What is the most frictionless system you've used?

René Lie said:
Have you tried Asana? It has some shortcomings, but I have learned to live with them. I'm all about making the best out of it, rather than trying something else, which is most likely to have some other things I wouldn't like...
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$10.99/month is too expensive for a personal todo list for myself.
 
Matt_M said:
I truly and deeply empathize with the OP. I have tried every GTD software application in existence (seriously, you name it and I have tried it) and they all have failed for a variety of reasons. Without going into a tremendously long story, I wound up on Emacs and created the ultimate GTD application on Emacs (no, it's not public ... yet?). It's all plain-text, which ultimately many people seem to also fall back on, as using databases, while nice, have a few inherent limitations: they are a binary format not easily changed, they require an application front-end to manipulate and interact with in any realistic fashion, and databases must have a rigid structure (i.e. a schema) that is tremendously difficult to change (without losing data) and therefore customize. They have a large number of benefits too but that is a whole other conversation.

In short, the reasons I chose Emacs came down to having complete control, and I do mean absolute, complete, unilateral control of every single aspect. Considering that it is already an x-plat software (i.e. works pretty much everywhere), it really makes the most sense. Couple that with the fact the Emacs' capabilities are/is the stuff of legend and the stability of Emacs as a piece of software (it has been in existence since 1975 and publicly since 1985 ... operating systems and tech companies don't even have that kind of heritage), there has been, and is, nothing else to challenge Emacs.

The single downside to Emacs is that it is not for the faint of heart when it comes to working with an old school "keyboard driven" application. Yes, you can use a mouse but Emacs is first-and-foremost a keyboard-centric application that demands users be not only touch typists but quite skilled with keyboard shortcuts and configuring everything. However, provided one does indeed master using a keyboard, they will experience truly boundless possibilities with Emacs.
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Love emacs and orgmode but left it because no good clients for iOS.
 
I have gotten into this bad habit a lot. I find that often when I go to switch systems it is not because I need a new system but because my system got sloppy or I got disengaged with it.

If you are on Mac I would suggest Omnifocus. It is great. The purest GTD implementation is facile things. Otherwise I like nirvanahq

But try to find a system and latch on to it, so much healthier that way!
 
Eric Wayte said:
I was an avid user of Todoist, making it to their Master karma level. However, they recently had some sync issues and I lost data. I am slowly migrating to OmniFocus as it has a web client that I can use on my Windows laptop at work while using the native OF apps on my Apple devices.
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Hi Eric, I tried todoist but never really stick to it. OF is great. If you'r on Mac also use the Mac version it is more powerfull than the web version which is " in improvement". Anyway OF4 will come when they will be ready. May be have a look at this A Look Ahead at 2023 for the Omni Group - The Omni Group Newsletter 2
 
apastuszak said:
I have this problem. I can't stick with a piece of software and tend to hop around a lot.

At work, I have no choice. I need to use Outlook and Microsoft Tasks, both which I absolutely hate.

At home, I have one requirement. The tool must not be tied to a platform. Up until last year, I had an iPhone and my laptop ran Linux. Now I'm all Apple, but I still use Linux occasionally. And even Windows sometimes. I like Apple's Reminders app, but it's very Apple specific. So, when I enter a task, I can't see that task on a WIndows or Linux PC without adding friction to the system.

Does anyone have a pretty frictionless solution that can work across Mac/Windows/Linux/iPhone/iPad/Android?
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Todoist works really well for me. All platforms and it has a template for the GTD Weekly Review. https://todoist.com/downloads
 
apastuszak said:
At home, I have one requirement. The tool must not be tied to a platform.
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Obsidian is a general purpose tool and framework onwhich you can hang just about any form of filing and task mangement you want to do. But it's big advantge, works well on all platforms (iOS, Android, Mac, Linux and even Windows)

You may need to play with some of the plug-ins to get it working for you but in the end it's plain text markdown and very flexible.

My must have plug-in additions
Kanban
Dataview
Periodic Notes
Calendar
Hotkeys ++
Pandoc
Readwise Official
Tasks
Templater
Tag Wrangler

edited days later to fix typos :sigh:
 
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apastuszak said:
Everdo seems pretty pricey. Need to pay $80/year for the desktop app. And another $40/year for the iOS app.
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I don’t believe that’s accurate. I paid about $80 for a lifetime license, including iOS and Windows desktop versions (and all the other platforms available) plus a relatively small recurring fee for sync service. The $40 in-app purchase on iOS will buy an isolated iOS license (but not any other platforms), but again it’s a lifetime license.
 
apastuszak said:
Does anyone have a pretty frictionless solution that can work across Mac/Windows/Linux/iPhone/iPad/Android?
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It's kinda hard to tell you what's "frictionless," because what cause me to experience friction might not cause it for you and vice versa. I can say that most of the major cloud-based solutions have iPhone, iPad and Android apps. And since you can access them on a browser, it wouldn't matter whether you're on a Mac, Windows or Linux desktop.
 
mcogilvie said:
But I think friction is inherent in what we want our systems to do for us.
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Yeah. Another way to put it is: it's totally subjective. I know, for example, you prefer a solution to offer an iPhone app with support for share sheets. That's not as important to me. Is there really a right or wrong answer? If lack of share sheets causes you to experience friction, who am I to tell you you're not?

Well, actually, there is a way to know objectively. It is once again time for me to challenge anyone who disagrees with me about GTD apps to a match in the GTD Jell-O Wrestling Pit. It's the only way to resolve this.
 
bcmyers2112 said:
It's kinda hard to tell you what's "frictionless," because what cause me to experience friction might not cause it for you and vice versa. I can say that most of the major cloud-based solutions have iPhone, iPad and Android apps. And since you can access them on a browser, it wouldn't matter whether you're on a Mac, Windows or Linux desktop.
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These were some of my criteria for choosing my system - in addition to picking one that there is a GTD setup guide for!
 
Hi,

For me the definitely best softwares for managing tasks for GTD are the ones wich are inspired by Things.
They are extremely simple and easy to use. Only the few features you need in a clean and simple interface.
I've started with Things (Apple only) then moved to NirvanaHQ (Apple, iOS, PC, Android) many years ago. (5 years with things, 10 with Nirvanahq)

So you can take a look to this softwares depending on your preferences :

Only Apple : https://culturedcode.com/things/
Apple + PC + Android : https://www.nirvanahq.com/
If you prefer to store your datas yourself (like in the Obsidian phylosophy) : https://everdo.net/

Comment about Obsidian :
I use it for knowledge management. (ZettleKasten) It is an amazing software for what it was made for (PKM). But it was not made for task management.
So for sure you can use it for task management, but you will end up with some friction. (lot of copy / paste, custom scripting, lack of functionnality like tasks drag and drop, alerts, inbox by mail, usefull shortcuts, ...)

You can take a look at my own "frictionless" system here. The article is in french but there is a schematic where you may understand the use of each software : https://yanncharlou.fr/2022-07-15-mon-organisation/
 
I have this problem. I can't stick with a piece of software and tend to hop around a lot.
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Your problem is that you do this, not that your software isn't the perfect one.

Stop spending time polishing your tools, and start using them for Getting Things Done instead.

On a side note, Apple reminders is available at icloud.com for all platforms with a browser.
 
YannCharlou said:
lot of copy / paste
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I use templater to handle that, No copy past at all in my normal operations
YannCharlou said:
custom scripting
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OTOH that gives you ultimate flexibility. FWIW I have several "dashboards" with different queries. All simple and all provide plenty of ways to slice and dice my projects and actions. None took more than a few minutes to set up after about 30 minutes of learning how to do it.

YannCharlou said:
lack of functionnality like tasks drag and drop, alerts, inbox by mail,
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Those are all things that CAUSE friction for me. If I can drag and drop tasks I tend to and then things get confused, me especially. Alerts are absolutely my kryptonite. I can't stand them in any software I have to use regularly. I have all alerts and notifications turned off. They are a distraction that keeps me from getting useful and important things done. I want to be in total control of when I choose to interact with my technology helpers and notifications and alerts are undermine that. No software package has evenr handled my needs when trying to predict when an alert or notification will actually help rather than just distract.
YannCharlou said:
inbox by mail
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What do you mean by that? I don't understand.

YannCharlou said:
usefull shortcuts
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I have several useful shortcuts I use, most common are using appropriate templates for notes that will become either projects or project support. Because Obsidian is all plain files it's also easy to script all sorts of automations and shortcuts to do specific things. I don't have a huge need for that but am starting to expand and add ones I find useful

Again, what you see as friction in Obsidian I see as freeing because I don't need or want many of those things. For me they are the source of friction.
 
Any list manager should do the job, I had the same problem as you -- there were lots of frictions. I realized it's not the list itself, but the project planning and reference I had problems with.

Lately I have found that Notion is the best tool to organize projects simply because you can dump everything in a sub-page and link any two pages easily. It helps me focus on the project and related information, planning out the required actions/milestones. Then I *copy* the next action to Microsoft To Do. (!) It seems doing double entry is counterproductive at first, but because now the project is in one place, I actually have a clearer head. Also it's very easy to link back to the project from tasks with the page's unique URL.

My MS-To Do is set up the standard GTD way -- contexts + waiting for. On iPhone MS-To Do is sync'd with Apple Reminders automatically.
The project list is in my Notion. One simple table called ProjectsDB. A project is a page. I paste links to customers (also a Notion page), Dropbox links, files, images, Google Map, other projects etc. into the project page. Then I write the outcome on top of the page.

This setup should work on Linux too.
 
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