Please help me organize I'm drowning in lists
September 14, 2010 12:35 PM Subscribe
Suggestion to organize my lists (online tool or other suggestions) and move parts of my life online (photos/CDs). Best practices, website recommendations/applications, warnings.
Any recommendations to solve any of the problems would be great. Free/cheap/easy to use would be great, but I would pay for a program if it is really useful. If you recommend an online resource, please tell me your experiences, why it’s a great resource/potential warnings that you have observed.
Some of my organization problems:
I tend to keep lists on scraps of paper (and now on my computer) for all kinds of things. These lists range from things that “I need to do (pay bills, buy X)”, “things that I want to do for my business” ,“ideas for science fiction stories”, etc. Some of these stay active for the next few days and some I will drop on the side and try to return to months later. The problem? Scraps of paper everywhere and I lose my lists. I tried to do this on my computer with word files and also misplace the lists. Suggestions for an online resource that I can use to keep track of these would be great (or if you have suggestions for an easy to implement solution, that would be great)
PDFs. I mainly keep PDFs for projects that I have worked on. I throw them into a folder with the name of the company and topic (e.g. company X-CRC, or company Y-hepatocellular, etc.). Some of these PDFs would be useful for other projects, but then I can’t find them again or need to search for the next hour to find it.
Metafilter favorites. Excluding the "I agree so I'm favoriting this" or "interesting point of view" favorites, I favorite comments because I want to see that movie, look for that book, try that solution, but now I have a massive list of a few thousand comments and questions, and I can't find them anymore.
Along the same lines (and because I’ve lived in small places the last few years), I’d like to move things that I have in hard copy (CDs, pictures), put them online, and get rid of the hard copies. My concern, however, is: Is this reliable? Besides backing it up on CD are there other problems with this? Can I make this private for just me? Other things that I should think about?
If this has been answered previously, tags or posts to search would be helpful. I tried looking for the tags and got too many posts. I think that I’ve seen some of these addressed in metafilter before, but I can’t seem to find it.
Any recommendations to solve any of the problems would be great. Free/cheap/easy to use would be great, but I would pay for a program if it is really useful. If you recommend an online resource, please tell me your experiences, why it’s a great resource/potential warnings that you have observed.
Some of my organization problems:
I tend to keep lists on scraps of paper (and now on my computer) for all kinds of things. These lists range from things that “I need to do (pay bills, buy X)”, “things that I want to do for my business” ,“ideas for science fiction stories”, etc. Some of these stay active for the next few days and some I will drop on the side and try to return to months later. The problem? Scraps of paper everywhere and I lose my lists. I tried to do this on my computer with word files and also misplace the lists. Suggestions for an online resource that I can use to keep track of these would be great (or if you have suggestions for an easy to implement solution, that would be great)
PDFs. I mainly keep PDFs for projects that I have worked on. I throw them into a folder with the name of the company and topic (e.g. company X-CRC, or company Y-hepatocellular, etc.). Some of these PDFs would be useful for other projects, but then I can’t find them again or need to search for the next hour to find it.
Metafilter favorites. Excluding the "I agree so I'm favoriting this" or "interesting point of view" favorites, I favorite comments because I want to see that movie, look for that book, try that solution, but now I have a massive list of a few thousand comments and questions, and I can't find them anymore.
Along the same lines (and because I’ve lived in small places the last few years), I’d like to move things that I have in hard copy (CDs, pictures), put them online, and get rid of the hard copies. My concern, however, is: Is this reliable? Besides backing it up on CD are there other problems with this? Can I make this private for just me? Other things that I should think about?
If this has been answered previously, tags or posts to search would be helpful. I tried looking for the tags and got too many posts. I think that I’ve seen some of these addressed in metafilter before, but I can’t seem to find it.
I really like Remember the Milk for lists and have used it for several years. It's free for the basic edition, or $25/year if you want the iPhone/Android apps too. It gives you multiple lists, task locations (great for mapping tasks/routes) and URLs, and has some integrations with GMail and Google calendar. My only problem is that sometimes I forget to use it, which no tool can really solve.
Their blog is also terrific and offers good suggestions about how to organize all kinds of things using their tool.
posted by freecellwizard at 12:57 PM on September 14, 2010
Their blog is also terrific and offers good suggestions about how to organize all kinds of things using their tool.
posted by freecellwizard at 12:57 PM on September 14, 2010
I use Simplenote to maintain a number of text-based lists. Random thoughts, grocery/shopping lists, long-term things to do, gift ideas, etc. Syncs between my iPhone, iPad, and its web app so I have it with me pretty much constantly--I use it as a space for brain dumps. Thoroughly invaluable to me. For near-term to do lists, I use the Remember the Milk web and iPhone apps. Synchronization, again, is key. Plus I like having the little iPhone icon badge telling me how many things I have to do. A bit overkill for simple to do lists, but it gets the job done.
posted by jroybal at 3:02 PM on September 14, 2010 [1 favorite]
posted by jroybal at 3:02 PM on September 14, 2010 [1 favorite]
One other option to consider might be Evernote. I use it on my iPhone and my Windows 7 laptop, and it's been invaluable in helping me keep track of certain things. You can organize your notes into 'notebooks' - I currently have one entitled 'Hamlet' that I'm using to plan my vacation in England, when I'll be seeing John Simm perform at the Sheffield Theater.
posted by Telpethoron at 9:45 PM on September 14, 2010
posted by Telpethoron at 9:45 PM on September 14, 2010
Best answer: I tend to keep lists on scraps of paper (and now on my computer) for all kinds of things. These lists range from things that “I need to do (pay bills, buy X)”, “things that I want to do for my business” ,“ideas for science fiction stories”, etc. Some of these stay active for the next few days and some I will drop on the side and try to return to months later. The problem? Scraps of paper everywhere and I lose my lists. I tried to do this on my computer with word files and also misplace the lists. Suggestions for an online resource that I can use to keep track of these would be great (or if you have suggestions for an easy to implement solution, that would be great)
Look at Notational Velocity.
It can also be set to sync automatically with the Simple Note web-app, and its iPhone/iPad apps.
PDFs. I mainly keep PDFs for projects that I have worked on. I throw them into a folder with the name of the company and topic (e.g. company X-CRC, or company Y-hepatocellular, etc.). Some of these PDFs would be useful for other projects, but then I can’t find them again or need to search for the next hour to find it.
Look at Yep
Some people might recommend Zotero - I have not used it.
Metafilter favorites. Excluding the "I agree so I'm favoriting this" or "interesting point of view" favorites, I favorite comments because I want to see that movie, look for that book, try that solution, but now I have a massive list of a few thousand comments and questions, and I can't find them anymore.
There was a discussion of tagging favorites on Metatalk, a tool for bulk-exporting and tagging to delicious.com as proposed, but not implemented.
Along the same lines (and because I’ve lived in small places the last few years), I’d like to move things that I have in hard copy (CDs, pictures), put them online, and get rid of the hard copies. My concern, however, is: Is this reliable? Besides backing it up on CD are there other problems with this? Can I make this private for just me? Other things that I should think about?
For advice on scanning photos see these previous questions.
For CDs, search AskMe for cd rip.
If you do put these online with S3/Mozy/Rsync.net/whatever, make sure to keep a copy on a hard drive at home. Don't rely on just one copy, looked after by someone else.
posted by James Scott-Brown at 2:42 AM on September 15, 2010 [2 favorites]
Look at Notational Velocity.
It can also be set to sync automatically with the Simple Note web-app, and its iPhone/iPad apps.
PDFs. I mainly keep PDFs for projects that I have worked on. I throw them into a folder with the name of the company and topic (e.g. company X-CRC, or company Y-hepatocellular, etc.). Some of these PDFs would be useful for other projects, but then I can’t find them again or need to search for the next hour to find it.
Look at Yep
Some people might recommend Zotero - I have not used it.
Metafilter favorites. Excluding the "I agree so I'm favoriting this" or "interesting point of view" favorites, I favorite comments because I want to see that movie, look for that book, try that solution, but now I have a massive list of a few thousand comments and questions, and I can't find them anymore.
There was a discussion of tagging favorites on Metatalk, a tool for bulk-exporting and tagging to delicious.com as proposed, but not implemented.
Along the same lines (and because I’ve lived in small places the last few years), I’d like to move things that I have in hard copy (CDs, pictures), put them online, and get rid of the hard copies. My concern, however, is: Is this reliable? Besides backing it up on CD are there other problems with this? Can I make this private for just me? Other things that I should think about?
For advice on scanning photos see these previous questions.
For CDs, search AskMe for cd rip.
If you do put these online with S3/Mozy/Rsync.net/whatever, make sure to keep a copy on a hard drive at home. Don't rely on just one copy, looked after by someone else.
posted by James Scott-Brown at 2:42 AM on September 15, 2010 [2 favorites]
I highly recommend the web-app that I made: FolderBoy for a very similar problem.
Here are some of the things it does well:
* Can throw items (notes, PDFs etc) into as many folders as you want. And then throw those folders into as many parent folders as you want. (Hierarchical labels)
* Can jot down things without worrying about where to store them....then organize them later.
* Upload files
* Search-as-you-type (very fast)
* Paste in bookmarks...so you can just copy the link of the metafilter post and paste in (browser plugin to come later)
* Scales well when you have loads of lists and when the lists are interrelated. Say if you have a PDF that is useful for multiple projects, e.g. "Quantum Electrodynamics", "Thesis", "Prepare upcoming seminar", then you can put that PDF in all of those folders. Then you can also organize the folders themselves and put, say, "Prepare upcoming seminar" into "Must do by Friday" and into any other folder you deem relevant.
Anyway, the basic idea behind FolderBoy is that you should be able to record every thought, organize them in an easy/powerful way, and then be able to find them easily later.
posted by tomargue at 10:49 PM on September 15, 2010
Here are some of the things it does well:
* Can throw items (notes, PDFs etc) into as many folders as you want. And then throw those folders into as many parent folders as you want. (Hierarchical labels)
* Can jot down things without worrying about where to store them....then organize them later.
* Upload files
* Search-as-you-type (very fast)
* Paste in bookmarks...so you can just copy the link of the metafilter post and paste in (browser plugin to come later)
* Scales well when you have loads of lists and when the lists are interrelated. Say if you have a PDF that is useful for multiple projects, e.g. "Quantum Electrodynamics", "Thesis", "Prepare upcoming seminar", then you can put that PDF in all of those folders. Then you can also organize the folders themselves and put, say, "Prepare upcoming seminar" into "Must do by Friday" and into any other folder you deem relevant.
Anyway, the basic idea behind FolderBoy is that you should be able to record every thought, organize them in an easy/powerful way, and then be able to find them easily later.
posted by tomargue at 10:49 PM on September 15, 2010
Response by poster: I really want to thank everyone for replying (and if you have more ideas, please let me know and drop an answer here). To be honest, I haven't had a chance to evaluate all the ideas, links, and applications yet (and I will over the next few weeks and report back).
I need to organize the PDFs in an academic manner, though. I just saw the description (plus video) that describes Zotero - absolutely incredible! I did more searching here in metafilter and also found out that there is a similar program/app called Mendeley. I will probably install them both, but it looks like these will be a great solution for my PDF problem. They seem like itunes for PDFs, beyond what I imagined. Thanks for the suggestion, James-Scott.
I will definitely check out some of other note taking apps in the next few weeks, and will find out of they can solve my organization problems.
posted by Wolfster at 1:19 AM on September 16, 2010
I need to organize the PDFs in an academic manner, though. I just saw the description (plus video) that describes Zotero - absolutely incredible! I did more searching here in metafilter and also found out that there is a similar program/app called Mendeley. I will probably install them both, but it looks like these will be a great solution for my PDF problem. They seem like itunes for PDFs, beyond what I imagined. Thanks for the suggestion, James-Scott.
I will definitely check out some of other note taking apps in the next few weeks, and will find out of they can solve my organization problems.
posted by Wolfster at 1:19 AM on September 16, 2010
Best answer: That MeFi credits an AskMe with a comment that links to a blog post which provides a brief comparison of Zotero, Mendeley, Sente, and Papers that you might find helpful.
posted by James Scott-Brown at 1:20 PM on September 16, 2010
posted by James Scott-Brown at 1:20 PM on September 16, 2010
This thread is closed to new comments.
There are plenty of purpose-built online resources for this kind of to-do list tracking and whatnot, but I've settled on just using my existing email app (Gmail) for this. Here is what I do:
- If I get an email that I just need to respond to and do nothing else with, I respond and archive the conversation. If I don't respond right away, it sits in my inbox until I do.
- If I get an email that is about some event (like someone inviting me to something on Thursday), I leave it in my inbox even if I respond. Once Thursday rolls around and passes I archive the email.
- If I have similar things I need to do or events I need to keep track of, I send myself an email about it and leave it in my inbox.
- If I have long-term lists that I update periodically or need to keep indefinitely, I save it as a draft and leave it in the drafts folder rather than the inbox.
So the end result is that my inbox is basically a todo list, and the drafts folder is like a set of sticky notes. This may seem like a hack or misuse of email, but since I already check my email all the time and have stuff to reply to sitting in my inbox it makes sense for me to keep track of offline things there too. Also I do this for both work and personal stuff, but I keep them separate, which works pretty well since I have separate work and personal email addresses.
posted by burnmp3s at 12:57 PM on September 14, 2010 [1 favorite]