Looking for a minimalistic way to keep track of what you need to get done? Wunderlist is a great application for the job.  I have tried many of the to-do list mangers out there and Wunderlist is by far the best looking, and possibly one of the most functional I have used.

Once installed, the first thing you will notice is that this is a great looking program.  It is very stylish and sleek. 

On the right side menu, you can add categories of to-do lists you need to create.  For example, you could have one named personal (for your personal to-do list items) and the other named work (for your work related projects). Then all you need to do to add things to your to-do lists is type out a short message in the box labeled, "Add your task here" and then hit the Enter key on the keyboard.  Add stars to give certain to-do list items more importance and clear things off by clicking on the check mark box to the far left. 

Now, that is not to say Wunderlist is without its flaws.  One thing that bugged me was there was no real documentation on how you use the program.  You just pretty much have to figure it out. Right now, there is no way to sync your usage either to a mobile device (however, that should be coming soon). Wunderlist also needs to be able to minimize too.  I’d rather it live by my clock rather than take up space as another item in the task bar.

Pick up the task management application Wunderlist (available for both Mac and Windows) and let me know what you think.

When you change a regular tab into an app tab, it moves it to the left side of the tab bar and shrinks the tab down to the size of the favicon shown for the web site.  I have to have four or five browsers open just to cover all my bases on a day to day bases – so getting any type of extra tab real estate in Firefox is a good thing for me. 

To open a new App tab, just right click the tab bar and select App Tab from the context menu.  When your done with an App tab, just close it – or you can set it to restore the App tab every time you start the browser. 

If you want to enjoy this Firefox 4 feature before it becomes a standard, the App Tabs add-on for Firefox is the perfect tool for the job.

Want a new place to store your virtual notes to yourself?  Listhings looks to be your personal dashboard for storing notes.  The service is very easy to use and understand.  Click “Add” to add new notes and… yeah, that is about it.

Here is a little more about the web site application from the developers:

Back in the days, people used fridges to stick notes to. Nowadays, people are green and don’t waste paper on notes. Instead, they use Listhings – the free online tool for storing notes. You can use Listhings to store ToDo’s, titles of great songs, phone numbers, shopping lists, you-name-it. It’s very simple and straightforward. Everyone should be able to use it from any web browser.

It is a neat idea, and I am looking forward to seeing what they do with the project in the future.  If your looking for a place to store your notes, give Listhings a shot.

Get More Done!

You have a daily to-do list to create after signing up.  As you type in things you need to do, they are added to the list.  Anything you haven’t gotten done for one day is automatically moved to the next day. You can also re-arrange tasks like this by taking advantage of the “shift” command.  This will let you put something off till the next day.

Here is a screen shot of Patio in action:

The best thing about using Patio, or any other online to-do list manager is that you don’t have to remember to jot it down somewhere, or hurry up and find a pen and paper to write yourself a note.  You have it all online, which makes it even easier to access and organize your daily tasks.

I always love to try out new to-do list applications and web sites, because I am a ‘bit of an organizational nut.  With that in mind, I recently started checking out ForcedDo and I am pretty happy with the results.

ForceDo is much more than just your common to-do list.  The thing that is special here is that you set mini deadlines in minutes for yourself.  Once you hit the “play” button for a to do list item, your clock starts and you see how much time you have left right there on the screen.  You can kind of think of it as forcing yourself to become more productive.

Here is a little more information about how to get started from the ForceDo web site:

The key is to split a BIG task into smaller tasks + set priorities + set the (estimated) duration of a task. Lets say, you have a task "Write a blog article". You may have all the plan and ideas in your head about the article, you simply start writing. Thats OK, but if you are a perfectionist you may write the article for 5 hours or never get ready.

Need to organize your time better?  Check out ForceDo.com and get yourself motivated to get some things done.

Once you install it, the setup is pretty easy to understand.  You just setup how you want you desktop to be split, hit the OK button and it is done.  If you find yourself overwhelmed by having too many programs or windows floating around your desktop – give MaxTo a shot.  Previously I had been doing this same type of desktop reorganization on my own, but MaxTo does it for me – and in turn saves me a lot of tweaking time.

From the default interface, you will think, “oh, this looks like Twitter”, but I promise that there is more under the hood than that.  Think of it along the same lines though, a social stream of co-workers all posting together.  The team can then post updates, ask questions, share links all in real time. 

You can also quickly share the daily job or agenda with your team.  This way you don’t have to bother trying to get everybody together so you can go over the job that needs to be done.  You can always go back in time and check on members’ contributions and search through the transcripts.  So it is an ever growing database of knowledge too.

I like organization, especially if it helps me get things done, and Co-op is a very useful combination of those two goals.

Download the Vista Colorful Folder Pack! (.zip)

All of the icons are  in the .ico format, and supports the following sizes:

256 x 256, 128 x 128, 64 x 64, 48 x 48, 32 x 32, 24 x 24, 16 x 16

Why color code your folders? Having color coded folders for certain documents is more than just about “making things pretty”.  It is also very helpful when it comes to getting things done.  Let’s say you use the green folder for your bills, green is the color of money – hence it makes you jump right to it instead of having to hunt through all those yellow folders.

Depending on how popular these are, I might release more colored folders in the future. Feel free to use them however you like.  If you pass it around to a friend, might also mention where you got it and ask them to subscribe to my RSS feed for more!

Right click on the desktop, select “New” and then “AutoHotkey Script”.

On the desktop icon created for the script, I want you to right-click on it and select “Edit Script”.  This should open up a Notepad window with your empty script inside.  Go to the Notepad window, hit enter twice so you are on a new line.  Next I want you to type in the following:

c:testscript::

Now this is telling your script that the word “testscript” is your keyword to type to get your longer response to launch.  Next add some text to the end of that – such as…

c:testscript::Thank you for your suggestion.  I really appreciate it.

Now that you got that text typed into there I want you to go to “File” and then “Save” to save your script.  Now lets go back to the desktop where you created your quick response, and double click the icon created on your desktop to launch it.  You should see the green box with the “H” in it in your taskbar now. 

Now go into any text field, e-mail, search box, anything and type in testscript then hit enter after typing it in.  Presto – you just saved yourself a few more seconds in your day.  You can now quickly type out phrases you use multiple times in the day and save your keyboard (and fingers) from all that extra work.

Using this service could not get any easier. You get you own e-mail to contact Sandy at and she will then remember or remind you of certain things. For an example if you send her an e-mail saying, “Remind me to post about Sandy on Mitchelaneous in 15 minutes” then in 15 minutes you will get an e-mail back reminding you of the task you need to do.

The service (trying my best to stop calling the service “she” and “her”) knows the words remember and remind the best. Here is a little more information.

When you signed up, I sent you a “Welcome” message containing your own personal Sandy email address. You send me stuff by writing to me at that address, either directly or by Cc’ing me on a message to someone else. You can write to me in the subject line or the body of an email message — I pay attention to both.

More details about the service can be found on the official web site.

All in all I think this is a neat service, and I am currently trying to find reasons to use it more and more. If you need a little help getting your projects (and/or life) in order you might want Sandy too.