For quite some time, I have been meaning to start writing a series of posts concerning the tools that I use from day to day as a programmer. Although this concept is nothing new, as everyone and their brother has posts about this topic, I feel the urge to add my opinions to the lot.
Why Have Tools and How To Use Them
Tools are needed for a variety of reasons. Some tools make us much more efficient, which allows us to work faster, reduce repetitive typing / browsing / etc. Other tools serve as organizational aides, giving us the ability to focus on topics without forgetting or burning brain-cpu cycles on non-applicable thoughts at the time. Finally, other tools allow for collaboration, which allows us to utilize the efforts of our peers in order to accomplish the task in a faster more organized manner. Despite the underlying goal of the tool, it seems that every tool’s main purpose is to save us time, which is our most valuable personal commodity.
The above statement is pretty obvious, so - why have I wasted your time in making you read it? Basically, I wanted to frame the discussion for this key point: Tools are great items and can save you a great deal of stress et al, but you have to invest in the tool in order to gain benefit from said tool. Most people fail when adopting a tool because they do not take the time to fully understand their tool. They do not go beyond the initial cost (be it time, resources, or money) of using the tool in order to find that efficiency nirvana. After just giving it a few seconds of their time, they quickly pass judgment and then subject the rest of their world to their naive-expert opinions via their blogs, tweets, etc. Everyone does this to some degree, so we have to be mindful of this and try to avoid it as much as we can. Due to this, I generally try to follow a few guidelines to avoid making this mistake:
- Read the instructions – I know, its totally lame and against the man-code to read the instructions. Suck it up and read them. Also, don’t just scan them. Assume that this tool will someday have a function that could save your life. If you do not know that function at the crucial moment, you will quite possibly (but highly unlikely) die. :) Also, pay special attention to your shortcut keys. Those are efficiency tools within efficiency tools. You don’t have to know them all, but 10 to 15 of the most important will not hurt.
- Make yourself use the tool for no less than 2 weeks – If it is a simple tool, put it up to the litmus test by trying to use it in your day to day life for at least 2 weeks. The more complex the tool – the longer this test should last. Two weeks is simply a arbitrary baseline whereas 2 months is more appropriate at times. This may involve a bit of extra work on your side, especially if your are trying to maintain a legacy tool at the same time. The main purpose of this test is to not only ensure that the tool works in the context that you wish to place it, but to also make sure you have an appropriate grasp of the tool before you go crazy in its adoption. There is nothing worse than selling someone on an awesome tool and then spoiling any chance it has due to the fact that you were inept in its use.
- Find someone who uses the tool and ask them to show you how they use it – Tools can have many different uses and sometimes we are not always the most inventive in their use. It always helps to see how other people are using your tool and seeing if they have something to teach you. Unless you were the writer of that tool (and probably still if you were), I can guarantee you that you will always learn something new by watching someone else use it.
- Finally, invest in your tool beyond just using it – Once you find the tool that you like, be sure to contact the vendor / creator. Let them know what you love / hate. Donate time / $$ to their cause if they are open source (even if it is only 10 bucks). Participate in their forums and press for new feature sets. You will be amazed on the amount of impact a small group of people who give vocal input have on a project’s direction.
Following these basic concepts is a pretty easy task, but we tend to cut corners, which will eventually end up only robbing us of our productivity in the end. Let’s try to avoid this outcome.
Today’s Tool Highlight – Evernote
Today, as I was trolling around on Twitter (another great tool), I managed to stumble across a conversation between Dave Penton (aka @dpenton) and Chris Benard (aka @cbenard). Here is the basic conversation that evolved:
Chris Benard:
David Penton:
Chris Benard:
Since I have been intending to write a bit on this subject anyway, I agreed to post a bit about this tool, which is perhaps my one of my favorite and most versatile tools.
What is Evernote?
In its most basic form, Evernote is a note-taking system that gives you a high level of functionality on a very basic concept – keeping notes. Even though there are a plethora of note taking systems, Evernote excels in that it not only gives you a pretty slick functionality for categorization, searching, and sharing, but it also makes itself available to a plethora of platforms so that you can use on your computer, via the web, via your phone (iPhone, Windows Mobile, or generic web-capable phone), and even via email. Here is what Evernote has to say about themselves as well:
“Evernote allows you to easily capture information in any environment using whatever device or platform you find most convenient, and makes this information accessible and searchable at any time, from anywhere. Did we mention that it's free?”
What can Evernote do for you?
Now that I have made the pitch for the wonders of Evernote, let me delve a bit into its possibilities. What can Evernote do for you? The best answer would be “whatever you choose to use it for.” Thanks, Captain Obvious!
Although this response is rather evasive / generic, it is very accurate. At its most basic level, Evernote is a text / screen capture system with many different accessibility options. This means that anything that you may type into or view on your screen is subject to being organized and captured in Evernote. To be honest, the possibilities are pretty endless. For the sake of brevity, I think the best description of how to use Evernote would be to describe of few of my use-case scenarios and let you draw your own conclusions.
Evernote Use Cases
In my day to day use, I tend to mainly use the Evernote windows application. Although the web application is very handy (as well as the mobile options), I tend to prefer web-capable desktop applications in order to allow for offline sessions and, usually, more stable control /functionality. In addition, the desktop application has great synchronization features, which allows me to sync my Evernotes from my work pc to my home pc. This has all kinds of uses that range from quick capturing that pesky code issue that you want to mull over later to reminding yourself to feed the cats when you get home. For the most part, Evernote, for me, is an information filter through which I am able to quickly make note of and process any information that floats across my desk while I am at work. Of course, my favorite feature of the windows application is the context menu addition that allows me to right-click and send any item that I am working with quickly into Evernote, without ever missing a beat (with some exceptions).
I can’t stress how much of a time saver this is for me b/c I can continue working on a single purpose without forgetting an errant yet excellent thought or allowing myself to become distracted and wasting the time I spent to ramp up to the task at hand.
Blogs and information processing:
Every morning, I start my day by scanning my blogs via FeedDemon (btw, this is another awesome tool that has great synergy bonus w/ Evernote). Usually, when I open my blogs, the list looks something like this:
Currently I follow somewhere around 150 unique blogs, most of which are either news or programming information. Considering that I generally only allow myself around 30 mins to process / read through potentially 100 – 150 articles, it is needless to say that I have to have someway to capture the gems of information for later perusal and to cull the ‘junk’. This is where Evernote excels. As I read the blogs, I can quickly right click on either the entire portion or on the specific portion of the article and send the note on its merry way to Evernote.
Later, usually when I get home, I will check my entries, categorize them and then read through them at my leisure. Evernote allows you to specify a default ‘notebook’ in which incoming notes can be dumped. This makes it very easy for me to simply make a ‘uncategorized’ notebook that captures the days information to be processed and fine-tuned later. Of course, the desktop application gives you nice drag-n-drop features, easy editing, and other cool features to boot.
Twitter and time maintenance:
Twitter is a great tool and I currently follow hundreds of people. Needless to say, I spend quite a bit of time reading different thoughts and ideas on Twitter that range from the inane such as @dkoren ‘s wondering whether moleskine is actually make from the skin of mole to @elijahmanor ‘s frequent posts on great tech topics.
However Twitter does present a bit of a problem in that it is a constant stream of information and, as a programmer, my concentration on the task at hand is critical. I can’t afford to allow myself to stop what I am doing every 10 mins to read a totally off-topic concept.
In comes Evernote… Elijah posts a link, I quickly follow that link, use the context menu to add the information to Evernote, and Evernote not only adds the text of my selection of the page, but will also capture the URL, and auto title the note for quick reference later. SWEET! Now I have a concept saved for later perusal and I can keep on being efficient on the task at hand. On the flip side, if I am truly interested in if moleskine notebooks are indeed made from moles, I can quickly hammer out a note to investigate this later.
Remember the Milk / Random Thoughts
Finally, Evernote is awesome to use for mundane stuff as well. This includes todo lists, task lists, Christmas lists for the spouse, great blog ideas, random images that you might want to see later, or a quick dump of temp data that you might need tomorrow. No matter the item, Evernote will keep track of it for you and it will always be on-hand whenever you need it. Often times, I will use Evernote’s built in screen clipper to save quick images of things of note / items into a note and then email them to an interested party.
Currently, I am opting to use Evernote to save important links and categorize them. Although other tools, such as delicious and IE’s built in bookmarks are good for this, I simply appreciate the ease in which I can add / process this information in Evernote.
In conclusion…
All in all, Evernote is a great tool that allows me to quickly process information, categorize it, and remain efficiently on the task at hand. It has literally saved me hours of time and kept me from allowing thinks to slip through the cracks. Also, thanks to its integration into so many different products (did I mention that it integrates into Office products?), I can quickly utilizes its abilities without having to switch my working context. Give it a try and let me know – What do YOU use Evernote to do?