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This excerpt is a relief because it feels like I got permission to stop trying to use org-mode for to-do lists: "# I gave up on using Org-mode for schedules an

This excerpt is a relief because it feels like I got permission to stop trying to use org-mode for to-do lists: "# I gave up on using Org-mode for schedules and to-do lists I spent some words in the original post on using Org-mode for schedules. I gave up on using Org-mode for to dos and the like, as I have to coordinate many meetings and calls every day with dozens of people, and I cannot ask the rest of the world to adapt to my choice of tools, nor do I have the time to transcribe or automate moving things to Org. We are primarily a Mac shop, use Google Calendar etc., and the native Mac OS/iOS tools do a good job for collaboration. I also use a plain old pen for note-taking during meetings, as I find laptop/keyboard use in meetings to be rude and limiting to my ability to listen and think. Therefore I've largely abandoned the idea that Emacs/org can help me with my schedule or organizing my life. Org-mode is great for lots of other things too though, and is my go-to for writing documents, including this one. In other words, I use it largely in ways the author didn't intend, and it's great at them. I hope someone says the same of our work at Fugue someday."

komali2 7y ago
Yea, same. I keep trying to figure it out but it just doesn't seem to have any advantages over checking my backlog for my todos. Maybe because I gave up trying to configure emacs on my own and ended up with spacemacs + evil mode, thus overcomplicating org mode (and overriding some of the keybindings people use in tutorials) beyond use?
- omarhaneef 7y ago
  For me best solution is: paper and pad to take notes, and then any todo/note app to make a list in the cloud, so I can refer to it at home, the next day etc.
- stefco_ 7y ago
  I found the main problem was at the interface with other people. I never got org's iOS app working properly and generally missed the multimedia flexibility of Notes (nothing beats scanning PDFs and instantly having them show up in your document, ready to share with others from your phone). It's messy, but in practice it's actually lower friction. I ended up generally dropping org mode and just using LaTeX to-do lists based on a template I wrote.
codemac 7y ago
As a huge proponent of org-mode I completely agree. Collaboration today via online tools is largely required in most jobs now. For personal TODOs, I still use SCHEDULED/DEADLINE in org-mode, but for anything via a calendar, Google Calendar is my read-write interface. I used a separate tool [0] to quickly read my calendars and populate a read-only org-mode file for my org agenda. This puts my schedule in it's entirety in my org-mode agenda, but also has all the benefits of using google calendar. [0]: https://github.com/codemac/gcalorg https://github.com/codemac/gcalorg
- holri 7y ago
  You can also export your SCHEDULED/DEADLINES from org-mode to caldav.
qdot76367 7y ago
This took me multiple iterations of org-mode bankruptcy to finally accept. A lot of my config at the time came from Bernt Hansen's fantastic open source org-mode config document, about organizating absolutely EVERYTHING in org-mode. http://doc.norang.ca/org-mode.html http://doc.norang.ca/org-mode.html However, any time I needed to collaborate with someone else, this all kind of went out the window, not to mention I never really ended up using any of my clocking data outside of contract needs, which I didn't have nearly as much of as the original author of that config. I still use org-mode tasks for personal tasks sometimes, especially since BeOrg (iOS, https://beorgapp.com/ https://beorgapp.com/), Orgzly (android, http://www.orgzly.com/ http://www.orgzly.com/), and org-web (web, https://org-web.org https://org-web.org) can get stuff to/from my phone, but otherwise I've just learned that dealing with multiple task systems (CRM, bug systems, trello, etc) is a fact of life and trying to optimize around it is an arms race I probably won't win. Turns out managing multiple systems still takes less time/friction than trying to shoehorn your own. Something like Monolist (https://monolist.co https://monolist.co) looks interesting, though. EDIT: Added org-web. :)
safgasCVS 7y ago
Same here! I tried really really hard to make org mode work for me but never managed to get it to stick. I now use workflowy and I am not missing the extra features
mhd 7y ago
How do you guys collaborate then? Either Word, Google Docs or some bastardized Wiki (Media-/Doku-) are quite popular for documentation and collaborative writing in the larger scale, but I found the todo/organization space to be fractured enough as is. So you've got plenty of duplication and wasted effort already, org-mode is just another pebble on this pile. Some are using Word's outline mode, some are using things like MS Project or the various Mac GTD apps, then there's workflowy, OS X Notes/Reminder, Hipster PDAs, OneNote etc. So exporting, munging and re-typing is going to happen anyway. It's a bit boring sometimes, but using a good tool and then doing that is not more time than everyone agreeing on the least common denominator (emailing screenshots?) anyway -- and you get the speed/productivity benefits at the time when it matters most.
Myrmornis 7y ago
Yup, agree. Uf you're a programmer using Emacs and have time to devote to customization, devote it not to messing about with Org-mode but instead to getting the IDE features for your language working nicely (e.g. flycheck, and a static analysis tool like Jedi for Python), and probably to ivy/counsel, and to trying paredit (which will probably work surprisingly well on your language's syntax).

komali2 7y ago

Yea, same. I keep trying to figure it out but it just doesn't seem to have any advantages over checking my backlog for my todos. Maybe because I gave up trying to configure emacs on my own and ended up with spacemacs + evil mode, thus overcomplicating org mode (and overriding some of the keybindings people use in tutorials) beyond use?

omarhaneef 7y ago
For me best solution is: paper and pad to take notes, and then any todo/note app to make a list in the cloud, so I can refer to it at home, the next day etc.
stefco_ 7y ago
I found the main problem was at the interface with other people. I never got org's iOS app working properly and generally missed the multimedia flexibility of Notes (nothing beats scanning PDFs and instantly having them show up in your document, ready to share with others from your phone). It's messy, but in practice it's actually lower friction. I ended up generally dropping org mode and just using LaTeX to-do lists based on a template I wrote.

codemac 7y ago

As a huge proponent of org-mode I completely agree. Collaboration today via online tools is largely required in most jobs now. For personal TODOs, I still use SCHEDULED/DEADLINE in org-mode, but for anything via a calendar, Google Calendar is my read-write interface. I used a separate tool [0] to quickly read my calendars and populate a read-only org-mode file for my org agenda. This puts my schedule in it's entirety in my org-mode agenda, but also has all the benefits of using google calendar. [0]: https://github.com/codemac/gcalorg https://github.com/codemac/gcalorg

holri 7y ago
You can also export your SCHEDULED/DEADLINES from org-mode to caldav.

qdot76367 7y ago

This took me multiple iterations of org-mode bankruptcy to finally accept. A lot of my config at the time came from Bernt Hansen's fantastic open source org-mode config document, about organizating absolutely EVERYTHING in org-mode. http://doc.norang.ca/org-mode.html http://doc.norang.ca/org-mode.html However, any time I needed to collaborate with someone else, this all kind of went out the window, not to mention I never really ended up using any of my clocking data outside of contract needs, which I didn't have nearly as much of as the original author of that config. I still use org-mode tasks for personal tasks sometimes, especially since BeOrg (iOS, https://beorgapp.com/ https://beorgapp.com/), Orgzly (android, http://www.orgzly.com/ http://www.orgzly.com/), and org-web (web, https://org-web.org https://org-web.org) can get stuff to/from my phone, but otherwise I've just learned that dealing with multiple task systems (CRM, bug systems, trello, etc) is a fact of life and trying to optimize around it is an arms race I probably won't win. Turns out managing multiple systems still takes less time/friction than trying to shoehorn your own. Something like Monolist (https://monolist.co https://monolist.co) looks interesting, though. EDIT: Added org-web. :)

safgasCVS 7y ago

Same here! I tried really really hard to make org mode work for me but never managed to get it to stick. I now use workflowy and I am not missing the extra features

mhd 7y ago

How do you guys collaborate then? Either Word, Google Docs or some bastardized Wiki (Media-/Doku-) are quite popular for documentation and collaborative writing in the larger scale, but I found the todo/organization space to be fractured enough as is. So you've got plenty of duplication and wasted effort already, org-mode is just another pebble on this pile. Some are using Word's outline mode, some are using things like MS Project or the various Mac GTD apps, then there's workflowy, OS X Notes/Reminder, Hipster PDAs, OneNote etc. So exporting, munging and re-typing is going to happen anyway. It's a bit boring sometimes, but using a good tool and then doing that is not more time than everyone agreeing on the least common denominator (emailing screenshots?) anyway -- and you get the speed/productivity benefits at the time when it matters most.

Myrmornis 7y ago

Yup, agree. Uf you're a programmer using Emacs and have time to devote to customization, devote it not to messing about with Org-mode but instead to getting the IDE features for your language working nicely (e.g. flycheck, and a static analysis tool like Jedi for Python), and probably to ivy/counsel, and to trying paredit (which will probably work surprisingly well on your language's syntax).