As I confessed earlier, I am a perpetual switcher. But for the last couple of weeks I think I have found a solution that finally sits well with me. I know i’m not the first to coin the phrase “Analog PDA”. Others, far greater than me have already written about this type of device. But I do think i may bring something a little new to concept.
I keep all of my appointment in google calendar, and all of my todo’s in rememberthemilk. Both of these services offer the possibility to print out your calendar and todo items. In gcal, I select the 4 weeks ahead view before printing, giving me a nice overview of the weeks to come. In rmilk, I have prepared a “smart list” with the search dueWithin:”1 week of today” OR due:never OR dueBefore:today, but you can use whatever suits you best.
I then take these two printouts, fold them twice and put them in my back pocket.
Done.
My stylus for this PDA is my fisher bullet space pen. When folded, it barely takes up any space at all in my pocket and it’s nice to write with.
How to work the system
There are two key points to making this system work. First, I need to view my printouts as my main system. Not the online applications, they are backups. This helps me to not confuse which version is up to date. Nothing can exist in the backups if they are not on paper. Which brings us to the second point. I need to sync events from my PDA to the backup systems daily.
To create a quick overview process of which items are backed up from paper I use a few tricks.
In my todo-sheet, I write down new todos as I come up with them. As an example, we’ll use the task “Investigate USB memory stick memorysizes”.
As soon as I remember I need to do that, I write it down in the todo-application of my PDA (i.e. the printout from rmilk).
When I get a chance to sync todos, I look for any written down tasks on the sheet.. err.. I mean in the todo-application. All tasks that aren’t completed I copy into rememberthemilk, and then I put a square box next to the item on paper for checking them off.
The presence of a box next to the todo item is a signal to me that the item has been synchronized.
For calendar items I put a small dash in front of the task as a signal that the item has been synchronized.
So when the PDA starts to look worse for wear, it’s time to “recharge” it. This means I print out new copies from the backup systems. It’s important to synchronize before recharging to prevent loss of data.
But what about appointments further away than four weeks?
I’m glad you asked.
For this I use a neat little program developed by Johnny Matthews called getCals (as reported on lifehacker), to copy my google calendar into my iPod when I recharge or update the iPod.
As long as I do this at least every four weeks I’m ok.
So, when someone asks if I’m free at some specific date three months from now, I just whip out my offline backup device (i.e. my iPod) and check the calendar. Then I still write down the appointment as a todo or on the back of the calendar application (the printout).
Implicit Simplicity 