Get Motivated and Stay That Way!

We all know it is sometimes hard to start projects, even those we care about and want to do. Thus, today's lifehack comes from the Zen Habits blog offering The Ultimate Guide to Motivation. My favorite aspect of this article is that it breaks down two categories in which procrastination usually stops progress:

1. Getting started, and
   
2. Staying motivated when you are in the middle of the project.
   

This latter category is especially helpful because natural stalls in project workflow can make downtime, wasted time if we're not motivated to keep moving forward. Thus, for the long hot days of summer, let the zen expert be your guide.

Adobe AIR apps worth a look!

Below are two sites that feature cool Adobe AIR applications that take care of small tasks we often farm out to larger pieces of RAM hogging software. The applications run on the adobe AIR runtime platform which you can download for free here. Better yet, most of the applications are free too which means wonderful interfaces, open source design and responsiveness to user requests.

1. The first site is from Mashable and they featured a top 10 list.
2. The second site, Fresh AIR Apps, provides a stream of new tools, most of which are useful utilities you wish you had invented.

As always, feedback on these tools is appreciated.
later,
phree

Keep focused while working...

It is easy to get distracted and not get the most out of time set aside for work. Thus, in the spirit of fostering productivity, this post from Zen Habits provides numerous tips for keeping work time focused on must-do tasks. These tips fall into the "don't waste time and prioritize" categories. Though most seem like common sense, there are a few gems worth noticing:

1. Take more breaks,
2. Plan you day with details, and
3. Notice your lazy routines to name a few.

Klok is a cool Adobe Air application that allows you to keep track of the time you spend on projects. It might be useful for quoting jobs or just tracking a work session.

As always, I appreciate feedback on the application if you try it.

Now get to work!

Declutter Your Life

A less cluttered life will result in inner peace. This is the mantra of the getting things done (GTD) crowd. According to many studies on hoarding, clutter creates stress, tension and in the extreme, depression. So today's tip comes from the practical blog entitled, "dumb little man."

Read 10 Ways to Declutter Your Life and become an ocean of serenity.

Take your office on the road

This post is productivity oriented in that it links to an article, Rolling Your Own Online Office, that shows you how to keep all of your information handy when you are on the road. The best feature of the article is that it addresses all sorts of project/workplace needs and gives links to freeware for each and every application. Need IM, flowcharting or documents on the road? If so, Josh Catone provides an all-in-one resource center with links for getting things done (GTD). If you find a tool that is particularly useful, please leave a comment below so that others can benefit from your experience.

Forget about Forgetting: Hello to File Syncing

It is a fact that your computer will have issues and lose data when you need it the very most. Saying good bye to that data (countless hours of laboring) is never an easy thing to do. It is much easier to say hello to file syncing.


Unison is one example: http://www.cis.upenn.edu/~bcpierce/unison/ (caution - this program is for people who enjoy command line, Linux style operations)

Syncback Freeware is another: http://www.2brightsparks.com/assets/software/SyncBack_Setup.zip The Syncback downloads page is here and the free version of the software is located at the bottom of the page.

Cheers!

Lookslikematt

How to Study Sites

Here are a few study tips sites for those of you wondering how to study for midterm or final exams:

• Hacking Knowledge: 77 Ways to Learn Faster, Deeper, and Better

• Study guides and strategies

• CalPoly: study guides library
  

Get a lifehack

This one is posted for all students who have too much to do and too little time to do it.

Lifehacker.com is a great resource for anyone who wants to learn about cool new downloads and efficient methods for getting things done (GTD). GTD strategists are obsessed with increasing productivity and eliminating wasted time. Thus, the site always presents interesting tools to help with time management skills and technology tasks.