Toodledo.com is a free as well as pay for service that allows you to track all your stuff online from as simple as a basic todo list, to the more complex uses of the GTD (“Getting Things Done” a book by David Allen) principles, a system that helps people manage all the stuff from low level “eat breakfast” to “Become CEO” type tasks and goals in life.

I started looking for a better way to keep track of my todo lists.  I came from the Franklin Planner days of having a list that would contain all the important items I needed to do but did not have a set time to get done.  That system would have you prioritize each item with an A, B, or C depending on it’s importance for the day then you would take all the A items and number them 1, 2,3 and repeat the process with B and C items.  Those items you have left over at the end of the day you would forward, or write again on the next day.  When I used this system I was very effective in getting things done, and not loosing track of stuff I needed to accomplish.  This worked great until the Technical side of me, or the Geek in me took over.  I wanted to have all my stuff electronic as well as in my planner.  I moved to Palm and kept things in there for a while, but it lost it’s focus (or rather I lost my focus), then moved to Outlook.  Nothing seemed to work as well as the paper based system.
I thought there had to be a better way, then I stumbled upon this book I kept hearing other geeks talk about called “getting things done” or GTD. (I would see the #gtd hash in twitter and wonder what it was.)  I had recently found “Remember the Milk” a program that would work with my iPhone and liked it, but was looking for a free solution.  I figured that there had to be ome geek out there that has built a better mousetrap.

I found a program called Ultimate Todo’s and started using it.  It has the ability to sync with toodledo.com and of course being the geek that I am, I signed up.

I started to love the ability to sync my stuff so I didn’t have to keep my phone open to the todo app all the time.  while working with it I saw articles talking about how toodledo works well with the GTD principles and thought there is that GTD thing again.  Well I decided to check out the book and found it on Audible.com (I also signed up for that based on another well known geek Leo Laporte constantly recommending books for it and it’s services.) I saw that my monthly subscription credit was about due, and I waited a few days to order the book. Once I listened to it, I was hooked on the priciples.

One of the main themes is you have to have your stuff in a system that you can rely on and trust, so your brain can let go of trying to remember all the stuff.  You know what that stuff is. How many times have you seen or been listening to something and a word reminds you of something you forgot to do, or wanted to do, but you keep forgetting to do it.  That’s stuff that weighs on your mind when you forget to do it, because you feel that you should have remembered it.  That is a stress you don’t need.  and if you had everything captured in a system you could rely on and trust 100%, your brain would then be free to work on other things and not feel like it had to keep a hold and tab on the 1000′s of things you mean, said, or set out to do.

After I tried to “capture” all the “stuff” that I needed to get done, wanted to get done, or would like to do someday, I was finding that there was this great freedom in being able to write down in a reliable system something that just popped into mind that I needed to address but was not in a position (or “context”) to do anything about at the time.  Once I knew I had recorded this inforamation and felt “free” from trying to remember it.  I was hooked.

Then something very bad happened.  See my previous post (or rant) toodledo goes down hard… for more detail. Basically the service had a HUGE interruption and when I needed my “stuff” it was not available. GASP! What’s in there that I have forgotten, that I need to worry about. The trust in and relied upon system was gone! So now where is my proven trustable system?

Well if you read the other post, you will see I eventually realized that I was only missing 1 or two items, which I consiously remembered, and I had the rest backed up with the Ultimate Todo’s app on my iPhone. So really it was not as bad as I originally thought.

I know that the creator of toodledo feels horrible about the downtime, and is working on putting systems in place so that can never happen again.

Toodledo.com really is the best system online out there for iPhone users and GTD types. For the price (free) you can’t beat it. I paid for the premium package for two reasons. Reason #1 they don’t purge my stuff after a certain amount of time. I will be able to search my completed items, months or years later. Reason #2 I liked the program so much I thought I should support it.

Toodledo may have lost a bunch of customers that day, but I think they will gain new ones and even gain those back when they realize it truly is the best product out there for what they need.

Welcome back Toodledo.com I really did miss you while you were away!

Until the next time,

Thirteen

Also bought a few toys for home and I am going to play with those for a bit. Stay tuned this blog is going to have all things related to Thirteen and his technology haves, and have nots.