The first one is Use Getting Things GNOME to get things done which looks at Getting Things GNOME (GTG), a GTD application for GNOME. It’s pretty basic compared to other GTD apps I’ve played with, but that also gives it some extra appeal. If you’re looking for a good GTD app on Linux, you should look at GTG.

The second is Check out NX remote access for Linux and Solaris systems which looks at NoMachine’s NX, a remote desktop application that uses SSH for a transport mechanism. NX is wonderful; the only drawback is that the system you are connecting to needs to run Linux or Solaris. If that is what you need to connect to, NX is highly recommended; there are clients for Windows and OS X in addition to Linux and Solaris, so it’s great for connecting to remote Linux/Solaris servers or desktops.

One tool that I looked at was called Concentrate, which sets you up with a fully customizable “work session”. When I first saw Concentrate I thought it was kind of gimicky, but I’ve come to appreciate how it lets me, easily, shove stuff out of the way and only pull up the things I need. Having a timer handy ensures that I can work for a set amount of time and gives me a sense of actually concentrating and getting things done. The other is a web service called Rescue Time and it’s quite interesting to see the stats on yourself. My boss will be happy to know that this week I am in the top 16% of Rescue Time people, with an efficiency summary score of 1.12 vs the average of 0.4. That actually seems to be pretty consistent, which is somewhat scary (for the average person). It also shows me that the bulk of my time is spent in the Terminal each week (the highest used application). There is proof that I’m a CLI junkie.

Anyways, it’s an interesting read.

I’m reading David Allen’s Getting Things Done book and this quote really stuck out at me. Totally true. I know a few people to whom the latter belongs to.

Anyways, this is a really good book. I’ve already gotten some fantastic ideas from it and am already shifting my way of thinking, and I’m only 1/4 through the book. I’ve been trying to ascribe to the GTD “methodology” through the use of GTD-related software, but I have yet to turn it into a lifestyle.. so far it’s been nothing more than a few bits and pieces here and there, mostly relating to my work with Mandriva which has really had the advantage of keeping me and getting me focused. Of course the GTD “methodology” could be used everywhere — from work, other hobby projects, and personal life too. I’m always looking for ways to be more efficient and by reading this I’m seeing what I’ve been doing wrong, what I could be doing better, etc. Really good stuff. I plan to read it through once then go back with my highlighter once I’ve got the overall concept so I can really amplify the parts I struggle with and really need to have sink in.

Anyways, highly recommended. Even if you think you’re efficient now (and you could very well be), there’s always remove for improvement and doing things better/faster/easier should be an aspiration for anyone who has less time than they’d like (and who among us can honestly say we have *enough* time for everything we want to do?).

The first thing was to unsubscribe from non-essential mailing lists. I used to sit on the openssh and exim mailing lists, amongst a few others, just to glean tips and insights and whatnot, with the full intention of implementing some of these ideas. In fact, my exim mbox has over 150 *saved* messages that go back about 3 years… messages I’ve thought “this would be good to try”, etc. But know what? In three years, I’ve barely looked at those messages again, and I’ve implemented about 2% of the “content” of those saved messages into active implementations on my exim server. And now that I’ve out-sourced most of the hosting I do for other people, those things don’t apply since my exim server handles mail exclusively for me and some mailing lists I still run. So do I need to know how to integrate spamassassin with clamav under exim? Not really. Do I need to learn more spam tricks? Again, not really, since I use TMDA as my “guard” for my email accounts on that machine. In other words, will I ever use those 150 exim messages? Probably not. Will I ever look at those mails again? Even more unlikely.

So I’ve been taking the axe to some old/saved messages and removing myself from mailing lists that I’ve had a cursory interest in but haven’t really been active on. It’s slow going because you need to make a concious decision as to what is important and what isn’t. But the basic idea is to have these folders as empty as possible… even the mailing list ones. It’s not just enough to keep my inbox uncluttered, I want *all* of my mailboxes uncluttered. And the less mail I have coming in that isn’t important, the less time I spend deleting crap.

Once I have my email under control again, I’m going to start looking at other areas to increase my productivity and reduce the amount of wasted time. Time is a finite resource, and I have too little of it as it is… so I need to start making some changes to more effectively utilize my time. Especially now that my daughter will be in school 5 days a week full-days (grade one, wOOp!) and my wife will be working full-time (as the secretary of the school my daughter goes to), if I discipline myself to get up when they do (and, of course, not go to bed at 1am), then I have a good 8hr window in which to work. My main goal is to stuff the 10+hrs of work I do every day for Mandriva into those 8 hours. There should be no external distractions (at least not of the same magnitude anyways), which already gives me a bit of an edge, but if I can squeeze it even more by getting rid of the inconsequential *crap* that seems to suck up so much time, then I think I can probably take those 10+hrs and compress them maybe into 6-7hrs and actually give myself some breathing room and get *more* done.

The main idea here is the concept that if my wife and kid are gone all day, when they come home I’d like to spend time with them… time with them instead of finishing up this update or that, writing articles for TechRepublic, or doing other work-related things. A worthy goal, I think.