Although it’s been said, many times, many ways… I did enjoy this ears-back rant from Merlin Mann on 43 Folders on “Distraction,” Simplicity, and Running Toward Shitstorms
http://www.43folders.com/2010/10/05/distraction
Naturally, I came across it having spent an hour looking at screencasts on OmniFocus, which I am considering purchasing. I am a freelancer, and I’m beginning to feel that I can’t run my to-do lists and stuff in umpteen paper/online places, so I’ve been evaluating various tools. I’ve used Basecamp before, which I quite like - and there’s an open source version called collabtive which is almost there, although the graphics and German-> English translation don’t quite work in places.
I also looked at DotProject, WebCollab and various other open source PM apps, but I think I should reflect the reality of my life that I use iCal and email a lot more than any other software, and OmniFocus seems to tie in with both really well. It will mean finally ditching Thunderbird and going over to Mail for all my email, but I guess I can live with that.
Obviously, this is a monumental waste of time, and simply using up time - Mann-style - that I could have used writing, or HEAVEN FORBID, earning some money. But does anyone have any views on OmniFocus or can suggest an alternative?
I run a few clients, with some recurring project (and project patterns). I’d like to keep files together with project data (eg configs and passwords - things I currently store in a massive Scriv file), and then have a list of things to do which I can then ignore in favour of post-its…