For years I used Cocoatech’s Pathfinder to compensate for the Mac Finder’s shortcomings. I eventually stopped because it added more overhead than it was worth. Besides, Finder has gotten better recently. Still, sometimes I want just a little more oomph. Yesterday I discovered XtraFinder. I’ve tried a number of Finder plugins but this one seems like a nice balance of power and convenience. It’s valuable if only for the “Automatically adjust width of Name column” feature.

Frank Chimero: I made an agreement with myself in January: no new apps on my phone or computer. Don’t do new stuff. Just do your work. I started reading Frank Chimero’s post with delight, because I have been thinking along the same lines. I thought what he was about to say was that he should learn to use the tools he has and stop trying new things all the time.

I don’t use paper because I’m “nostalgic” for it. I use paper because I prefer it. I use paper for as many things as I can. Notes, lists, tasks, everything that makes sense. I even tried a paper and folder based project management system for a while. I loved the idea, but it turned out to be less than ideal. I also really want to use a paper calendar, but the iPhone is better for that sort of thing.

Yes, I change things up now and again. This time, it's about where I post photos.  <p> I'm trying Koken so until further notice, photos and photo-related posts are going on <a href="https://photos.baty.net">photos.baty.net</a>. </p> <p> </p> </div> </div> </div>

I finally got to see Finding Vivian Maier. The hype surrounding her life and work gets a little tiresome, but it’s entirely deserved. The movie does a very good job of unravelling some of the mystery surrounding Maier’s strange existence and serves as a nice introduction to her work. I’m happy I was able to kickstart the project and still have my “Official film spool used by Vivian Maier”

I’ve kept a Daybook using Tinderbox for years, and wish to continue doing so. The problem is I know that Day One exists and is really good at what it does. The conflict between smooth and easy entry using Day One and the comfort and flexibility of Tinderbox keeps me up at night. Well, not really, but it does cause me to waffle between the two. I switched to Day One again a month ago and I really do love it.

We use Kanban boards successfully for most client projects, so I thought it might be interesting to try it in other areas as well. “Personal Kanban” is meant to help with that. The book is deliberately non-prescriptive, which I found a little disappointing. The entire thing can be boiled down to two concepts. Visualize your work Limit work in progress Knowing that, you can probably skip the book and start with the Personal Kanban website.

People who like OneNote seem to really like OneNote. I’ve always been a bit envious because I don’t own a Windows machine and I’m not likely to run Windows in a virtual machine like Parallels just for a single app. When OneNote for Mac was announced I installed it immediately. I also liked it immediately. As an on-and-off Evernote user I found OneNote to be nicer to use in almost every way.

I have a tendency to “zag” when everyone else is zigging. It’s a combination of a need to explore and my built-in contrarianism. For example, everyone uses Twitter. Using Twitter is zigging. It’s the easy choice. App.net (specifically alpha.app.net) is the zag. It’s newer and, to the uninitiated, nothing more than a Twitter clone that no one uses. That’s really too bad. On the other hand it’s clean, useful, and quiet.

This site is was built using Tinderbox. I continue to find ways to improve the process so that publishing is as easy as I can make it. One thing I still didn’t like was getting images in the right place and linking them. So I fixed it. First I added an “ArticleImage” attribute so I don’t have to type in the entire path for images links. I just type in the image’s filename and the Tinderbox export template figures out the rest.

“LICEcap – simple animated screen captures” That’s exactly what it is and it works great.

I’m not a fan of “self-help” books, so it’s a good thing I don’t consider “The Wisdom of the Enneagram” to be one of those. It’s more a tool for understanding personality types. I’m a 9.