Information Overload

I know we've all experienced this, come back from a week vacation unplugged and all of your inboxes are full and RSS feeds are jammed full. The consensus that I've read from all of the GTD sites basically tell you to start eating less information, congregate them all in one place and if you get over your head in things you don't need but rather want that you should just mark as read all of your personal feeds and just pay attention to the work stuff until you are caught up.

I've developed a personal technique that lets me process important things for work timely during the times that I'm caught up and then mixes "info" notifications from work and personal feeds. This allows me to catch up on everything and/or keep up with priorites built in. Let me oversimplify what I mean and see if you get it.

I have a single (yes, single) email rule. I developed this system after Gmail gave me a different way to think about how to process my email. I use an archive folder and the inbox..only. The rule specifies that any email with my email address in To: or CC: get left in the inbox. All other pieces of mail go to the Archive folder. This means that for work, where I receive automated email notifications from almost every system that we have get lumped into one folder. My email applications only give me a visual or audio notification of new email in the Inbox only. That way as the tons of emails spew in during the day they don't distract me from the important things.

I have to confess that even 3 years ago I was sorting email into 40 folders based on who it was from, while this is nice in the moment, it usually prevents most email applications from being able to show a thread or discussion in one continuous flow. I then move Inbox emails to the Archive folder once the final response to the confersation has been sent. This means my inbox is actionable and the stuff in Archive is in fact done.

That way I can interact with people in my workspace, address the important email messages from customers and co-workers in real-time. I then set asside two or three times a day to check both the bulk emails and my RSS fieds. That way my time is utilized for what I need to do when I need to do it. And, the time I set aside for the lower priority bulk is usually not interupted.

I have to say that my way is grossly oversimplified for the purpose of processing hundreds of emails a day. Your case may be different, it may even be paper, but the priority built into the way it arrives at your desk is the important for you to manage your flow. The hardest part of this is when the information comes to you via channels that are beyond your control and that can produce a lot of frustration. Even for folks who receive their information in the same way as I do have a hard time taking the first step to change the way they have been processing that information for ages.

Change is good, it has really helped me in my workflow and the few co-workers I have to have seen what I do are usually impressed and benefit from seeing my method even if they only apply some of these ideas in a very high level method.

Feel free to put your real-world methods in the comments and share how you managed to make digesting all of your information in a more sane way.

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CafeNinja

EEE PC - Intrepid Ibex - resource round-up

So, my confession is that I did not upgrade my eee pc 700 8G just as soon as it was released. I did try out a fresh release of Ubuntu-eee which has the remix interface included and all the drivers "out of the box". I was a bit put off by the interface (not horrible, just not for me) and waiting until I found concise guides for upgrading to 8.10 with as little issue as possible.

I found two links which seemed to sum up everything I needed to do. The first is a howto provided by the ever-excellent Tombunutu blog. This guide is more or less the best method for upgrading to a standard 8.10 install and then changing the kernel to that provided by Array.org which has all the correct modules pre-compiled. Array also follows new kernel releases closely with the correct modifications made so that you don't need to recompile drivers each time you upgrade the systems kernel.

I have to confess that after the straight 8.10 install and updating to the Array kernel I made one fix, listed at Ubuntugeek in an article about Atheros wifi. I followed method 2 and only needed to add ath_pci to the blacklist.

In summary my upgrade looked very much like:

1.) Install 8.10 from usb.
2.) Method 2 of Ubuntugeek for working wireless.
3.) Change to the eee modified kernel from Array.

I know it's not a simple check-box selection + reboot, but I have to say that it's much easier than the process that needed to be done for 8.04. I'm thinking to try the new 9.04 Jaunty as frequently as I can to see if it delivers much of the "out of the box" functionality promised in 8.10.

Best of luck with your EEE upgrade, feel free to post your resources used in the comments. Please also share your success and problems (fail!).

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CafeNinja

An easy blog app! w00t

I have found that one of the most distracting things from posting on this blog is that it isn't as easy to access like twitter or jaiku. I have just discovered a great application for linux that should make posting here as easy as the others.

By ease of access I should say that recently thanks to Dan of Linux Outlaws I've started using Gwibber which works like pidgin for microblogging and now I can reach Jaiku or Twitter just as easy as sending an instant message to my friends from a single application.

In the past I have tried to use flock to post with since it has a great tool for writing blog posts, but I find it too much application to launch and use for spontaneous use.

Enter Gnome-blog a.k.a. gnome-blog-poster. Easy to use, pretty powerful application and it is lightweight and most important it's easy to get to with a simple shortcut on the top panel of my gnome desktop even on my eeepc.

I highly recommend it to anyone trying to upkeep a blog, check out the site to see if your blogging site/software is supported.

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CafeNinja

Command Line Life v2.0

In reference to an earlier blog post I thought I might expound on my use of the command line and explain to how addictive it can become when you finally get your "rig" set up.

This bug, itch as it were, is a hard one to kill. Once you get it, very difficult to completely remove. It could be that it is comfortable for some aspects of your computer experience, yet not something you can completely embrace. But for most, with the resources, this CLI (Command Line Interface) is addictive and efficient.

I've seen better men succumb to the influence of the command line. Some fall in love over the security, others for the low bandwidth usage. Some come to love the responsiveness, others it's efficiency of execution.

In this post, I intend to list the applications (not just file commands) that I use in my command line arsenal to keep my focus on the terminal window. I should confess first so that it is clear to understand that I use terminator and screen (inside of terminator) to have many of these programs running simultaneously.

I have a terminator window open full-screen and split into two vertical windows. In the first I launch mutt for email. Then in the second, I use screen to launch in the first session irssi for irc and then a ssh connection to my remote server in the second. I leave the third free in the case I need to use any of the other command line tools.

I like to use cmatrix on a fourth session to use as kind of a "boss-key" which most just ignore instead of trying to understand. I wish to be perfectly clear that learning all of the keyboard commands for screen and terminator are important for making efficient use of these tools. Practice makes perfect and if you wish to be proficient, you should practice the keystrokes until they come without thinking about it much.

So here is the list of apps that I've used, currently use or have had recommended to me;

a2ps - printing
vlock -- a lock for the CLI (tty)
cmatrix -- a screen saver
vifm -- my favorite file manager
ncftp -- FTP client
antiword -- converts Word .DOC files to text
screen -- console multi-tasking
sipcalc -- IP calculator
cal - calendar
irssi - irc client
centerim - cli IM client, multiprotocol
mutt - email client
alpine - mail app
**fetchmail -d 60 -keep (get mail, check every 60 sec, leave on server)
**this is needed since for POP3 mail isn't collected by the mail apps above.
w3m - web browser
elinks - web browser
wget - web download
newsbeuter - RSS feed reader

Add comments with your favorite command line application.

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CafeNinja

Playdeb - what fun!

Ok, I don't know what rock I've been living under.  But today I found a link from our friends at GetDeb to a new beta site called PlayDeb.

MAN!  I've not seen a more comprehensive selection of games for Linux in a long time.  Anyone who tells you there are no games for Linux is lying or very uneducated. 

This site actually adds a repository so you can add/remove games the same way you would any other application.  As well, it should follow that when they repackage new versions of the games, they would come down via the normal system updates.

There is a fab list of the games available on the front page of the site.  They range from First Person Shooters, to car racing and puzzle type games.  Some are simple, some are complex.  It really is a great list if you are tired of snake and mahjong games.

Don't just take my word for it, check it out!  And remember to play as hard as you geek.

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CafeNinja

Compiz sometimes doesn't play nice

I was just looking around some of my favorite linux blogs and found a great little post at TomUbuntu.com for a great fix of something that was bugging me.

Some applications just don't work the Compiz (fancy 3d effects for the linux desktop) on.  As well, sometimes when trying to use an external monitor it doesn't help matters.  Well with the keen post from TomUbuntu I was able to fix the problem quick and easy.

The answer was a package called "fusion-icon" which puts an icon in the systray and with a simple right-click you can activate or de-activate the compiz effects or go to the compiz control panel.  I won't steal Tom's thunder and will ask you to go to his blog and read how to install the appliation.  I highly recommend it and give Tom "two thumbs up" for his pick.

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CafeNinja

First Political Post for me

Well, I don't normally get involved or concern myself with political views here.  Only in this case it mildly affects my geek.  The Italian National Government has decided to block Piratebay because it is the "way" that italian citizens are able to get copyrighted material that belongs to the privately owned national TV station.  It just so happens that the current Premier of Italy owns said station.  And now the torrent host service of Piratebay (who physically stores none of the material in question) has been blocked not just via DNS blacklist but has also mandated that all Italian National ISP's block it by IP address.

I normally wouldn't care so much except that I transfer movies of my family back to the States this way as well as download current ISO images of Linux distributions.  It's very disheartening to see a civilized "free" state resort to aggressive internet content control for the commercial interest of it's leader.  Somehow it feels much more Chinese than Italian.

Anyway, that's enough of my soapbox.  More geek to come to prevent me from going mad over stupid DNS filtering policies here in Italy.

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CafeNinja