December 2007 Archives

Wow. Browse your own DNA, web 2.0 style.

I find this both very cool, and also very scary. Bad enough all the databases which have tonnes of my personal information, but now they will have my DNA on file. Not sure how i feel about that…

Video below the fold.

An eye-witness account of the first deployment of the OLPC machines, in a non-pilot setting. I wish them nothing but the best of luck!

I should say right away that trying to join these different methodologies may be futile and result in something that is less then its parts. But, who knows? Maybe we can discover something new and better! Or, help others from making the same mistakes we do.

I’ve been giving the whole task management vs GTD thing a bit of thought. Spending time with Redmine I think I’ve got a way of looking at these two different methodologies, bringing them closer together. In Redmine one has several lists (bugs, features and support), which are all contained by a project. Each item on the list has some attributes, including priority, due date and others. In GTD you break tasks down into individual atomic bits. It seems like the traditional methods don’t reduce each item down as far. And they don’t have too. The level of detail that GTD wants is more appropriate for the individual rather then the entire team. Redmine has two levels of abstraction, Projects, and tasks. Using GTD you would have each task as a project, and further break it down into smaller parts. There would have to be a higher level, to replace the project level of the traditional tools. In fact it would be better to allow arbitrary nesting of items. One no longer needs a persentage-done attribute as you can track the number of sub-tasks completed.

There is a lot more to GTD, but this seems an interesting start.

Open questions

How to model the waiting for action? Each side of the task needs a separate task but some way to keep them linked. Assuming that they are both on the same system.

Priorities are tricky too. Although they are really just suggestions for how to order your task list. You could, by default, have the software move the task with the highest priority to the top of the list for that project - it would become the ‘next action’ (this is GTD speak - you always have a next action to perform).

The inbox and review would also need to be visited and thought about.

Examples

Here are some examples from a software development perspective:

• Build great todo Software.

  • Write Design Doc

  • Write blog post about ultimate list of features for a todo list

  • Write blog post about the connections between GTD and traditional PM methods (a-la Redmine)

  • Combine all thinking (in blog posts) into a single design doc

You could further break down each of these items - Writing a blog post might include some reading and othe research, which you might want to break out into its own thing - especially if it involves more then just google ;).

Contexts, which are one of the key elements of GTD, would be pretty similar for most software projects - @computer or @work. In GTD contexts are denoted by the ‘@’ symbol, and are used to group tasks by physical location or equipment (or lots of other things) needed to complete a task.

Andrew put me onto this software called Redmine, another project management issue tracker thing. In fact, it comes closer to the illusive perfect software then any of the others i’ve tried or seen. While it is lacking some things that i’d want to see in a personal todo manager, for running a software, or any digital project, this thing is the bee’s knees.

Its got two things that i didn’t have on my master list: Workflow, and integration with version control software. Both of these are going on my list. And it doesn’t just work with one or two, but 5! Subversion, CVS, Mercurial, Darcs and Bazaar.

While it is a bit sparse on documentation, it didn’t take me long to figure out that it has a lot to like: Flexible access management, roles, projects with sub-projects, documents (wiki), files, trackers (issue lists), calendar, gantt chart, time tracking and easy moving of items from one project/list to another. Its open source, programmed with Ruby on Rails. Not as easy to setup as one might want, but not that bad either. Easier on windows, and if you are on a GNU/Linux, well, you should know your way around that system anyway.

Its kind of like Trac, but, i think, better. The interface is nicer, and the setup was less painful. Getting Trac to play nice with SVN on Ubuntu was very difficult for me. Also, creating new projects in Redmine is simplicity. Not quite so in Trac. I should note that i tried out Trac quite a while ago, so i’m sure it has improved since then.

If you are looking for a tool to help manage software or web projects, i recommend this one.

Having got some feedback from the previous post, I’ve started to think that there is a fundamental difference between what I’ve been thinking of as task management and project management. This different could just be purely representational, I’m not sure yet. I like to think that there is a way to rationalize these different views. Especially for the agile methodology folks. There seems to be a closer connection between them and the GTD way of organizing things. It was pointed out to me that I should keep the two software development methodologies in mind: the waterfall — lots of upfront planning, and the agile crowd with an iterative style.

One interesting fact I’ve discovered is that most of my peers are not using any digital tools to help manage their time. A common theme was that it was more work to use a tool then not. This begs the question, do they just need an easier tool? Another theme was the use of paper lists, which, i guess, is about the easiest tool you could have! Keeping the paper lists in sync with the digital was also one of the complaints. I recently tried iScrybe, a newish web task manager. The standout thing about it is it’s great printouts. It uses the pocketmod style. I found that printing out a new list every day or two was enough, and updating the online part more frequently. One gets the satisfaction of physical crossing items of the list and all the advantages that the digital world brings. Also, for the first time, I always had paper and a pen on me for those random notes that pop into your head and need to be written down now.

As a total aside, I wrote this using Dasher, a cool alternative input … thing. Watch the Google video, and check the website. I like it, but, interestingly, although my speed is getting up there, and my error rate is probably lower then my regular typing, i found using the mouse all the time was actually harder on my wrist then typing. But that could also be because my current desk setup is less then ergonomic!

I’ve tried quite a few online and desktop todo list applications. Some are quite good, lots are not. None has everything. I thought that i would write down what everthing is, just so that i can keep track of which tools have what. This is just a hodge-podge of features and requirements.

I should make it clear that this list ignores pure project managment tools. No gantt charts, no adding resources to tasks. More basic. Let the PMs use MSProject or, better yet, OpenWorkbench to do all that planning.

The Bushpig! Amazingly, they are available both in Australia and Canada. Check out this video (wmv - all they had, sorry). I’ve also been looking at this electric skateboard. Apparently, there is an electric version of the bushpig in the works too. That would be a big step up, as its 2-stroke 50cc engine would just not fly in the city. I’m also sure the cops would pull you over quicker then they could blink if you were riding that thing on the road. The skateboard you might get away with tho.

Sooo nerdly, but great Nasa TV. Its got everything - talk about “mission control”, shots from inside the ISS, etc etc. I love it!

It totally unrelated and sad news, Robert Craig “Evel” Knievel passed. I remember from way back having an Evel Knievel motorcycle toy, and all the crazy TV specials with him doing some bat-shit crazy stunt.