Reading the conversations about Reminders, Markdown and DevonThink etc. made me think (again!) about managing projects in general.
In practical terms, how do people manage projects with the various associated emails, notes (including project parameters, success factors, meetings, calls et al), and perhaps more importantly the files associated with a project?
I have used Obsidian previously, with a heavily self-modded setup. I liked it because the files associated with a project were easily added, and due to the nature of Obsidian, were available in a ānormalā iCloud folder accessible by any other application including Finder. The reason I stopped using it were a) I spent a lot of time managing the system rather than managing projects, and b) the reminders/tasks issue was sub-optimal (no system notifications, plus I effectively had two reminder systems as I was also using Appleās Reminders for other stuff).
I now use Agenda, and generally am finding it very useful, especially the ability to directly link to Reminders and my calendars. However, the downside is with emails and files. I have to link to emails (I realise there is probably no other viable option - but all very āmanualā), and any files exist within Agenda and therefore are not available to other applications.
I have tried (and will probably return to) using DevonThink, either wholly or for associated files and emails using DTās excellent linking abilities.
Very interested in your responses-eager for a magic solution
Once I used OmniFocus but it was too overloaded for me (and my projects) - and I was more busy to maintenance the projects in OmniFoucs than working on the projects.
Then I used also Agenda, which is/was in the beginning more a very good note-taking (related to dates) app but now getting more and more a good ToDo or even a project management app in ālightā. But my projects are/were not so much ādate sensitiveā. So Agenda was not the right choice. It just did not fit well into my workflow.
Now, for some years I use Things and it works very well, suits to my workflow and projects. Of course not fully/perfect integrated in the Mac universe (with Reminders or Calendar) but still. I also like the UX. E.g. mails per Drag&Drop to an action. It helps me e.g. to get reminded for actions, helps me to keep different projects and works separated (not to mix these together) or just to have an overview in a clear and easy way.
DevonThink for me was mainly a huge container for documents (I switched back to EagleFiler) and not a tool for projects.
I think it is a very personal and individual question (and answer) which app(s) one uses (and how!). Also depends on the kind of projects: OmniFocus for small projects is too big, complex projects in Agenda or Things can be difficult to handle.
My setup is similar to @Bmosbackerās, but I use rely on OmniFocus for projects of all sizes and I like Bear for notes, as Iām rather markdown-oriented. I also like MindNode for visualizing a project, and Shortcuts for having project templates. The new beta of DEVONthink has me evaluating whether I should use DEVONthink a bit more.
One thing I find handy is consistent naming conventions and folder (or tag) structures to keep projects organized across these apps. I got into Johnny Decimal a few years back, and itās been really helpful for me knowing that whatever app Iām working in, I know where to look for something or what to name it since itās basically the same across apps. That kind of consistency is a real time-saver.
I keep projects wherever theyāre being worked on by everyone. Often itās Basecamp or Github, but it depends on the group. I do ask that no one use something wretched like Jira. I augment the collaborative to-dos with OF tasks that would look disorganized in the projects view, but are quick to enter and show up in the right perspectives.
Tactical personal projects tend to stay in OF because the grouping of tasks helps me. Files/links for them are all over the place and I keep them together either by linking from an individual task or with Hookmark associations at the project level. Not every project needs this.
Project planning is mostly writing/sketching/scratching/long lunch conversations/long walks. I keep organization light here as I want to keep discarding ideas as thoughts improve.
(Iām also a former Agenda user; it was great. Fortunately I was able to get out of having so many meetings and execute more projects sequentially. )
Due to upcoming compliance reasons, I have preemptively switched to MS tools for work related stuff before itās mandatory so I have some time to tweak the setup. That means Edge, Outlook (I prefer the web version for some reason), Todo, Teams, OneDrive and OneNote, the whole pack. To the merit of MS there is some sort common language in these tools that make them tick together and the possibilities of tweaking are not few, plus they are more integrated than the Apple default apps and have a mobile version. I may use Obsidian on top of a corporate OneDrive synced folder but OneNote seems capable in terms of search and ingestion (really you can add anything and it gets attached to the note) and I need to make a final decision. Probably āgood enoughā as to be tolerable is an accurate description of the MS productivity offering. Not exciting, but works.
For personal life, everything is in iCloud Drive folders as regular files (only exceptions are Photos), and I use DEVON or Obsidian as I see fit, I tend to switch from time to time because in āpersonal modeā itās usually about fast retrieval and some light edition, I have some linking but I donāt really use it as a PKM. Reminders and Calendars close the loop and I keep using Evernote as my last resort vault: when Iām processing my Inbox of files, I carefully put the file in the folder that I believe it makes more sense, categorized in a Johny Decimal inspired way but not very strict if there are more than one folder, I ruthlessly duplicate and then the file goes to Evernote, uncategorized, untagged, so itās just drag and drop to a Safari tab. In mobile, I use plain Files.app if I know where the file is and will go to Evernote for more complicated searches.
I have become more passionate about this as time goes on.
All my client work and ongoing large side projects ā anything thatās required to run my agency, basically ā lives in Notion. The one exception is files, which I generally keep out of Notion. I also keep a task list for each project in Notion. Tasks have statuses, flags, all that kind of junk, as do projects. Projects can also be tracked along the sales process. I pull only the next task for projects out of Notion and put them into Omnifocus (I could use Things with this setup too, or even Reminders, but I have inertia and like OFās power).
Relational databases in Notion tie together normal notes, meeting notes, and project information.
I genuinely think, though, that I could probably do almost everything in the Finder and get away with it, save for task management. Probably just a file structure that looks like this:
Client Name (directory)
Plain text note for all meetings with this client, dates of meetings as headers
Subdirectory for any client metadata
Project Subdirectory
Plain text note for general notes on the project, including status updates
Even a plain text note for tasks, if youād prefer not to put it all in Omnifocus, or a simple spreadsheet
Subdirectory for assets received from the client
Subdirectory for the work itself
Subdirectory for any exports I need to send the project, each export in its own folder sorted by date
Subdirectory for final work
Subdirectories can all be sorted numerically.
Most of the PM software we use, if youāre not using it as part of a team, is probably overkill compared to what we can do in the Finder, plain text, and spreadsheets. But everything is in Notion now, soā¦ ĀÆ\_(ć)_/ĀÆ
I have a similar approach, the structure itself is not that important, the key is keeping the consistency of that structure across all projects and tools (for example browser bookmarks or email), then everything is always a couple of clicks away. This is my learning from Johnny Decimal. My other learning is that keeping this discipline is harder the more tools you add to your system.
Pretty much a ānakedā CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system. A few years ago when I needed a personal CRM system by which I mean one that runs on my local machine there were none to be found.
If I need a pCRM in future I will hack one together using SQLite3 on my Macs or MariaDB on my RaspberyPi5 server. Wrapping it up in some python.
Iāve used a similar folder structure with an agencyāworked well. The admin had an Automator shortcut on her desktop that would generate the folders. The top level organization was projects in year-clientcode-project number format, e.g. 25MPU001 Web Refresh. Thereād be a 000 project for each client copied between years with strategic documents, core assets etc. (I think this part couldāve been better.)
The drive was mounted from a URL accessible with a VPN. It sounds like you could keep everything local.
I use Obsidian. I see you tried it and it didnāt meet your needs. I donāt know when you tried it but it has changed a lot recently, especially the tasks plugin. I donāt use notifications or reminders much at all. I do have start and due dates on some things but I always view them by looking at my task dashboard. I have found that the many new features of the tasks plugin are solving many things I thought Iād have to give up when I left Omnifocus.
As to the general project management. I have 2 vaults. One for my personal stuff and one that is shared among all people working on the AnimalTrakkerĀ® system. I have templates (using templater) for project notes of 2 types, recurring and one off. Most projects can be handled just with 1 Obsidian note which may contain links to emails. Projects that have files have a folder in Obsidian for the project, into which most if not all the files go. If there are files that I canāt either view in Obsidian or automatically click on and open up in my native app for that file type or are very large (like SQLite Databases, FASTQ FASTA and BAM files and similar things) Then they live in a folder in my Active_Projects folder in finder that is named the same as the one in Obsidian. Finished project folders move to my File_Cabinet folder in finder. Tasks for the project are in the note for that project with tags for context, or person assigned to it in the case of the vault with shared projects. I use the Kanban Plug-in to provide a now next later done view of all tasks for a specific project and the Canvas for an Assignments view of all tasks assigned to a particular person for the shared vault of common projects. In my personal one I have a dashboard note that groups my tasks by context in a GTD fashion I work from. so far most of the meeting notes are in the one big project note but I am exploring splitting them out and making the project note more of a dashboard for the project using some of the dataview scripts from Mike Schmitzās Life HQ Obsidian vault. Some of that is more automation that I want or need and some of my workflows and projects are unusual too say the least and donāt exactly fit in that mold but Iām getting some good ideas I can implement.
I am liberal with links when the need comes up. IF I am looking for something and I canāt find it easily Iāll put a line or note or link about where the item is in the first place I looked for it so my mesh of knowledge increases logically according to how I look for and use things.
Most of my individual notes for meetings etc have filenames that start with the data YYYY-mm-dd_ so I can search for stuff that way too.
My Obsidian/Finder hybrid is pretty close to this. I also add subdiretories as required for types of things, like old AnimalTrakker databases from customers or documents and stuff from them etc.
@cornchip@pantulis the problem for me is exactly what you say, in that the discipline is harder the more tools you add to the system. Iām in Notion now, which makes it ironically harder to migrate back to the Finder.
I will add that the benefits of Notion (primarily the ability to share stuff with other people) are lifesaving the minute you need them.
I have a folder called ā10 Projectsā in my Work folder. ā10ā allows it to be on top of the list in column view in Finder. This folder is indexed into Devonthink under ā10 Projectsā group in Work Database.
With recent shift to Devonthink, I am happy to have found a location for notes, meeting minutes, reference material, emails to be stores in same folder (group). I am also learning to use more and more markdown which I find makes my note taking (specially during meeting) faster. Still I miss the ease of making tables which was there in Evernote.
For Projects, I work off Devonthink though I can easily work off Finder as well. It just that mentally allows me to separate projects management (Devonthink) from regular file management (Finder).
I use Things for task management and create a project with same name with link back to Devonthink Project to it using either Things Helper utility or Hookmarks (which I am using more and more these days).
For me usually Things Projects are gateway to all the related material to a project through linking. The notes section under the project is where I put all important links and each task usually has a link to related material (email or file Iām working on etc). I find this setup to be most productive for my workflow.
Upon completion of project, the folder is moved to āArchiveā folder in finder and in Devonthink.
I am aware about the indexing related points in Devonthink but still prefer it as it gives me mental comfort knowing that I can always directly access files in Finder.
I am recently learning Devonthink and my use case maybe too simple, I donāt use any automation or scripting etc. but for me whatās important is, this setup allows me to get my work done, which I think is the ultimate goal
