PigPogPDA - PigPog Creativity Wiki [Introduction]

Michael Randall lays out a paper GTD-based system that should appeal to a lot of folks here.

What Is It?

• A Moleskine hack.
• An extreme Moleskine hack.
• A simplified GTD system (What system? See our GTD Introduction), with relatively little actual organising. May be useful if you fancy Doing GTD Without Doing GTD.
• A complete personal management system for those who’s needs aren’t too complicated.
• A rather over-the-top system for dealing with just the capturing and processing end of GTD.

Why?

I was finding GTD a bit much for various reasons, but didn’t want to stop entirely - I needed to be Doing GTD Without Doing GTD. This is the system I came up with in the end. It’s simpler than GTD, and wouldn’t scale to the sort of level that GTD will, but it works pretty well for me, so it seems reasonable to think it might work well for other people too.

Read on for details of a clever system for turning a Moleskine Reporter into a kind of über-notebook, in which capture, processing, and related work are handled using sticky-note flags and some light templating.

Really good post on a satisfying hybrid of paper and digital. Full of good insight and “what I've learned” observations. Best of many good lines: “The power of Greyskull is the power of the next action.” Word.

Old-timey Hipster PDA.

Try a nice simple to-do list that you can really manage.

I dig how Doug’s combined his tools (and, like, three different memetic atoms) for his Hipster PDA mod.

As a consequence of being too lazy to take the trash out a couple nights ago, the smell of salmon took up residence throughout our kitchen. In addressing the stank, I ran across this ginormous page full of of links on cleaning and stain removal including a handy collection of homemade air fresheners.

This is very cute—turn an old Zip disk cast and some custom-printed templates into a sexy little Hipster PDA variant or a mini-tickler file. Clever!

Here’s a quick roundup of a few cool items I’ve picked up (or had recommended to me) over the past few weeks.

• Globe-Weis Expanding Project File Jackets
• Polder Electronic Clock, Timer, and Stopwatch in One
• Avery Extended Edge Document Sleeves
• Eldon SpaceMaker File Box
• Fisher Military Space Pen

The Hipster PDA has been extended and improved beyond my wildest dreams thanks to things like GTDTiddlyWiki, Douglas Johnston’s DIY Planner, and John Norris’s very creative templates. With this growth and interest have come a lot of requests from readers for the best, cheapest, and most Mac-friendly printer for printing directly to ordinary index cards. I’ve shared this interest since, frankly, I’ve been buffaloed as well—crippled by the crappiness of my old Epson and unsure what to try next. So I did what I always do: I asked for help.

Even as I started asking for reader advice on inexpensive printers that handle standard index cards well, I had a feeling this was going to be a tough post to put together. This was borne out by the very wide range of suggestions you all submitted—over 30 different models by most all the major companies were mentioned (although only 4 got mentioned more than once)—as well as the plain fact it’s virtually impossible to give meaningful advice on a product you’ve never used. Duh, right?

Anyhow, to put this together, I’ve adopted a blended approach. First, I took everyone’s suggestions (and warnings), compiled a tally count, and then did a bit of extra research on CNET, Epinions, etc. (including a couple phone calls to sales support and some assorted friends).

But, in the end, I decided to put my real-life money where my mouth theoretically should be: I popped in to CompUSA on Saturday morning and bought the recommended model that looked best to me—the Canon Pixma iP3000—and then spent the rest of the weekend testing it out. See how much I love you guys?

The Winner: Canon Pixma iP3000 Photo Printer

• Basics: Ink jet; 22 ppm b/w; 15 ppm color; 2 paper sources; automatic duplex
• Street Price: about $80 (after current rebate)
• Home Page : iP3000 @ Canon
• Compare:
  • Froogle
  • Price Grabber
  • Epinions
• Buy (your purchase supports 43 Folders) :
  • Buy.com (Best deal: $59.95 after rebate)
  • Amazon ($69.99 after rebate)

This sexy little number looks like a toaster oven from 2001 and has an awful lot of cool features given its sub-$100 price tag. Most importantly for our purposes, it takes a big pile of regular old, drug-store index cards and prints whatever you want onto them at a clip of about 10 seconds per card. It also has a 150-sheet, cassette-loading paper drawer (similar to those on the old LaserWriters). This means that you can load up the tray with plain printer paper without removing your blank cards from the top loader —no juggling, and no disruption to your “normal printing.”

It’s a great photo printer and a fast, middle-quality text printer, but if you’re looking for a cheap way to print index cards from your Mac, I think this is a great choice.