At my first job out of college in 1985 I worked for a unknown, unsuccessful mainframe company. I started a TODO.TXT file when I arrived; when I left a year later I put my TODO.TXT (along with ADDRESS.TXT, DATES.TXT) on a 5.25" floppy and took it with me to the next company, and the next, and the next. I didn't buy my own computer until 1997, and those files finally made it to a machine I own and control. Those files have been in continuous use for 39 years. TODO.TXT's icon is the upper left icon on my desktop and I view and edit it multiple times a day.<p>I now have 46 .txt files for managing things, where each one pertains to some particular topic: food, music, travel, a website, etc. All are listed in my main TODO.TXT and since I use vim, I can just move the cursor on top of any of the files and type "gf" to jump to that other file. When I'm done, I hit Ctrl-O to jump back to the original file. It is hypertext without the html.
I use a similar system, but I duplicate and rename the file at the start of each day. Then I remove stuff that got done the previous day. Or stuff that is old and not relevant anymore.<p>The system has evolved over the years. The greatest thing about it is how flexible it is. When faced with new requirements (new projects, job change, etc) I can just start taking notes in a different way and see if it sticks.<p>I also commit it to git every 30 minutes using a cron script. Its awesome.
I'm doing something similar with Obsidian daily notes[^1]. I also have a weekly note that I use to plan the next week.<p>Similar to how the author talks about scheduling their next day the evening before, I've started planning the big tasks for next on Friday afternoon, as this gives me momentum on Monday morning.<p>Related: I've found the 3/3/3 technique from Oliver Burkeman[^2] and the concept of open and closed lists to be a great complement for this type of organization. It hits the sweet-spot of flexibility and consistency for me.<p>[^1]: <a href="https://help.obsidian.md/Plugins/Daily+notes" rel="nofollow">https://help.obsidian.md/Plugins/Daily+notes</a><p>[^2]: <a href="https://ckarchive.com/b/e5uph7hx43mn" rel="nofollow">https://ckarchive.com/b/e5uph7hx43mn</a>
> Every night before I go to bed, I take all the items on my calendar for the next day and append it to the end of the text file as a daily todo list, so I know exactly what I'm doing when I wake up. T<p>This is a key win. Most of the rest he describes is support (also cruicial). But setting up your day the night before is amazingly powerful. Many of the things I plan for the day I actually schedule into my calendar (12:30-13:00 read and respond to those three unanswered messages from Jane).
I used to use a .txt file like this for over 10 years that I edited with Vim and could also edit on my phone using Dropbox. And then I used the Mac Notes app and realized the search, sync, autosave experience, and other properties made Notes way more useful for me.<p>Similarly, for over 10 years I used to compile my CV with LaTeX using a fancy template I designed, until I realized the time it took to edit it was just not worth it. So I pasted it into a Google Docs file with Arial font and just text bullet points and no rich text features. My life became way easier and my CV looks way less annoying.<p>(This may be irrelevant to the original post but) I found that a lot of the optimizations I thought were good for me were stemming from an unnecessary attachment to a minimalist technical aesthetic.
I tend to format my plaintext notes as markdown to add a <i>small</i> amount of organization. I also have some light folder/file organization to break things into categories/topics/days, depending on what it is. That gives me a nice clean slate to work from each day, but lets me pick up where I left off on more long-term stuff. Finally, I push it all to a private Github repo so I can get to my notes easily from wherever I am.<p>Overall this system works for me for several reasons. First, I hate pretty much every note taking app out there. Second, I like having control over my files. Most importantly, though, I don't actually <i>need</i> to write notes all that often, and this way of doing things is convenient. When my brain is so crowded I need to overflow some thoughts or tasks for the day/week somewhere, this system is there. When I'm managing it all in my head just fine, I don't have to worry about keeping notes up to date, and I can count on my own system not to send me a push notification bugging me about it.
I've had pretty decent luck with `todo.txt` style tracking, but also tend to run into issues with tasks or notes "going stale" so came up with this system. `today` basically opens `~/Desktop/$YYYY_MM_DD-todo.txt`, but it'll start you off with a copy of the most recent (previous) file.<p>This lets me have "durable" files (I can grep for pretty much anything and get a date-specific hit for it, similar to doing a `git log -S`), and also lets me declare "task-bankruptcy" without any worry (I can always "rewind" to any particular point in time).<p>The addition of `report` (aka: `diff $YESTERDAY $TODAY`) is helpful to see what I've added/removed. Yeah, there's better ways to do things, but the degenerate simplicity of `open ~/Desktop/todo.txt` is fantastic. Having the equivalent of `open ~/Desktop/$TODAY.txt` (with no ceremony) has been very valuable to me!<p><pre><code> $ cat ~/bin/today
#!/bin/bash
TODO_HOME="$HOME/Desktop"
TODAY="$( date "+%Y-%m-%d" )"
TODAY_FILE="$TODO_HOME/todo-$TODAY-todo.txt"
PREVIOUS_FILE="$( ~/bin/previous )"
if [[ ! -f "$TODAY_FILE" ]]; then
cp "$PREVIOUS_FILE" "$TODAY_FILE"
fi
report "$TODAY_FILE"
printf "Press Enter to Continue, Ctrl-C to exit." && read -r PROMPT
open "$TODAY_FILE"
echo "$TODAY"
$ cat ~/bin/previous
#!/bin/bash
TODO_HOME="$HOME/Desktop/"
TODAYS_DATE="$( date "+%Y-%m-%d" )"
MOST_RECENT="$( ls "$TODO_HOME"/todo-*-todo.txt | sed 's/^.*todo-//g' | sed 's/-todo.txt//g' ; echo "$TODAYS_DATE" | sort )"
PREVIOUS="$( echo "$MOST_RECENT" | awk -- "BEGIN { YET=0 } /^$TODAYS_DATE/ { YET=1 } { if ( !YET ) PREV=\$0 } END { print( PREV ) }" )"
PREVIOUS_FILE="$( echo "$TODO_HOME/todo-$PREVIOUS-todo.txt" )"
echo "$( realpath "$PREVIOUS_FILE" )"
$ cat ~/bin/report
#!/bin/bash
TODO_HOME="$HOME/Desktop"
TODAY_FILE="$TODO_HOME/todo-$( date "+%Y-%m-%d" )-todo.txt"
PREVIOUS_FILE="$( ~/bin/previous )"
echo "${PREVIOUS_FILE}...${TODAY_FILE}"
diff -U0 "$PREVIOUS_FILE" "$TODAY_FILE" | grep -v ^@@</code></pre>
I've been using what is essentially a single sticky note (Raycast floating notes feature) for a year now and it works great. I put todos, meeting notes, ideas, and everything else in there with zero organization. When I want to remember stuff I read it. When I finish stuff I delete it. Has worked for me better than Notion, Obsidian, Reminders, Tick Tick, etc.<p>I've found that for productivity tools, there is an inverse correlation between time it takes to setup and how effective it is.
Personally, I feel that Todoist[1] has revolutionized how well I can track things. You can use it exactly like a text file, where each line / task is tracked individually. I'll often add tasks for my current day (that will fail over to tomorrow if I don't get to them). However it's real strength (compared to a text file) is in its features for repeating periodic tasks. Other products I've used struggle with irregular timing structures, but todoist simply understood (for example) "the first monday of every month" for street sweeping.<p>I still keep daily notes at times and track what I'm doing in other spots, but getting used to using Todoist to help me do periodic tasks at the proper rate has been one of the only productivity tools that felt like they "really worked." I pay for the app because not doing so would feel ungrateful, but I don't really use any of their premium features. The base app is more than good enough in my view.<p>[1] <a href="https://todoist.com/features" rel="nofollow">https://todoist.com/features</a>
I'm also using Obsidian daily notes, with all un-actioned items shown on a page with a dataview API[^1]:<p><pre><code> ```dataview
TASK FROM "VaultName/Journal" WHERE !completed
```
</code></pre>
Since at least 2012 I've also been using a text file format from <a href="http://todotxt.org/" rel="nofollow">http://todotxt.org/</a> and more recently I wrote a program that takes a crontab-like list[^2] to pre-generate entries on a daily, by-day-name (every Sunday for example), and I also pull in a list of holidays from gov.uk, so they are also populated.<p>[^1]: <a href="https://github.com/blacksmithgu/obsidian-dataview">https://github.com/blacksmithgu/obsidian-dataview</a><p>[^2]: <a href="https://github.com/alister/alister-tools/blob/main/.todo.crontab.sample">https://github.com/alister/alister-tools/blob/main/.todo.cro...</a>
I've arrived at something similar after going through a lot of different solutions: Evernote, Quiver notes, Apple Notes, Logseq, Tana: now I just keep everything in one big Journal.md file in Obsidian. I added a datestamp shortcut that inserts the date as a title in "2024 February 19 (Mon)" format, and get to writing. I use subheadings sometimes if I'm writing a lot on a particular day and it gets messy, but most days it's just a hodge podge of everything, and that's fine.<p>It works. A big issue with computer notetaking software, I've realized, is that I was spending too much time trying to figure out where to put things: what note should this be connected to, which folder should this be in, etc. Dumping everything into a single document, under today's date, gets rid of that. The other issue this solved was that I never looked back at what I'd written previously: opening a bunch of files was too tedious to ever do unless I was explicitly looking for something. With this, I can just scroll down and see what I was doing last week, immediately.
My productivity app is just todo.txt in one drive using <i>specificaly</i> notepad.exe.<p>You put .LOG at the top of the new file with a return. Save and close the file.<p>Every time you reopen the file, the timestamp is append to the file. Add your notes, save, exit notepad. Open it again when you need to update, rinse and repeat.<p>Nothing I’ve ever tried has been more effective than just keeping this endless file.
Everything old is new again:<p>John Carmack's .plan¹:<p><a href="https://garbagecollected.org/2017/10/24/the-carmack-plan/" rel="nofollow">https://garbagecollected.org/2017/10/24/the-carmack-plan/</a><p>Archive:<p><a href="https://github.com/ESWAT/john-carmack-plan-archive">https://github.com/ESWAT/john-carmack-plan-archive</a><p>¹ <a href="https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc742" rel="nofollow">https://www.rfc-editor.org/rfc/rfc742</a>
This matches my experience. Its all about ingestion speed. Ingestion of the thoughts in my head, that is. Most note taking systems require you to structure it. That’s basically the whole point. I find that this just gets in the way. I just need a sort of working-memory dump.<p>I have a note directory with a root level markdown file which I use for general stuff which i dont use much. I also have folders for each task # with a similar sort of markdown file. And sometimes (rarely) other useful assets.
I love the idea of using plain text files for note taking and task tracking. As others have commented on specific tools and workflows that make this easy for them to stick with, I thought I'd add mine. I use textnote [0], which is a tool I built for exactly this workflow but is hopefully flexible enough to accommodate many of the similar processes mentioned here. It simply opens a plain text file in your terminal and provides lightweight tooling for tracking by date and rolling up previous notes into archives if desired.<p>Thanks for opening another great discussion of plain text note taking as a productivity tool!<p>[0] <a href="https://github.com/dkaslovsky/textnote">https://github.com/dkaslovsky/textnote</a>
I don't know how to articulate it, but I could never do anything like this.<p>The ability to organize one's life like this is so foreign to me, it's almost like he's describing what it's like to be an octopus.<p>I think it may be my emotional state that I can't manage. There is absolutely no way, I could decide what I'd be doing the next day every night. The thing is my state of mind would prevent me from doing half the tasks in the list. So shit would just pile up in that text file, making me every day more nervous about things.<p>For what it's worth, I think I am more "normal" than the person who wrote that piece. So that's a consolation...
OP uses their calendar as a supplement for their the todo file. There is a lot of functionality implied in that decision:<p>- calendars have mobile apps which enable quick and precise entry<p>- calendars understand time spans<p>- calendars have many options to display events<p>- calendars have cloud syncing<p>- calendars are backed by a queryable data store<p>Not saying using a text file is good or bad, but I think a more accurate title would be “my productivity app is a never ending txt file and a calendar app”
I am using a similar structure a single text file usually split by each day, which also gives a good start to writing my standup notes.<p>I tried to avoid bringing in some strange formatting rules etc, quite free form. With a single file, it's effortless to go back and find out maybe why something was done in that way or why it wasn't done at all.<p>Looks kind of like a work diary to me, I have seen people trying to do a similar thing by bringing too much structure/org modes etc and making it so complicated that they forgot at first why they are doing it.<p>KISS
Previous:
My productivity app for the past 12 years has been a single .txt file (2020) (December 23, 2021 — 523 points, 202 comments)<p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29661167">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29661167</a>
I've been using chat apps "send to self" for this exact same workflow.. at work I just use Slack as it supports threads and basic formatting (e.g. render code blocks separately and clickable links). So every day has a few threads on different things I'm working on and I can just add notes on them as I go throughout the day. For my own projects I use a messenger app, which is not as nice because most messengers do not support threads. I was actually considering switching to an external text file for versioning purposes.. and being able to render code blocks would be nice, org mode looks like overkill though.
I have been using Apple Notes which is great because I can read/write in the moment on a Mac, on iPad, on iPhone, and everything is (almost always) synced and stored in the cloud. I have been doing one note per day.<p>On the other hand, PTF (Pity The Fool) who tries to export these notes. I know some people have written exporters but of course, whenever Apple decides to change format, PTF.<p>I would like to change to a more portable format, e.g. markdown, but I am looking for a solution that syncs nicely across devices. Maybe iaWriter. Maybe just sublime text or even emacs and just put everything in a dropbox folder.
Going on 5+ years using a single giant org file. It's the only system I've ever been able to stick with for more than a couple days.<p>I think of it as my labbook.
I actually sent this to my friend as he always thought I'm crazy for doing this. Mine one is a bit simpler though, just a big .txt file with TODO and DONE sections. Some of TODOs just have dates next to them if they're urgent, otherwise it's just it's just a simple list.<p>That being said, I do use my calendar-equivalent app on my phone for very time-sensitive stuff, just in case.
I also use plain text files for a lot of my personal organization. My system isn't quite like what OP describes, but it has some things in common. Some of my files are also structured by date as a never-ending journal. This isn't for a todo list, it's for a journal of things I encounter that I'd like to be able to find again and that I don't want to accumulate as clutter elsewhere...i.e. in browser tabs, etc. Sometimes it's a web link, or maybe something I learned somewhere, something someone told me, etc. I include notes whatever words / strings I think I might use if I want to find this particular thing later. I use org mode and make each date be a top-level bullet so I can nicely leverage powerful text search tools like ripgrep, regular expressions, etc.<p>I don't find it useful to force everything into a single file. Instead, I'll organize these text files somewhere inside a directory structure that I can recursively grep. Unlike the OP I do use mutable TODO lists to track high level lists of things that I want to continue to spend mental energy on, but I do like the chronological list of done things and I might think about adding something like that or maybe augmenting the chronological notes file I already have.<p>I do depart from the world of plain text for keeping track of larger amounts of information such as good papers I encounter, complete blog posts that I might want to refer back to, etc. For this I use the fantastic DEVONthink tool. It's got a large array of powerful features including automatic OCR and indexing of images and an excellent search feature, but the one that I use the most is its ability to make a "web archive" from a link. This downloads all of a web page's resources and stores them in the database locally, making it really easy to refer back to things that I've seen before regardless of whether I have internet access or not, whether the website is still around, etc.
Same. Ever since I had my proprietary rich text note taking application/database corrupt and become inaccessible in the early 2000s I've used a single notes.txt file with filepaths for noting images and other rich media. It is super simple to search within; everything is in one place. And it'll never become corrupted or inaccessible.
Lists in text files work great. So unbelievably great.<p>I go back to them often, and some things can outgrow them completely when you want to:<p>- Reduce the work between my list and collaborating with others (a shared list)
- First class convenient experience on all my devices is useful - Notes synced automatically can go a long way.
- When projects grow, and there's more details to manage, along with updates, than not.<p>Has anyone used the text file appoach that can be compatible with LogSeq/Obsidian?<p>I'm not sure why, but this time using mainly LogSeq has clicked. I do run it inside of an Obsidian Vault just in case... but haven't used Obsidian much. I really like the feel of per line item like a text file that logseq provides. There are tradeoffs too though.<p>I think I might be enjoying it because it's plaintext, with a little bit more metadata, when/if I want it.<p>The hashtags I invent that only I know are almost an unfair advantage for pulling up all the meetings with a person, or a topic, etc.
Did the exact same thing, sublime shortcut to add a datetime stamp (Python command) whenever I needed it. Moved to Obsidian recently and the daily note takes care of that. The folder system helps a bit with organizing recurring themes that the daily log journal didn't.<p>Edit: Reading the comments. Wow Uncanny so many people doing something similar
I am drawn to the idea of keeping todo lists, but it seems like whenever I start to do it, I begin to feel stressed out or overwhelmed. Not so much by the contents of the list, but by maintaining a list in and of itself. Kind of like an obsessive type of problem. Does anyone else feel this way?
It's something I also tried to do for a while, just by using VSCode and a bunch of text files. I really like the lightweight-ness of just being able to edit as if it's text, but wanted to have for tasks what VSCode has for code: command palettes, "syntax highlighting", jump to "references" (like dates) and an editor which understands structure (like an outliner, but without all the awkward text selection issues).<p>Anyway all of that led us to try and build a dedicated "IDE", but for tasks/notes and multiplayer support
[1]. Hopefully it's going to be useful for others working from their todo.txt/thoughts.txt!<p>[1] <a href="https://thymer.com" rel="nofollow">https://thymer.com</a>
> So my daily routine looks like<p>> [...]<p>> 5. copy the next day's calendar items to the bottom of the text file<p>Interesting. For a file with 51,690 lines at the time this post was created, I'm curious why the file is not ordered with the most recent day at the top of the file.
Reminds me of Heynote, posted to HN recently[0].<p>In general I think this approach of "super easy capture into an append-only log" is great, especially if it can be paired with features to enable editing/re-discovery/search/synthesizing old ideas together, which exist in a <i>separate</i> view/mode from the "just get something down as fast as possible" mode. Working on something like this, but just in nights/weekends free time with other obligations, so it's been slow going.<p>[0] <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38733968">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38733968</a>
I have a TODO.txt and it’s the only productivity system that I’ve ever been able to stick with. Just a list of stuff I need to do, what’s done gets moved down or deleted. Maybe there’s value in having an archive (a DONE.txt?) but I’ve found that after a while most notes/items lose the context and often it’s hard to decipher what they were about.<p>One thing I haven’t figured out yet: I’d love to be able to keep this file open at all time, have it pop up with a hotkey. Currently it’s just a TextMate window that I often close by accident.
I mostly do this, but with a physical notebook. I wouldn’t be able to work with a .txt file because it’s too limiting: you can’t draw anything, you can’t easily make arrows between stuff, you don’t have the nice mental reward when you strike some item off your list.<p>This is for the day-to-day organization. For the rest, I dump all my knowledge in a wiki (MediaWiki), and I use iOS/macOS’ Reminders app to remember things to do far in the future (like "cancel XYZ subscription" in 6 months) or at very specific times.
Old man checking in. I use the TOPS Steno Pad and PaperMate Gel Ink pens. Light weight, damage resistant, and no power required.<p>Still works a treat. There's something about writing information down on paper that makes it store in my memory differently. I read volumes of digital text on my monitor every day, but I write very little into the steno book, so almost everything I write gets stored very deeply in my memory and is very easy to recall even when I don't have the original.
I ended up at the same point after a lot of trying and failing but wanted a _few_ extra features than notepad offers. It's also important to me to be able to take notes in a browser.<p>I do use logseq/obsidian in my better moments, but having another faster system is so helpful for a number of reasons.<p>I have been building my own text bookmarklet[0] that I use for this.<p>[0]: <a href="https://github.com/pwillia7/Text_Bookmarklet">https://github.com/pwillia7/Text_Bookmarklet</a>
To be honest, that's why apple notes really is great. I have the same, but apple notes manages to save my mess on all my devices without ever overwriting my own changes.
My todo.txt is more of a digital whiteboard, a temporary summary. Once the day or task is done, the text is wiped. (That's not to say I don't document things - only that I don't use my todo.txt as long-term record-keeping)<p>The concept (along with sentiments such as <a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39434558">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39434558</a>, where the mundane inefficiency of having to access the todo.txt window every time is the annoyance) makes me think that a wall-mounted screen dedicated to displaying the list may be an improvement for some people. Alternatively a multi-monitor setup where one (perhaps smaller) screen is permanently dedicated to the list.<p>After all, back in the old days when people did literally do all this with physical black/whiteboards and similar, you didn't have to "pull up the whiteboard" every time you wanted to look at it - you just turned your head a little, or shifted your gaze. In that particular sense, having to open or pull up a file every time is a regression, an added inefficiency.
I used to track every project in its own text file. Every task and a description was in this file. It was great, but got a bit messy. So now I use EasyOrg [1] where I also track each project's todos in its own text file, but now with time scheduling, search by time, links to other tasks in the file etc.<p>[1] <a href="https://easyorgmode.com" rel="nofollow">https://easyorgmode.com</a>
I use the notes app on my phone and I'm also split between two calendar apps and three email accounts, none of which integrate well with each other.<p>It's a real dog's breakfast of a system and while I forget few things, I procrastinate many of them because the act of even trying to track what's done vs outstanding is very taxing.<p>ahh well, c'est la vie
I've tried various note taking / organising strategies in the past and nothing compares to pen and paper for me.<p>I used to go through a lot of notepads as "scratch" work and would also lose things that I would like to look back on.
So for the past few months I've been using a rocketbook. I have a special format for weekly todo / done tasks, a kind of daily log format, pages for meeting notes, and then scratch pages for rough notes etc.<p>I usually upload the weekly / daily / meeting stuff or research stuff I may want to keep. Rocketbook ocrs the page and uses anything with ##s as a title so I can find stuff quickly. I have set up different Dropbox folders for different categories of notes.<p>It's been working quite well for me.<p>Some things like documention, or draft documentation etc. I do store in markdown text files, and sync between my devices with syncthing. On my phone I used termux and vim for editing them, which works surprisingly well.
Looks like markwhen[0]. When making it, which initially started out as a strictly timeline-making tool, I realized it is essentially a log or journal language - write a date, any date, and add some stuff to it. Good for notes, blogging, a calendar, etc etc.<p>[0] <a href="https://markwhen.com" rel="nofollow">https://markwhen.com</a>
I also use a simple text file, but for sake of context switching - I have one file for one topic - account x has a file, account y has a file, topic z has a file and everything related to it goes in. This is all now curated in my Obsidian vault that is synced via the fantastic Git plugin.
Jarring that the author doesn’t use 24:00 time notation.<p><pre><code> 3:45pm meet with Oprah
4pm Rihanna talk
15:45 meet with Oprah
16:00 Rihanna talk
</code></pre>
Monospace typeface keeps it tidy and the timestamps pop in a visual scan. Zero AM/PM ambiguity.
I use the same system but with highlighting/formatting of <a href="https://xit.jotaen.net" rel="nofollow">https://xit.jotaen.net</a><p>I even learned how to create a plugin for the IntelliJ IDEA and created one for highlighting this format (love idea hotkeys and workflow).
I didn't see anyone mention Markdeep [0] yet.<p>I started with a notes.txt file for the system I maintain. I found myself gradually adopting Markdown syntax because I need bulleted lists and headings to separate different sections. I also needed hyperlinks to documentation or StackOverflow answers.<p>So one day I just added the Markdeep tags to the bottom of the file and renamed it to notes.md.html<p>I still keep it open in a text editor for day to day use, but it looks really nice when you open it in a browser.<p>[0]: <a href="https://casual-effects.com/markdeep/" rel="nofollow">https://casual-effects.com/markdeep/</a>
the checkout fallacy:<p>waiting in line compresses your perception of time. when your items are being rung up, and it's time to pay, your perception of time dilates.<p>i pay cash mostly. if i don't organize my change at the register, i have to do it later, which i'm less likely to do since others behind me are waiting, causing my next transaction to take longer.<p>i don't want to hold up the line, but i'm largely unaware of the time it took those ahead of me to accomplish the same task i'm sweating through and doing poorly.<p>what i'm attempting to propose via analogy, is that systems are only as effective as the amount of time you put in. if social pressure causes me to toss everything back into my pocket haphazardly, it takes me more time in the future to use those things.<p>i used a straight text file with my own format while i had my own business. it worked. i'm not a dev anymore, i'm a musician and booker. if i don't amend my calendar or text file or handwritten notebook in the moment? i'm toast.<p>the fallacy is thinking one system is better when any system that's not updated fails
Mine is: Orgzly Reloaded syncing to a webdav share, which is mounted at ~/Org so it can be opened by Emacs.<p>For shared shopping lists, my wife and I use the OurGroceries Android app and website. It's simple and just works.
Same. I saw a very productive friend just build a list like this:<p><pre><code> - Thing to do
- Subtask before that can be done
- Another level deeper
- Another task
</code></pre>
And he just deleted things from the list when done. I adopted it and quite like it. I've tried keeping it in git, using some tool, etc. but in the end the Notes app on Mac with the same format helped because I dislike the strike-through stuff. It just occupies cognitive space. Just deleting feels better.<p>Notes.app is nice as well because if I have it on a hot corner I can access it easily.
This is how I run all my one-on-ones, just an append only list where every meeting just gets appended on top of another with a date. If there are kaban tasks/external documents/etc that are relevant they still get linked into this page. It very amazing to see what we're working on now, a week ago, a month ago, etc. And as a collaborative free-form document it gives both the manager and their report the ability to craft a story of what's happening (and check in on progress in a way that dashboards fail to represent correctly!).
This little nugget at the end is the key of all of this, to me:<p>> It does mean sometimes I miss some questions or don't pursue an interesting research question, but helps me maintain a manageable workload.<p>It's easy to get hyped up by modern productivity software, sort, categorize, and prioritize everything, only to end up creating way more work than you will ever be able to do.<p>Keeping things simple (eg using a TODO.txt file) is one easy way to help prevent putting too much on your plate.
I use <a href="https://joplinapp.org" rel="nofollow">https://joplinapp.org</a> because it allows for pasting images and files.<p>Supports markdown.<p>Has easy sync and also mobile and desktop apps.<p>Free and open source.
I do the same grouped by week with some personal markup like:<p><pre><code> FEB 18
- todo
x done
! important
? optional
FEB 11
- todo
x done
! important
? optional</code></pre>
I started doing this for work after reading this here 2 years ago. It’s been helpful, but I haven’t made it a consistent habit to check the night before. I don’t access the todo list from home (partially due to barriers inherent in my work’s IT dept and also of my own making). I also keep it pretty limited to my work and don’t let my other hobbies/projects/family onto it too much. It’s been a good record and reference for things!
VSCode and Markdown go a long way for me because it allows for index linking and some other nifty tricks. The main challenge is making sure the md files are organized.
I use my own messageboard: <a href="https://willashani.com/gigabots/threads" rel="nofollow">https://willashani.com/gigabots/threads</a> Feel free to post! And I use Apple Notes. I like the messageboard because you can see the relationships in a tree-based structure. I store techy things in the messageboard above. I store non-techy things in Notes or when I am in a hurry and its not high priority.
Original EverNote (v 2.0, first public version) was built on that idea - endless tape of notes : <a href="https://notes.sciter.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/evernote2.png" rel="nofollow">https://notes.sciter.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/evernote...</a><p>Plain text is OK, or Markdown as poor man WYSIWYG for that matter, but at least images should be there too.
I have a similar system, I have the latest 3 + active in one org buffer and the rest in separate files. Mostly use org mode for expanding headers. Super fast search for anything is the killer feature.<p><a href="https://people.iola.dk/arj/2024/01/02/a-work-diary/" rel="nofollow">https://people.iola.dk/arj/2024/01/02/a-work-diary/</a>
There's a virtue in being able to take this and plug it into a large-enough-context-windowed ChatGPT to be able to search/converse with.<p>Makes me think that the real play is to use ChatGPT for, say, an ongoing todo list/dialog/personal notes system for that purpose. Or wire up a custom GPT to reference notes stored elsewhere.<p>Either way, the idea that you can interrogate, intelligently, a list of your own ramblings, is pretty damn cool.
This illustrates well that you don't need another productivity app - you just need a basic tool and discipline.<p>This also generalizes to other domains.
About a month ago I made a chrome extension that adds a "sometime this week" todo list at the bottom of google calendar (a feature I copied from Hey calendar). Any items that don't get done roll over to the next week and I can go back to previous weeks to see what I got done. Super helpful to help plan out my week that way and integrated directly into my calendar.
Interesting. I've been using Things (similar to Apple Reminders) for 10+ years, which I thought was really minimal, but a .txt is about as barebones as you can get. Makes me want to give it a whirl. Curious about the use of Remote Desktop with a mobile device. Being an iPhone user, I'd prefer putting it in iCloud Drive or something more easily accessible natively.
I just read two posts, same topic, same day, same first name. Fun!<p>Yesterday, Jeff Geerling explained his .txt file TODO list:
<a href="https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2024/my-todo-list-txt-file-on-desktop" rel="nofollow">https://www.jeffgeerling.com/blog/2024/my-todo-list-txt-file...</a>
Obligatory reference to Emacs Org-Mode [1].<p>Author's approach is basically Org-Mode with fewer helpers.<p>Org-mode's power is that, at core, it's just a text file, with gradual augmentation.<p>Then again, Org-Mode is a tool you must install, accessible through a limited list of clients (Emacs originally, but also VSCode), and the power of OP's approach is that <i>it requires no external tools</i>.<p>[1] <a href="https://orgmode.org" rel="nofollow">https://orgmode.org</a>
I feel like this post gets posted to HN every few months.<p>Not as frequently as that, but a bit:<p><a href="https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=productivity%20.txt&sort=byPopularity&type=story" rel="nofollow">https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que...</a>
This is basically this auto focus system I was introduced to. I use Google Sheets so I can have a few columns. I can print it out if needed, and easily accessible on my phone and desktop.<p><a href="http://markforster.squarespace.com/autofocus-system" rel="nofollow">http://markforster.squarespace.com/autofocus-system</a>
I ended up using plain text files because it's the most efficient editing experience with my editor.<p>Although I have multiple files for different things: work reminders, abstract ideas, bookmarks, etc.<p>For time sensitive events I use stock calendar app on my phone because it's the only thing I need notifications for (except email).
Yeah, I use a similar text file journaling system to this and have for years. Let's me know what I need to work on every day, let's me know exactly where I left of debugging, etc, makes status reports a snap, and makes figuring out what I did all year at review time simple.<p>Would recommend.
I made a Node CLI that captures everything in a flat JSON file:<p><a href="https://github.com/ErikAugust/todo/blob/main/applications/cli/README.md">https://github.com/ErikAugust/todo/blob/main/applications/cl...</a>
Archy had everything in one file too, for similar reasons to the ones expressed in FTA:<p><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archy_(software)" rel="nofollow">https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Archy_(software)</a>
I also use a single text file, but it's Markdown. And I wrote a CLI application to help me maintain it -<a href="https://www.hackberry.dev/alas/" rel="nofollow">https://www.hackberry.dev/alas/</a>.
there's a much better way providing simplicity with full data ownership and real tasks out of the box in daily documents <a href="https://acreom.com" rel="nofollow">https://acreom.com</a>
Glad to know I'm not the only madman using a slew of text files to dump their thoughts into. My kids will surely think I was a crazy person if they ever stumble on them after I pass.
> My daily workload is completely under my control the night before<p>This being the key for such a system to work.<p>Preparing a todo list the day before would be mostly pointless for people who have to deal with interrupts and such.
Considering the size of LLM token contexts now, this has become easily parseable. It would be trivial to set up a GPT that has all historic notes ever, making them easily queryable.<p>Neat.
My obsidian already got out of hand. I switched to asana for business todo but it also got out of hand. I still create txt files occasionally. I think it is inevitable.
This really is the way. Just one long append-only dump of all pertinent information. It’s the perfect complement to what’s in my head because I know where everything is!
I tried doing it this way. While it sounds nice, and apparently works for some people, my biggest problem was stuff getting buried hundreds of lines into the file. I couldn't trust it to remind me of anything beyond the few items at the top of the file. Another problem was having everything as a big blob of text mixed together, unless you take on some overhead when entering things (put them in the right place) or during the day (moving things around).<p>If this appeals to you, I'd recommend using a big html file with Javascript to query the things you want to see, using class names as tags. A good text editor will have snippet support, and you can just dump any new items at the top of the file as they come in. If you want to get fancy, you can write in markdown and convert to html on the fly.
I just use a weekly planner. I have a nice one without pre-printed dates made by Moleskein.<p>I find the act of writing things down with a pen helps me remember them better as well.
This looks like a bullet journal (with the transfers to next day & from calendar), but without the journal. I, too, find the approach very natural.
I use a format[1] that's _slightly_ more structured, in that files are divided into explicit entries with headers to indicate whatever metadata I want, and I also use this same format for storing other information (metadata about my music[2], workshop projects, orders, whatever).<p>Other than that, same, bro.<p>[1] <a href="https://github.com/TOGoS/TEF">https://github.com/TOGoS/TEF</a><p>[2] <a href="https://www.nuke24.net/music/music.txt" rel="nofollow">https://www.nuke24.net/music/music.txt</a>
same, I use TextEdit specifically because its seemingly the only gui text editor left on MacOS that isnt online<p>sometimes I use notes, for the syncing, but then I regret it