Hot on the heels of my post on how Facebook could be a killer productivity application, Read/WriteWeb has an article on the 10 most useful Facebook Apps for workers.

Did you know that you can embed a calendar, todo list, and even send real email to other facebookers, from inside of Facebook?  Me either. Check out the article for the other 7 office apps, plus some tips on developing your own.

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We just finished a series over at the LifeDev Tools blog that asks the question of which is better: paper or digital-based productivity systems?

While everyone has their own opinions as to which is better, we’d argue that it’s best to combine both. Both types of tools have certain unique features that are awesome, and both certainly have failings as well. Yet I haven’t come across many people who have tried to fuse the two together.

If you’re interested in seeing how to fuse a paper + digital productivity system together, be sure to check it out. (A good place to start is at the beginning.)

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Well, after the successful launch of the productivity video blog, I’ve decided to start another blog on the brand new LifeDev network. I love just about anything involving productivity tools. The prospect of trying a new beta of a productivity app excites me in an almost unhealthy way. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to write and test the many cool tools that I stumble upon. Fortunately, I met Brett.

Brett Kelly is the writer of the awesome GTD blog Cranking Widgets. It wasn’t long after chatting on IM that we were like peas and carrots when it comes to productivity apps. So, Brett graciously accepted my invitation to help write the brand new Productivity Tools blog. We’ll be covering all things productivity tools, (both online and offline), with Brett doing the majority of the writing.

Oh, and don’t worry about the main LifeDev blog. Now I’ll have more time to focus on a few of my own passions here: creativity, productivity, organization, and the beautiful marriage of the three. So now any post that has to do with any sort of tool used for productivity will now be on the tools blog, and any post that has to deal more with everything else will remain here at the ranch.

I’m really excited.

So if you’re feeling like you’d like to join in on the fun, subscribe below to the LifeDev Productivity Tools.

Subscribe by feed:

or by email:

Oh, and if you’re wanting to subscribe to the entire LifeDev Network (main, video, tools), we’ve set up a feed that has all three wrapped into one. There will probably be somewhere between 4-6 posts per day, no more than 10 (extreme).

LifeDev Network Feed:

As always, we’d love to hear what you guys are thinking about the recent expansions, etc. If you’ve got any ideas/questions/comments/ screams of outrage, put ‘em in the comments below. We’ll be sure to respond.

Thanks and Enjoy!

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The Stikkit blog informs us that an enterprising lad James Adam has released a Stikkit dashboard widget. With this handy little tool you can

Create new stikkits, find and edit existing ones—multiple at a time—and click the “synch” button to save them to Stikkit online. And the widget grabs a snapshot of the latest online each time you show the dashboard so that you always have piping hot stikkits just when you need them.

Brilliant!

I think I can feel the ground shaking as the herd of mac users who love Stikkit stampede over to Mr. Adam’s blog to download the tasty program.

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A lot of times people try to find the latest and greatest tool to fully organize their lives. I can tell you up front… it’s not gonna happen. What makes the self-help/productivity arena so interesting is there there isn’t one tool to “rule them all”. Some have come close, but tools aren’t meant to organize everything in our lives. That’s not their strength.

Because as of yet there hasn’t been the mythical app that controls every detail in our busy lives, we should focus more on becoming more productive with our existing tools. So in that spirit, I’ve decided to share a little trick that works pretty effectively with your online tasks. I’ve used this system mostly for blogging, but the uses are practically limitless. I call it the Browser Inbox.

The basic premise is this: use your browser’s tabs to track your things to do. If you have a modern browser like Firefox, you can have multiple tabs open within the browser. Each tab can be thought of as a task (or Next Action for the GTD Junkies), and once you’re done with the task, close the tab. It’s extremely simple, but it’s surprisingly effective.

Here’s an example.

Blogging

I’ll crack open my trusty Google Reader and start browsing feeds. If I see a story that’s compelling and a possible post topic, I’ll hit V and open the original page in a new tab. By the time I’m done reading, I may have 6 or 7 tabs open. I systematically go through and read each story, deciding whether each one is blog-worthy. If it is, I write the post. If not, I close the tab. Easy, right?

I love this approach because

• The tabs are physical reminders that I can’t ignore
• I’m not bringing any other tools or extra processes into the mix
• I have everything I need in one spot

Granted, this system has some obvious limitations (like all tools). The browser inbox only works if I know I’m going to be writing in the immediate future. Also, if Firefox crashes and the system can’t restore your session, or your browser is accidentally closed, you’re screwed.

But, at the same time, the simplicity forces you to quickly get through the “inbox” of your browser’s tabs quickly. The physical closing of each tab is pretty satisfying too, so that’s a subtle motivator as well.

So there you have it. The Browser Inbox: Gently forcing people to finish their online tasks quickly. A nice tagline, don’t you think? ;)

I’d love to hear any thoughts or suggestions on this system. Can anyone think of other uses for the BI?

[Update: You guys had some great suggestions! Be sure to check out the comment thread for incorporating the BI with offline tasks as well.]

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Creating My ToDo List Through Jott And Gmail

“1. If you don’t have an account with Gmail, you must set one up by going here.
2. Once you have logged into your Gmail account, go to the “Labels” box on the sidebar and click on “Edit labels”.
3. In the entry box marked “Create a new label”, type in the name of your label that you will store all of your to do’s and hit enter. (Mine is called “*TODO” – the asterisk keeps the label at the top of the list of labels in the sidebar).”
(read the rest …)

37 Signals Take on why internet is bad in airplanes [caution: stong language]

“Ironically, SAS killed the internet access on their transatlantic flights this January because nobody was using it. (Well, except for me saying “look, I’m online at 30,000 feet!!” in a chat room). And I think that’s a good indicator for offline web applications. The idea is cool, but the reality is that it just doesn’t matter. You don’t need access to all your stuff all the time. We’re already overloaded with connectivity. Cherish the few remaining strongholds for offlineliness!”

Clearing Your Inbox with Minimal Pain 

“My complete system involves a physical inbox and simple file structure, 30 Boxes for my calendar and contextually tagged to do lists, and trusty Apple Mail. Of course, any combination of web or desktop apps will suffice.” g

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We’ve written before on one of our most favorite Extensions for Firefox: GTDGmail. However, since then the extension has gone through some changes.

First and foremost, the extension’s name has been changed to GTDInbox (courtesy of Google’s lawyers).

But secondly, they’ve come out with an update that gives a 2-minute timer to help with blazing through your inbox.

When you compose an email, or begin a reply, a discreet clock starts counting down encouraging you to respond in a timely manner.

This falls in line with David Allen’s 2-minute processing rule, a major part of the workflow in his magical GTD system. This feature has the potential to be quite a handy tool for those of us easily-distracted types.

Oh, and if you use GTDInbox, the developers are needing to raise $5,000 to develop the product further. Feel free to help save GTDInbox by donating a little bit. I know I’d hate to see this killer Gmail extension fall to the wayside.

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The Mind Mapping Software Weblog has a nice comparison complete with charts that show the differences between online mind-mapping applications.  The article focuses on four of the most popular mapping software: Mindomo, Bubbl.us, Mindmeister and Thinkature.

I think my favorite is still Bubbl.us, but that’s probably because I’ve played with it most.  What’s your favorite of the four above?

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Highrise, the 37Signals latest production, has just launched. 

Highrise is a nifty little online contact manager.   With Highrise you can:

• Share contacts and personal info with others in your organization
• Assign tasks for contacts and reminders that can be sent to your mobile phone
• Keep a full history of all the interactions you make with each contact.  Emails, calls, conversations, everything.
• Create cases.  These are like virtual folders that groups and stores information for contacts and their organization.

The thing I like best about Highrise is the hidden power of email integration they’ve built in.  You can cc or forward all of your emails to your dashboard, and they show up beautifully in your highrise dashboard.  You can also assign tasks and have them date sensitive, just by changing the email address to Highrise.

Highrise is a great app.  It’s not as robust as other tools of it’s kind, but like all 37 Signal products, it’s dead simple.  There’s no learning curve.  You just signup, and your business communication is organized.

Highrise comes with several levels of accounts ranging from free to $149/month.

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LifeDev guest-blogger Brett has a great post on how to whip Stikkit into GTD submission, David Allen style.

It’s the tagging functionality that will be doing the bulk of the work here, along with heavy use of the ‘aka’ capabilities of Stikkit (more on this later). I’ll be presenting this implementation in a somewhat step-by-step configuration – Projects, Tasks/Actions, Calendar and Tickler and Reference – and concluding with a short bit on using Stikkit for ubiquitous capture.

It looks like a great implementation to a great service.  I’ll definitely be trying it out soon.

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