Productivity 101

On this first day of a new year I would like to take the opportunity to thank all readers for their comments, emails and reading of  my blog. About a year ago I started with this blog and I had written down some goals for this blog.

At first I aimed at writing 4 posts a week. Well, I didn’t succeed. I also wanted to experience fun when writing and communicating through the blog. I can honestly say that through my blog I have met and interacted with a lot of people I never would have come across if I didn’t have this blog. It was great fun writing the posts I have written.

Some of the posts on productivity I want to highlight:

• Make a productive visit to your local library!
• Too much info, do something about it.
• How I take regular breaks to stay productive
• Doing more and more GTD stuff online
• My Weekly Review, perfect start for the weekend!

On a personal note 2008 was at times though as you can read here:

• Complexity brings stress in your life
• Getting back on track…

But in all I feel privileged and blessed. That is also why I am looking forward to 2009 with anticipation. I sure hope that this will hold true for all of you, both in your private and business life.

What I never would have considered myself started when someone sent me a book to review. This has started off a series of book reviews and I definitely am going to do book reviews this year. Primarily on productivity but also on other topics since I love reading that much. Here are two reviews I did last year:

• What Got You Here Won’t Get You There
• A Dutch perspective on the Faith of Barack Obama

Of course I will keep on writing on productivity and will continue with the series on Evernote. So keep on reading!

One last goal was to generate at least the costs for maintaining this blog by putting Adsense ads on the blog. This goal has been reached, that is exactely the amount of money needed for the domain and hosting was provided through the Adsense income. Because of the fact that I am so pleased with Mozy as on no-hassle online backup service I can recommend them. I am an affiliate for Mozy as well. If you sign up for their free or paid backup service I get a commission and you get 10% of your first annual or biannual subscription of MozyHome Unlimited or MozyPro signup. Just click on the logo below and use JANUARY as your promo code.

written by Fokke

In this third post in the series on Evernote and GTD I will discuss how I use the Evernote client for iPhone. I find myself using the iPhone client primarily for collecting information.

Over time I still find new ways to use one of the four options for entering information on the iPhone. When I am doing a weekly review I use the new text note to just enter new tasks to pop up during the time I reserve every week. But also when I am on the phone with someone it is quite easy to quickly add tasks that way. It takes some time to make it a habit to enter every single task or item that pops up during the day. Also I have found some resistance in entering some small detail like get new batteries for emergency light. But it is now a natural thing to do.

The Snapshot Note option has proven to be a very convenient way to be more productive and ahead of things. I use it for business cards, clippings from magazines and newspapers, price tags in shops, location of my car in the car park and numerous other ways. Basically all things that I need to remember or want to remember is entered through this option.

The Saved Photo Note is ideal if you want to add photo’s you have taken into a note, for instance when you are writing about a trip you have made.

I use the Voice Note option a lot in the car. When I want to brainstorm on a subject or when summarize a meeting I was in I create a new voice note. The quality of the audio is great. Sometimes I just listen to the audio note and then process the tasks that are in the recording. Other times I just keep the recording for later use.

But there are also other ways I have found the iPhone to be of great help in collecting. I use Google Reader as my newsreader and with the handy option of emailing items right from the mobile browser interface I email items of interest to my Evernote email address. Sometimes there is an action involved in an item and just emailing them keeps my head clear because I later process the items when I review the inbox notebook in Evernote.

A lot of people miss the copy/paste option on the iPhone. I use the screenshot option on the iPhone to make screenshot from a lot of apps on the iPhone. Not only webpages but also screens from applications like contacts, Google Maps, TwitterFon, the SMS app, Calendar and others as well. When I am looking at my tweets in Twitterfon and there is something in a tweet that needs my action I just press the power button and the home button to take a screenshot of that page. With the Saved Photo Note I then add the screenshot to Evernote. The possibilities are endless.

Clarifi case

I really think the iPhone camera is of good quality for the day to day use as I need it. If I want to take quality pictures I take my digital camera. But in one area the camera of the iPhone good be better and that is when taking shots of text. The Clarifi case has a built-in sliding lens that makes close-up photos incredibly clear. Together with the text recognition feature of Evernote there is no need for typing in business cards addresses because with Evernote you can search for that name or address on the card. I have found out about the Clarifi case on the Evernote blog. I immediately bought the case and I must say it is a must for serious collecting with the iPhone client.

In later posts I will write about the ways of the iPhone client for reviewing information and taking action. For now I close with again a call to your readers to add your own tips and suggestions by commenting on this post.

This is a post in a series on GTD with Evernote:

Part 1: Evernote and GTD
Part 2: Collecting
Part 3: Collecting with the iPhone
Part 4: Tags, Saved Searches and Premium
Part 5: Revisited

written by Fokke \\ tags: Evernote, GTD

This is the second post in a series on using Evernote in a GTD setting. In the first post I discussed the setup of Evernote for use with the GTD methodology. In this second post I will start with the collecting of information into Evernote.

Collecting is a very important step in the Getting Things Done methodology. I am running OSX as my primary OS and have an iPhone. So I use my Apple laptop and my iPhone for getting stuff into Evernote. In this post I will focus on the Mac side of collecting stuff into Evernote.

If you are running Windows and have a Windows Mobile phone some of the things you read here will not apply although most actions are also available on those platforms. In a later post I will also briefly mention those Evernote clients as well. But for now I stick to the ones I use most.

Getting info into Evernote on OSX

You can set up your computer in a way that makes it possible to sent info to Evernote from all programs. This is one of the best features of Evernote. When you install the OSX client also a Clipper is installed. This nifty tool sits in the top menu bar. It gives you access to two important tools to get info into Evernote:

Paste into Evernote will paste the current selection of the clipboard to Evernote. Clip screenshot into Evernote will give you a rectangle with which you can select any portion of your current screen as an image into Evernote. Evernote uses a recognition technology that identifies text on images and pdf files. So when I take a photo of a business card the info on that card can be found by typing the name of the person or the company that is on the card.

On the website of Evernote you will find instructions on how to install a webclipper in your web browser. This will gives you functionality to clip complete web pages or parts of web pages to Evernote. So when I am browsing and find some info I need to take action on I will send it right from the browser to my default notebook (in my case “1. Inbox”) in Evernote. The same is true for all other programs I work with. If there is some text in a Word document that holds an action or some important information I select it and past it right into Evernote.

But sometimes a task just pops in your head while you are working on something else. For that I have installed a Quicksilver script to quickly add a todo item to Evernote. You can download the script Clip to Evernote here. And a direct link to the latest version of the script: download. Before you can use this script you need to edit it and read through the instructions. Make sure you set at least the default notebook setting and read through the instructions on how to use it.

When I work at a document and someone walks into my office with a task for me I simply activate Quicksilver, press period and type: title:Call Fred at 1231245. I then tab to the action field and enter clip to Evernote.

A last way of getting info in Evernote for this post is using the mail address that is provided with every Evernote account. You can mail to that address and the info is added to your default notebook. I use it for sending complete emails to my Evernote inbox when the mail contains actions. I also forward account information and other mails with information to my Evernote account mail address. You can find you Evernote account mail address in the web interface settings page. It looks something like this:

In the next post I will describe how I use the iPhone client of Evernote for collecting stuff and actions in Evernote. As always your suggestions, questions or remarks are welcome. Simply comment on this post.

This is a post in a series on GTD with Evernote:

Part 1: Evernote and GTD
Part 2: Collecting
Part 3: Collecting with the iPhone
Part 4: Tags, Saved Searches and Premium
Part 5: Revisited

written by Fokke \\ tags: Evernote, GTD