Organization | Simple. Organized. Life.

Wunderlist – The Free, Syncing To-Do List App

January 23, 2012 by David · 5 Comments

In October of 2011 I wrote a post about the program SimpleNote, which was my note-taking application of choice. At first it only worked on my iPhone, and then they eventually added a weird work-around for syncing, but I got tired of stuff not showing up on one machine or another… so I stopped using anything at all, reverting back to either a piece of paper in the house or the Notepad app on my phone. A few months ago I put the word out to my contacts that I was looking for a new to-do app that would work flawlessly on both my laptop and my phone, and I received a few responses back. The one that caught my eye was one called Wunderlist, which is marketed as being “task management at its best”, so I decided to give it a try. It’s fantastic.

Why is it fantastic?

It’s free.
It syncs perfectly between my devices.
It’s as simple as it can possibly be.
It allows me to cross off completed items while still being able to see them.
It’s beautifully designed.
I can share lists with others.
It’s cross-platform and available for Mac, Windows, and Android devices

Here’s a snapshot of the list I was working from earlier today:

wunderlist Wunderlist The Free, Syncing To Do List App

If you are looking for a desktop or mobile app to help keep you organized, you really couldn’t do much better than this one. Seriously, give your to-do list a makeover and give it a shot. You’ll dig it.

Smartphones Can Replace These Everyday Items

October 10, 2011 by David · 7 Comments

I may have recently written about going back to a simple cellphone instead of my iPhone, but chances are I won’t be doing so anytime soon. I think it hit me the other morning when I realized just how many purposes my phone now serves for me on a daily basis. Sure, it makes calls; but it also replaces many different items I would otherwise have around cluttering up my life and my space. Off the top of my head, here are a few things that my iPhone stands in for perfectly well, enabling me to simplify my life and my belongings:

GPS unit
Kitchen timer
Compass
Radio
Stereo to play my entire music collection
Recipe Book
Map book
Notepads
Calendar
Address Book
Digital Camera
Remote Control

iphones Smartphones Can Replace These Everyday Items

When you think about it that way, $199 for a device that does all that is a pretty good value. Imagine having to buy each one of those items individually? Add in the fact that I can also make calls and check email from almost anywhere and it is an astounding deal. Granted, the monthly access isn’t cheap and that’s why I am looking into switching to an Android phone on Virgin Mobile (75% less monthly cost than what I pay AT&T), but I do believe I need to stay with having some kind of smartphone for the future. What do you think? Do you use your phone to replace several everyday items, and if so what items does it replace?

Filed Under: Simple Living · Tagged With: clutter, digital, iphone, Organization, simple, simple living

Simple Security: Automatic Off-Site Computer Backups

August 5, 2011 by David · Leave a Comment

I cannot stress just how important it is to backup your computers often and in multiple places. Computer hard drives fail more often than anyone would like to admit, and having several separate backups of all your important documents, photos, and music can ensure that you never lose any of it in the event of a computer crash, fire, or theft. While I have written here before about having a backup hard drive in your home that you back up to daily, you also should consider having an off-site backup that constantly (and behind the scenes) backs up the contents of your computer’s hard drive. I have a good friend who lost both the internal drive of his iMac and his backup drive in his home office on the same day. Talk about coincidence! So while for most people a single backup is usually enough to recover from a simple computer disaster (not theft or fire, though), he lost his primary and backup drive at once; if that was all he had for backups he would have lost everything. Luckily, he was using an off-site backup service as well, so he contacted them and had DVD’s made of all his files and mailed to his house so he could put everything back on his new computer.

There are many solid options out there for off-site computer backups, but I have been using BackBlaze without fail or falter for over a year now. For $5 a month, it backs up my computer on a daily basis without my even knowing it’s doing it. Simplicity! For $60/year, it’s a piece of mind that I am absolutely willing to pay for as my entire life is inside my MacBook. Any time I want I can log in to their website and look at my files, access them, download them, or just make sure that my computer is still backing up every day (it hasn’t ever missed a day, FYI.) It even lets you “find your computer” should it get stolen away from you.

If you aren’t doing off-site computer backups, I highly recommend you start doing them right away. No one thinks their computer and hard drive will fail on the same day, or that their house will burn down with both inside, or that your home office will be burglarized. But stuff happens — and if you are anything like me you have a lot of important data on your computer you can’t afford to lose. So simplify your computer security with off-site, automatic backups as soon as you can. You never know when you may need it!