A while ago, I saw a 43folders post on a GTD application called iCommit.

I originally attempted to sign up to the site from work, however at the time IE was not a supported browser. (And while I find it very cool that it supported just about everything but, I’m stuck with IE at work). I did send my home email account a link to the site, but in my busy life the whole thing got forgotten and the email just lurked in that pile of unread messages that inhabit my Outlook at home.

Until last night. Call it fate, or kismet or, more accurately, anything to avoid studying for that exam on Thursday, but I finally got around to sorting through that lurking terror and found the email. And as investigating this site would take me further away from the pleasures of Marketing Management, I checked it out.

Seems that the site now supports IE. Hurray! I can use it at work. Check off the first point on my list for viable GTD helpers.

Second on the list was that all important thing that keeps me drifting away from the tiddlywiki-on-a-stick solution – easy handling of projects and contexts. (GTD Tiddlywiki et al probably handle this perfectly well, but I’ve never managed to work it out).

Thirdly, it is able to be accessed on my locked-down, paranoid work machine which allows me access only to the very barest of essential programs, and the Internet.

So far so good.
So I register (Again. I didn’t do anything with my initial registration so it lapsed) and checked it out. Today, all of my outstanding projects and next actions went inside. After a small perplexing moment when I couldn’t create a new context (a quick trip to the forums solved that issue) and another when only a few of my NAs turned up on the front page (it doesn’t show me anything with a reminder date other than today) I sorted that out, reassigned my reminders for actually viable dates rather than wish-dates and I was off.

So now all I have to do is collect, process and organise my home life, get it all into iCommit and I should be right to go. This is a bigger task (not exactly more projects, just less incentive to be organised in the first place).

But what I really want is something with a bit of backup to it. So I’m investigating my options with something like GTD-PHP hosted on my own server. That way, I’m in charge. Of course, I couldn’t work my way around an Apache/sql/php maze if my life depended on it, so this could be a challenge.

I have tried numerous online and offline-computer-based resources to keep my GTD system in line. I’ve had a giant Word doc, modified Excel to within an inch of its life, followed the teachings of those who preach .txt files and made myself known to many an online and usb-drive Wiki.

But still I fall off the wagon and go back to my paper based to-do/Next Action list.

I really want a computer-based system. I hate writing. I hate the messiness, I hate the time it takes and I hate that I can’t correct myself when I stuff it up.

But up until now I haven’t been able (or willing) to invest the time to really give a program a good shot. Oh, I’ve been close. The Wikis that I’ve tried did survive long enough to collect my work related information and projects, but the main problem has come in the personal stuff. All those projects and next actions that have been sitting in my mind for years that I want to tackle around the house and around my computer. These poor, orphaned projects just never made it into those wikis, mostly because the setup and management of it just didn’t sit properly with me.

But I’m changing. I’ve been using iCommit now for a day or so, and today my very first non-work project appeared in it. It is a very simple, innocuous project that really won’t get done for a while (at least until that Marketing Management assignment is done) but nevertheless it marks a step in the right direction for my GTD system.

So this weekend I’m committing some time to getting into my home-office, collecting all those projects and next actions, going through the excruciating experience of mind-dumping my personal life and hopefully I’ll still be in the frame of mind that iCommit will pick it all up and keep it collected.

And hopefully I’ll have successfully bridged that chasm between my old, paper-based ways and a newer, computerised system.

I like email. A lot. I find it a brilliant, efficient and easy way to stay in touch and informed. I’m the type that is keen to check my email the minute I walk through the door, be it my work email address, or the myriad of personal addresses I keep on my notebook at home.

But perhaps my way isn’t the best way. 43Folders a while ago had a post on the merits of not checking that all important email as soon as you walk through the door; rather waiting until you had offloaded at least one of the nasty things on your to-do list and downed that second cup of coffee before touching base with the rest of the world.

I’m all for this, in principle. I rather think, however that I would find this particularly difficult in real life. My personal email, for example, generally contains only spam, digest emails from various groups I belong to, and emails from friends. I like checking that email, and really, really want to do it when I get home from work.

And speaking of work; how do I explain to my manager and my boss that I’m not ignoring whatever frightfully important thing they deemed it necessary to send me a 9pm the previous night just so I can finish off this letter/report/telephone call/cup of coffee, but rather engaging in a time-honoured personal efficiency technique? I don’t stand a chance.

So, as effective as this particular lifehack would be to a great many people, I don’t think it is for me. I just need to be connected to the world. Even if it is before that second cup of coffee.

I’m completely entranced by ThinkGeek’s new Wee Ninjas. I want one. Desperately. Now to brave the perils of international shipping to get me one.

[Edit: Shipping to my country is US$23.  I think perhaps I'll wait until I have a few things I want.]