• 0 Posts
  • 24 Comments
Joined 1 year ago
cake
Cake day: July 1st, 2023

help-circle
  • I used to get sucked into finding new tools to help me be more productive, but keeping it simple and visible works for me.

    I use Apple Reminders and leverage their smart tags to break tasks down by how long they’ll take, how much effort, and when they need to be done. I keep Reminders open on my iPad so I can always see it, and when I have 15 minutes to kill, I select a 15-minute or less task and knock it out. It works for me, and my whole family can add to it, so I never forget to do something.


  • A year ago, I discovered I have ADHD. Suddenly, everything fell into place. I’ve had many hobbies, projects, and ideas throughout my life, but I’ve rarely completed or stuck with them for long. I’m still working to develop a system that allows me to explore while helping me complete tasks over time.

    I’ve thought about using medication but I don’t want to depend on it for productivity. I’m curious, has it significantly changed things for any of you?









  • So this is where I’ll disagree.

    Android is not a good choice for my use case. Signal is excellent, I use it every day, but it’s not great when you factor in that I need to get elderly and non-tech savvy family to all download an app to talk to you. I might get some, but I won’t get all of them. The remaining ones deal with SMS, which I already said isn’t reliable where I am. Now factor in MMS messages, and they need to deal with degraded quality because I’m there. This changes in iOS 17, so it’s a short-term issue for them, but still a long-term problem for me.

    Keeping tabs on my parents using Apple health and find my, can’t do the same with Android. Yes.m, they can share their location with Google Maps, but they don’t use Google Maps, so now I have to get them on that and help troubleshoot if something stop working.

    FaceTime calls, again, possible but not easy for them to set up, so now we need another app.

    Lifetime of device and cost of ownership. Without loading a third party version of Android, Apple still provides longer support, which means my phone lasts longer, cost me less, and leads to me contributing less e-waste back into the environment.

    I like Android, I use it everyday, and sure, I could switch back, but I would lose more than I would gain. I would love if Apple would be willing to adopt a common standard, but they won’t do that unless it benefits them. Look at me, I’m in their ecosystem an unwilling to leave because my experience immediately deteriorates when I do.

    So yeah, while messaging is a part of it, it’s not the whole picture.


  • That’s a fair question.

    I’m tech agnostic; whatever fits my need is what I use, and I can easily change devices and operating systems without skipping a beat. My entire family and nearly all of my circle are in the Apple ecosystem; it just makes it easier to communicate and keep tabs on my parents. For those that aren’t using iMessage, Signal is the preferred app.

    I still use Android for work, but the only thing I miss about Android is notifications. Apple can’t seem to get notifications right.







  • Keeping it simple works for me, so I stick with Apple Reminders and leverage smart tags to keep everything organized and give me an “at a glance” view. I can open Reminders and see things categorized by:

    • level of effort
    • estimated time to complete
    • category (home, school, kids, etc)

    I’ve tried a lot of other tools in the past but too many options keeps me in a constant state of tweaking instead of getting things done. Plus I like being able to just say out loud what I need to add to my list and share it with my family without them having to get another app.

    Notes are a bit trickier for me. I still use OneNote for work (and hate it), but I use Apple Notes for home and Goodnotes for school. I’ll probably end up going Apple Notes for the same reasons as Reminders, but I’m still hesitant for some reason.