[pmwiki-users] Ideas for PIM, GTD (Getting Things Done)

Ben Wilson dausha at gmail.com
Tue Mar 6 15:30:35 CST 2007


For those who want the PmWiki markup of a summary of GTD:

http://dausha.net/Productivity/GettingThingsDone?action=source
http://dausha.net/Productivity/GettingThingsDone

You may also consider checking out the fan site dedicated to GTD.

http://www.43folders.com/

I personally use one of the simple todo recipes to keep track of some
things on a "desktop" group on one of my private web sites that runs
PmWiki; although I am turning more paper-based.

Ben

On 3/6/07, Sandy <sandy at onebit.ca> wrote:
> Several here have expressed an interest in using PmWiki for
> work-life-time management.
>
> Check out http://www.dogmelon.com.au/ns/GTD.shtml
>
> The page talks about using David Allen's Getting Things Done system on
> a wiki. (Specifically NoteStudio, which, unlike PmWiki, runs on a Palm
> and hotsynchs to the main computer.)
>
> In short, and translated to PmWiki:
>
> Groups are:
>
> - Homepage.
> - Contexts. More details later.
> - Projects.
> - Calendar.
> - Due. aka Tickler. Possibly combined with Calendar.
> - Reference, Archives, all the other usual stuff.
>
> The system makes extensive use of (:pagelist link= :)
>
> All the notes for a project go on a page in Projects. Project is very
> broad. It can be an accumulation of little things, or a
> big project. The key thing is that everything you need to do gets into
> the wiki, no matter how big or small.
>
>
> Each project gets at least one Next Action (NA). To be an NA, the action
> must be doable. Getting the car serviced is a project, telephoning the
> garage is an action. Reading the odometer so you don't feel like an
> idiot when the service rep asks for it is the NA. Every project gets an
> NA, otherwise you'll never be reminded to work on it.
>
> "Wait" is a valid NA. Often these NAs will also have a Due.abc link, so
> you don't wait too long.
>
> Some people have an additional group called Someday/Maybe, to collect
> things you don't want to call projects but may want to work on.
>
> Each NA gets a Context, which is where you are when you can do it.
> Assign contexts by adding a link beside the NA. So, assuming you have
> the odometer reading, your NA is:
> Call garage. [Context.Phone].
>
> Only assign contexts to NAs; no sense reminding yourself to do step two
> if you haven't done step one.
>
> The main page has (:pagelist link=Context.*:). Now you have a single
> page showing all the things you have to do, sorted by where you can do
> them, and without all the actions that you can't do just yet. And you
> don't have to manually maintain a list of phone calls to make.
>
> Beautiful, isn't it? (Yep, the Context group is a lot like the Category
> group.)
>
> Calendar. If you need one. PmCalendar works. Or just a page listing
> appointments. I'd (:include:) the current day (week?) on the site
> homepage, I'm sure there's a way to do it.
>
> Due. This one is a bit trickier. Decide up front how finely you want to
> divide things. For each action with a deadline, add a link to Due.Date
> (or Due.Month, or Due.Hour). Then on Due.HomePage (or Main.HomePage) put
> (:pagelist link=Due.* order=#title :)
>
> As with Calendar, I'm sure there's a way to include the next week's
> worth of Due on the Main.HomePage.
>
> I wonder if you can add (:pagelist link=Due.ThisDay:) to each entry in
> the display-by-month?
>
> You might not want to bother distinguishing between Due and Calendar.
> Depending on your schedule, you might not even need a proper month view.
> Just use (:pagelist link=Due.* order=#title :).
>
> No more flipping back and forth between calendar and project page while
> planning, just stay on the project page and add a link to Due.Date. Then
> go to Due.HomePage to see the schedule for all your projects combined.
>
> Note: The GTD system does not assign times to things unless absolutely
> necessary. It uses Contexts, which are more flexible. It reminds you to
> make the call while the computer's down but your phone's still working,
> even if you hadn't planned on doing it for another few days.
>
> I remember talk about adding a feature to (:pagelist:) to include a
> few words on either side of the link. This would save having to look up
> each link for more details.
>
> References, Archives, Diary -- all the usual suspects. Wikis are
> searchable. All the pagelist commands above can include or exclude these
> groups.
>
> You can probably do most of this by searching for keywords. I like using
> backlinks because it's more forgiving of typos. If you misspell
> [C.Telephone], you'll still see it in the list of all pages linking to
> members of C.*, but if you'll never find it if you search for "Telephone".
>
> +++++
>
> The GTD refresher
> http://www.dogmelon.com.au/ns/GTD.shtml
> is well worth reading for philosophy and examples. (I still prefer
> Covey's system for deciding what you to do, but GTD is better for
> actually getting those things done.)
>
> The rest of the stuff on the page, about how to use a wiki for GTD, is
> movies. Skip the one about customizing it, and have something else to do
> while the rest play. (I hate tutorial movies of any type, except cooking
> shows.) They use the first letter of the page name where I've used
> groups; the wiki they use doesn't have groups.
>
> The templates they talk about are here:
> http://www.dogmelon.com.au/ns/Resource%20-%20Downloads.shtml
> They're in XML format; lots of codes to wade through to see the actual
> content. Each XML file is a book. You can run the demo of NoteStudio
> without a Palm if you want to read the full GTD manual.
>
> If PmWiki ran on the Palm and hotsynched to the desktop, wow!
>
> Cheers!
>
> Sandy
>
-- 
Ben Wilson
"Words are the only thing which will last forever" --- Churchill



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