I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file • Hacker News Board

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#541

Post by eadmund » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:16 AM UTC

jorvi wrote: post #420

reddit_clone wrote: post #397

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Org-mode is the most appropriate answer. It is as simple or as sophisticated as we want it to be. Obviously one needs to be an Emacs user first

> Obviously one needs to be an Emacs user first This makes it so infuriating that the top comment on Todo systems is almost invariably "just org-mode lol". Same as remote editing "just TRAMP lol". I am not going to completely change my editor and rebuild two decades of optimization just to use two Emacs tools. On-topic: TickTick or Todoist with a slimmed-down "Getting Things Done" system works really well. Almost no…

> I am not going to completely change my editor and rebuild two decades of optimization just to use two Emacs tools.

Change your editor and rebuild two decades of optimisation in order to use Emacs, two Emacs tools, and also every other Emacs tool out there. Org Mode, TRAMP, Magit, gptel, eglot, flycheck, elfeed, ERC, Emms, EWW … there are a ton of reasons to use Emacs.

Or you can keep using less-capable systems and being annoyed when folks recommend that you upgrade.

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#542

Post by komali2 » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:19 AM UTC

Igrom wrote: post #92

Reading through the comments under this thread, there are many users who swear by a plain text file, but who then build quite a lot of snowflake software to regain functionality offered by more structured TODO applications. That includes: - having your computer alert you to things that come up - being able to tag notes - being able to add events to a calendar - being able to set priority of tasks - expecting prioriti…

If people want an excellent todo list system that's essentially infinitely customizable but still approachable for basic productivity, org mode is good.

The mobile experience is somewhat lacking but good enough with Orgzly on Android.

However with org mode I had the same issue I had with all my to-do list systems, wherein I tended to record too many todos. I needed granular prioritization and gtd contexts and scheduled and deadlines and repeaters to keep track of it all. I needed to install org super agenda to get useful views.

I switched to trillium and nuked 90% of my todos in the migration as out of date or just kinda vague things that'd be nice to do and chucked those into a future projects note. Trillium's to-do UX is slightly better than a markdown document because you can click to check the boxes, that's about it. It's high friction. I have to go to today's note, go to the Todo section, and then put my to-do in the list. Or the week Todo section, or month or year.

What I've found is now I actually do all my to-dos because now they're all actually worth doing. I'm not scrabbling down every single thing and cluttering up my list.

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#543

Post by walt_grata » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:19 AM UTC

jack_pp wrote: post #441

barbazoo wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In terms of earning money, but surely that's not what's it's all about, is it?

in terms of actually building something useful

Define useful and who it has to be useful to? If building it helps me improve my craft, let's me decompress and have so fun. That's useful

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#544

Post by eadmund » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:19 AM UTC

makapuf wrote: post #237

rambambram wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not so fast my dear, just this year I finally adopted the default home-directory structure of my linux distro (Document, Pictures, Music, Video, etc.) in my workflow. I'm not ready for more big obvious changes like this. ;)

Am i the only one to generally find those directories getting in the way ? I have very few videos or music, or even images worth storing as images and not related to other documents. Downloads and documents might be useful but then, documents is almost everything that is not online so why not put it in $HOME. And I don't like capitalized folders but that's me.

    man 5 user-dirs.dirs

I hate the default directory names, and like you I hate the capitalisation — fortunately they can be overridden.

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#545

Post by eadmund » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:20 AM UTC

j0e1 wrote: post #467

AiAi wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think one thing that is missing from emacs/org-mode is the mobile integration. There are apps that handle some features of org-mode on mobile, but probably missing features of the desktop version. Currently, I manage my notes only on the desktop because I haven't found a good companion on mobile.

If you have Android, emacs is now officially supported on Android ( https://f-droid.org/packages/org.gnu.emacs ). Along with https://github.com/Julow/Unexpected-Keyboard , it turns out to be a pretty usable (assuming you are the type that is okay working with emacs in general). I am now in search of a simple way to sync notes between my phone and computer (without using Big Tech solutions).

> I am now in search of a simple way to sync notes between my phone and computer (without using Big Tech solutions).

Syncthing?

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#546

Post by komali2 » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:21 AM UTC

codazoda wrote: post #199

nosianu wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> - having your computer alert you to things that come up If my own experience is a valid example, alerts are overrated. They don't work for long. I hate getting interrupted by something that actually does not need my attention at that precise moment. I would disable those alerts in no time. I prefer leaving physical cues in the real world. I think screens are bad UI unless you already spend way too much time in fron…

I geeked out a bit, after reading another blog post, and used my thermal printer for this. I've been using it for a few weeks now. The little sticky notes it makes are great. https://joeldare.com/trying-to-stop-procrastination-with-my-... I am starting to collect too many of them though. I kinda like the idea of ops text-file because it is renewed from day to day. I'm still not quite sure how to deal with the items I…

Yeah the thermal printer one made the rounds here too, I've been curious to see how it's been going the last couple months for the people that adopted it.

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#547

Post by kamaal » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:27 AM UTC

fernandogrd wrote: post #388

I follow something similar automated as: function todo vim "$HOME/ /"(date --date=$argv --iso-8601) end So I can do.: $ todo # opens the today file $ todo tomorrow #opens tomorrows file $ todo ' ' And silver searcher for full text search.

Or you could use a Google doc. Everything is backed up online and has all kinds of formatting and security baked in these days.

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#548

Post by komali2 » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:27 AM UTC

folkrav wrote: post #494

bluGill wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminders is not the job of a todo app, it is the job of a calendar app. For a todo there is no now, it is pick the best thing todo next. I need to be interupted for my dentist appointment. However I don't need to be interupted to buy milk, I need a remineer when I'm at the store anyway to also get milk. If the reminder was 'i see you are going in the direction of a store: we need milk if you have time to stop' that…

Certain tasks have deadlines - can you really have one of those without some concept of time? Creating a calendar entry for those doesn’t make any sense to me - they are not events happening at a point in time with a given duration, but things that need to be done BEFORE said point in time.

Hence scheduling, which leads to agendas, the midway point between a calendar and Todo list.

I used to use an org agenda view for this, now I just use a caldav calendar and trillium. In the morning, I check my to-do list, which has been being created for this day over the last couple weeks or months, I look at my agenda to see what meetings or appointments I have, and I slot todos in between them. I might even be doing so for the whole week or month, moving tasks around as needed. I take a look at my week and month todos and see that something is due in two days so slot it in for today. Similar to how a project manager might do with sprints and tickets I guess.

I think the critical aspect of any functional Todo system is active review, at least daily if not more so, plus regular weekly and monthly cleanups.

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#549

Post by viraptor » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:37 AM UTC

Aurornis wrote: post #253

pancakemouse wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What this shows to me, as someone who has committed some of the unholy crimes above, is that people want their system, however esoteric, to come naturally to them. I think reading docs, understanding a new system which someone else has designed, and fitting one's brain into _their_ organisational structure is the hard part. Harder than designing one's own system. It's the reason many don't stick with an off-the-shelf…

> What this shows to me, as someone who has committed some of the unholy crimes above, is that people want their system, however esoteric, to come naturally to them I think this is a vocal minority. Outside of internet comment sections, most everyone I know doesn’t care that much about their todo list software. The most productive people I ever worked with all had really minimal productivity software. For one person…

On managers side the equivalent is making fancy JIRA workflows with all the fancy fields so that everyone is informed. Makes people annoyed with extra work and that time could be spent just talking to people to understand what's actually happening.

Re: I tried every todo app and ended up with a .txt file

#550

Post by tempestn » Tue, Aug 12, 2025, 2:39 AM UTC

Igrom wrote: post #92

Reading through the comments under this thread, there are many users who swear by a plain text file, but who then build quite a lot of snowflake software to regain functionality offered by more structured TODO applications. That includes: - having your computer alert you to things that come up - being able to tag notes - being able to add events to a calendar - being able to set priority of tasks - expecting prioriti…

I feel the same way. I landed on Evernote rather than org-mode, but it similarly provides all these features out of the box, while letting me largely customize my setup. (I basically do GTD with a notebook for each priority level.)

Was regretting it a bit in the 2020-2023 range when Evernote was going downhill, but it's improved a fair amount since the acquisition. Almost (but not quite) to the point where I'd recommend it to others again.

What I would recommend is spending the time to learn some system beyond just a text file. I've ultimately found it well worth it, to the extent that I couldn't imagine going back now. It is definitely an investment up front though.