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pimg src=”http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/gizmodo/2008/10/foodlunchbox_03.jpg” width=”468″ height=”350″ style=”display:block;float:none;” /What could be more useful than this concept of a food pyramid designed to keep your portions in check and to make you eat the right amount of veggies? If there is anything that I consistently do all day long besides working for Gizmodo, it’s probably putting anything edible within reach into my mouth. Whether I’m slowly making it my mission to make every Kit Kat on earth disappear, or having my stomach growl embarrassingly in front of my co-workers, I live for lunch where I get to chow down and thoroughly ravage my plate each day. Usually afterwards, I sink into a major food coma, which is exactly why this concept is perfect for me. After this article is published though, my boss will probably know why my productivity plummets in the afternoon. [a href="http://www.yankodesign.com/2008/10/27/quick-forward-this-to-jamie-oliver/"Yanko/a via a href="http://swissmiss.typepad.com/weblog/2008/10/food-pyramid-lu.html"SwissMiss/a via a href="http://www.crunchgear.com/2008/10/29/food-pyramid-lunch-box-should-help-american-fatties/"CrunchGear/a ]/p br style=”clear: both;”/
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pimg src=”http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/lifehacker/2008/10/2008-10-27_101735.jpg” align=”left” hspace=”4″ vspace=”2″ width=”494″ height=”250″ style=”display:block;float:none;” /br Windows only: If reading the comments on a href=”http://lifehacker.com/software/getting-things-done/gtd-in-a-nutshell-236452.php”GTD/a-related posts is any indicator, many of you have found yourself in the situation I recently found myself in: you love getting things done but somehow your system isn’t working like you planned and you’ve fallen off the wagon. While reading up on ways to more effectively use a href=”http://lifehacker.com/5042429/microsoft-onenote-is-a-note+taking-power-tool”Microsoft OneNote/a as a GTD tool I came across a brilliant tag based implementation courtesy of Rob from the productivity blog 7Breaths. We featured Rob’s integration of a href=”http://lifehacker.com/software/microsoft-outlook/getting-things-done-with-outlook-and-onenote-2007-293963.php”OneNote and Outlook back in August/a, but somehow I had completely overlooked his method of using OneNote tagging system to move ideas through the Capture - Process - NextAction/Project cycle./p pHere is a quick summary of Rob’s system, definitely read his series of blog entries on the topic in detail:/p pWithin OneNote you set up tags for things like Processing, Contexts (@home, @calls, etc.), and for Projects. I additionally set up a tag for Someday/Maybe which was absent from Rob’s implementation. The tags are the most critical part of the implementation and the part that has done the most to radically improve my workflow. OneNote has checkbox style tags that allow you to tag and then check off items, very handy./p pCreate a Notebook for GTD, with tabs for Today, the current month, Active Projects, Support Files, Archived Months, and Archives projects. I, again, added a Someday/Maybe tab./p pThe Today tab is where you do all your capturing. Here is where you would enter something like “Upgrade Computer” and tag it as “Processing”/p pDuring the day when you sit down to process your new inputs, you search using the “Processing” tag to make sure no newly captured items have escaped your attention. As you process each input you tag it appropriately if it is a single action: “call insurance company and request copy of accident report” receives the @call tag. A project, and this is where using OneNote and tags really shines, gets it’s own dedicated page. An input that is multi-stepped become a project. By right clicking on the project item in the list you can create a linked page in OneNote. This linked page can be dragged into the Active Projects tab and will serve as a base for all the information for that project./p pThe beauty of the tagging system is that no matter how many projects you have, because the next actions in each project are tagged a comprehensive list is a simple search away. The tags-as-checkboxes feature I mentioned above is especially handy during searches, you can search only by the unchecked tags to ensure the list is current. Searching for the @call tag will generate an instant list of all the phone calls you need to make across all projects while still giving you, thanks to OneNote, the flexibility to lay out your projects and accompanying information as you see fit./p pFinding Rob’s OneNote workflow helped me break through the mental resistance I was experiencing fully implementing GTD the way I wanted. If you’ve had a similar breakthrough, share it below in the comments and help out your fellow readers!/p div class=”related”a href=”http://www.blog.7breaths.co.uk/2007/04/gtd-with-onenote-set-up.html”GTD with OneNote/a [7Breaths]/div br style=”clear: both;”/
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pimg src=”http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/lifehacker/2008/10/netflix-update.png” width=”305″ height=”250″ align=”right” hspace=”4″ vspace=”2″ align=”right” /Netflix has officially (and finally) added support for Macsmdash;well, Intel Macs at least. The update is rolling out to a small group of users at first, but the company promises support for the all Mac users soon. The unusual part of the announcment: Netflix is using Microsoft’s Flash alternative a href=”http://silverlight.net/”Silverlight/a to handle the streaming and DRM on the Mac instead of Flashmdash;despite the fact that Flash is what Netflix uses to stream movies to the Windows platform. No word yet on whether or not there will be browser limitations on the Mac. Unfortunately my account isn’t one of the lucky few that are already seeing support, so if yours is, let’s hear how it’s working for you in the comments. div class=”related”[via a href="http://gizmodo.com/5069026/netflix-streaming-video-finally-on-macs"Gizmodo/a]/div/p br style=”clear: both;”/
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pimg src=”http://cache.gawker.com/assets/images/lifehacker/2008/10/wikipediasearch.png” align=”left” hspace=”4″ vspace=”2″ width=”494″ height=”300″ style=”display:block;float:none;” /br Developer Chirag Mehta wanted a better way to search Wikipedia, so he put together a fast, dynamic as-you-type search box that loads results in a sidebar and the best match in the main panel. You can also use the search engine’s address mdash; codehttp://chir.ag/wiki/something//code mdash; to go directly to search results for “something” (like using a Firefox keyword search). Here are the results for a href=”http://chir.ag/wiki/lifehacker”a search for “Lifehacker”/a. A few Wikipedia-specific search interfaces have popped up over the years to compensate for the suckiness that is the built-in search box, and this is one of the better ones./p div class=”related”a href=”http://chir.ag/wiki/”Ajax Wiki Search/a [Chirag Mehta : chir.ag]/div br style=”clear: both;”/
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pDon’t want to see political posts on Lifehacker? Use our a href=”http://lifehacker.com/tag/not:politics/not:election/”politics and election-free/a tag (here’s a href=”http://lifehacker.com/tag/not:politics/not:election/index.xml”the feed/a) to survive through November 4th. Same technique works if you don’t want to see a href=”http://lifehacker.com/344188/get-only-the-posts-you-want-from-lifehackers-site-feeds”Windows only posts, iPhone posts, and Google Chrome posts/a, too./p br style=”clear: both;”/
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As mysterious to Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang as the location of his keyboard’s shift key is the trick to communicating layoffs. Jerry, you should deliver them the way Steve Jobs unveils the latest Apple products: All at once, and tell the audience they can get them now. Instead, in his latest no-caps memo, Yang informs Yahoo employees that 1,400 of them will lose their jobs, but they won’t find out any details for “several weeks.” Jerry, you’re doing it wrong. Here’s Yang’s latest botched communication to his staff:

yahoos,
 
i feel it’s important for me to reach out to you after our earnings announcement, and before our all hands meeting tomorrow.
 
we as a company have been through a tremendously challenging year; and managing the increasingly turbulent global advertising climate has been an important focus for the last three months.
 
throughout the first three quarters of 2008, we have been balancing between investing in our top priorities, and managing our cost structure.  beginning in september, with the help of Bain & Co., we initiated a series of steps to determine how we can become more efficient and productive as an organization.
 
we heard from you through the YEES survey, and through your suggestions on backyard, and we’ve identified many areas that we all feel we can improve upon.  our productivity efforts, based in part on what we heard from you, will involve initiatives such as streamlining our organizational structure through reducing layers and increasing spans of control, and eliminating redundancies.  longer term structural efficiencies include consolidating facilities, improving procurement, and standardizing our global technology platforms.
 
today as part of our q3 earnings release, we said that our goal is to reduce our current annualized cost run rate of roughly $3.9 billion by more than $400 million before the end of 2008.  we are targeting non-headcount expenses wherever possible, such as facilities and outside services.  however, because compensation expenses are the single largest part of our costs, we anticipate a reduction of at least 10% of our global workforce by year-end.
 
affected employees will be notified of layoffs in the next several weeks.  we understand that hearing this news now creates uncertainty, but we are moving ahead in a way that balances speed with a clear focus on accomplishing what is necessary to set the organization up for long term success.  going forward it will continue to be important for us to make the right decisions to keep our business efficient and strong.
 
having layoffs is very difficult, particularly in light of all we’ve experienced this year.  but we don’t take these decisions lightly, and are committed to treating affected employees fairly, offering severance and outplacement services.
 
the steps we are taking are not easy for us as a company, but as we become more fit as an organization, decision-making will be faster and it will be easier for us all to get more done and stay focused on our strategy. these changes will also prepare us to better deal with the macroeconomic downturn.  as with previous downturns, yahoo! continues to be a place where consumers turn for information and communications, and is an integral part of their internet day.  as the global economy improves in the future, i certainly believe that we will be stronger and benefit from the actions we are taking now.
 
as always, i thank you for all you do as yahoos.
 
best,
jerry

Last week I came out with what I thought were my most shameful secrets about my software use and productivity habits. I also invited our readers to let go of their own “confessions,” and, well, you delivered. From iPhone lust to Notepad pragmatism, many of you have a few unusual or against-the-grain habits to get off your chest. Here are some of our favorites from our comment box confession booth. Photo by allaboutgeorge.

Capnsouth spurred a whole bunch of commenters to admit a very specific strain of gadget lust—no Macs please, but do want phone (and other Apple tweaks):

I can’t stand Apple, I will never own a Mac but I would like to have an iPhone, and I like the Mac dock so much that I use rocket dock on my Vista machine, and hide desktop Icons.

A lot of commenters expressed sentiments similar to ddthesm’s, sticking to applications they knew and trusted, rather than letting themselves be wowed by even possibly useful “features”:

I’m still using Winamp 2.81, which I’m oddly proud of. It’s simplicity just can’t be replaced by all the millions of audio apps that have come out since then.

andrewsomething has made a serious go of trying to switch to using Linux full-time, but feels some serious guilt geek (maybe) about leaving his Windows-using friends behind:

More and more a windows using friend will ask me how to do something, and I have no idea how. If they haven’t figured it out by the next time I go to their house I can usually do it in a couple minutes, but they have lost confidence in me…

Sooner or later, people will stop asking me for help. I’m not sure if that’s a bug or a feature though. =)

inthefastlane offered a simple, sad statement of fact: All the go-anywhere organization apps in the world can’t save your skin sometimes:

I have google calendar, remember the milk, evernote and a money tracker all syncing to my iphone and STILL overdrew my checking account.

Resonanteye ‘fessed up to using, and mostly liking, Windows Vista, but only after wiping it of any productivity/background apps. He also admits a similar, singular obsession with keeping things simple:

I have a notepad file that functions as my to-do list. I admit a long-standing love affair with notepad and no longer use much else, really. work stuff on the laptop txt file, home stuff on the desktop txt file, and sending myself delayed text messages for errands. I even got rid of my pda and switched back to a fairly low-scale cell phone.

life is simple now without all that help

And, finally, our one-time Lifehacker addiction (in that it later became a, uh, full-time obsession) was validated by, amongst others, Git Em SteveDave loves this guy–>, whose commenter name itself betrays some serious time spent on this and other Gawker properties:

Once I discovered the gawker websites, I ended up spending more time on them then I do working on some days. To the point I’ve had to stay late to complete my work, which has strangely made my boss think I work harder.

Thanks to everybody who contributed!

Designers these days seem bound and determined to lower our productivity with products that entice us to sleep when we should be working. The iSleep concept expands on the idea behind products like the Napbook by making the process a little more high-tech. When you close your laptop, the fan exhaust automatically fills up the latex-lined cushion with warm air. It also activates a music playlist that will soothe you to sleep for 10 minutes before sounding an alarm to wake up. I highly doubt that this product will ever see the light of day though, so it looks like you will have to continue to rely on you arm, the supply closet, your car or that space under your desk to catch a little shut-eye. [iSleep via Likecool via Yanko]

The Web Worker Daily weblog rounds up a handful of useful tweaks for using an instant messaging application at work without letting it ruin your productivity. For example:

Many IM programs allow you to be “invisible” to different contacts or contact groups when you come online. You can also be invisible to clients who rarely IM you anyway, and leave yourself visible for a few clients whose projects are more urgent. Taking advantage of your visibility settings can also come in handy if you use the same IM accounts for both personal and business contacts.

Instant messaging gets a bad rap in the workplace, but studies have suggested that instant messaging increases workplace productivity when compared to email, and IM can even reduce workplace interruptions. The catch: You need to know how to use IM effectively or the constant ding can ruin your productivity. We’ve highlighted a few of our own IM survival tips in the past, but Web Worker Daily’s list offers a nice take.

If you’re on the hunt for a strong IM app, check out the five best instant messengers.