-Haha yeah right, my outlook sometimes crashing and i don’t know why.. By the way, are you familiar with this time management site http://www.mercola.com/Downloads/bonus/time-management-guide/report.aspx? don’t know if someone here read this before. ANy ideas? Thanks!

My company has switched to Google Apps, but I am able to synch with my outlook…allows me the best of both worlds for calendar and email processing, but does not yet synch tasks, so still in Outlook (alone) for tasks.

Mobile solution is old school…something about writing that helps me remember!

OneNote for more detailed lists that do not need to be readily available.

DO I SYNC TO A HANDHELD?
Yes I run a Blackberry Bold and Blackberry Exchange at work and the sync is automatic for email, tasks, notes and calendar.

MY FAVOURITE COLLECTION TOOLS
1. Outlook inbox for emails.
2. Physical inbox at work and home office.
3. Vlingo app for Blackberry to add tasks in the car or out and about. This is way cool and works a treat. (Tip if you are Australian, select English not American voice recognition)
4. A4 Pad and pen in my folio for meetings. I annotate with a G in a circle anything that needs to go into next actions.
5. ScanR app for blackberry which enables me to photograph documents/businesscards/whiteboards and get them back as PDF’s or VCF files for filing.
(Also very useful if you are overseas and need to execute a document and send a digital copy.)

PROJECT PLANNING
Brainstorming I use a pad and paper.

Support Material I use OneNote and link Outlook projects categories to a OneNote folder as required.

WHAT ELSE?
REXconnect APP allows me to turn an email on my blackberry into a task/appointment/note.

It also allows me to turn tasks/notes into SMS, and calendar appointments into email or sms. Very useful.

PROCESS
I played with a few tools for Outlook and Blackberry but have gone native again.

My Outlook set up has two extra tweaks on the DAC guide. I preface all my context categories with A- rather than @ because older versions of Blackberry OS wouldn’t sort on @ very well.

I have set up a rule in Outlook for sent emails that I want to become A-Waitingfor actions. I simply tag the email with the A-Waitingfor category and the rule then automatically asks the recipients for a read-receipt and sends the email to a “Waiting For” email folder”. I have outlook 2010 and have set up “Inbox” and “Waitingfor” in my favourites. I then process the Waitingfor emails to next actions each morning when I do my emails. (Tip, you can get the email rule to remove the Waitingfor Category from the email before it sends it which saves a lot of questions from people wanting to know what it means.)

In addition to @projects, @agendas @calls @errands @computer @home @waitingfor @office @somedaymaybe I have added

@away because I travel to 5-6 international destinations frequently and I collect actions notes in an outlook task defined by destination (just like agenda’s for people)

@study to distinguish between things to do at home in the study and things to do at home out of the study as I find I need to allocate separate time to these areas to ensure I get out of the study.

SUMMARY
I will continue to try new apps and tools but simple is almost always best and I don’t mind throwing out a tool that doesn’t work.

I have concluded that Outlook is my main GTD processing tool and my Blackberry is mostly a window into my next actions, lists, calendar and contacts but I can process on my Blackberry if I have to.

At this point, it would be very painful to have OmniFocus taken away from me. As such, though I have no affiliation with the OmniGroup, I’m definitely a stakeholder in OmniFocus’ success now, so there, there’s my full disclosure.

OmniFocus is built for GTD and has everything you need for a proper GTD system in one place. It is very thoughtfully conceived software that is the most thorough GTD system I’ve seen.

It is a little heady at first, but I’m thankful for every single nuance now that I’ve got the hang of it. Once you do get the hang of it, it sings!

I’ve heard it said that there’s a really big difference between doing 99% of GTD and doing 100% of GTD. I didn’t get it until I adopted OmniFocus back in ’07 when it was in beta (or alpha, I can’t remember now).

I use it much as you’d expect, but I also use OmniFocus to track various lists by creating them as Single Action Lists and setting them to On Hold. Examples of these lists are as follows:

- Household Wishlist
- Music Production Wishlist (Musical instruments and other tools I lust after for to further my obsession with creating electronic music)
- Music To Listen To Someday
- Books To Read Someday

Should I want to check out from the library or buy a book that was on my Books To Read Someday List, I would simply move it to the appropriate list, such as my Shopping List (An Active Single-Action List). For the ‘On Hold’ Single-Action Lists, I set the ‘Next Review’ time to 100 years from now, which safely keeps it’s contents from cluttering up my Weekly Reviews or the Context Views from which I work for the time being.

Regarding the Weekly Review, the Mac, iPhone and iPad apps each include a very good Weekly Review function. Most projects I review on a weekly basis (the default in OmniFocus & GTD), but I have the freedom to set longer review intervals for some of my longer-term projects. On a weekly basis. I mostly use the Mac app for weekly reviews, but I’ve come to love the iPad app for this purpose. There is something therapeutic about taking my iPad out onto my covered patio every Saturday morning with tea or coffee and making sure I’m clean and clear on all of my projects and commitments.

I use Mail.app, the Mail program included with Mac OSX, as does most everyone in my company. OmniFocus for Mac includes a great utility which lets me very easily capture tasks from any email in Mail and move them into OmniFocus, complete with automatic dynamic references back to the appropriate email and a time and date stamp of the email. If I move the email to archive or another folder, the link is always preserved.

I use iCal for Mac and iPhone for keeping up with my calendar, my wife’s calendar and everyone in my company’s calendars (as needed).

I use MindNode Pro for Mind Mapping and create all of my spreadsheets and documents within Numbers and Pages, two applications that are part of Apple’s iWork productivity suite.

2. POMODORO TIMER – tool for focusing

3. iCAL (and GCAL) – main calendar tool – I input all my shedules here. If there are office/business related schedule I want published, I autosync it with GCAL.

4. EVERNOTE – repository of all things read over the net.

5. NOKIA 5800 – I know, I should’ve gotten an iPhone, but this has worked for me quite well over the years and I’m a traditionalist. I put all of my mobile reminders here. I turn all SMS into actionable items here. I make sure I clean out my inbox at the end of every day. I also save financial transactions over the phone and record in Moneydance later.

6. iSYNC – syncing tool between iCAL and NOKIA 5800.

7. RESCUE TIME – for tracking. GOALS section of Rescue Time also makes me more productive. It’s also my way of checking patterns of productivity and distractions–I do this analysis at the end of every month.

8. KLOK – time tracking tool. Tracks time spent on projects and clients.

9. MONEYDANCE – to keep track of my finances.

In addition to ToDoMatrix (which I’ve been using for over two years), I use:

- + RexDesktop (Online companion to ToDoMatrix)
- + Outlook (required at work)
- + Gmail (personal email, subscriptions, etc)
- + Google Reader
- + Delicious bookmarks (with a TAG called “inbox” … which is processed during weekly review.
- + OneNote

===

OneNote (2010) is THE centre for holding reference information. // However, any ‘reference info’ that I may need with me at all times (such as “shirt size”) is also kept in my “Checklist folder” in ToDoMatrix”

I really like it, and they are coming out with an iTouch/iPhone App. It also is much cheaper than some of the programs.

It is for mac, PC and various PDA’s (inc iPhone). I use PC and my trusty Handspring Visor PDA (circa 1999!).

This amazing app allows me to structure every single thing in my life from goals right down to smallest action in tree structure and assign places (in GTD speak “contexts”) to each action.
So when I am about to make calls, I get it to show me all actions that are calls etc.

By assigning importance at any point up and down the tree, I give it all the info it needs to prioritise the actions on a given context list.
Items at a given level can me mandated to “complete in order” or not, so it never shows me thing I can’t do yet.

Call a guy and he’s out all week ? Set the due date to next week and he disappears from your call list until next week.

Sync from PDA to office PC in the morning, sync back and carry it all home in the evening. Always have it with you in case.

GTD sounds like very hard work without a tool like this – I’m amazed anyone has the patience to do it on paper.

You would have to get the pro account but its worth it in spades. This is what I used to set everything up using tags and smartlists. Tailor to your own needs. RTM also integrates with Gcal which is fantastic.

Perfection

[Editor note: Dan did not mention it, but he is the developer of Gtdagenda. Reminder please to all developers who are using this post to promote your products–please let our GTD Times readers know if you are in some way involved with or could potentially profit from, the mention of your product. That way the readers know your intention in posting to GTD Times.

To all readers & commenters on this post, or anywhere on GTD Times–as you know, GTD® is “tool agnostic” and there are very few tools that we specifically endorse or profit from. Products listed here are not officially endorsed by or affiliated with the David Allen Company. They are suggestions from your fellow GTD enthusiasts in the community. Check them out and see if they work for you. Those that we do have a partnership with are listed here.

I wrote Breevy (http://www.16software.com/breevy/) which you might find useful. It’s basically like AutoText but you can use it anywhere. You define abbreviations and configure their corresponding replacement.

For example, perhaps you’d rather type ‘eml’ instead of your e-mail address. So then you’d tell Breevy that whenever you type ‘eml’ you want it to replace it with ‘myemailaddress@yahoo.com’, or whatever your email address is.

Then, whenever you type ‘eml’ in any app, Breevy will replace it with ‘myemailaddress@yahoo.com’ instantly. Same goes for any other abbreviation you configure to have replaced with something else.

You can download it here:

http://www.16software.com/breevy/

Project and action lists: OmniFocus! I started out with it when I learned GTD and I’ve never looked back… Use it on iPod touch as well.

Calendar: iCal + google calendar. Syncs to the iPod via calenGoo.

Project planning: Directly in OmniFocus if not too big. I add outlines in OmniOutliner, drawings, diagrams, charts in OmniGraffle or bigger project plans with OmniPlan.

Areas of Focus: OmniGraffle plan with lots of links and attachments and notes… love that app!

Brainstorming, mind mapping, creating at the higher horizons: OmniGraffle of course!

I’m using a freeware GTD app for windows called TimeGT, which is really good as well, but nowhere nearly as nice to use as The Hit List.

I also Love evernote for capturing all kinds of info and I use Feedly add-on for firefox as a feed reader, webpage saver.

Mindnode for mac was my favourite mindmapper and I’m still on the hunt for a Windows equavalent, but freemind is not too bad.

I customised the Tasks and now manage all my lists this way – it’s great for assigning tasks (waiting on) to the people who work for me. I can also print them out or acces them on my BB.

The best device I have is my A5 Filofax. No calendar, just lots of home printed GTD lists. Its with me in all my meetings and works well.

Still searching for a good mind mapping tool – ideally web based. Any ideas?

I made a list on my top 10 tools on my blog last year – http://www.phillipjenkins.co.uk/2009/12/10-top-productivity-tools/