Hamster-GTD

Boost productivity while reducing your stress by organizing your documents and workflow with an ultra-simple system loosely inspired in GTD, Todo.txt (notes on TXT files), Bullet journal (notes on paper), Inbox and Desktop zero.

So, how can you start?

Organize your (digital) documents:

• Container
• Project folders
• Naming
• Archiving
• How to navigate through your documents

Organize your workflow:

• Introduction
• Actionable notes: tasks
• Non-actionable notes: references
• How to navigate through your notes
• Screenshots

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Organize your (digital) documents

'Every document belongs to a project'.

Container:

• container folder ¹: YOUR NAME

    First of all create a folder in a safe place of your disk.
    ALL your stuff will be stored there.
  

• main folders: PROJECT STATUS

    Inside your container folder there are 3 folders:
  
    INBOX (folder to put new documents until deciding what to do with them).
    CURRENT (folder to store your active projects).
    ARCHIVE (folder to store your dormant projects).
  

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Project folders:

# bundle @ project . subproject - folder - nested folder

• bundle of projects (derived from twitter hashtag): #

    Inside CURRENT and ARCHIVE folders you store #bundles of projects:
    e.g: #large investor (bundle with all projects of a client)
  

• project (derived from twitter mention): @

    Inside #bundle folders you store @projects:
    e.g: @house in portugal    
  

• subproject (derived from OO programming): .

    Inside @projects you store .subprojects:
    e.g: .building permit
  

• folder (each nesting level): -

    Inside .subprojects you store -folders:
    e.g: -plans
  

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Naming:

• to reduce unnecessary nesting and memorization, name some folders combining nesting levels:

    e.g: When having just one or two folders inside a folder, join them and reduce nesting.
    Use: #small investor@house in portugal
    Instead of: #small investor / @house in portugal
  
    When the folder name is too generalist, add anterior nesting name(s) for context:
    e.g: -drawings-sections
    e.g: -drawings-details-wall
  

• name your files using a system that fits you ². Hints:

    Use spaces or other naming style:
    e.g. using spaces: #large investor@house in portugal
    e.g. using camelCase: #largeInvestor@houseInPortugal
  
    Enclose folder's name to mark it as private: [ ]
    e.g: [#personal]
  
    Use a prefix for standard / boilerplate files: $
    e.g: $curriculum+A007
  
    Use a prefix for temporary files: _
    e.g: _tempFile 
  

• but don't use these symbols for regular naming: # @ . - + $ % { } [ ] _

• great free tool for batch renaming.

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Archiving:

• archive releases of (sub)projects using SemVer (each version adds a change on data): + major . minor . patch

• archive files using BranchVer (each version adds a change on data): + branch . progress

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How to navigate through your documents:

• you only need two permanent desktop shortcuts to navigate through your documents:

    Shortcut to INBOX folder
    Shortcut to CURRENT folder
  
    A shortcut to archive is not needed, only dormant projects are there.
  

• and/or a laucher-file finder ³.

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Organize your workflow

'Inputs to your workflow are materialized as notes'.

Introduction:

• your workflow consists of a collection of plain text notes on a cloud synced folder ⁴ and on paper notebook.

• actionable notes are called tasks; non-actionable notes are called references.

• workflow management is loosely inspired on Todo.txt and Secret Weapon but using only plain text files edited with any text editor and a paper notebook. Files's structure (check also screenshots):

    References (TXT files on a cloud synced folder)
  
    Tasks (on a paper notebook)
        0-next (tasks to be done ASAP)
        1-soon (tasks in the queue to get done)
  
        // TXT files on a cloud synced folder
        2-calendar (tasks with a precise/deadline date or with a trigger/fuzzy date to get done)
        3-someday (tasks to get done someday)
  

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Actionable notes (tasks):

• actionable notes are called tasks. Time related tasks live within the same file:
  Short term tasks are managed on a paper notebook.
  Long term tasks are managed on a cloud synced folder.

• tasks should have a due date: ( )

    Dates are inserted before the task description (allowing chronological sorting):
    
    e.g. inserting a scheduled date: (year-month-day=hour)
    (2015-11-29=9h) Doctor appointment
  
    e.g. inserting a trigger/fuzzy date: (date >>)
    (2015-03-10 >>) Waiting for client feedback after this date
  
    e.g. inserting a deadline date: (date <<)
    (2015-10-22 <<) Pay electricity bill until this date
  
    e.g. without knowing the due date: (soon) or (someday)
    (soon) Call Mom
    (someday) Bungee jumping with friends
  

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Non-actionable notes (references):

• non-actionable notes are called references. All references are managed on a cloud synced folder.

• projects should have a reference note to compile info as: a list of tasks (briefing), a list of completed tasks (changelog) and specific references. Therefore name your notes using project folders notation:

    Note with all references regarding a particular project:
    e.g: @house in portugal
  
    Suggestion: use reference notes to keep your collection of bookmarks.
    e.g: #research@frontend
  

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How to navigate through your notes:

• use Text Editor's side bar for navigation.

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Screenshots:

• calendar tasks note on Sublime text editor. ⁵

• I use YAML on reference notes. It's readable and allows data exchange.

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^{Notes:
1 - the hamster cheeks :) ↩
2 - e.g: relevant naming system for architects. ↩
3 - after having tried most options for Windows (win+type, Keypirinha, Everything, Cerebro, Wox, Zazu, Launchy, FARR), I'm using Listary.
Pros: Launch and file search without external software, low memory usage (less than 40k on win7), fast and configurable. Cons: No calculator function. ↩
4 - Google Drive, Dropbox, etc. ↩
5 - hint: on Sublime press F9 (or F5 on Mac) to sort dates. ↩}

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hamster-gtd by Enio Ferreira is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.