Ten Mac tools for Getting Things Done
Tools to help Mac users with Getting Things Done 
(or “GTD”), David Allen’s work-smart philosophy, fall into three camps:
- Email clients, where most of the stuff that needs to get done arrives in the first place, tweaked to do the job.
- Dedicated GTD apps like kGTD or Easy Task Manager provide more focussed collection and processing buckets.
- Web-based solutions offer platform-independent tools for getting things done, especially good if you use a Mac at home and a PC at work.
After the jump, you will find some of the best options in each category.
Mail.app
Smart folders and excellent plugins like Mail Act-on and MailTags quickly turn Mail.app into a powerful productivity tool.
For starters see my Getting Things Done with Apple Mail and Got some things done with Apple Mail, Parts One and Two. Patrick Rhone also has an excellent plan of attack .
The app’s large and clever user base has produced additional tools like the Tickler file applescript and the MailTags Tickler.
Unsurprisingly, it’s my weapon of choice for Getting Things Done.
Thunderbird
Thunderbird users have also put its built-in labels and saved searches to work creating a GTD system.
Entropic Principal has a great post on how to do this (see his updated Thunderbird GTD post too). Katy Whitton’s post is another excellent resource, incorporating the Lightning calendar and other Thunderbird extensions.
Entourage
With its integrated calendar, contacts and other bits and pieces, Entourage is well placed to offer the grunt for GTD app.
Jorge Arango has posted his Entourage-GTD system, based in part of the GTD Projects with Entourage article at Slacker Manager. You can find an AppleScript to create GTD projects within Entourage on the 43 Folders Discussion Board.
David Allen sells an ebook of tips for implementing GTD with Entourage for USD 10.
kGTD - Kinkless GTD
Ethan Schoonover’s OmniOutliner Pro template and collection of AppleScripts is an outstanding GTD solution. If I didn’t use Mail.app to manage my workflow, this is what I would use.
All the processing and management features are there and the two-way syncing with iCal is very slick. An Applescript that transfers messages from Mail.app into kGTD’s Inbox brings added integration.
Amazingly, it is freeware, although it requires OminOutliner Pro (USD 69.95). Extra productivity-fu is provided by Ethan’s Quicksilver Action .
But don’t take my word for it; Merlin Mann is a hard-core fan .
Todo.txt
Gina Trapani of Lifehacker fame has created a clever script to manage a plain text todo file from the command line. It’s not as forbidding as it sounds (watch the movie ).
Recently updated (changelog ), it offers support for projects, prioritisation, GTD contexts and more.
You can pipe it through GeekTool so that it sits right in your face on the Desktop:
EasyTask Manager
This stand alone app (see a previous Hawk Wings review) offers a simple GTD framework without the learning curve (or the grunt) of kGTD.
Recent versions of the app have solved some of the initial teething problems, making it a good alternative in the dedicated apps department.
The interface is simple and efficient:
EasyTask Manager is shareware (USD 19.99) and available from the developer’s web site .
iCommit
iCommit is a web-based, PHP-scripted management tool for Getting Things Done. Think of it as a wiki without the pain.
It provides the standard contexts, project and next action tools, but also allows for attachments, printable views and other neat touches described in a review on 43 Folders .
The developer hosts the app on his server on a “first come, first served” basis. Great for people who need to use both Macs and some other OS.
Backpack
Jon Hicks loves Basecamp for getting his things done, but Backpack, the slimmed-down personal version of Basecamp, has almost all the things you need to run a GTD system.
Frank Meeuwsen has posted at length about implementing GTD in Backpack and maintains a de.licio.us links list of other people’s hacks.
Patrick Rhone recently posted a great description of how Backpack works for him.
Make it all even easier with Quicksilver, the Backpack widget and a Desktop Backpack app like Packrat (”Backpack Unplugged”).
Gmail
Bryan Murdaugh has written a white paper on using Gmail for GTD.
Liming Zhu thinks that system can be improved.
Jonathan Powers prefers “Slacker GTD” , a kind of anti-getting-things-done system using Gmail and Gcal, which is not entirely a joke.
wikis
I will mention this at the end of this piece, because if I don’t Ted Palvic will scold me.
GTDTiddyWiki is very clever, very cool, very open source, very flexible and innovative and a very attractive cross-platform solution to GTD that I have never used. Some people like it a lot.
Still not satisfied?
43 Folder’s wiki
A list of blogs that talk about Getting Things Done
GTD resources list at 52 Reviews
Joel Spolsky: How to get things done when you are not in charge
PigPog: GTD on a PDA
Related posts
July 14th, 2006 at 11:12 pm
Omni Group is planning a GTD app, according to their recent blog post, looking forward to that.
July 14th, 2006 at 11:38 pm
Really? I thought it was a mystery. Why do you say it’s a GTD app?
July 15th, 2006 at 12:39 am
Tim, I am putting together a Mac OS X GTD app and would love to add you to the beta tester list prior to release if you’re up for it.
July 15th, 2006 at 12:56 am
It’s not the mystery app, Omni pre-announced in one of their blog entries for the Mystery App that they are talking with Merlin and Ethan about building a GTD-focused app with their help:
July 15th, 2006 at 1:17 am
Oh, I see. Thanks, Patrick. It’s hard to keep up.
With Merlin and Ethan on board, I am keen to see what Omni Group come up.
July 15th, 2006 at 2:18 am
What about GTD for Linux? Any listings of open source apps for GTD?
July 15th, 2006 at 2:21 am
I really wanted to like Kinkless. It worked, it had some fur around the edges, but my cats have fur and they work so I figured it’d be fine.
Well, unfortunately, it’s in the trash bin. Falling off the wagon is one thing - having the wagon fall off *you* is another. Magically, my cool ‘put in a task on my Palm and have it pop up in KGTD’ functionality disappeared. Then, it refused to re-appear. Thanks to the glorious lack of documentation (”go here for the user’s guide! it’s a video of some real basic stuff!”), I decided to not spend hours digging on the forum and just refactored my solution. At least I have a copy of OmniOutliner to use for outlining my attempts at the Great American Pulp Novel.
I’m trying out something called Tasks (http://www.kingdesign.net/tasks/) and I think it may work. Web based, which isn’t really what I wanted, but then again I now have my own domain and stuff, and I can send emails to it and have them magically become tasks,which then go into an iCalendar I can hook up to iCal and sync to my Palm.
Hmmmm. I like that. My previous iCalender forays worked out good…
July 15th, 2006 at 5:48 am
I have moved from kGTD to another program not mentioned in the article - Tracks. Browser-based but running it locally. Installation seemed intimidating but I found that the Mac method involving Locomotive (described on the home page) worked for me. It’s working beautifully for me so far; I hope the features under discussion (task dependencies, start dates) will appear soon, which I think will perfect it as a GTD-on-Mac solution.
July 15th, 2006 at 6:58 am
I agree with the previous commenter about wanting to like KGTD but finding it too frustrating to use. There’s no documentation, it’s easy to run into bugs, and there’s been no radio contact with the developer for months. I see it as more of a research project or a proof of concept than a usable tool. It’s a shame, because with a little extra polish it could be great. Omni’s comments that they’re working with Ethan and Merlin on something is a very good sign, though it’s pretty clear that their programming staff is stretched very thin already. OmniOutliner could use an update, but they haven’t even begun the planning process for OO 4.
July 15th, 2006 at 7:38 am
hi! surprised your article didn’t mention Tracks, which is a slick, super-awesome GPL Rails webapp for GTD. like commenter Craig said, it’s a little intimidating to install, but i’m hosting it free on tracks.tra.in, so check that out if you want (i’ll be adding some more design and feature tweaks in the coming weeks as well).
July 15th, 2006 at 1:37 pm
@Walt: This kind of thing - http://decafbad.net/gtd/gtd-linux ? Or, of course, any of the web-based solutions.
@Kevin, Craig, Chris - Thanks for the links to those othe GTD apps. I hadn’t heard of either of them. Looking forward to checking them out.
July 16th, 2006 at 1:25 pm
Guys you must check out Thinking Rock
OSX, XP and Linux.
It’s the closest I’ve used of them all so far.
July 16th, 2006 at 4:31 pm
Also check out Zoodo and TodoX. Especially when hooked up to Quicksilver triggers, they can help out quite a bit — though I wish Zoodo would make it possible to post to any ToDo app, instead of just iCal.
July 16th, 2006 at 8:56 pm
voodoopad is a great GTD tool also
July 17th, 2006 at 2:01 pm
We are doing a major upgrade to our service http://www.myticklerfile.com so that
the service fits its’ name more (i.e. 43 folders). Coming this month!
July 17th, 2006 at 11:40 pm
Another application GTD-people might be interested in is Life Balance (http://www.llamagraphics.com/LB/LifeBalanceTop.html). On the surface it is a to-do manager, but it contains a number of powerful features for managing tasks that are not immediately obvious and that I’ve not seen elsewhere. It also has a great Palm OS version.
July 18th, 2006 at 5:53 am
As a registered user of Life Balance, I highly discourage users from going to it. In order to adequately enter a task in, you have to fill stuff out on multiple tabs, and, also, the application has not been substantially updated in God knows how long and shows no signs of any substantial updates in the future. There are far more superior to-do apps out there.
July 20th, 2006 at 9:48 pm
I work with Journler (http://journler.phildow.net), which is a journaling software. With its “intelligent folders” it can easily be used for GTD-purposes. Another interesting tool is “Frictionless” (http://www.twinforces.com/Frictionless/Frictionless.html). Both apps are free and well worth to be tried.
July 20th, 2006 at 10:17 pm
[...] Ten Mac tools for Getting Things Done | Hawk Wings (tags: gtd osx) [...]
August 7th, 2006 at 4:01 am
[...] Hawk Wings » Blog Archive » Ten Mac tools for Getting Things Done Tools to help Mac users with Getting Things Done (tags: gtd mac tools) [...]
August 17th, 2006 at 9:26 pm
I thank you for this guide…
I can use it.
September 3rd, 2006 at 9:37 am
Also keep your eye on the new http://www.midnightbeep.com/?p=79, Inbox application by Midnight Beep which looks interesting…buggy at the moment, but interesting still.
September 3rd, 2006 at 10:42 am
I’ve had a little play around with Midnight Inbox, but found it — at the moment — too buggy to post about.
It’s not really a viable GTD tool at the moment, although there are strong hints of a fine app to come.
September 6th, 2006 at 1:12 am
A nice app for all major platforms is Thinking Rock, which is free so far, and at the moment is much better than Midnight Inbox. TR actually walks you through the Processing steps, so it’s especially good for people new to GTD.
I have no connection to the company, I just like this program.
http://www.thinkingrock.com.au
September 6th, 2006 at 3:33 am
Inbox by midnight beep isn’t a ltitel buggy…it’s pretty unusable right now.
Thinking rock is less Mac like…but really gets GTD now.
September 6th, 2006 at 4:15 am
I also am a long-time, registered user of Life Balance, and it is very good for GTD; and if you use a Palm/Treo and want to sync to a Mac desktop program, there is none better. The desktop program is elegant and very powerful, and the Palm sync means that you can carry your Outline and To-Do lists around and check them by whatever context you wish. Basically, using an outliner means that any task which has a subitem is (in GTD terms) a project, and the lowest level item is your next action, which you can view by Place (= GTD context). The next actions and projects are completely and elegantly linked, and you get the benefits of a to-do list filtered by context that is also sorted by importance and urgency, makiing choosing a lot easier. Life Balance at http://www.llamagraphics.com is well worth giving it a 30 day trial.
September 6th, 2006 at 4:25 am
I couldn’t disagree more with Garrett. Entering tasks requires entry of numerous metadata inelegantly scattered over a number of tabs. Moreover, the program’s not been updated in years upon years, showing a distinct lack of caring or motivation on the part of the developers. Definitely do not waste your money on that piece of UI-nightmarish, very stagnant doo-doo, especially not while the field of Mac productivity is making the competition all the more alive.
September 8th, 2006 at 3:33 am
Life Balance is primarily a product for people who use a Palm OS Device and who want a stable Mac OS (or Windows) desktop that will successfully sync with it. It was created long before GTD arrived, and thus it is not as consistent with some aspects of GTD as some recent apps such as Thinking Rock, Easy Task, or Kinkless. If you don’t use a Palm OS device, you might like another Mac program better. But the objections by Harris are very misleading.
GTD is all about thinking through what exactly you need to do and how to do it, and then recording your answers (Next Actions) in a place where you will see them when and where you can actually do them. It doesn’t matter what software or paper method you use as long as it achieves this for you efficiently. Life Balance was designed from the beginning to combine seamlessly an outline of various projects and actions with a to-do list that is filtered by context and sorted by importance first, and by urgency second. It does extremely well what GTD requires. And being available for the Palm, you have your lists with you wherever you are.
For people who want Palm synchronization and a Mac desktop, software that just works is more important than how fast they update it. I too am frustrated by the slow pace of upgrades, but I understand why, from reading their forums and blogs. Llamagraphics is a very small company (3 employees?) that is focussed primarily on the Palm, and with all the rapid changes in the Palm OS and the various devices, they have had to do a lot of work just to keep up and make sure their software works on all the devices (including older ones, like my m515), not to mention changes in the Mac OS every year. They devote a huge amount of time to rapid customer service, which is one thing that anyone buying software should welcome in thinking about buying a product. They also have devoted significant effort to making LB work for people abroad using different languages and character sets, which doesn’t affect you and me, but which is laudable and a sign of their devotion to customer service. And in any event, they are working on a significant upgrade for the Mac desktop to come out soon. To say that they do not care or are not motivated is outrageous; they are extremely motivated. In fact they made a significant improvement to the Palm (shared selection) just last year. It’s very difficult to make big changes to software on Palm, Mac, and Windows platforms all at once and without creating new bugs that will cause a lot of inconvenience to their customers who depend on Life Balance for their organizational (including GTD) needs.
It’s just not true that entering tasks is difficult. You do have to decide where in the outline to place a task, but you could just make a simple header called “inbox” and put it there. (See the examples for GTD setup by Ratz on the llamagraphics discussion boards.) You have decide what place (context) and how important it is, but that’s true for the Palm to-do list as well. If you define a header in a certain way, every sub-item inherits all the same settings, so you don’t have to do it for each item, You can also duplicate a task with its settings, which is hard to do on the Palm task list. By the way, you can import your to-dos from the Palm task list and in a few seconds have them all set up in Life Balance.
If you use Windows and a Power PC, you have other options, such as Bonsai or MLO. If you just use a Mac, give LB a try. If you use a Mac and a Palm and want a easy way to link next actions to projects, LB is the only software I know of that does this well.
September 8th, 2006 at 6:39 am
I’m not about to get into it with Garrett, but I do take exception to his remarks that my opinion is “very misleading” and “outrageous.” Simply because our opinions of Llamagraphics’ responsiveness and the Mac desktop’s ease of use differ … wildly … does not mean that I am presenting the facts in a misleading or outrageous way, rather that we approach the subject from different perspectives. Having attempted to use the Life Balance software for quite some time prior to giving it up, given that I paid for the Mac+Palm bundle, I feel comfortable standing on my opinion that the Mac client’s ease of use and user interface is very problematic — especially when compared to the the ease of use seen in other applications. I will gladly try out the new Mac desktop client when and if it ever sees the light of day, and if my problems with it have disappeared, I’ll be joyous; I am not rooting for Life Balance or Llamagraphics to fail. But your comment below is the first I had heard, in quite literally years, of any substantial or serious application development.
September 9th, 2006 at 12:59 pm
I too do not want to make this a battle, I just felt that the comments about the developers (none of whom I know personally, by the way) were unfair and wrong; they had more pressing issues as a primarily Palm developer; they very much care about their product and their customers. There is a long thread on their forum about all this (”IS LB still in development?” from March 2006), and I share the frustration of Harris and others who want certain features - I have emailed many suggestions to them, and I know they are aware of what I and others want.
This is a comments section where people new to the Mac or GTD might want information on helpful software, and I felt that Harris’ insistence that others stay away was also unfair.
There is no harm in a 30 day trial, and its primary advantage over recent Mac GTD apps is the Palm synchronization, which in my 2 years with the software has worked very well. I love the Palm and have used a lot of other software besides LB to do GTD (such as the pigpog method in ToDo List as well as great programs such as Bonsai, Memoleaf, ThoughtManager, Progect) but I think LB is best because of the outline connection and the flexibility with places. If Mr. Harris or anyone else wants some suggestions about how to set up LB for efficient GTD use, go to their discussion boards or email me. I can be reached at natgorham gmail .
By the way, there is a fun fictional story about Life Balance at the llamagraphics forum thread “Are you sitting comfortably?”
September 26th, 2006 at 11:52 am
I’ve tried many, and think I’m settling in with Daylite http://www.marketcircle.com. Not perfectly GTD, but adaptable; quirky but powerful. I like the possibility of complete everything integration in a single app, AND ability to easlit share across teams. Downside: Mac only
September 28th, 2006 at 8:31 pm
[...] I’ve only played with it for thirty minutes, but it looks very likely to earn a place in my list of Ten GTD apps for Mac Users. I like it. [...]
October 5th, 2006 at 12:32 am
[...] They are not the same as the ten I picked out. In particular, I would have added GTDGmail, a triumph of interface hacking and adaption. [...]
October 12th, 2006 at 6:36 am
One more mac GTD app to add to the list is one I just released called “Ready-Set-Do!” — a set of applescripts that comprehensively integrates all of your files and programs into David Allen’s GTD workflow without locking you into a particular application. It uses the file system architecture for a simple and reliable solution to implementing the GTD workflow on the mac.
I’m looking for some more mac users to try “Ready-Set-Do!” and let me know what they think. I’ve been using it for the past 2 years and it is helping me get a ton done on my mac.
The philosophy behind Ready-Set-Do! as well as the trial version are available for free here:
http://homepage.mac.com/toddvasquez/Ready-Set-Do!/RSD%20Backstory.html
Would appreciate any feedback.
Sincerely,
Todd V
Ready-Set-Do! Creator
October 19th, 2006 at 2:42 am
I have today released yet another GTD app for the Mac: Ghost Action. It is a to do list manager which allows you to view your actions both by context and project, while synchronizing both project and context information to iCal.
It’s in beta for the next three weeks but I expect it to be fairly stable. If you want to check it out I’m grateful for any feedback.
November 20th, 2006 at 9:08 am
[...] Ten Mac Tools for Getting Things Done (GTD) [...]
November 25th, 2006 at 4:34 am
Hi,
Please note the link to “Getting Things Done with Thunderbird” has moved. it is now
http://www.flippingheck.com/index.asp?view=display&ID=579
Thanks
Katy
November 25th, 2006 at 11:59 pm
Katy, thanks for letting me know.
November 26th, 2006 at 4:08 pm
I’ve been gradually wiring GTD into Daylite (marketcircle.com), with some success. Anyone else laboring in that particular vineyard?
January 9th, 2007 at 4:43 am
Hi
Found this one, a Filemaker based GTD app.
http://macproductive.com/actiontracker.html.
Have not tried too much yet.
–h
February 10th, 2007 at 12:30 am
I’ve just finished a new web-based GTD application called Nozbe:
http://www.Nozbe.com
It features not only projects with notes and actions (tasks) but also “next actions” and contexts.
It’s been developed using newest web2.0 technologies so it’s fast and user friendly. You might want to have a look.
Thanks - Michael
April 19th, 2007 at 12:42 pm
Hi! We think Midnight Inbox, our product, is easily the most elegant GTD solution for the Mac. We hope you give it a try! V 1.1.5 was released today.
May 2nd, 2007 at 10:48 pm
Midnight Inbox is clearly the most artistic & typographically sophisticated GTD solution out there.
However, it does not work.
It’s like a Ferrari without an engine.
If you have time to spare or if you just look for something to procrastinate with, give it a try.
If you have things to get done, download iGTD for free and/or wait for OmniFocus which looks very promising. There is a video on the Omni website showing the design philosophy and the basic features of a current pre-alpha version. It looks alreday more stable and powerful than Inbox is today (and will probably ever be).
Chris
August 18th, 2007 at 10:10 am
For me neither of the GTD apps on this page really worked (including the much hyped OmniFocus). I am still hoping for a break-through application and Things from Cultured Code (still in development) might just be the one…
November 20th, 2007 at 8:36 pm
I agree about Things.
I’ve been playing with the Alpha release for a few days now and it beats Omnifocus by miles.
It is elegant, very simple and therefore very usable.
November 20th, 2007 at 9:18 pm
Hmmm…. I’d love to try it out, but it looks like it’s a closed beta :(
November 27th, 2007 at 12:58 pm
Unerring timing, Tim - Omnifocus went public beta two days after your post (and has moved $100k worth in five days - at a 50% discount for orders before Jan 2008). For anyone interested (I’m yet to have a play, but can vouch for the high quality of some of Omni Group’s other software offerings), it’s here.
November 27th, 2007 at 1:02 pm
Ah - you’re onto it. Grand. (Note to self: check main page of blog by knowledgeable and well-informed GTD fan before posting!)
December 10th, 2007 at 5:45 am
Take a look at this one, it’s a personal task manager oriented to GTD and web based