« ClerGTD.... | Main | Ah, spring... »
February 10, 2006
Cool tip from Belgium re: digital filing, if it fits you...
As I'm now using a digital labeler (Brother PT-18R) I think I'll experiment with Jan's suggestion. Interesting idea. Unfortunately Lotus Notes (where I have a lot of digial info) is not searchable (yet) with the "global" (not quite) search apps, so I'm a little handicapped, but this is a creative trick.
Dear Mr. Allen, In the past few months I have learned to work with the "Getting things done" method. It takes some time to get used to and I had to go back regularly to your book to keep myself in line. Acquiring the Outlook add-on has helped a lot. There is however one aspect that could be improved significantly. It has to do with reference-material. In your book you deal very much with paper-based reference material. It goes into folders and is stored (for example) in alphabetical order. I like the system, and it works. But more and more material comes to us now in digital form. You can print it of course, but you can also store it on your hard disk (again in folders). The essential problem remains: how do you find the specific document in this sea of printed and digital material? I believe that the recent development of search engines for the PC can provide an important extra to "Getting things done". Search engines like Copernic (my favorite) or Google Desktop will make an index of all files stored on your computer. They are very clever and will trawl through your files, emails, attachments to email etc. while your computer is idle for some time. And when you are looking for a particular document: just type in a word that is likely to appear and the search engine will do the work for you. It is super fast, you don't have to remember in which folder you have put the document, you don't have to make lists of reference words. The search engine will find it, and you can make your search very clever so you don’t end up with 40.000 hits. But what about written material that is not digitally available? The solution is very simple. In your book you insisted (and rightly so) that we put our documents in a clearly labeled folder. There are very quick labelers available that are linked to your computer. So, I make a new label (e.g. "Holiday in Barcelona"), print it, and copy-paste it in an Excel-file called "reference.xls". The folder and documents are stored in my alphabetical filing system with the exact label. When I want to find it back, I need not worry if the reference was on paper or digital: I just type the word "Holiday" or "Barcelona" into the search engine and it will find the digital document or it will find the words "Holiday in Barcelona" in my digital reference.xls file. If it's there, I know that it is paper-based and to be found in the filing system. It works, it's fast, I find all my things! That reduces worries and searching-time considerably. And all I have to do is type a few words, print the label and copy these words in one Excel-file. That takes me about 30 sec to do. I sure hope you can incorporate the value of search engines in "Getting things done". Yours sincerely, Jan Trommelmans, CEO, University College, Karel de Grote-Hogeschool, Antwerp
Posted by David at February 10, 2006 10:27 AM
Comments
Dear Mr. Allen, you could try this on a Mac with OSX Tiger, having Spotlight as a searchtool for files and metadata and so on.
Best regards, Max H.
Posted by: Max H. at February 10, 2006 11:19 AM
Thanks for the good suggestion Jan. As my filing cabinet groans at the bursting point (I know- time for a purge!) I wonder if anybody has had success in time-efficiently digitizing all or most of their paper documents using a scanner with a 30-50 page document feeder? Could cut way down on the paper blizzard, speed retrieval time for documents, and improve ease of portability of information. Purging dated digital documents would also be a cinch since they could dated in the document title. i.e. "2004 Holiday in Barcelona info" I have no experience with scanners so I'm not sure how the processing time to scan a document compares to the time required to print a label and file. Most GTD'ers probably have this down to 60 seconds or less. As a lazy guy I'd only switch to scanning if I could match that level of efficiency. Anybody out there who has developed and stuck with a simple system for digitizing? (apologies for this longer than intended post- if this is a conversation better suited for the posting board- or if it's already been dealt with there- please feel free to re-direct.
Cheers,
Chris
Posted by: Chris Watt at February 10, 2006 12:49 PM
David, let's meet this afternoon and I'll show you how to do this in Lotus Notes for the content you have there. X1, the makers of the google desk search element also have a tool that will allow searching of Notes databases, too.
Eric
Posted by: Eric Mack at February 10, 2006 01:33 PM
Don't forget Microsoft Lookout, awesome search engine in outlook that can also search the hard drive. (Sorry David, they don't have one for Lotus Notes).
Posted by: Brian D at February 10, 2006 01:57 PM
Google Desktop Enterprise searches Lotus Notes databases.
Posted by: Tim at February 10, 2006 01:59 PM
I also use extensively and really admire X1. It has changed all my filing habits - that is I no longer obsess over file structures since X1 finds documents for me.
One caveat - I don't think X1 has the capability of indexing information within the Microsoft OneNote product. This is really disappointing as I would like to begin storing reference file info and also my notes inside OneNote.
I am also not certain X1 indexes data inside PDF files but I am not certain this is true.
One more item - Microsoft Outlook became 100% more useful after I purchased your add-on. I hope you are making it also available in the next version of Outlook - I can't live without it!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by: Chuck at February 10, 2006 02:07 PM
Google Desktop Search for Enterprises (http://desktop.google.com/enterprise/) handles Lotus Notes databases, as well as all the rest of the stuff on the computer.
Posted by: David Singer at February 10, 2006 02:30 PM
Just be careful with that Google Desktop!
Google Copies Your Hard Drive - Government Smiles in Anticipation
http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2006_02.php#004400
Posted by: George L. at February 10, 2006 08:34 PM
David [Singer],
Google Desktop search is an interesting app, however, it only scans Notes E-mail. For organizations, Like DAC that use Lotus Notes extensively for all aspects of knowledge management, it's a real handicap to be limited to searching mail only. Nevertheless, it's a good start and a promise of things to come.
Meanwhile, between a good desktop search tool and an enterprise domain search (built-in to Notes/Domino) we can cover the bases.
Eric
Posted by: Eric Mack at February 11, 2006 01:08 AM
One way I have found to deal with files on the computer, is to simply keep them all in one folder and to give them a title along the lines of what I would do for my paper reference material, which I keep in a filing cabinet using alphabetical order.
I keep track of specific project support material using Devonthink Pro, but could do the same using PersonalBrain if I used a PC.
In my modest opinion, the search capability of both Spotlight and Devonthink Pro seems to give a clear edge to the Mac OSX.
Posted by: Pascal Venier at February 11, 2006 06:14 AM
I'm very interested in how people manage their digital documents, and I appreciate the search angle. As another option, I've had good luck adopting the A-Z model for digital files, with a straight analog to paper ones. So far it's worked great, and it's quite simple. More here, if anyone's interested (comments always welcome): Organizing Electronic Documents GTD-Style?
Posted by: Matthew Cornell at February 11, 2006 08:11 AM
David,
I recommend to clients that they can use a similar trick with Palm Desktop Memos/Outlook Notes.
Create a Category called "Files". In that category, create a Palm Memo/Outlook Note Titled with the Name of the file folder, and in the body put a short summary of what it is that you filed. Save it, and HotSync. This way, it will be indexed by whatever desktop search engine you currently use, but it will also be available using the Global Find on the Palm.
Hope that Helps!
/Mike
--
Solutions At Hand
Empowering and Mobilizing people using Palm Powered Handhelds and Treo Smartphones
Posted by: Michael Brown at February 13, 2006 04:57 AM
I scan in all my paper (with a Fujitsu document scanner) and (once I do my weekly backups) shred it.
File size is very efficient--One year's worth of documents can fit on a DVD-R. And it's searchable. I use an application that can OCR into PDF files that are searchable with "Google Desktop Search". You see the image of the original document, and the OCR'd text is "behind" it, visible only to the search software. This way, OCR errors don't matter too much. As long as you can find it with a search, you're looking at an image of the original document.
Posted by: Robert Swirsky at February 28, 2006 11:17 AM
David,
In addition to your remark on using Lotus Notes and the other comments re Google Desktop: I just installed Google Desktop 2, it works great and you can define in the Google Desktop plugin in Lotus Notes what databases it should search. So you stay in control!
Regards,
Peter
Posted by: Peter Simoons at March 1, 2006 08:10 AM