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

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

#741

Post by Aerbil313 »

jodrellblank wrote: post #387
codazoda wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

The recent HN thread on receipt printers for task tracking had this comment which I wish got some attention and replies: " The biggest killer for any task tracker I find is an accumulating backlog of items that seem too important to quit but too intractable to make progress on. " - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44270076 (I suspect that’s part of too many browser tabs hanging around, too)

> "The biggest killer for any task tracker I find is an accumulating backlog of items that seem too important to quit but too intractable to make progress on."

I worked in this space for some time. Solving the backlog problem is the holy grail of To-Do systems. I am convinced it is a solvable problem.

The reason there are a bajillion To-Do apps and strategies right now is because a working UX for a digital task-keeping system is still not figured out. To simply put it, no To-Do app 'works' right now. Many of them work well enough for some people to depend on them to some extent.

One of the major reasons for failure is the backlog problem. It's surprisingly difficult, it's at the crossroads of human psychology and the varying real life tasks and responsibilities of real people. Real world is messy.

You'll see To-Do apps "work" out-of-the-box for most people and be hugely beneficial when:

- You see research papers comparing different strategies for To-Do task scheduling, cognitive load of different UI views, etc.

- Popular To-Do apps converge. They'll likely look nothing like the scheduled-checklist style apps of today.

- People start depending on them in managing most areas of their life.

Right now the To-Do app industry is competing on who has the shiniest UI. Very few players are even acknowledging the backlog problem.

Personally, I tried everything under the sun from using a single .txt file to custom-designed software. I have ADHD. Right now the thing that works best is a physical Bullet Journal. It works because of the friction of paper and pen. It mostly solves the accumulating backlog problem.

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

#742

Post by baggachipz »

spooky_deep wrote: post #737
baggachipz wrote: post #694

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple Notes if you're in the ecosystem. Or, a txt file in icloud.

Not a bad idea, but… Can Apple read the notes? Can Apple switch you off? Is it easy to edit from a non-Apple device?

- No

- Presumably yes, but unlikely

- No

So you definitely have to be in the ecosystem, like I alluded to.

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

#744

Post by antiframe »

wim wrote: post #282
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…

Combining the feel of plain text with real structure is also exactly why we're building an "IDE but for tasks/notes" [1]. With structured apps (task managers, outliners) you lose the illusion of editing plain text, but plain text alone lacks things like structure, links, dates, and collaboration. We've spent the last few years building an editor completely from scratch to keep the ease of text editing while adding pl…

There's a few bits of information missing on the website that is critical to some people:

- What platforms are supported? - What is the business model? - Does the editor support customizable key bindings? Are there presets for Emacs, vi, or others?

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

#746

Post by jorvi »

eadmund wrote: post #541
jorvi wrote: post #420

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

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

Or I get to choose the most logical option yet: keep being annoyed when haughty people keep trying to push a downgrade on me as a supposed 'upgrade'.

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

#748

Post by BrtByte »

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…

But I think part of the OP's point was about deliberately not chasing extra features, even if they're free and

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

#749

Post by BrtByte »

potatolicious wrote: post #236
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…

The term that comes to mind, and one of my favorite concepts, is "progressive disclosure", which is a concept we really ought to be more mindful of. One of the perks of just-a-text-file-with-a-bunch-of-addons is that it enables progressive disclosure - it takes no learning curve to just get in and use the tool on a basic level, but additional complexity (and power) can be introduced over time. The problem with a purp…

Markdown is a perfect analogy

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

#750

Post by BrtByte »

xz18r wrote: post #39

There is a format called todo.txt that works follows very readable syntax (like your own example) and has some minimal bells and whistles if you want it to: http://todotxt.org/ As an alternative: I started using org-mode 5 years ago and have never looked back. This is my workflow ( https://karelvo.com/blog/orgmode ) although I sync it via Git now, and have an iPhone where I use Plain Org ( https://xenodium.com/plain-…

Org-mode is obviously in a whole different league, but I think both scratch the same itch for different types of people
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