I've been trying to find ways to increase my productivity and effectively take my life back by the horns, which for the past couple of months has spiralled out of control.
Gmail is a staple in my life. I use it and don't think about it. I've not gotten to the stage where I really use the folders as I can, however that might be about to change. So I've been looking into other online solutions that might be able to reach that status. Traditionally I've tried my very best to shy away from online services except those that are backed by one of the major players, mainly because they're not going to be charging me cash to provide a task that while isn't necessary to have online is nice to have. You could say it's a bit of an antithesis to Web 2.0, and in a way it actually is. You'd also expect someone like me to jump for this sort of thing, however I don't move into this arena without a little bit of caution, simply because I don't like to be dependant on others that can pull the plug on me at any time or worse, decide to change the terms and conditions.
NewsGator
For all those in the dark earlier this year I help redesign the excellent open source RSS aggregator Feed On Feeds Redux. I'm still completely commited to the project, however I've been extremely busy of late to be able to do anything else apart from work (I will be posting the fruits of that labour in the not too distant future), so the CSS is still in a bit of a mess at the moment, which is my fault to solve. In the meantime back to news aggregators, FOFR is not really ready yet. It's a bit on the slow side; the team is working on it but I need to take my life back now (once it's ready I'll probably move everything over to FOFR). I don't know why not many people have been talking about this particular service because I seriously rate it a great deal. It's completely free, clean interface, and actually believe it or not operate in the same way (more or less) as FOFR. You can import and export your feeds, you can move feeds into folders (and read all the feeds individually or within that particular folder), it's fast, the subscribe to bookmarklet works a charm, the favicons pop up (and can be turned off if you don't want them). Elements can be saved (or flagged depending on how you would like to term it). The only option that is missing as far as I'm concerned to be honest is the addition of tagging. I dunno if I could be bothered to tag things to be honest since I've only really gotten into tagging on my blog. Ben has recently mentioned Newshutch, which I'll definitely check out, although I have the feeling that Newgator is still far better. If only they could sort something out for linux, that would be well appreciated.
Ma.gnolia
I've been using this for a little while. I love the colours, I love the design of the site, I love the bookmarklet. Again I've not been using it for all that long, however I am getting into the habit of using it whenever I come to a website that I really like however I don't want to clutter up my firefox bookmarks, because it's get far too much. I haven't used de.lic.ious (or where ever the bloody i's go to be honest), because it looked far too basic for me. Too much text not enough form and structure to it all. Then again I've not visited the site in a good long while. Yup still a bit sparse for my liking.
Google Calander
I've only started using this today and I think it's great. It's got one single KILLER feature as far as I'm concerned. That is the fact that Google will text message me with the latest element on my calander of things to do. I can choose how far before it text messages me, however I seriously think that this is one of those features that is a complete godsend to someone like me. I've got far too much on my brain to be honest to worry about a number of things and will forget appointments, or worse (as is becoming a bit of a problem) double book things, or in the case of a couple of weeks back, triple books something. Yeah it got a bit ridiculous. This is part of the reason I'm chopping at the bits to get a PDA or the new Sony M600i.
I think I'm becoming a life hacker, hopefully the next couple of weeks will see a bit of this hectic lifestyle that I've been living cool down a little bit and I can actually get back to finishing off some of these projects that have been on my plate for months, some even a year.
Well you really ought to try newshutch. I've been a long time user of newsgator, but after trying newshutch, I couldn't go back. What newshutch lacks in features (not much) is counterbalanced by the sheer beauty and fluidity of the interface. To me it has been like a zen experience: the minimalist design removes everything that's unnecessary between you and the news.
I also like a lot Ma.gnolia. If you haven't yet, I suggest that you try the "roots" bokmarklet, it will really enhance your experience. http://ma.gnolia.com/blog/2006/09/18/introducing-ma-gnolia-roots
Roots is clever for sure. But, depressing when you root your own site and the only person that's magnolia'd it is you.
I actually tried Newsgator (a while ago, admittedly), but just couldn't get on with it; it felt too clunky and slow. Newshutch, as Laurent says, seems to remove everything unnecessary.
Ma.gnolia definitely has the edge over del.icio.us design-wise, but I already have a lot invested there in terms of saved bookmarks, tags etc., and the (mental) effort it would take to switch over is too much of a barrier for me right now. If anything, Ma.gnolia's design is too strong, visually: when you get down to the nitty-gritty, del.icio.us is amazingly functional (not that I admit to a conflict between beauty and function, but you take my point), with little pinches of Javascript in just the right places. It's not much to look at, I admit, but when you're using it it FEELS right, just like Newshutch does.
I was never a fan of the fuss made over 'interactivity' back in the bubble, but these days it's a more relevant concept, and the quality of interaction I get with Newshutch and del.icio.us is very important to me. They let me do what I want to do without it feeling like a chore: everything is intuitive, simple, meaningful.
Google calendar, apart from the texting bit is great because you can invite other people via your email to the event that's in your calendar. Also, before going in to that, you can create an event just from an email invitation that was sent to you! Apart from gmail and the google calendar, the other piece of software from Google that we like to use is Picasa2, because it implements a lot of online services together! Anyway, we really didn't want to sound like we've been on Google's payroll..! Apologies! :))
[...] For the last couple of days I’ve been toying with different feed readers (my staple diet is usually either Blogbridge or Feedlounge). Some time ago I’d toyed with FeedDemon - when I bought that a free business grade subscription to Newsgator came with it. I’d never really used Newsgator all that much, but after reading this post on Khaled’s blog I thought I’d give it a try. It’s pretty good I must admit - both speedy and functional. [...]