Moving tasks to the night before can support this early-morning writing by freeing up more time. The more I can do the night before, the less I need to do the morning after - and it pays off even when the exchange isn't 1:1. For example, moving the half-hour I used to spend cooking steel-cut oats for breakfast from morning to evening means that I spend just a few minutes heating up a breakfast with much more texture than instant oatmeal. I packed my lunch last night, so I just need to grab it from the fridge and head out the door. I checked my purse for my keys and badge, too. Doing these little things the night before helps me streamline my morning routine.

What else can I do to free up time? I might try watering the plants in the late afternoon or try outlining in the evenings. OpenLoops has good tips for making the most of these early morning hours, and I'm sure I'll discover more along the way.

I'd also like to look into freeing up weekend time. I used to save laundry loads and library runs for the weekend, but if I can use my weekday evenings to take care of these things, then that frees up a larger block of uninterrupted time.

I told him that David Allen's book on Getting Things Done is popular among geeks who deal with frequent interruptions. The key ideas that help are to write down all the tasks in a trusted system, and not to switch tasks unless it's really urgent and important.

He's also checking out LeechBlock, a Firefox extension that makes it just a bit easier to focus on your real work instead of going to your favorite time-wasting sites. =)

How I get books:

I still read lots of books. I usually order books from the Toronto Public Library system or pull them off the library shelves when I go on a library run, but sometimes I'll pick up books from the bookstore or order them online. I occasionally get book recommendations from other people, too.

I tend to read in sprints, focusing on a single subject. I'm currently revisiting personal finance, and I've read about comics and graphic novels, sketching, storytelling, writing, leadership, time management, Javascript, CSS, relationships, communication, management, consulting, entrepreneurship, photography, cooking, presentation skills, education, reading, economics, parenting (yes, I read my mom's parenting books when she was raising me - made for an interesting childhood!), social networking, quarter-life crises, career planning, learning, creativity, self-defense, exercise, romances (particularly classic Regency ones) gardening, and other topics that slip my mind at the moment. Reading in sprints allows me to get through books quickly (few non-fiction books are packed with new ideas) and see the interconnections between ideas in books. Sometimes I'll go for variety when I'm raiding the library shelves.

This is a pattern of reading that practically requires a well-stocked public library, as there's no way I'm going to spend all that money doing a reading sprint by buying books from Chapters or Amazon. I'd be limited by my book budget and I'd end up with too many books full of too much filler. Using the public library allows me to get value from books I might not ordinarily buy and books that are mostly fluff except for one or two good insights. (Or books that have one good idea and just keep hammering it in.)

How I read books

While I'll slow down and enjoy a dense, well-written book, most books are worth cursory scans. Sometimes I'll look at the table of contents to get the lay of the land. Other times, I'll just plunge right into it, skimming the book for good quotes, interesting insights, or good explanations.

I read books on the subway, over breakfast or dinner, while walking (except across intersections), on evenings and weekends, and whenever I can steal a moment. I try to always have a book or two in my bag.

How I take notes

The first step is to mark the passages I want to keep. I don't like writing in books (and absolutely abhor the idea of writing in a library book!), so I have to keep track of the passages I want to put into my book notes system. I must confess that I've resorted to dogearing pages. Post-It flags feel wasteful and torn slips of paper are inconvenient. I'd be happy to switch to a better method for remembering pages if it was something I could do while walking around (rules out scanning text with a digitizing pen) and it allowed me to keep track of any number of pages (rules out bookmarks, unless I carry a whole stack of them).

After I've gone through a book once, it's time to put the passages into my book notes system. If I have time, I use Dragon NaturallySpeaking to dictate the book details, page numbers, and relevant passages to my computer. It's fun, it reinforces my memory, and it helps me train the speech recognition engine. If I'm pressed for time, I scan the relevant pages, then and use Tesseract Optical Character Recognition to convert the scans into text.

I currently keep my book notes in a large text file with a little markup to make it easier for Emacs to display it as an outline. (Hooray org-mode!) Each book is an outline item, and each quotation starts with the page number. I also add my own notes.

How I review my books

The human brain is good at associative memory. When a conversation topic reminds me of something I'd read, I can usually come up with a few titles or keywords from the quotations. My book notes allow me to send not only the book details but also the relevant quote, which helps other non-bookwormish people zero in on the part they might want to check out. So far, my text file has been working well.

I occasionally review my book notes by flipping through my book notes on the computer or on my Nintendo DS, jumping to a random note, or searching for certain keywords. I also reread particularly good books to see if I'll get even more insight this time around. This helps me keep the content fresh, and it also prompts me to think about who I know would benefit from the book I'm reviewing.

How I can make this system better

I think I'll start using LibraryThing to keep track of the books I've read. This allows me to take advantage of social recommendations. I used to use Amazon for that, but it's also nice to run into fellow bookworms with similar interests and to see what else they're reading.

It might be good to capture diagrams neatly. I've got the scanner, so I just need to work out a good image storage thing.

I want to be able to link related quotations and books with each other. Blog posts would be a good way to do that. I just need to make sure I save my post locally, too.

I need to think about which new books are worth acquiring. =) There are a few presentation-related books I'm going to order (Back of the Napkin, Presentation Zen, Slideology).

Every three minutes, a little dialog pops up on my laptop and reminds me to stretch and refocus my eyes for ten seconds. Every hour, the same program reminds me to take a two and a half minute break—and even helpfully suggests some exercises I can do. I usually ignore those suggestions in favor of quick chores (a sink of dishes, a stack of clothes) that get me out of my chair and doing something just as productive.

I came across Workrave (workrave.org) while looking for a time-out software for my work laptop. I had tried a break reminder tool on Mac OS X before, and I remembered liking it even though it always managed to catch me mid-keystroke. Workrave was highly recommended and ran on Microsoft Windows, GNU/Linux, and BSDs (probably including Mac OS X), so I tried it out.

I found that the frequent breaks help me stay focused and active throughout the day. The breaks not only give me a chance to stretch and rest my eyes, but also helped me remember to stay on task by helping me catch myself when I found myself getting distracted. The breaks help me remember to check posture, too. It's easy to slip into a slouch while working. If you look around an office, I'm sure you'll see lots of people hunched over their computers. When I don't take the time to stretch and sit up straight, I find myself tired and sore in the evenings. When I do, I feel more upbeat. Simple decision, eh?

I also use the breaks as an opportunity to remember to drink more water. This is something I tend to forget during particularly intense programming or writing sprints. A few years ago, I collapsed due to dehydration, and I was taken to the emergency room. I had simply forgotten to drink water in addition to what I took in at meals. Since then, I've been a lot more careful about water intake. I find that I do better when I have at least a glass and preferably a pitcher of water close at hand. When Workrave reminds me to take a break, I sip some water too. When it's time to take a longer break, I get some more water and take care of other matters along the way.

It's strange, but slowing down helps you get further. Break reminding software is Good Stuff, and I strongly recommend that you try out something like Workrave. Time Out for Mac OS X looks pretty good, too. Whatever it is, try it and see if it works for you. Tell me what you think of these breaks, and share your tips!

(Want more ideas for slowing down and working smarter? Grab this book at your library: Cool Down: Getting Further by Going Slower)

On Technorati: productivity, software

Random Emacs symbol: backward-up-list - Command: Move backward out of one level of parentheses.

Fortunately, Planner makes it easy for me to do really detailed time-tracking. When I mark a task as in progress, the clock starts ticking. When I postpone or close a task, the system clocks out automatically.

I find that my attention occasionally strays. Sometime ago, I wrote a function to help me keep track of what I'm supposed to be doing. Today, I've decided to try estimating task completion times for more of the tasks on my list. I modified my old function to tell me how much time has elapsed since I started the task. This doesn't take into account previous clock-in/clock-outs, but it will do for now.

We'll see how well it works. =)

;; I've bound sacha/planner-what-am-i-supposed-to-be-doing to F9 F11. I
;; start out by clocking into the task (use planner-timeclock.el and
;; C-c TAB to mark a task as in progress). Then, when I find myself
;; getting distracted, I hit F9 F9 to see my current task in the
;; minibuffer. C-u F9 F9 jumps back to the task so that I can either
;; mark it as postponed. M-x planner-task-pending (bound to C-c C-p in
;; my local config) and M-x planner-task-done (C-c C-x) both clock out
;; of the task. If I want to jump back to the previous window
;; configuration from that planner page, I can just hit F9 F9 again.

(defvar sacha/window-register "w"
  "Register for jumping back and forth between planner and wherever I am.")
(defvar sacha/planner-current-task nil
  "Current task info.")
(defadvice planner-task-in-progress (after sacha activate)
  "Keep track of the task info."
  (setq sacha/planner-current-task (planner-current-task-info)))

(defun sacha/planner-what-am-i-supposed-to-be-doing (&optional prefix)
  "Make it easy to keep track of what I'm supposed to be working on.
If PREFIX is non-nil, jump to the current task, else display it
in a message. If called from the plan page, jump back to whatever
I was looking at."
  (interactive "P")
  (if planner-timeclock-current-task
      (if (string= (planner-task-page sacha/planner-current-task)
                   (planner-page-name))
          (jump-to-register sacha/window-register)
        (if (null prefix)
            (message "%s %s"
                     ;; Minutes so far
                     (timeclock-seconds-to-string (timeclock-last-period))
                     planner-timeclock-current-task)
          (frame-configuration-to-register sacha/window-register)
          (planner-find-file (planner-task-page sacha/planner-current-task))
          (planner-find-task sacha/planner-current-task)))
    (if prefix
        (planner-goto-today)
      (message "No current task. HEY!"))))

On Technorati: emacs, pimpmyemacs, planner, productivity

Random Emacs symbol: cal-tex-mouse-filofax-week - Command: Two page Filofax calendar for week indicated by cursor. (Hey, I didn't know we could print Filofax calendars from Emacs cal...)

• If I drop an action item made of glass, something gets broken. It has a guaranteed negative outcome not to do it.
• If I drop and action item made of metal, nothing gets broken — but there will be plenty of noise and maybe even a dent claimed.
• If I drop an action item made of rubber, it will will probably bounce either back to the tasker or to the right person. This is probabaly an action item that is either silly or not my role.

Mondays are the best days to deal with "glass" things, he says, and people should minimize the number of glass things they're juggling at a time.

Come to think of it, my life is like that. It's not just a matter of keeping all of the balls in the air, satisfying all the responsibilities - there's never going to be enough time for that! I have to think about which responsibilities I don't really need to take on, things that can bounce to someone else...

On Technorati: productivity, lifehack

• Munch on things regularly to keep a good sugar level. I brought plenty of apples and bananas, and I've been raiding the bread and crackers.
• Drink plenty of water. This also forces me to get a bit of exercise. I find I get very thirsty when I think... <laugh>
• Set my computer to force a 5- to 10-minute break every hour. Microbreaks (15 seconds every ten minutes) are also useful. I don't find myself losing track of ideas, and I can stay on track better when I know regular breaks are coming up.

On Technorati: productivity, lifehacks

Random Japanese sentence: 雨が土砂降りに振りはじめた。 It began to rain cats and dogs.

• Read genehack's review
• Check out the book

On Technorati: productivity, books

On Technorati: writing, productivity

(Sneak preview of m-ph entry for tomorrow)

"I've found the perfect PDA," I gushed. My friends perked up. Knowing how much of a geek I am, anything I was that crazy about was bound to be interesting. They leaned over and watched as I reached into my bag and brought out...

... my Hipster PDA.

"SACHA?!"

One of the hottest topics in the productivity blogosphere right now is the Hipster PDA, a surprisingly effective low-tech way to organize your life. Grab a pack of 3"x5" index cards and a fold-back clip and you're set to go!

What's so cool about the Hipster PDA?

• Gets rid of worries. You don't have to worry about running out of battery during a critical meeting. You can drop it and it will still work. Even if you dunk it in water, you'll still be able to recover your data.
• Grows along with you. Don't be constrained by software or hardware limitations! You can easily experiment with different ways of planning, and you can expand your Hipster PDA's memory simply by buying another pack of index cards at your nearest bookstore.
• Helps you stay focused. The Hipster PDA helps you stay focused and on-track by not supporting addictive games like Tradewinds. To help you pass the time, the Hipster PDA comes with a few built-in two-player games like Tic-tac-toe and Hangman.
• Organizes real-life data. Receipts? Business cards? Movie tickets? No problem! Just tuck them into the fold-back clip and process them when you get home.
• Beams anything to anyone. You can easily "beam" information to other people—just scribble a note and give it to them. 3x5 index cards don't crumple easily and can easily be shared with other people no matter what mobile device they use.

Here's what you can do with your own Hipster PDA:

• Get a good pen or mechanical pencil. Keep it with your Hipster PDA at all times.
• Write down one task per index card. You can write down subtasks and notes there as well. Rip up the task card up after completing the task for a satisfying finish.
• Alternatively, divide your tasks into projects and write down your tasks. Check the tasks off as you finish them.
• Scribble notes and ideas down on index cards.
• Write down a month calendar so that you can easily see when you have appointments.
• Print important contact information on an index card. You can probably fit 50 names and phone numbers. Good backup if your phone is out of battery or gets lost.
• Print birthdays on an index card, sorted by month and day.
• Label your Hipster PDA with your contact information just in case it gets lost. (name, phone number, e-mail address)
• Clip a cheap pen to your Hipster PDA for people who borrow pens. Never lend your good pen.
• Keep newly-written cards in an "inbox" section (front or back) so that you can process them when you get home.

For more information, check out the following links:
43 Folders: Introducing the Hipster PDA
Technorati: Hipster PDA

Check back on Wednesday for tips on making the most of your Hipster PDA!

そのデザイン・ハウスにとって、コンピュータ製造にさらに急進的な色彩を導入することは適切な戦略であった。 For this design house it was an appropriate strategy to introduce even more radical colors into computer production.

On Technorati: productivity, organizer, hipster, hipsterpda, planning

Today I bought two small plastic cases.

[Plastic cases]

A good size for scrapbook material: photos, receipts, tickets... No more digging around in my bag for things to scrapbook!

(Hmm. Thinking about it now, I could have also survived with a Ziplock(tm) packet.)

Okay. Maybe I can store art materials in it. Or cards. Yeah, it's a good size for stationery. That's it.

(You know you have it bad when you think of reasons _after_ you buy the thing...)

On my way out of the school supplies stand, I found my fingers inexplicably rifling through the notebooks on display. I picked up a Stradmore notebook composed of eight thin notebooks held together with pins. Here's the side view:

Side view of notebook

A light bulb went off in my head. This is perfect for journal-writing! I can keep a journal along with my work notes (eliminating the need for a separate album) and then simply re-file them. If I use a mini-notebook for letters to Dominique, I can mail the whole mini-notebook to him when I'm done.

I had a hard time deciding between a small notebook that could fit in my purse and a medium-size notebook that gave me more room to write, but I eventually decided on the medium-size notebook.

Why?

Because it had "girl" written all over it.

Really.

Notebook

Of course, _after_ I bought it, I reasoned that larger mini-notebooks would be more efficient to store and mail. (Right.)

家にはパソコンが５台あるが、内２台は役立っていない。 It is not useful though there are five personal computers in the house.

On Technorati: organizer, productivity

What does it mean to be more productive? I love reading about productivity tools and tips. I could spend hours just going through the discussions at http://www.43folders.com . However, all of this has to translate into concrete benefits. How can I improve my productivity? Improvements include:

• Keeping better track of tasks
• Keeping my goals firmly in mind
• Making it easier for me to work on something than to procrastinate
• Finding ways to see the big picture

Why do I want to be more productive? Well, I've got my Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals:

• Get people hooked on computing by offering highly individualized, experiential learning characterized not only by strong technical content but also excellent delivery.
• Help people totally rock through personal information management. I want to listen to people describe how they plan and how they want to plan, and I want to help them figure out how to support those methods through software or whatever.

With my BHAGs firmly in mind and a critical approach to trying out new tools, I've found that I can successfully resist the urge to migrate everything to the whizzy new PIM app of the day. This is important; otherwise I'd spend forever playing around with this stuff. I still love finding out how other people are doing things, though! =)

今日この番組でハッカーの問題をクローズアップするんだって。 This program is going to focus on computer hacking issues today.

On Technorati: productivity, plans

GTD Tiddly Wiki is a GettingThingsDone adaptation of JeremyRuston's Open Source TiddlyWiki. The purpose of GTD Tiddly Wiki is to give users a single repository for their GTD lists and support materials so they can create/edit lists, and then print directly to 3x5 cards for use with the HipsterPDA.

http://shared.snapgrid.com/gtd_tiddlywiki.html

No kidding. I wonder what we should do to get Planner to support 3x5 index cards sanely...

E-Mail from Miguel Javier

彼女は娘にパソコンを買ってやった。 She got her daughter a personal computer.

On Technorati: wiki, gtd, hipster, hipsterpda, productivity, organizer

You might also want to subscribe to 43folders if you aren't reading that yet. Really nifty.

And if you're having a hard time keeping on top of all of these blogs, I highly recommend Bloglines! It's an RSS aggregator that makes it easy for you to subscribe to many sites and view all of the new entries on one page.

I love reading people's reflections on how they plan their day and how they organize their information. Have any other blogs to recommend?

彼女はコンピューター・プログラマーではないのですか。 Isn't she a computer programmer?

On Technorati: productivity, blogs

He uses colored notecards to separate his notes into categories.

Yellow	schedule & project cards
Red	todo cards (or just stuff I should copy to planner-mode)
Blue	idea cards
Green	expenses (writing down stuff to copy to my ledger file later)

He also uses cards that are lined on just one side. On the lined side of schedule & project cards, he writes down:

Photography

Mon	5/9	Lab
Wed	5/11	Critique of Assignment II & I (pics don't have to be dry - must by Wednesday)
Mon	5/16	Field trip
.	.	Assignment #2 dry-mounted

On the back, he keeps a TODO list. When a task needs to be done multiple times—for example, preparing a print of a picture—he adds extra checkboxes before the task.

I think he writes down non-project-related TODOs and random notes on red cards, which are easy to pick out in the pack. Right now, I jumble them all together on white index cards. I'll try keeping the front half of the deck for tasks and the back half for notes.

Green cards help him keep track of his expenses. I keep receipts in front of my index cards using the handy fold-back clip, although an organized table view would be pretty cool.

I don't know where he managed to find lined-on-one-side 3x5 colored index cards. I guess bookstores in other countries are better stocked. On the other hand, I found 3x5 organizer refills, so I'm not absolutely deprived.

He was bemused by my mention of "two pages of month templates from a 3x5 day planner". If you crack open a pack of 3x5 organizer refills, you'll get year, month, and day views. Normally a single month would span two pages, but if you're using a planner where month views haven't been labeled "January", "February"—in short, blank ones—then you can use one page to represent one month. If you don't have organizer refills handy, simply print the numbers 1 to 15 down one side of an index card and 16 to 31 on the other. Leave space at the top for the month name, and space beside the numbers for appointments.

He also had this interesting anecdote to relate about a friend's way of planning.

"Oh, I gave up keeping track of to do lists," she sighed. "These days I just write everything on my mirror with a dry-erase marker, so when I groggily stumble into my bathroom in the morning I go, 'OH SHIT! I HAVE *THAT* TO DO TODAY!'"

I should do that with a random Japanese quote of the day. I'll write it down the day before, then groggily try to read it in the morning. Or I can scribble my Big, Hairy, Audacious Goals (superb teaching and quality assurance for computer science education, and strategy coaching for life planning (must find better way to summarize these things!)) on my ceiling at home. Ooooh. My ceiling is low enough for me to do that...

Check out Christopher Allan Webber's website at http://dustycloud.org/ . =)

I love swapping ideas with people, so feel free to send in more suggestions!

コンピューターは単なる計算機だと考えられている。 Computers are thought of as mere calculating machines.

On Technorati: planning, productivity, hipster, hipsterpda, organizer

My Hipster PDA is composed of:

• a colored index card with my contact information
• my inbox: cards with notes on them that haven't been entered into the computer
• two pages of month templates from a 3x5 day planner
• a year calendar for 2005 and 2006
• my archive: index cards that have already been entered but might still be useful
• a colored index card with yellow sticky notes
• a stack of blank index cards
• a fold-back clip holding all of these things together
• a black signpen or a mechanical pencil tucked into the fold-back clip

One of the things I've found much easier to do with my 3x5 pack of cards than with a PDA or a Franklin-Covey planner is to keep track of get-togethers. When my friends and I schedule our next get-together, I lay the month templates out so that I can see the next 30 days at a glance. This is difficult to do with a PDA because PDA screens are small. A Franklin-Covey planner would probably be more organized, but I like being able to lay things out side-by-side instead of flipping through pages.

When I need to jot something down, I flip the deck and write on the last card. After I finish one side of the card, I turn it over, clip it, and write on the other side. When the whole card is full, I move it into my inbox.

Index cards are handy because it's easy to give information away to other people. Paper gets crumpled and business cards can disappear into the chaos of a purse or a bag. An index card is big and bright. I'm thinking of replacing half of my white cards with brightly-colored cards so that people can easily find information I give them.

I'm planning to do other things with my pack of 3x5 index cards. For example, I can write my projects on the cards. Reviewing these cards will reinforce these goals in my mind and remind me to keep making progress.

Index cards totally rock.

新しいコンピューターは旧型よりも１０倍速い。 The new computer is ten times as fast as the old one.

On Technorati: productivity, planning, hipster, hipsterpda, organizer

HEY. This might actually work. Here's a quick test of tags:

Use C-o to add a "tags" field to your BBDB records. This should be a space-delimited list of tags (case-sensitive for now). Call M-x sacha/planner-bbdb-insert-tags-alist to produce a list like the one above.

(defun sacha/bbdb-get-tags (record)
  "Return the tags for RECORD as a list."
  (let ((tags (bbdb-record-getprop record 'tags)))
    (when tags (split-string tags))))

(defun sacha/bbdb-test-tags (query tags)
  "Return non-nil if QUERY is a subset of TAGS."
  (let ((result t))
    (while (and result query)
      (unless (member (car query) tags)
        (setq result nil))
      (setq query (cdr query)))
    result))

(defun sacha/bbdb-search-tags-internal (records tags)
  "Return a list of RECORDS matching TAGS."
  (when (stringp tags) (setq tags (split-string tags)))
  (let (result)
    (while records
      (when (sacha/bbdb-test-tags tags
                                  (sacha/bbdb-get-tags (car records)))
        (setq result (cons (car records) result)))
      (setq records (cdr records)))
    result))

(defun sacha/bbdb-search-tags (tags)
  "Display all the records that match TAGS."
  (interactive "MTags: ")
  (bbdb-display-records (sacha/bbdb-search-tags-internal (bbdb-records) tags)))

(defun sacha/planner-bbdb-link (record)
  "Return a link to RECORD."
  (or (bbdb-record-getprop record 'plan)
      ;; From a BBDB entry with a plan page; use that. Yay!
      (concat "[[bbdb://"
              (emacs-wiki-replace-regexp-in-string
               " " "."
               (bbdb-record-name record))
              "][" (bbdb-record-name record)
              "]]")))

(defun sacha/bbdb-get-tags-index ()
  "Return a list of tags and records."
  (let ((tags-alist '())
        (records (bbdb-records))
        tags
        entry
        list
        link)
    (while records
      (setq tags (sacha/bbdb-get-tags (car records)))
      (while tags
        (setq entry (assoc (car tags) tags-alist))
        (setq list (cdr entry))
        (add-to-list 'list (car records))
        (if entry
            (setcdr entry list)
          (add-to-list 'tags-alist (cons (car tags) list)))
        (setq tags (cdr tags)))
      (setq records (cdr records)))
    tags-alist))

(defun sacha/planner-bbdb-insert-tags-alist (&optional tag-alist)
  "Insert TAG-ALIST into the current buffer."
  (interactive)
  (unless tag-alist (setq tag-alist (sacha/bbdb-get-tags-index)))
  (insert (mapconcat
           (lambda (item)
             (concat (car item) " | "
                     (mapconcat
                      'sacha/planner-bbdb-link
                      (cdr item)
                      ",")))
           tag-alist
           "\n")))

To think that only took me an hour of leisurely coding (including tagging my contact information)...

昨年度のコンピューターからの利益は、今年度分よりも１０％近く多かった。 Profit on computers for the previous year was nearly ten percent higher than the current year.

On Technorati: emacs, productivity, organizer

One way is to call people up or write them a friendly note every so often. I find this difficult to do because I'm still not used to small talk. I'm also not used to being interrupted for a purely social call unless it's someone I know well. I'm much more comfortable dealing with information. I want to be useful.

First, I need to keep track of people's interests. When I run across something that might be useful for them, I can send them the information. If I also keep track of other little facts I know about people, then I can make them feel a little more special.

Second, I should regularly refresh my contacts. I should make sure I keep in touch with people. Maybe I should set goals for how often I should get in touch with different kinds of people. There are people I don't expect further contact with, there are people I should write at least once a year, and there are people I'd like to correspond with more frequently.

The next step would be to proactively search for useful information. If I periodically read about other people's interests, I will not only learn many new things and gain more common ground with them, but might also find resources they haven't run across before.

WHAT I CURRENTLY HAVE:

I already keep notes on people in my BBDB (Big Brother Database, Emacs). BBDB makes it easy for me to associate notes with e-mail. Whenever I read a message from someone in my address book, the BBDB record pops up and I can review or add notes easily.

However, I don't regularly review these contacts or make a conscious effort to stay in touch with a wide range of people. I tend to react instead of act, and I'd like to change that.

WHAT I'D LIKE TO HAVE:

I would like to be able to see my contacts grouped by relative frequency. This would allow me to flip through, say, all the people I have yet to contact this year, and randomly pick people to get in touch with. I need to also keep track of our last few communications, in terms of both when I got in touch with that person and when I got a reply.

I would like to be able to see my contacts grouped by interest. I can achieve the same effect by searching through the records for a particular keyword. This would allow me to easily look up all the people I should get in touch with regarding a particular topic.

I would like to be able to create tasks based on each contact or group of contacts. I should be able to list all the tasks associated with a particular person as well as see the tasks on my day page, perhaps under the "social" context.

WHAT I CAN DO:

First, I should add two fields to my BBDB records to keep track of the last time I spoke/wrote to the person and the last time I received a reply. I can probably configure Gnus to update this automatically for mail, although I can also do that myself. I can also add an entry for maximum days without contact, or something like that.

I can add another field called "Next action", which keeps track of the next thing I can do for that person.

I can write Emacs Lisp code to extract all the relevant information from BBDB and prioritize the list.

Hmmm. Sounds useful.

最近コンピュータ用の新しい机を買いました。 I just bought a new desk for my computer.

On Technorati: emacs, productivity, organizer

鬼いぬ間の洗濯。 When the cat's away, the mice will play.

On Technorati: productivity