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Ask Slashdot: Life Organization With Free Software?
BigZee writes "For many years, I've used a page-a-day diary as both a planner and a method for taking notes. While not perfect, it's proven to be an approach that's worked fairly well for me. Conscious of the limitations, I want this to become more electronic. In principle, I want to be able to use my Nexus 7 for this function. There are some limitations: My workplace uses MS Outlook. However, I am not able to use Evernote (or similar) on my workplace machine. This limits possible integration along the lines proposed with GTD. What I want is to be able to take notes that are organized by date as well as being integrated to a calendar (preferably Google). Additionally, I want to be able to prioritize my work along lines similar to GTD. I'm not averse to spending money for the right software but prefer to use free software where possible. Can anyone suggest what could be used?" The above-linked Wikipedia page lists some relevant Free software as well as closed-source options. If you use such organizing software, though, how do you use it, and how well do you find it works?
http://www.activeinboxhq.com/index.php/ works with GMail to bring GTD into your email. It works really well, but if you're stuck on outlook then it might not be suitable for you. You can use it for free or pay for more features.
You're a temporary arrangement of matter sliding towards oblivion in a cold, uncaring universe
Why do you need the source code?
Just slap Microsoft OneNote to your Nexus 7 and be done with it. For your work PC, it comes bundled in MS Office.
I know this goes contrary to what a lot of people here will think, because it ignores the technology aspects we're all so obsessed with.
Me, I still use the same black lab-books for persistent note-taking I've been using for 20 years.
I've got a stack of them, numbered and with dated pages. Every time I've looked at an alternative, I've found it cumbersome and less useful, and sooner or later you discover whatever technology du jour you're using has gone away, and you're left finding yet another alternative.
By all means, apply technology as you see fit. But for some things, many of us have found that old fashioned pen and paper is still superior. Everything else is a temporary solution which will eventually fail on you or go away completely.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
Your planner and notebook dont run out of batteries, work when (mostly) wet, are readable in sunlight, and offer many advantages over electronic forms. Analog is sometimes better than digital.
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
I have been using Google Keep. https://www.google.com/keep While not great it is adequate. Integrates with google account, although better integration with calendar would be cool. Works with google drive. Posting because some organizations are more open to letting you use google apps. Google keep is relatively new and seems not a lot of people have found it. Here is a pretty good review of Google Keep. http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/google-in-the-enterprise/five-things-worth-noting-about-google-keep/
It's really a "geek only" tool but emacs org-mode is great for me for organizing my work. The big plus is that the format is plain text so you can use version control to manage it. I use drop box and leave the files on there. I usually use one per project and then a master file.
Here's a specific guide to using it with GTD: http://orgmode.org/worg/org-gtd-etc.html
TiddlyWiki is a self-contained app stored in an HTML file that you can store on a USB, Dropbox, or elsewhere. People have written GTD add-ons for it and it is easy to write your own customizations. There is an Android app to help run it on Android systems and the new version uses HTML 5 with option to use node.js to make it even more powerful.
I use the Zim Desktop Wiki http://zim-wiki.org/ plus Dropbox.
Zim is a graphical text editor used to maintain a collection of wiki pages. Each page can contain links to other pages, simple formatting and images. Pages are stored in a folder structure, like in an outliner, and can have attachments. Creating a new page is as easy as linking to a nonexistent page. All data is stored in plain text files with wiki formatting. Various plugins provide additional functionality, like a task list manager, an equation editor, a tray icon, and support for version control.
If you need version control, Zim supports Bazaar, Git, and Mercurial as backends.
Zim is not network aware, so I just keep its ~/Notes files in my Dropbox folder, install that and the desktop Linux/Windows/OSX Zim client as needed and I'm good to go.
Unfortunately, there is no smartphone version of Zim, but I have little need for a smartpone app of this sort. I do email myself info as needed to integrate into Zim later.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
The first time I got an Android, I was utterly appalled that there was no note editing app in the base install.
I went looking for combined note/voice-note/picture/calander organizing apps. Most had too many strings attached (specific cloud-service sync options, or whatnot.) All of them lacked the ability to quickly procrastinate a task. You'd think that would be an obvious feature, but no. I went back to just remembering stuff with wetware. By the time my wetware starts to wear out, hopefully there will be something suitable.
Someone had to do it.