows the iMac to swing behind the far edge of the work surface.  This leaves the work surface completely clear for jotting down ideas, spreading out 3×5 cards, etc.  I like the additional openness of this configuration over where I started from.  Gratifying to contemplate.

At this point I cut a grommet hole out of the semi circle and then used steel straps to mount the cable access door plug and grommet hole plug from the under side of the desk.  Action shot (sorry it is blurry):

Then I filled in all the gaps around the plugs with white plastic wood which I was very delighted to discover at HomeDepot.com.  Much sanding and re-filling and re-sanding ensued. And once I got the work surface to be “not terrible” I moved on to finishing the edge the jig saw cut.

I was surprised at how easily iron-on melamine edging went on.  Get a clothes iron, cut the length of edging you need, then slowly iron the melamine edge on to the work surface.  Took about 30 minutes from start to cleaned up.  And I’m very delighted with how the edging is staying attached.

Partial component list for desk:

• Galant conference table from Ikea $299 new, much less when available in the AS-IS department
• Galant cable manager $5 = the un-drawer
• Innovative 7500-hd-1500 heavy duty monitor arm (for 27″ iMac as iMacs weigh 1 pound per inch of diagonal screen) $263
• Cordless remote light switch control $20

Support RestartGTD by buying at Amazon.com with this link!

GTD Anchor #1: Reference Filing

Source: HABRAHABR.RU

What do I mean by “reference filing?”

Glad you asked!  There are two components to my reference filing system: Evernote, and the Fujitsu ScanSnap iX500.

Evernote

Evernote is document storage and synchronization infrastructure.  Pay $50 a year for a premium account, then install Evernote’s client software on as many Macs or PCs as you want, and all the documents in Evernote will be synchronized across all your computers without you having to take any actions.  Evernote could be described as a means of providing “working backup” where your Evernote store is used on each of your computers, so you are testing your backups whenever you switch machines.

Key features of Evernote in decreasing priority value are:

1. Full text search.  Pictures, Word files, plain PDF files, and even some hand-written scans, are processed once a day so that the documents become full text searchable.  Once you start using full text search, you tend to do much less organizing of documents into notebooks, because documents become so easy to find via keyword search and tagging.
2. Friction-free capture of (advertising-free) web pages.  <== Turns Evernote into short term memory for me.
3. Keyword searching.
4. Tagging.
5. Friction-free synchronization.
6. Cross computer availability of all mission-critical documents.
7. Remote access to documents.  Evernote has a cloud component, so you can be at an internet cafe, decide you want to print a document, and then log in to your Evernote account, download the file and print it.

Some people have their entire GTD system in Evernote.  Not me.  When I first started doing GTD I put my entire life into OmniFocus, and my brain hated the one-electronic-system-to-rule-them-all solution.  I could not sit down at my desk and use OmniFocus after I had entered every open loop.  Welcome to my first “off the GTD wagon” experience. Since then, I’ve been iteratively refining my GTD trusted system, keeping it as simple as possible, but no simpler.

I use Evernote purely for reference filing (purple region 3 in the following figure).  Evernote has several nagging weaknesses: (1) it does not search within all file types, (2) It does not have a simple highlighting function.  Lack of a highlighting function causes me to read documents in PDF form, highlighting them in PDF, and then emailing them to Evernote, and using Evernote just to recall documents and original source web pages.

Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500

I can’t say enough about this little machine.  It enabled paperless reference filing, via Evernote.  It folds up into a very small package.  It scans fast enough that a 150 pages scan, in under five minutes.  I strongly encourage you to at least go to Amazon and look.

Here is my sales pitch on selling you on buying a scanner:

• In under a week, you can be paperless via Evernote and the ScanSnap S1500.  I started with 94,000 pages in December 2010 and in 4 days, I had recycled the entire 94,000 pages.
  • Once you are paperless in Evernote, you will discover that you can “find” documents you never would have bothered to look for, while the document was in paper.  I’ve found old newspaper articles that were handed out to me as a student, and then forwarded them to my students.
  • When was the last time you could find any document that you knew you had?  You can be there again with Evernote and a ScanSnap.
• There are four tricks to guaranteed scanner success:
  • First, go through all your papers and sort them into boxes labeled “Recycle” and “Scan.”  When in doubt, put the paper into your “Scan” box.  Once you pre-sort, you will know which scanner to buy.
  • Second, buy the right scanner for the amount of paper you need to scan.  If you have less than 500 pages you can buy the slightly cheaper ScanSnap S1300.  I did this at first when implementing Evernote.  I found that the S1300 with its 12 page paper bin, and slow speed, was just too clunky to get it done with my piles of paper.  If you have 400 pages to scan and a doubt about buying a slower unit, or, if you have 501 pages to scan, then you are crazy not to buy the ScanSnap iX500.
  • Third, as soon as the scanner arrives, take it out of the box and put it on your desk.
  • Fourth, once the scanner is on your desk, call your friend “Bill” the gadget guy and tell him what is on your desk.
• Remember “Meade’s Law” which is “Buy the best, only cry once.”
  • I was lucky and a friend offered to buy my ScanSnap S1300, I warned him that he’d be happier with the iX500 but he insisted.  By the way, “Thank you Steve!”
  • For most people with a bureaucratic residue of disorganization, the Fujitsu iX500 is going to be the happiest, highest-utility long run solution.
• If you’ve read this far, ask yourself, “How long have I been thinking that a scanner ‘might be useful’?  If you have been thinking about this for longer than a month, the time is now to GET YOURS. You won’t regret it.

What happens next?

One you have a reference filing system, you have an anchor set solidly into improved organization.  Whenever your fall off the wagon with GTD, no matter what, your reference filing system will be in ever increasing order.  Evernote and the ScanSnap make it easier to be organized, than to be disorganized.  Once you have an anchor in improving your organization, you have a home base to work out from as you refactor your life to incorporate more effectiveness and more efficiency.

If anyone has had great experiences with other scanners, please post what scanner you have (make and model), how long you’ve used it, what the one best thing about it is, in the comments to this post?

Thank you!

bill meade

Abomination of Deskolation … Redeemed!

First the before pictures:

Ladies and gentlemen, 28 years in the making, RestartGTD brings you THE ABOMINATION OF DESKOLATION!

Figure 1: The Abomination of Deskolation!

Figure 2: The Accompanying Office

Now the after pictures:

Figure 3: The wait, … what?

Figure 4: Wow, just wow!

Figure 5: How It was accomplished

The Story:

This is John Niebergall’s desk.  John is an engineering teacher at Sherwood High School in South Portland.  As I’ve gotten to know John (i.e., seen his desk and had him over to my office to see my desk), I encouraged him to read GETTING THINGS DONE.  Over the holidays John listened to GTD three or four times via Audible, and then wanted help translating the ideas in GTD to his work processes.  I believe the specific words were “I’m a visual learner, I don’t do well reading books.  I need to see it.”

John is the target blog reader that I started RestartGTD to serve.  I’ve traveled to John’s office, carrying my Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500M (I use portable Macs), had John take down one of the three ring binders against the back wall of his office, and we scanned it into PDF.   Done!  Four minutes, and now the paper and the binder both can go in the recycle bin.   It was hard to let that first binder go.  But the liberation grows on you rapidly.  It gets easier the more space you free up in your office.

Seeing scanning is believing.  John ordered his own Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500 (PC) and I made another trip down to his office to take the scanner out of the box.  Maybe I should do a poll of how many GTDers have purchased scanners and never taken them out of the box? You know who you are! De-boxing is the key next action in getting a scanner up and contributing to your mind-like-water.

In addition to the visible things on and around John’s desk, I believe there is a second USB hub that is hidden inside the typing elevator drawer space.  And also, that there is a power adapter in that space to feed the label printer and scanner.

Reflections on Abomination’s Redemption:

Note in Figure 1, that John had a trackball on his desk when he started GTD.  This desk makeover has shifted him to a small travel mouse. There are wireless trackballs from Logitech and Kensington, but they cost $30 more than the Logitech M305.

John chose to keep his legacy desk with leg stalls.  That is this style of desk is like a horse stall, only for your legs.  I prefer sliding side to side so that I can start parallel projects on different parts of my desk during the day as interruptions happen.  My advice to John was to cut the surface off this desk and then mount it on IKEA legs. Ikea’s desks have inexpensive cable management options, and they are simple to work with.

The glass on the desk feels disruptive to me.  Glass is cold when you put your hands and forearms on it.  I think I’d prefer to remove the glass, and then I’d probably resurface this desk with white-board-contact-paper.  White lightens the room (always welcome in Portland where we get 5.5 inches of rain per month), and gives you a place to jot notes with white board pens, so you can save paper.

John is a public school teacher who has been in Sherwood High School for 28 years.  And he is digging his way out via GTD.  Teachers, you CAN DO THIS!   If I can shift to GTD, anyone can.  The key is to start.  Don’t start big or small.  Don’t give yourself the chance to over think this.  Just start.  John got the scanner, Evernote, and then beautifully reconfigured his desk (putting the scanner on the old typewriter elevator is genius!:-) to support his workflow.

Thank you John for sharing your before after.  Anyone else interested in sharing?  Before/afters are fantastic motivators.  Email me if you have pics you are willing to share.

bill@basicip.com