With GTDInboxV2, I’ve been focusing a lot more on moving beyond crudely offering GTD labels (as in v1).
I’ve been trying to work out the most elegant solution for turning Gmail into an efficient task manager and knowledge store.
But, it’s becoming apparent to do this I need some more use-cases. I’d love to know how people interact with Gmail (using GTD) right now. (more…)

Continuing the preview-while-we-wait theme; I wanted to highlight another little treat in GTDInbox v2 that I’m particularly fond of

I think this is easiest to reveal with an example, so here goes…
When I receive an email, I rack my brains to try & remember if that person has written before… it’s hit & miss at best. Therefore I made GTDInbox capable of, after the conversation is loaded, right clicking their name, choose “Show All Conversations”, and have all existing conversations with them popup in a new window (without moving me away from the conversation).

Similarly, if I’m reading a conversation, and I notice something I want to research deeper in the text, I can do a Gmail search, but have the results shown in a new window – again so I do not have to leave the conversation.

Conceptually, it’s letting you do useful research without disrupting your normal work flow.

Actually, as I’m writing this I’ve just had another thought… say I receive an email from ‘Bob’ that is labelled ‘P/BuildHouse’. It would be neat to be able to quickly see all other conversations I’ve had with Bob about the BuildHouse project. Hmmm….

I was a little late twigging the implications of Gmail’s recently announced IMAP support, but it really is brilliant for GTD-ers.

What is IMAP for Gmail?
In a nutshell, it takes messages you’ve labelled, and allows you to use them in other (email) clients; with labels mapping to folders.

So, P/GTDInbox will map to the folder GTDInbox, which would be a sub folder of P.
And, S/Next Action will map to folder Next Action, which would be a sub folder of S.

Any changes you make, by moving messages between folders, are then perfectly synchronised next time you log into Gmail.

Why is this Great?
First & foremost, it allows you to retrieve/manipulate your tasks using your favourite email client (e.g. Thunderbird); allowing you to take advantage of GTD email features with your regular desktop software.
This is particularly useful when the email client is on a mobile device, like the iPhone, allowing you to access your tasks on the road.

It also allows developers to create specialised (possibly GTD based) software that uses the messages/tasks you have in Gmail as the database. So, in the future you may do 90% of your (email related) task management within Gmail, but use 3rd party tools to either work with it on other devices (e.g. PDA), or to use specialist functionality.

In short, IMAP – while not an instantly beneficial feature – makes GTDInbox & Gmail much more capable as a ‘base’ system that other software can hook into & extend… meaning more efficient/available task management!

Perhaps unsurprisingly, it transpires the ‘beta by Wednesday’ promise was a little optimistic. It’s been a long hard slog so far; and I’m still not 100% sure what’s to show for it

While the wait goes on I’d love to point the spotlight on some functionality I’m really thrilled about – stuff to help improve stress free team-work.

Delegation
You can now delegate to others, and it’ll automatically be marked as “Waiting-On”. You can then review tasks you’re waiting for others to complete; generally, by project or by person.

Efficient Sharing of Project Names
You can now pre-label a message before you send it to another person (so long as they use GTDInbox). So, I can assign a project/status to a task and send it to a colleague, and they will receive with the correct project/status already applied. (And if they don’t have the labels, they’ll be given the chance to quickly add them – helping to sync terminology between people).

To temper expectation, I imagine the first release will be a bit rough & ready. There might be some usability pitfalls and a bit of scaffolding still showing; but the foundations are there for some great improvements!

So, the last question is, when?

There are still 2 or 3 bits of real complexity to overcome; and then it’s on to the (slightly) easier job of adding in the front-end UI.

I hope there will be something by the end of this week (15/11); but I have to go to London Thursday & Friday – which makes it a rather short week!
Fingers crossed

Time for a little status update on GTDInbox v2.

For a quick recap, GTDInbox v2 was always going to be a complete re-write to resolve the fundamental problems v1 has (speed/ui-glitches), and it was going to be relatively straight forward (!). For I had done my research on the inner-workings of Gmail 1.0…

And then Gmail 2.0 arrived :/
The surface changes may seem rather small; but behind the scenes it is a complete rewrite. I think it’s best summed up by a kindly response I got from Gmail engineer, who, when asked for some insight into the technical details of Gmail 2.0 said something to the effect of, “Andy, not even we’d like to contemplate having to tackle Gmail’s new codebase from the outside… it’s far more complex than it ever was”.

Happily I can report that after an extremely long week, it’s starting to make some progress. The improvements to Gmail mean we can do some much-requested features (like pre-labelling emails/actions when you compose them); the UI is less ‘jumpy’ and everything is very noticeably faster (ironically to be the point of being unnoticeable).

As forewarning, the very first release (GTDInbox 2.0) may have some features cut; but if there is enough demand they will come back. I’m conscious that if features can be dropped, and GTDInbox simplified, it will be better for new users & it will help make GTDInbox more maintainable. Things currently dropped are: Custom-Search and Hipster Print; and Custom-Search is probably gone for good (other extensions do this better).
I’ve also taken some liberties with the Options, essentially creating less choice (and thus less confusion). So, now a ‘Finished’ item will be automatically archived, a starred-items can no longer be used to denote Next Actions. Another advantage to reduced choice is I can focus on making the ‘standard’ way of doing things much more efficient – in usability terms – so your regular GTD processes are more intuitive.

I’m not sure when the first test version will roll; but something will probably go out to existing testers/donators early next week; and then a public beta shortly after.