Get Ready to Get Things Done in 2010 with TeuxDeux

As far every bit I'one thousand concerned, there is no better personal productivity tool than the humble to-do list. Simply the ability to put down and visually scan everything you've got on your plate offers a huge benefit – as anyone who's ever reached for a sheet of newspaper and started listing tasks when they were feeling overwhelmed will adjure.

What'southward missing in most to-do lists, though, is the element of time. My beloved Moleskine is a case in indicate: whenever I think of something I have to do, I add it to the end of the list. During reviews, I'll sit down and brainstorm tasks, and they too go to the end of the listing. In good GTD way, there are no priorities and only tasks with fixed time requirements cease upwardly on my calendar.

Which means that when I take time, I have to browse through pages, skipping over finished items, to notice something to work on. If I were a ameliorate GTD'er and used contexts more than efficiently, I'd have the same problem, although the lists would be shorter since they're exist limited to what I can practise in my office or out and about or on the phone.

Enter TeuxDeux, a new task list that bills itself every bit "a simple, designy, free, browser-based to-do app." "Simple" is right – TeuxDeux's interface consists of columns for the next 5 days and a "Someday" section underneath. You lot can add tasks in the text box at the elevation of each day, click finished tasks to cross them out, delete finished tasks, and drag tasks from one day to another or to the "Someday" list.

And that's information technology. No contexts, no projects, no time tracking, none of that stuff. You enter tasks, yous do them, you cantankerous them off. If y'all don't terminate something, you can drag it to some other twenty-four hour period. The interface is lovely – y'all wouldn't normally call something "designy", except that TeuxDeux is a collaboration betwixt two design houses that are conspicuously looking to demonstrate their skill to potential clients – and everything just works.

Using TeuxDeux every bit a planner

I have accounts with a dozen online to-exercise list managers, and yet I keep coming back to my trusty Moleskine. Then what makes TeuxDeux special? What do I need with yet another online task list? And could information technology peradventure be that I'm giving upwardly my beloved Moleskine?

Have no fear, my Moleskine isn't going anywhere. It'south still the best tool I've found for on-the-get capture, not just of to-practise listing items but phone numbers and addresses, notes to myself, project outlines, and random ideas.

TeuxDeux fills a gap that I hadn't really known needed filling, and that no other task list manager has really addressed – daily and weekly planning. As a daily planner, TeuxDeux acts as an MIT listing – "Most Important Tasks", also known every bit "Big Rocks".

I accept hundreds of tasks in my Moleskine – later all, I'm a college teacher, a freelance author, a blogger, a website manager, a book editor, an flat renter, an uncle and brother and son, a unmarried human, and a person living his life. Each of those roles comes with dozens of things to practise, from researching an academic presentation to buying toothpaste and breakfast cereal.

Simply I tin can't just sit down downwardly and do all those tasks one past one – on any given 24-hour interval, there are sure things I have to do and certain things I'd similar to do and certain things I'd exercise if I found some spare time. An MIT list is a listing of the 3-5 things that are, as the proper name suggests, most of import to become done today. The things that, if you finished but those tasks, yous'd have had a good, productive day.

TeuxDeux makes it easy to whip upwards a list of the 24-hour interval'south tasks quickly, and I tin drag and drop them around to roughly prioritize them. When they're done, I can go dorsum to my Moleskine and cross them off. If I don't stop all of them, I just drag the remaining tasks to the next day.

Since I can see the whole week in one view, TeuxDeux also allows me to plan out what I need to do in the days to come, making it actually useful for a Weekly Review. A calendar isn't a actually useful tool for plotting out tasks; rather, calendars are adept for blocking out time to do those tasks in. For example, I might block out iv hours for writing on my calendar, but the particular things I need to write keep TeuxDeux. Or I'll block out the time I spend in my office on campus on my calendar, but the tasks I need to exercise while in my office are on my TeuxDeux list for that day. And whatever I don't get washed can be easily dragged to the adjacent day.

Y'all can exercise all this with most task lists, of grade, but not so easily or intuitively. The simply existent drawback is that TeuxDeux is entirely self-contained and not easily attainable except through a computer browser. An iPhone app is apparently in the works, and hopefully they'll develop apps for Android, Palm, and Blackberry too. Just it would also be nice to be able to add together tasks via 3rd-party services similar Jott or Dial2Do, or to access your daily lists in other applications.

Still, as it is, TeuxDeux is proving an immensely useful tool that fits well with my by and large newspaper-based productivity arrangement. As you expect forwards to the new year, y'all should definitely give it a endeavor and see how it can assistance you stay on task and get things washed in 2010. And allow us know what you call up in the comments!

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Source: https://www.lifehack.org/articles/featured/get-ready-to-get-things-done-in-2010-with-teuxdeux.html

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