is hotsync killing ninerpad?

[Alex]

Dan just wrote, wondering why there was so little activity on the
group. And he then asked: Did this hotsync thing kill NP?

Good question indeed. Until then, I had assumed that no news was not
necessarily bad news, and that you were all living your lives _while_
using NinerPad, having learned to live with its quirks.

Was I wrong? Did the hotsync problem kill it?

Come what may, if anyone is still using NPad, please drop me a quick
"I still am". Of course, if you have a minute, please add a comment or
2 about whatever bugs you about it.

On my side of the ocean, I am beginning the wrap-up of a new title for
the iPhone (nothing serious; just a game; my first) and will then
continue what I began last month (NPad archival and restoration).

Thanks
Alex

[Thea Hardy]

Nothing to do with hotsync for me - just other life issues taking me
away. I am still sketching away, and keep planning to do more GTD
stuff but don't quite get there.

Thea

PS I lost my hard drive and DriveSavers could not recover it - first
time they have been unable. So that kept me down a long time and even
now things are still coming up missing. It was a brutal loss and a
hard way to remind myself to back up my stuff.

[matt...@juno.com]

Thea,
Good to here from you., Thea.

Me too, life issues. But I have relied on NP in crisis. Not drawing, but I will get back to that. What I need to do is to tag more and try out the search features. I think those features are there HHHMMM? Make these notes more accessible. Make life simpler.

Hope all is well.

Dan

I want this program!

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[Diana Park]

Hi Alex,

I'm afraid my Tungsten E2 battery won't hold a charge any more so I've
moved everything over to my iTouch. On the other hand, I'll be VERY
interested to see what you've developed for the iPhone! ;-)

Keep up the good work,

Diana

*******************

[Roger]

Just checking in. Still using the ninerpad , but staying quiet while
the new features (???) are rolled out in the next version.

iPhone apps sound fun, but I need something which I can scribble on
real quick, not a hunt/peck keyboard. I already have a Treo that
failed to meet the mark, so ninerpad is the only real contender for
me

Off to turkey party now.

[Alex]

Hi Roger

How was the turkey? :)

I am working (a bit slowly yes; juggling a few hats at one same time;
4 jobs + 2 software projects + other aspects of my life; in China;
what was I thinking?!) on the next version of NPad. Mainly: an
internal backup + sanitation system... Paused that for the next few
days as I prepare a test for Mike (Smith), trying to resolve the
hotsync problem, still.

iPhone dev is fun. But definitely not suitable for fast handwritten
note entry. The screen feels sticky to my fingers (and I wash
regularly). The Palm stylus is sorely missed.

Alex

[newpalpadfoot]

Alex,

I'm all for fixing the hotsych problem. I want to use Npad again.

> > Off to turkey party now.- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[Roger]

Alex,

I am impressed that you persever with the hotsync problem. I like
that you consider fixing bugs that affect only a few of your loyal
followers. I wish I could send suggestions on the problem, but I
have exhausted my brain on my limited knowledge of current palm
internals on this issue and for those of us who are not affected,
trying to reverse engineer the problem is interesting.

How is the progress on that front ? haeve you managed to reproduce it
yet ?
I dont know if it would help to get a list of the other apps and hacks
on the affected systems, as it might be version or externally related
and you might find some thread regarding another app that does not
play well with palm hotsync.

I look forward to the next update when you are ready.

Roger
btw, the turkey was smoked (yum)

On Nov 28, 4:48 am, Alex <yal...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Alex]

Hi Roger

Nothing I have seen thus far, unless I missed it, would indicate that
the problem is due to a non-standard setup. It doesn't seem to affect
E2s, but rather TX's and T5's. I'm now testing some changed code that
I will ask Mike to test over a few days. My fingers ache, so crossed
they have been of late, but I'll keep trying until I pin this. All
other features are frozen pending resolution of that. Bummer I know,
but I can't imagine doing this any other way.

Thanks
Alex

[mike...@gmail.com]

Alex-

As a new user, I am very interested in the potential of this app. I
am a very big user of the Notepad on my T3, and I am looking at NP to
bring some order to the chaos. I am also a long time follower of GTD
(over 10 years), and am interested in how this app can fill in for
that role.

That being said, I cannot use it full time for either of the
previously mentioned roles for a variety of reasons:
* No list view of all notes; you must scroll through each one to see
what they all are
* Confusing arrangement for folders & spaces; there is probably some
genius approach that I just am not getting yet
* It would be nice to have some grid background or template to align
text and simple drawings
* I don't get the input, classify, and review cycle as it applies to
GTD
* I entered in notes but I'm not sure which folder they're stored in.
I'm sure it's simple, but it just seems overly complex.

I really want to use this application since it is very different from
everything else out there. As for as the GUI, this is a really good
looking, nicely laid out application. It has a tremendous potential!
It just needs to iron out these rough edges.

Mike

[Alex]

Hi Mike

Thanks for your comments. Good points all.

> No list view of all notes; you must scroll through
> each one to see what they all are
>

A feature to see all notes, scaled down to up to 25% of their original
size, in a space you can browse/scroll through, has been in the queue
for a few months now. Once I have gotten past the hotsync problem that
some users have reported, I'll resume work on that.

> Confusing arrangement for folders & spaces;
> there is probably some genius approach that
> I just am not getting yet
>

I agree. Everyone gets confused by this one. The more I use NPad, the
more I feel that saved queries/favorite folders, and spaces, overlap
in a sinister - read, confusing - way. This indicates a weakness. I
have flagged the need to revisit this issue later, after the next
release. I might merge the 2, or perhaps expand a bit on the
functionality of, and relevant UI, spaces.

> It would be nice to have some grid background
> or template to align text and simple drawings
>

See Feature Queue: "NEW: rulers, grid, lines". Templates are a good
idea, but perhaps a 2-layer system - a specific note for the
background, and current note artwork as the content - is more
flexible. That way, any note could be used as the background for
another one. Need to think about that a bit. I've queued something up
("notes can be used as background of other notes").

> I entered in notes but I'm not sure which folder
> they're stored in. I'm sure it's simple, but it just
> seems overly complex.
>

New notes are automatically filed in the root folder of your ninerpad
hierarchy, i.e., at the top. The one named HOME by default.

> I don't get the input, classify, and review cycle
> as it applies to GTD
>

I don't know if you saw the Getting Started video tutorial but this
may help you get started fast. See http://ninerpad.com/tutorials.html
. That's the system I am using for basic GTD. Then...


INPUT
I switch to my INBOX space and add new notes to that space (hence,
actually filed in the INBOX folder). Then, I return to the space I was
in. (cookie trail feature queued up to make this easier)


CLASSIFY
I switch to my INBOX space. Then , I review each note, tagging those
that are NAs (next actions) with appropriate context tags (@errands,
@home, @waiting), setting a reminder time for them if necessary, and
then filing them to either the 1-OFs (1-action todos) folder, or to
one of the PROJECTS/<PROJECT_NAME> folders. If these are not NAs, I
file them in the appropriate non-PROJECT folder, e.g., SOMEDAY,
INSPIRATION, CONTACTS, RECIPES, etc.


THIS_MOMENT REVIEW
I make a new space. Then, if I am in a specific context, say,
@errands, I run a search for that. All notes tagged thus will be
returned. I can drop those I do not want to deal with at present. I
delete those I just completed and that are not likely to recur. I
untag those I just completed that are likely to recur at some later
date.


DAILY REVIEW
I usually start the day by switching to the "? NAs" (next actions)
space and refreshing it (Space > Refresh). This retrieves all
contextual ("@...") todos. I then go through these, one by one, and
drop those todos I choose not to do today, from my current space. I
then add a new space, switch to it, and browse my PROJECTS folder
hierarchy, looking for any project I want to handle today. If I find
one, I enter it, close the Open Folder dialog. I then add a new space,
and repeat the search for other interesting projects. When done, I
will have as many spaces as I have projects of interest for today, + a
space for all next actions I hope to find the time to handle on same
day.


WEEKLY REVIEW
1. I open the 1-OFs folder. I find all untagged notes. These are the
todos that I once thought might recur some day, i.e., not deleted
after completion but rather, untagged and left in place for possible
some other day. Any notes unlikely to recur are deleted on the spot.

2. I then browse the PROJECTS folder, looking for any projects that no
longer seem important, and moving them to the SOMEDAY folder (moving a
folder has not yet been officially released; it's in internal testing
right now).

3. I open the SOMEDAY folder and browse all notes to see if any are
worthy of being promoted to a project. If that's the case, I file the
note into a new folder I will create inside the PROJECTS folder.


NEW PROJECTS
The first note to be filed in a new project (the one describing the
project outcome) will typically also become the master todos list for
that project, i.e., I will add todo items and add the appropriate
tags, as they come to mind, below the project outcome description.
Typically, these project master lists have several tags associated
with them.


PROJECT UPDATES
If a todo for a project has been completed, I typically cross it out
from the project master list, and then pan the list such that the
first yet-to-be-done item appears at screen top. At the same time, I
update the tags for this master list to make sure that they match what
remains to be done.


PROJECT COMPLETION
If the project is trivial, I delete its folder and all containing
notes. If it was non-trivial, I export it as images and store those on
my desktop computer. If it was non-trivial and is likely to be
repeated, or spawned in the future, I move it into an ARCHIVAL folder
(not seen on the video tutorial).


I hope this helped. Any other questions? Don't hesitate.

Cheers
Alex


On Dec 28, 1:53 am, "addresspoint-s...@yahoo.com" <mikeb...@gmail.com>
wrote:

[Roger]

Alex,

Wow. I was going to reply to Mike myself, as I am also very
interested in the GTD points of the app, but you managed another one
of your brain-dumps.

I think the explanation at the end should be added to the tutorials
page as it gives a wonderful insight into how to really use this for
GTD, just like when I watched the video and saw what you had alluded
to in other comments.

Let's hope the hotsync problem can be put to be soon so that you can
get the feature queue moving.

Roger.
-
Mike,

There seem to be 2 main users types for this app. One is the creative
folks who make use of the very powerful graphics capabilities, and the
other is use folks wot want a palm GTD setup. I know there is some
overlap and do not mean to demean either group by the prior
classification, but it helps to understand the serbase when reading
through the comments.

I was not aware that GTD was a decade old, although I can believe that
the principles have been talked about for that long, as I am still
trying to get it worked out in implementation after a couple of
years. One of my frustrations with GTD apps has been the author
putting the app out there and saying "now do your GTD with it". I
have tried looking at many of them and found that their vision was
very limited or extreeeemely rigorous, but rarely was it explained.

<nostalgia> There were some lovely threads explaining how to use the
Life Balance app on the Palm for GTD with massive write-ups by a guru
on the exact setup and how each step was performed. It looked
promising enough that I sought out the details and registered the
app. Then the guru discovered Omnifocus on the Mac and dropped LB and
the Palm. </nostalgia>

As Alex (and the group ?) have heard me say before, I really want a
portable app for the palm that I can write on, not text, not sync, not
email to, or twitter, or jott; just plain write. Ninerpad is just
that, and as you can see from Alex's description in the reply and the
videos, he does want to get full blown GTD implemented.

Right now, the app makes a great collection tool and it is possible,
to perform some classification with the folders and tagging, but, like
you, I really want more power in the review side, so that I do not end
up getting a huge list of unimplemented missed actions.

I know Alex is chomping at the bit to get going on the next release,
but he is also dedicated to the quality side and that means not moving
on till the bugs are fixed, or at least understood.

OK. That's it for this missive. I shouldn't post after 1am, so I had
better stop.

Hopefully, Mike, when the hotsync is working again, you will see more
GTD progress.

Regards,

Roger

[Alex]

Hi Roger

> I think the explanation at the end should be added to the
> tutorials page as it gives a wonderful insight into how to
> really use this for GTD, just like when I watched the
> video and saw what you had alluded to in other
> comments.

You're absolutely right and I will (probably in video tutorial form).

Cheers
Alex

[Susan]

Hi All!

Here are my observations on the hotsync issue:

- did a overwrite upgrade -- hotsync crash
- uninstalled / reinstalled -- no crash
- purchased and used versa mail and overwrote app -- crash
- uninstalled / reinstalled -- no crash

but now my Palm of 2.5 years has decided to act up (dead zone in
graffiti area). The good news is I purchased a 3 year extended
warranty. :)

Susan

[matt...@juno.com]

Wow,
Is that wiping note completely clean of protecting/saving notes?
The dead spots couldn't relate to the uninstall/reinstall?
Dan

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[Susan Douglas]

On Fri, Feb 27, 2009 at 2:44 PM, matt...@juno.com <matt...@juno.com> wrote:

Is that wiping note completely clean of protecting/saving notes?

Yes 

 

The dead spots couldn't relate to the uninstall/reinstall?

Nope -- I think it is just because I wore it out.  I researched the problem and it is fairly common in TXs

Susan

 

[Alex]

Matt may have caught on to something I didn't spot upon reading
Susan's note.

Susan, did the hotsync crash in step 3 (versamail) occur without you
having created any notes in NinerPad? Did you launch NinerPad at all
between 2 and 3?

Thanks
Alex


On Feb 28, 6:18 am, Susan Douglas <susanthe...@gmail.com> wrote:

[Susan]

I created a couple of test notes and a couple of folders.

Susan