GTD with Hiveminder
I've been getting my GTD system back on track after being off of it for a little while. I think that always happens with something worth doing; you're going to have to fail at it a couple times to really get it. I've been reviewing my system and reading the book again and found that I never really got a good review or organization system set up on my computer. I tried stikkit for a while but that never seemed to gel. It never kept my todos the way I wanted them, or had very good Google calendar integration. I also wanted something that let me keep track of Projects a little easier.
Enter Hiveminder
Hiveminder is basically just a todo app, but it's got a couple killer features for me.
- Command line integration
Hiveminder has a perl app that lets you add and view tasks via the command line. I actually use a python version that's out there and I've been hacking on it myself to add extra features to it. Since I live on the command line and always have one open (thanks Tilda!) having a command line interface to this is awesome. I now have gcalcli for my Google calendar and todo.py for Hiveminder and it fits perfectly into my workflow.
- Tags
Hiveminder allows you to assign tags to your tasks. I can tag each task with it's context (personal, work, phone, email) and what project it's for (basementcleanup, ebay, registration). If I ever want to see a certain context, I just choose that tag and only those todos pop up. Awesome way to dynamically have a view of my todo list that fits whatever situation I'm in.
- Task dependency
This is simply killer. I can assign tasks to require other tasks to finish first. That means that if I have a task called "Make Cereal", I can assign a "But first..." task called "Buy Milk" to it. When I look at my list, I only see the "Buy Milk" task. Once I set that to done, only then does "Make Cereal" jump onto the list. This allows you to set up a chain of tasks that only show up when they are able to be done.
This has huge implications for Project tracking for me. If I can look ahead and know what tasks need to be taken to get a Project done, I can go ahead and add them all in and just chain them together. I can add multiple "But first..."s and have a nice little Next Action production line set up and ready to go. Looking at that Project's tag allows me to review them whenever I want to, but normally I will only see the tasks that can actually be done.
- Built in review process
Hiveminder has a little button on the list page called Task Review. This will go through all of your tasks one by one. It's a great way to have a weekly review of everything on your plate. For each one, I ask myself,
- Is this actionable? (if not, redefine to be actionable)
- Is this a bigger project? (if yes, make it a tag and create a Next Action)
- Do I need to do something before this task? (add a "But first...")
- What do I need to do right after this task? (add a "And then...")
It has been a great way to help me with something I've had problems with before; doing the weekly review.
- Time-based helpers
Hiveminder lets you not only set due dates for tasks, it also lets you hide tasks that you know you can't work on right now. Know you're not going to get to something today? Hide it until tomorrow. Can't act on something until someone get's back to you? (waiting on) Hide it until next week. It's a great way to clear out the todo list and only have stuff on there that you can do now. I have always had a hard time with this because I'd have to scan through a list of todos and waste time trying to figure out what was actually actionable. No more. Now I just hide them.
Hiveminder also ties in with Google calendar. When you have a due date on a task, it'll show up in the Hiveminder calendar feed which will then show up in gcalcli for me. Awesome! (BTW, this is not working at them moment, but it was at one point. Not so awesome.)
There are also other features I haven't even looked at yet; the ability to have groups of tasks with other users, sending tasks to people via email, adding tasks via IM and SMS, RSS feeds, etc. I'll see how and if they fit, but I'm liking how it's going so far.
Related posts:
- links for 2008-01-28 Obama I totally agree and I couldn't have said it...
- Lies During the Third Debate A good review of the "mis-truths" of the third debate:New...
- Geektool Scripts Due to popular demand (I get about two hits a...
