Notebooks

I am a self confessed geek. I carry my iPhone with me everywhere and use my iPad constantly. For a long time I was using OmniFocus to track all my todos and make lists of things to check out, and using Simplenote to sync the couple hundred text files I have, as well as things like reservation numbers for train bookings, gift ideas and random ideas. Recently that’s changed. I purchased my first set of Field Notes notebooks. For the last 5 months I’ve carried a notebook on with me wherever I go, I didn’t think that it would change how I use my phone all that much but it has, quite significantly.

Over the last few months I’ve become more and more disillusioned with OmniFocus. The Omni group make great software, but, it’s fairly expensive compared to the competition and the development has seemed pretty slow, with very few updates to the iPhone version and the first major update being a paid one. I decided not to buy OmniFocus 2 for iPhone. It does look great but, I was barely using the version on my phone; so it wasn’t worth spending the money. I decided to give Apple’s Reminders a shot, it’s on all 3 devices I use, free and syncs. After trying to use Reminders for a while I realised why todo lists on my phone didn’t work for me. They are really easy to ignore.
Since carrying a notebook around I’ve stopped using apps to track my todos all together. There’s no due dates, no reminders, no notifications, just lists. I sit down most evenings and just make a list of things I know I need to do the next day. It’s simple. It’s also very handy for noting things down quickly and most of the time it’s quicker than pulling my phone out, unlocking it and launching an app.

There’s also something great about having everything in one place in a little notebook you can quickly flick through and in years to come I’m sure going through old notebooks will be far more interesting than looking through completed tasks in OmniFocus.