Using GTD on Mac AND PC (Outlook) any suggestions?

K

KenL321

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I am new to GTD community and am now implimenting GTD. I live with Outlook, on desktop when in home office and on my PDA when away. I just got a Mac, and would like GTD to be part of that system. Have a MobileMe account. Looking for a simple way to impliement GTD in Outlook and also have it available on the Mac laptop (when I travel). There seems to be a lot of SW out there, but haven't found the fit. Any ideas?

Ken L
 
Hi Ken,

There are some great apps available for Windows, and some great apps for OSX. Cross-platform, now, that's a different story. The only one I know of is ThinkingRock. Otherwise, webbased apps would seem to be the way to go, but then you forego the power of desktop apps.

As for getting just your mail to sync between computers: make sure you use the IMAP protocol rather than POP3. POP3 is meant to download your mail to the computer you happen to be using; with IMAP the mail remains on the server, accessible and editable from multiple computers with multiple applications (such as Outlook on the one and Apple Mail on the other). It does mean you need more space on the server, however. Your internet provider might not offer that much space, but others do. Contact me if you want to know more.

This (oldish) thread on Lifehacker might be of some help, too.
 
bertplat;64418 said:
There are some great apps available for Windows, and some great apps for OSX. Cross-platform, now, that's a different story. The only one I know of is ThinkingRock. Otherwise, webbased apps would seem to be the way to go, but then you forego the power of desktop apps.

As for getting just your mail to sync between computers: make sure you use the IMAP protocol rather than POP3.
Click to expand...

I'd echo Ken's comment on IMAP. That should let you keep the email on the server and both computers.

One cross platform app you should consider is Lifebalance (http://www.llamagraphics.com). I was a long time user on the PC and the palm. When I moved to the Mac, I moved completely, so I have not tested it's cross platform ease of use.

- Don
 
dschaffner;64420 said:
I'd echo Ken's comment on IMAP. That should let you keep the email on the server and both computers.

One cross platform app you should consider is Lifebalance (http://www.llamagraphics.com). I was a long time user on the PC and the palm. When I moved to the Mac, I moved completely, so I have not tested it's cross platform ease of use.

- Don
Click to expand...

I'm using LifeBalance on Mac and Palm and synching. Had a few issues getting set up but it's working fine now.

Question on the e-mail suggestion, am I the only one who absolutely does not trust the whole concept of cloud computing and web apps? I find so many suggested apps now are predicated on leaving your stuff out on some server somewhere. I am just not comfortable with that at all, and wondering why everyone seems to ignore the security and privacy concerns that type of system has.
 
Oogiem;64428 said:
Question on the e-mail suggestion, am I the only one who absolutely does not trust the whole concept of cloud computing and web apps? I find so many suggested apps now are predicated on leaving your stuff out on some server somewhere. I am just not comfortable with that at all, and wondering why everyone seems to ignore the security and privacy concerns that type of system has.
Click to expand...

Good point. Certainly something to think about.

Personally, I use a 3rd party mail provider, with an Australian outfit called Fastmail.fm, to host my mail. They do mail, and they do it very well. They've been in the business for a long time, and I trust them to take care of the security of my mail storage. As for privacy, mail inherently isn't very private, unless you do end-to-end encryption, so no matter there.

That said, the IMAP protocol doesn't require your data to be only on the server. In fact, if my internet connection is unavailable, I can still access all the old mail in Apple Mail; Outlook and Thunderbird can work the same way. If setup correctly, IMAP simply syncronizes what's on the server with what's stored locally, and vice versa. This means my view on my mailbox is the same no matter if I access it from fastmail's web interface, my iPhone, or either of my two macs.

I use a similar solution for data storage, with Amazon S3 and JungleDisk, with local file encryption. In short, I don't rely on 'the cloud' for essential stuff: it's stored locally, then replicated using the web. If the web isn't available, it might not get replicated but it's still available on one of my machines.

The only exception is Evernote, which I use to sync fairly trivial lists to and from my iPhone. Their TOS states they have a right to everything you store on there.
 
Oogiem;64428 said:
am I the only one who absolutely does not trust the whole concept of cloud computing and web apps?
Click to expand...

I don't trust cloud computing... not because of privacy concerns, but because I want to have access to my system when the internet is down.

- Don
 
dschaffner;64438 said:
I don't trust cloud computing... not because of privacy concerns, but because I want to have access to my system when the internet is down.
Click to expand...

... which is why I'm using the cloud as a sync + backup tool, rather than the only place to work.

:-)
 
rememberthemilk.com

I am a completely similar situation.

I have a PC at work, a MAC at home and an iPhone. I have MobileMe as well. I tried a web based app called rememberthemilk.com. I can access it at work, home and there is an app for the iPhone that syncs with the web app.

I have only been using it for a few days, but so far has been going well. I went to a GTD seminar last week and this was recommended to me there.

You might want to give it a shot. You can pay for it eventually, however, I would start with the free version and see how you like it.

I hope that helps.
 
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