Number 6's Blog

Over the years I’ve used a number of task managers:

• My Head:Kept everything in my head. Much spilled out
• Paper: One Program I worked would not allow us to bring anything to work that was not in our pockets. I used pocket notebooks for everything including task management
• Remember the Milk: Along came the Internet and I discovered RTM. Just found out it’s still there. Wow, after all these years!
• todo.txt: I started todo.txt after I retired. As the name implies it’s a plain text based system using tags. The standard version had a group of Unix scripts to make task management easier. I added a few of my own in Python.
• GoodTasks: Layer on top of Apple Reminders and Calendar

And the along came NotePlan which started using earlier this year after a multi-year stay with todo.txt

The closest metaphor is the Swiss Army knife.

Why do I use NotePlan? ->

• Apple based,
• Markdown,
• Local storage,
• Projects,
• Intuitive interface,
• Extensible

NotePlan Components

NotePlan’s major components are:

• Task Management – Features Yearly, Quarterly, Monthly, weekly and Daily tasks. NP supports projects as well. IT also has time blocking, task filters, and recurring tasks
• Notes – Based on text files using the Markdown format. It also has “wiki” note linking. You can use #tags for topics and @mentions to assign tasks or reference people, which are instantly searchable.
• Calendar Integration – Integrates with iCloud, Google, and Exchange calendars. The integrated calendar, tasks, and notes display makes planning your day, and projects easy.
• Knowledge Management – The text files based, markdown format, wiki linking, hast tagging, and mentions enable knowledge management

NotePlan Characteristics

• Plain Text files based on Markdown
• All data is yours. Unlike some applications NotePlan data is stored on my system – in my case iCloud but other options are available
• Wiki forward and back note linking
• Apple Based
• Cloudkit syncing
• Tags
• Mentions – references people and notes – for example: “Finalize plan with @jane-doe”
• Search
• Filters
• Plugins – many already available and you can roll your own
• Projects
• Properties – Files can have user definable properties
• Tasks, Checklists, Actions
• Note Publication – A very intriguing feature I discovered after using NotePlan for some time is the Publish Notes capability

Here’s a couple sources explaining why to use NotePlan better than I can

Why Use NotePlan

My Productivity Workflow

Other App Posts:

• PopClip
• Alfred
• SuperKey