Matthew Lang

I stopped using Wunderlist for maintaining lists last week. It just didn't fit with how I worked. I wanted something a bit more low tech, so I switched back to a master list in my moleskine and index cards for tracking the stuff I want to do that week.Since I started freelancing though, I've been spurred to keep my development knowledge up to date and I'm also interested in getting some side projects off the ground. I also have a growing client list to maintain. This means more actions getting added to the master list on a daily basis. Maintaining it in my moleskine was becoming a real struggle as it was strewn across a couple of pages. I still needed something that let me track my master list in a digital way, without it becoming too technical.

Enter TaskPaper.

TaskPaper is a todo list that stands apart from many todo list applications in that it uses a plain text file for your list rather than a database or remote data storage. I'm a big fan of simple software that uses flat files for backend storage, especially when that software can link to your Dropbox and let you sync it across all your devices.

Taskpaper is like an editor but it also had nice features that let you interact with your list easily. The best of a todo list and a plain text file really. TaskPaper is also heavily influenced from Dave Allen's GTD system. TaskPaper allows you to create projects in your list and also attach tags to actions.

It's another change in the workflow, but I just want something that works and doesn't get in my way.

With Gryffindor, Hufflepuff, Ravenclaw or Slytherin?

In case you don't know what I'm talking about, let me give you a run down. It's become common place in the last few years for agencies and companies doing the hiring to describe the type of people they are looking for as a "rockstar" or "ninja". Yeah, I know. It's stupid. Here's why.

Describing the type of person you are looking for as a crowd-surfing, alcohol loving musician or as a specialist warrior for hire is just ridiculous.When you describe the person you want as a rockstar, I think of an out going person with the kind of personality that you just can't ignore. The kind of person that announces their god-like skills with a megaphone before entering the office, before biting the head of a bat and then downing a bottle of vodka. Okay, maybe not those last two things, but you did ask for a rockstar.What I think you are actually looking for is a person that has a passion for what they do. If that's the case, they why not just say so in the job description? There's plenty of people out there who are passionate about what they do, but they don't call themselves rockstars, they go by the job title that fits them and describes what they do best.

So you want a ninja instead then? When you describe the person you are looking for as a ninja, I imagine a person entering the office in a puff of smoke and taking out half your development with a single throw of multiple shuriken. Okay bad example, but isn't that sort of what a ninja does?What I think you are actually looking for is someone who works effectively and productively. Someone who knows how to make decisions on the best tools for the job and uses these tools effectively.

So why not just say what you want? Let's stop using these ridiculous terms to describe the type of person you want for a position. Unless you're advertising for a clown or a stand-up comic then I think you need to take the job description a bit more seriously.Oh yeah, and you can't use guru for the job description either.

... at night without having to drive miles to get away from the light pollution.

Awesome colour by the way.

via Pedal Consumption

Digital technology. The great invention of the late 20th century and now integrated into our daily lives on such a scale that many of us take it for granted. It's a very present in our home. We have the usual things like a laptop, a tablet, a games console, a reading tablet, smartphones and a number of other devices like televisions, digital picture frames and various MP3 players.

We also have two sons, our oldest is six years old and extremely well versed in the various digital devices around the house. While I applaud his ability to use all these devices un-supervised, for a while there I was worried about the frequency and time that he was using these devices. Every day started with a request to play this device or that device. I felt he was becoming too dependent on the devices for entertainment.I've read a number of articles in the past about the current generation of youngsters that have been brought up in an on-demand environment. If they want it, they can have it. And that is very true when it comes to digital devices. Very few things are out of reach with laptop or a tablet. I don't want this way of thinking for my kids. Technology is great, but it also has it's place.

Technology plays an important part in education and in the workplace. I'm not suggesting that technology is bad, but rather it's best used in moderation. While I like him playing Minecraft, I also like to see him play with his Lego. Drawing on the iPad is another activity he does, but I like to see what he can create with his own hands using crayons, pencils and paper.

Kid activities such as playing with toys, drawing, reading and getting him outside are things my wife and I are going to encourage this year with our oldest son. This isn't about restricting access to technology, instead it's about teaching him that technology has it's place and he shouldn't be too dependent on it.

Learning to appreciate technology and when to use it is an important subject to teach children. We shouldn't forget that there's a world for our kids to see with their own eyes rather than seeing it through a browser.

My attempt to blog every weekday on my blog hit a snag today. I didn't have anything scheduled for today. No worries though. I'll simply start again from tomorrow and ensure that I always have a couple of articles in reserve for days where I just can't think of anything to write about.

Journalong is up and running and I'm happy with it, but there's another itch building. Another itch to build something else and DecisionMail is it's name. The product bug has bitten me, but this time around it's slightly different. I'm not building a product as a revenue stream, I'm more interested in how the product is used and people's perceptions of using software in the decision making process.

So what is the new idea?

DecisionMail is simply a way of getting feedback on a decision through the use of email. You write the question that you want your colleagues to give you feedback on, list those people who you want feedback on the decision from, and then DecisionMail will email that question along with a link, to each of the people you want feedback from on the question.

Your colleagues receive the email and simply click their response to the question. From your select group of people you should then have a clear idea what the group's decision is.

One of my key concerns is that the email from DecisionMail to someone who has been asked for feedback on a decision will either be automatically dropped in a spam folder or will be completely missed in the inbox. I'm aware that the inbox is becoming a horrible place for people. Some people get hundreds of new email every day. I don't know how they manage it, but if this person was involved in a decision, then how can you be sure that that person will respond?

I'm not building this product to solve a particular problem, but I'm instead building this to delve more into using software as a decision making tool. I've already built a number of decision support systems for clients, but I wanted to build something simpler that involved the minimum number of steps to get feedback on a decision. Email is too complicated already for gathering feedback, which is why the email from a DecisionMail account holder, will only require the respondent to click the answer to the question that they agree with the most.

I initially perceived this as a product for virtual teams who have members across different countries, but the anyone could use it to make decisions.

The next few weeks are about getting the basics up and running. Watch this space!

Amazing photograph.

via Mme Scherzo

... with some teaser posters from the fans. Really like this one.

via DBSW

It's been over a year now since Journalong was launched and since it's launch, the total number of customers is still less than triple figures. Okay, so I wasn't expecting to be the next Dropbox of the journalling world in terms of success, but hitting my milestone of a hundred customers would be nice.

I still believe there is a place for a product like Journalong in the world, but I'm definitely not attracting increasing numbers of customers with the current pricing model. What got me thinking about this was the recent product announcements from 37signals for their Basecamp Personal and Breeze products which are priced as one off purchases. Sure, these are products that will hang off Basecamp, but the idea of a one off price for software is something that is done in the native mobile apps area. Lots of apps are priced as a one-off purchase rather than as a subscription. Journalong has been priced as a subscription service from the start but is it priced right?

While $10 a year sounds cheap as chips to some people, others look at as expensive. I fork out about $50 (US) per month on software subscriptions and I use everyone of them daily. Some are a couple of dollars a month, while one almost hits the $20 mark. So, I'm used to seeing value that software can provide and pay for it.

Which brings me to my next question. Does Journalong provide value? For me, most definitely yes. For others? Maybe not. Journalong definitely delivers value in my eyes, but I also need to determine if that value is worth the current subscription price.

Pricing and value are two of the most important areas in a successful product. Without getting the price and value right for your product, you're going to be left with a product that no-one is going to pay for and use.

So if you've created an account for a trial of Journalong in the last year but didn't fancy it, then expect an email from myself in the next few weeks. I'm looking to get more feedback on Journalong as a product and whether it is delivering value.

Goal setting. How many different methods have you tried? Lots? So have I, and every time I tried to use them I failed to reach the goal. Inevitably when I focus on one goal, everything else suffers. A few years ago I tried freelancing at night, however after month I was flat out exhausted and I the time I had to spend with my family also suffered. At the time I focused on the goal without seeing the rest of the world.

Last year though I tried something different. I used compass points.

Compass points are Nicholas Bate's strategy for making sure that goals in each aspect of life are moving forward goals in life that are based on aspects of your life. We all have different aspects in life, but when people set goals, they tend to focus on a specific set of goals and forget everything else in life.

The compass points that Nicholas Bate uses are:

• Career
• Mind/Body
• Personal Finance
• Relationships
• Fun
• Contribution

Now before you jump in and start assigning next actions to each of these compass points, take a step back. Each of these compass points are different and therefore require a different plan. Maintaining a healthy diet and exercise is different to advancing your career. Being healthy means regular exercise and of course eating healthily, but advancing your career might involve a training course at a local college. Also, compass points are not independent of each other. Focusing on one compass point for too long will likely have a negative affect on the other five compass points.

I used these compass points last year and had some success with them. Obviously, there's things in life that affect your plans and goals, but last year I advanced my career and I had some success with getting my finances in order and I made some open source contributions. I didn't set goals for all the compass points, but it did keep me focused on trying to maintain a balance between all of them. I'm using the compass points again this year, but with more of a focus on achieving a goal with each of them.

Nicholas has full blog post and free download on using compass points, which I highly recommend you read.

I would fail at this as well.

via xkcd

via Pedal Consumption

I read an interesting post by Curtis McHale today highlighting his pledge to maintain a daily contribution to open-source projects. Well done Curtis! It's developers like him that make the open source projects that many of us use possible.

While I don't currently contribute to open source projects (I really should), one thing that I looked at was the contribution streak for Github. The streak is the number of days you make a contribution to projects on Github. To maintain the streak you need to make a contribution every day. If you miss a day, the streak resets to zero. The question I have is, does it include weekends?

I was in a similar position a couple of years ago. I started using 750words.com to write daily. Every day I tried to squeeze in 750 words of writing in my day. It wasn't easy, but I managed to do it daily for a good couple of months. Then the fatigue started to set in. Finding time at the weekend was becoming difficult.

In the end I decided that maintaining this amount of writing everyday wasn't feasible. So I stopped. I can tell you that while writing every day was great, the relief of not having to write was great too. I didn't feel bad about it.

While I'm not writing everyday now, I am trying to publish a blog post every weekday. It leaves me the weekend to reflect on the last week and get some ideas in place for the following week. The same goes for an open source project I am about to start. Yes I might work on it at the weekend, but I'll mostly be working on it during the week.

Maintaining streaks like this are fun, but trying to fit them in seven days a week can be difficult too. I know for a fact that I'll never accumulate a streak of more than five on Github, but I'm happy with that. Sometimes I need the weekend to be a code-free time.

A new bike to lust after.

via BikeRadar

I'm not the first person to realise this, but productivity apps don't work for me. I've tried countless apps and services but none of them seem to work for me. The recurring problem I have is that all of them require me to be online or have a digital device in my hand. I like my iPhone, but using a task manager app on my phone usually ends up becoming a chore that I could do without.

My latest experiment was using Wunderlist to track some projects I've been working on. I setup the necessary lists I needed and started working with them. However after a few weeks of using it I ended up with lists of stuff that I haven't looked at for a fortnight.

Maybe it's just me, but tools like Evernote, Things, Omnifocus, and Wunderlist and other apps that aim to make you more productive, inevitably become dumping grounds for ideas, todos and other stuff that I end up never reviewing or actioning.

So what works for me then?

Pen and paper seems to be the choice that I keep coming back too. It's simple, effective and cheap, but not in terms of price. In terms of focus. I never get distracted by the latest features of pen and paper. There aren't any. I just open, write and close.

There's a place for productivity apps in my workflow and that's when you are collaborating with others as part of a team. Seeing what tasks are yours and sharing information in a group of people working on a project together is essential to making progress. I've no arguments with using productivity apps in this context. Especially when that team isn't in the same physcial office as is the case with so many people who take advantage of telecommuting to their job.

However, for personal projects and products I'm working on and day to day stuff that life throws at you, I'll stick with the lo-fi option of pen and paper. It works for me and that's what matters.

The fixed gear bike. Two wheels. One gear. Brakes, optional. Simple really. And that's the reason why the fixed gear bike is loved by many cyclists. It's a simple bike. Amongst it's carbon fibre, multi-geared brethren, it looks out of place, but it has a special place in the hearts of many cyclists. It's a bike with a single function, it just lets you ride.

Now take a look at Pop, the text editor for iOS from Minimal Tools. A single page text editor that offers no settings, no file management facilities, no synchronising with Dropbox. In fact there aren't any features about it. All you can do is write something with it and then copy what you have written to the clipboard. Why the hell would you want to buy this app then when all editors for iOS do this?

Well Pop does one thing that no other editor I have does. It doesn't distract me. It doesn't have anything to distract me with. It just lets me write.

We need more products like Pop and fixed gear bikes. Simple things that do one thing really well. Simple products let you do what you really want to do without any distractions.

I watched Miguel Indurain as a kid. He is a legend in cycling. When I first started watching cycling, Indurain was already on three Tour wins with a fourth on it's way. I watched him take his next Tour title and I was hooked on the sport.

We didn't see the likes of another Indurain until Lance Armstrong came on the scene. After chalking up a succession of Tour wins, there was just no stopping him. There was an aura about him. He just looked like he belonged there. Now today, his credibility as a sportsman is in tatters, but Lance Armstrong isn't the only guilty party to disgrace the sport. His is obviously the most widely covered and most damaging to the sport due to the number of Tour wins he achieved in his career, but there are others.The last 15 years of cycling have seen an increase in the frequency of doping scandals that have been reported. Year after year, riders are accused of doping and what's surprising to me is that riders are still testing positive for banned substances. Enough is enough.

For me the sport has been dogged by too many years of scandals which in turn have led to rumours of corruption higher up in the sport. My love of road cycling is definitely over. As a Brit I should have been over the moon to see Bradley Wiggins on the top of the podium in the Tour last year, but I barely paid much attention to it.

Maybe in a few years, if the sport has really tidied up its image then I'll watch again. However, it's no more road cycling for me.

... with everyone's favourite mentor, Nicholas Bate.

Ultimately we need to get big, get niche or get out. There are no magic recipes for success. But staying specialist, staying niche is close. And becoming generalist and starting to sell on price alone to compete is a road to self-destruction.

— Build a better business 4 by Nicholas Bate

I've been trying to get back into using mind mapping on a daily basis again. I've used it a couple of times this week already. So far so good.The problem I have is that the largest notebook that I am using is a tad on the small side (think half of A4 size) and therefore I can only fit two levels of branches in a single mind map.

And that's the recurring problem I have with mind mapping. You need a big workspace to mind map effectively and that means nothing smaller than A4, but I tend to favour smaller notebooks as a daily scratchpad and dumping ground.

Which brings me to outlining. It's fit perfectly with the small notebooks I have and it although it's more linear than mind mapping, I can still organise stuff in a hierarchy much like mind maps do.

Which is better to use though?

via FGGT

Matt Gemmell recently blogged about his array of writing tools. While my selection is somewhat smaller, I thought it was still worth writing about the tools that I use.

I keep a list of writing ideas in my notebook. During the weekend I pick out what I want to write about and do a quick outline of the article in my notebook.

Once I have an outline for some posts, I enter them into
Pop. This is a minimal text editor for iOS that lets you write and copy what you have written. That's it. No saving of files, sharing or syncing. It is everything that many apps dread to be: featureless. This is where Pop excels though. A minimal interface means that I can just open the app and get on with writing. I tend to use Pop when I'm out and about. For jotting ideas down or expanding on my initial outlines, it's hard to beat. You just open and write.

If I'm at home I tend to use
Plaintext on my iPad. It has a similar minimal user interface to Pop but also includes syncing to your Dropbox. At this point I liked to have a hard copy of my writing, so that I can have it available on my laptop.

Finally there's
Mou. I tend to do final edits and drafts with Mou as well as use it for composing emails and writing guides. Mou has some nice features like split views, word counts and of course it's a Markdown editor, so I can add headings, lists and hyperlinks easily.

I'm also looking at
Scrivener for longer forms of writing such as short stories and novels. I've already done Nanowrimo once and would love to do it again this year.

I initially tried to use web based writing tools for a while there, but the simplicity of native applications like the ones I have mentioned are hard to beat.

So we're definitely going to Canada this year. Which means I'm definitely heading down to YNOT's with a wad of notes to get me some YNOT stuff for the bikes.

via YNOT

A look at the contents of a writer's notebook.

Marvellous to see a notebook like this which has recorded life experiences, ideas, notes and other things that are deemed interesting enough to record by the owner.