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Productivity Tip: Synchronizing tasks for the individual
This week's Productivity Tip... As a kid I used little Day Timer notebooks to keep track of my schedules and projects. Of course my duties in high school were minimal compared to today, but those pocket-able sprial-bound notepads were great for capturing and tracking all my "stuff." In film school I met a videographer who kept track of his schedule using a PalmPilot. I loved how, for years, my PalmPilot kept perfect sync with my Mac -- provided I put it in the cradle every day and hit the Sync button. Today, we don't have that sync button. The "cloud" has removed the need for it, right? Well, that depends. Brain sync There's a famous story of Charles Schwab, at the time the president of Bethlehem Steel, who advised Ivy Lee (his generation's Covey or Allen) that he could increase Lee's team's efficiency with one simple tip. That tip was to write down the six most important things you have to do the next day before going to bed. At the end of the next day, anything still on that list went onto the next day's six things, and so on. Inspired by this, and by Federico Vittici's use of Drafts and Day One, I've started a similar ritual. Instead of one daily pass, however, I've started journaling in the morning (using Day One) and reviewing my tasks at night (using OmniFocus). You can do both of these using Drafts, in fact. Lists can be sent to Clear as tasks -- which I do if the day has only single-task items needed -- or OmniFocus, or Due, etc. The reason I call this "brain sync" is that I now have, via Day One, a running list of my personal and professional thoughts and goals every day. Coupled with a focused task list, I can reflect on where I am at any point. Making the simple list at the end of the night helps me sleep better, knowing exactly what my priorities are for the next day. Waking up and jotting down thoughts often yields solutions to problems, but also keeps a running log of what my mushy brain thinks is important contrasted with the hard reality of my task list. The goal is to align them over time, as much as possible. When to sync The Cloud: Syncs all the time, in theory. If you use iCloud, your iOS or Mac device will sync more or less seamlessly in the background at intervals regularly enough to cause few issues for an individual user. With iCloud, the system monitors a specific folder outside of the app itself, so changes made on your iPhone to, say, a Byword document, will appear on your Mac when you open up the document there. There are some issues with cloud sync, however. Depending on the mechanism, you might run into version conflicts. Services like Dropbox allow you to roll back, but iCloud really doesn't. Also, if you force quit an app while a sync is in progress and the app isn't using iCloud, you could end that sync session and wind up with problems. This is a rare one, but it's something to consider if you're the type of person who routinely "cleans up" their list of open apps on iOS. Apps: If an app is using iCloud, sync "just happens." Dropbox also has a sort of background sync, and apps that are in the process of uploading data can continue to "stay live" when closed for up to 10 minutes. Provided you don't lose your network connection, that should be ample time for Evernote and other such apps to sync their data. There are times when you will want to manually sync, however. In OmniFocus, for example, the default is to sync when opened. I also like to click the sync button if I've just gone through entering a bunch of data (after a review on my iPad, or if I've just powered through some errands). Then there are some apps which allow you to see when a sync happens, or force a sync when you wish or maybe even require you to manually initiate a sync. Again, I recommend doing this before closing the app. When I move a timer to the next day using Due, for example, I like to pull to refresh the timer so my Mac isn't sitting there chiming for a couple of minutes before sync happens. Paper: If you're using a mix of apps and paper, for best results sync at least once daily, then do a top-down check once a week to make sure everything is on track. It's sort of like reconciling your bank accounts. How to sync Cloud: I highly recommend using the sync service preferred by the application you use. iCloud is Apple's effort to push a ubiquitous sync solution in iOS. Unfortunately, as of this writing there are some serious problems with iCloud. Gus Mueller goes into the gory details, but I have hope that with WWDC looming, Apple is going to fix this. OmniFocus uses Omni's own sync service, and I have almost never had issues with it. Omni's sync is now available to other apps from the company as well, which makes for a delightful experience. Apps like Drafts and Simplenote use Simperium. There are tons of apps out there with Dropbox integration (I use Byword with Dropbox), and of course Google's products are all starting to get connected and sync up. Most of the time, all of this stuff "just works," and it works much better than it used to! Paper: How you sync if you blend paper and digital will, of course, depend upon the mix of the two. If you're lucky enough to be able to easily transcribe your paper stuff into digital stuff, you're way ahead of the game. Things like the Livescribe pen are expensive, but you can also use Evernote to scan your handwriting and do its best to find your words (it does pretty well, in fact). Personally I'm not afraid to spend some time scribbling notes in my project books or notepads, then spend about 10 minutes a day transferring what I need to OmniFocus. Perhaps the best of all worlds is this fancy Evernote Moleskine, which I haven't tried yet. What I do, now, is keep a collection of 3-ring binders. Each binder is a particular context, more or less. There's one notebook for home, comprising my DIY projects (repairs and improvements), tasks like checking on insurance and so on. There's another for work, which contains projects and plans for TUAW. Like Behance's Action Method, anything that needs to be done beyond a single-step is a project, and gets a sheet in the notebook. One sheet, that's all, for every single project I cook up. I wind up using leftover ruled paper I buy every school year for this. I use dividers, emergent task planning sheets and the like in these notebooks, but ultimately those are all for my mush-brain to write out and try to analyze. Once I have a specific path organized and ready to go, I put in the relevant project tasks into OmniFocus or my calendar (or sometimes Clear). This setup gives me the flexibility of being able to plan with sheets of paper -- and that's how my mind works best -- but digitize and distill the action steps needed to get there. Each week I sync up tasks completed and marked in my digital tools with the notebooks on the shelf, ensuring I can see progress towards the goals. Each project has a page, with a goal. Each project has a set of tasks. Those tasks go digital, then are scratched off digitally, then on paper. If reshuffling and more planning are needed, I find it's easier to manage this in paper form, with notes in margins, arrows pointing to milestones, etc. There's a benefit to me to having all of this on paper and having to double-check things. This is actually a rather new system for me, so I'll be detailing progress and usage in posts to come. For now, I wanted to give a concrete example to anyone out there with so much as a simple notepad they use to track tasks. My recommendation is that you try to sync at least once a week, and consider tools to help transcribe your notes. Conclusion We're currently enjoying the best way to sync so far right now, but cloud services have their caveats. Network problems, data collisions and more can turn sync into stink. I find myself doing more work on paper first, then transmuting it into digital forms for dispersal and action. That way I have some form of backup for my thought processes. No matter what you do, consider a "brain sync" twice a day to help keep you focused on those most important tasks, whether you keep them digitally or on paper -- and never forget to back up your critical data!
Productivity Tip: When and how to use paper vs software
One of the problems with giving people advice is that certain topics are so... personal. Our previous experiences, current technology and outside pressures inevitably corral us into a particular line of thinking or acting. So it is with the debate over paper vs. software solutions. Personally, I've found a mix of both to be handy. A quick poll of the TUAW crew indicates a similar divide: Some of us use paper almost to the exclusion of software, whereas some of us went digital once we found enough apps to deliver us from dead trees. Most of us use a blend of both, however. In this week's productivity tip, I want to discuss when you might want to use paper or an app, and some specific apps and resources for both. Paper (and whiteboards, etc.) The thing about paper is that you have to write on it. That seems simplistic, but for some that's actually a big deal. I happen to learn by doing something, and I find I remember notes better if I write them out versus typing them. The other (obvious) thing about paper is that it isn't connected to distractions like social networks and calendars, push notifications, etc.. If those are your problem, maybe switching on Do Not Disturb and sitting outside with pen and paper are a way to really focus on whatever you're trying to capture. I'm also a big fan of mind mapping, and while there are apps for this (discussed below), I have yet to replace my large format rolls of paper with an iOS device. There's something primitive and powerful about scrawling ideas and notes on a giant canvas, then seeing what patterns you can divine. Another advantage to paper is that you can hang the stuff wherever you want so things are always top-of-mind. Steve uses Post-It notes for reminders. Megan uses a Moleskine for capturing checklists -- and she correctly notes that there's something satisfying about actually drawing a line through stuff you've done. Dave has written a great post on Unclutterer about using a notebook for the ARC system. As for me, I can just do more with paper in certain ways. As this post from a time before the iPad notes, "paper is just more usable than a computer monitor." Sure, I can make annotations on a PDF, but it's not as easy in a PDF app to tear off 3 pages and line them up side-by-side to examine them. Similarly, as you can see in the image at the top of this post, I've created a simple "task board" when apps like 30/30 and OmniFocus weren't really nailing a certain workflow for me. In this case, I have a certain number of things I have to do regularly, but they can't be called a project per se, they're more like categories. I also don't have to do every one of them every day, so I pull these (I call them pommes, which is why they have little apples on them) out of an envelope each day and set them up on the board. When I complete one, I put it below the middle of the board (hence the "Done" with a down arrow). Each one of these "pommes" typically maps to a context in OmniFocus (and GTD, for that matter), and they represent the many hats I wear at TUAW. Each one is meant to be completed (more or less) in under 30 minutes. Some days I don't feel like digging into a lot of research, or maybe I just want to focus on writing. By putting them up on the board and being able to easily see them right there in front of me, I'm quickly able to see how much I've done or not done. Yes, I have tasks and projects in OmniFocus, but this allows me to structure my day around types of tasks, and greatly reduces the stress and feeling of being overwhelmed with "too much to do." I'm still working on this system, but on my most productive days it's a good way to batch my time. Some other low-tech things I do, sometimes with a high-tech twist: Use a whiteboard for mocking up web pages and quick mind mapping. Then I take a pic to save in Evernote. In my kitchen I use a whiteboard calendar so my kids can easily see the stuff that is relevant to them. Often this means writing stuff from my Google calendar on the board, but there are worse things in life -- like the stress of kids not knowing what they are walking into when they come stay with me. Use Moleskine notebooks when I travel. Often power is at a premium, and I like to travel light. Plus, during takeoff and landing I can't use my iDevices. Again, I try to capture this digitally later, either in OmniFocus, Evernote or a mind-mapping app. Big ideas beg for a big canvas. I keep very large rolls of paper and oversized sketch pads in my house so I can periodically clear the kitchen table and go to town with ideas and connecting them. Sometimes this requires stitching pics together before dumping into (you guessed it) Evernote. Cornell has a notes template here if you're in a meeting and worry about capturing things. Lastly there are times when you just can't avoid using paper. Coupons I get at the self-checkout are printed, though I wish I could add them to Passbook (if Kroger ever hops on that wagon). But when I see a poster for a show on a telephone pole, I snap a pic of it. Nothing jogs the memory like seeing that pop up in your Photo Stream. You can also use something like the iNotebook, Inkling or LiveScribe's offerings to write and capture to digital. I've only used the LiveScribe Pulse, but I find that adding complications subtracts from the organic nature of simply using paper. These also add considerable cost. Digital Obviously there are lots of limits when it comes to paper. Sharing among a distributed group is somewhat difficult. Contacts are better handled digitally when you get an email and can quickly add phone and address to your address book, or if you use a business card scanner app and text recognition. Speaking of recognition, natural language parsing has come a long way, so adding reminders and calendar events via Siri or Fantastical or Google Calendar is just so easy I will never use a paper calendar again. When I was in middle school I used FastTrack Schedule to plan projects. Now I use a combination of DevonTHINK Pro (for research materials) and OmniFocus, but there are a good number of capable project managers out there, including Merlin and OmniPlan. If I were handling larger projects, I am sure I would rely upon those heavily. Notes can absolutely have an advantage in digital form if you're busy linking things, as you can do in a wiki or software such as VoodooPad, which is excellent. There's also nvALT and a host of other note applications out there which can cross-link and insert multimedia in ways you can't replicate on paper. When it comes to capturing ideas, Doc uses Drafts and voice recognition to quickly capture items. Similarly, Siri does a great job for adding Reminders. Fancy tricks like geolocation are all but impossible on paper. The only problem with all of these: You have to know how to use them. Everyone knows how to use paper, however. Some digital tools I use that attempt to simulate or replace paper-based equivalents: SimpleMind for mind mapping (this has sync so I can access my maps on my Mac), although MindNode is good and Grafio allows a sort of scrapbooking. Passbook as much as I can for plane tickets and customer loyalty cards. Some folks in team chat mentioned Lemon Wallet as well. I just hate fumbling for a paper ticket while I wait for first class to board. Fantastical for scheduling (Mac and iOS) and BusyCal on my Mac instead of iCal. Sketch Club for sketches, although Autodesk's SketchBook is good (just overkill for my needs usually), and Paper on iPad is simply wonderful. I also use Procreate (and a Pogo Connect) when I want to make a really great drawing. Now that Penultimate is integrated with Evernote, it's hard to beat. That said, I kinda like Sketch Rolls when I don't have access to my paper at home. But when to use what? Well, this is really a personal choice. What I tell people is to try both and see what fits you best. It's hard to argue that digital contact management is a bad thing, and calendars are another one which paper doesn't do better than digital tools. When it comes to notes and creating tasks, it all depends on how much you have to share with others and your own personal style. If you are building a spaceship, you're probably going to need some pretty complex project management tools, and paper will likely reduce your efficiency. If you juggle a couple of things a day, it's really satisfying to whip out a sheet of paper or note card and start crossing off tasks through the day. I used to use the heck out of these DIY "hipster" planners, and Dave Caolo points out these awesome productivity tools you can print courtesy of David Seah. Try this: Pick one or the other for a solid week and see how it feels. If you get into the groove of reviewing your tasks in OmniFocus and you find satisfaction in clicking check boxes, there you go. If, on the other hand, you feel more accomplished writing down tasks and scratching through them, paper is your friend. Because we all work in such different ways, this sort of A/B testing is critical for determining your preferences. Hint: Use a simple to do app to prevent having to read a huge manual. Conclusion While I love gadgets and technology, we simply aren't in the Diamond Age just yet. I'd love to have an iPad which really felt like a book, but that doesn't exist yet. Yes, I'd love to save some trees, but there are times when my old monkey brain just wants to poke at a sheet of paper with a stick filled with graphite. There's still a case for paper. That said, I turn 40 this year and maybe I'm just wed to a particular workflow. In the end try out the tools and make an honest assessment of what works best for you. Let me know if you have any suggestions in the comments below!
Productivity Tip: Using specialized lists for specific use cases
It's time for this week's Productivity Tips column. While I use OmniFocus for just about everything, there are times when I prefer other task managers to handle certain things. Many productivity gurus advise against using more than one tool to list tasks, but I don't like putting short-term list items into OmniFocus. More to the point, I use specialized list tools for specialized tasks -- groceries, kid chores and the like. While you can put all of that into OmniFocus and see it only when you want to, there's something to be said for specialized tools which are tuned to a specific purpose, and may offer features not found in a more general-purpose product like OmniFocus. You can always use one task manager to rule them all, of course, but there are limitations. OmniFocus, for example, isn't where I store my recipes. If I want to create a grocery list in Sous Chef, it's a relatively easy affair. Better yet, I can plan a week's worth of meals and then make a grocery list easily from those menus. To do this in OmniFocus (or other general-purpose task managers like Remember the Milk), I have to do a lot of copy and paste work -- which sort of defeats the purpose of using these magnificent technology products, doesn't it? If I need a short list for a short period of time, I use a "punch list," which requires no contexts or setup. Sometimes an app with a narrow focus has so many great features that I can't help but use it. I've also found geofenced reminders in OmniFocus to be less useful than I'd like, but that's another story. Here are a few ideas for when to use specific task managers, and some of the ones I use. Punch Lists A punch list -- the term comes from the construction industry -- is the stuff you need to do in sequence, right now or by a specific deadline. It's often used for the "fixes" that accumulate towards the end of a project, with only a few loose ends or tweaks to finish off. For quick turnaround projects, it may be all you need. As I tend to use OmniFocus for bigger/long-term projects, I do also sometimes use it for these punch lists, but only when a series of steps will take me longer than an hour or so to complete. If I'm making a quick list to prep for my kids coming over to stay for a weekend, I use a short-term list tool (I don't always have to do the same things each time they come over). Apps: For general, short term lists I love Clear. If I have 3 or 4 things to do in a given hour, and I'm just coming up with that list on the fly, I'm likely to use Clear to quickly set those up and knock them down. Quick, short-term lists are great with Clear, which also syncs with my Mac. Wunderlist is a great solution as well, and so is Remember The Milk if you need to collaborate. There's also iOS/OS X Reminders, but I have wired most of my reminders to go to OmniFocus because I want to capture once and process later. When it comes to making lists that need to be in cold storage for a while (like Christmas wish lists), or lists of info which I need but not on a regular basis, I use Evernote. Evernote makes it easy to find lists I've made earlier, and add to those from anywhere. Kids or pets As a divorced dad, I have to keep up with a lot of info on my kids. From wish lists (often generated while we are at a store -- the old "daddy I want this!" cry) to favorite foods to blood types and other medical info, my puny brain can't keep it all. We've also started a chore chart, and I wanted to use something a bit friendlier than OmniFocus. If you have pets, there are a number of things to track and keep on top of, from vet visits to dietary needs and more. Luckily, there are a few apps for that. Apps: If you have pets, check out PetMinder, which will track all sorts of things about your pet including vet appointments and allergies. If you have those other household inhabitants known as "human children" I have been loving iAllowance for their chores. iAllowance allows me to use Dave Ramsey's system for saving, spending and giving, and handles all the math and checklists for me. I can even sync with my iOS devices, so I put the iPad on a table and as kids finish items they come and mark them off. Travel Do you really want all those shops, restaurants and tourist sites in your task manager along with all your work stuff? Aren't you supposed to be on vacation? Just like how I use Firefox for work stuff (well, and Chrome) and Safari and Opera for personal browsing, I like to keep my vacation info and work info very separate. A great example of a punch list, too, is your typical packing list. Again, you could keep a list of potential packing items in your task manager, but that could add hundreds of items that you may only need once in a while. I find packing lists are an easy win when testing list apps, not to mention there are some great special-purpose apps for this. Apps: Travel apps could be an entire month's worth of posts, so all I'll say here is that if you frequently travel for leisure you'll want to look into the "to do" aspects of Foursquare and Yelp. By creating accounts and using the app's bookmarking features as your wish list of stuff to do, you can quickly get directions and reviews in the app, saving you time. If you want a packing list, PackingPro is one of the best, and Stow features a clever Q&A method for using templates. If you're collaborating on a list with your partner or spouse, Avocado's one-to-one messaging includes a flexible list feature as well -- good for those last-minute pretrip items. Food There are some outstanding apps for wine and beer out there. To replicate those databases elsewhere would be onerous at best. So if you're a fan of touring wine country and want a list of wines to check out, you're more likely to use one of these special purpose apps here. Everyday cooking and food shopping are greatly enhanced when using one of the dozens of great cooking apps available. I am still in the process of finding my favorite, but most of them offer features out of the box that would be a pain to replicate in a general "to do" app. Apps: When it comes to food, I use Sous Chef or Groceries. If I haven't planned my meals, Groceries has a nice interface and makes it super easy to add items (even those not in its database). Sous Chef is my go-to for meal planning and recipe-keeping. Fitness Along with food, there are some great fitness apps out there with lists of exercises or tools to track your weight, food, etc. Apps: I don't actually use a lot of fitness apps, but I have used 30/30 to create a workout routine and it's great. 30/30 can also be used for daily routines, and I love the interface and experience. I used Lift for a while, and if you're trying to get into a habit of doing something, it's quite good. My only problem with Lift was that the entire interface was completely dependent on a network connection. Given AT&T's coverage where I live (and in many cities where the networks are clogged), I found that the simple act of loading the basic interface would sometimes fail -- which isn't very encouraging. That said, there are lots of options here for goal-setting apps, and they are all essentially list tools. DIY There are a number of awesome apps available to help you plan construction projects or minor repairs at your house. Like a food app, these take a project and break it into a parts list -- again something which you'd have to copy over to another tool. Along with DIY home projects, anything involving crafting, knitting, sewing, etc. will result in a specialized list. Do you need that list of yarn for that one project forever archived in your task manager? Probably not. Apps: DIY is another huge topic, but as an example of specialized apps, I like to point to My Measures and Woodcraft. My Measures will create a list of dimensions for a room and its fixtures. Woodcraft will create a list of wood you need for a given project. Both are quite excellent, and getting that data into another app is onerous and not that useful. I'm sure there are similar apps for sewing and other crafty stuff. Daily Routines, Location-Based Reminders While OmniFocus is pretty good at most things, I have resisted using it for daily repeating actions. For one thing, I keep running into a repeating item that starts multiplying itself over time (no, I don't need to balance my checkbook 4 times a day!). Also, there are tools out there which are more aimed at motivation (like the goal-setting apps mentioned in the fitness section) vs. plowing through a set of tasks. If you are self-motivated a one-size-fits-all approach might work for you. If not, check out some recommendations below. Lastly, OmniFocus does have a pretty good location system but I found it a bit onerous to use (espeically on the desktop) and annoying in daily use. No, I don't need to be reminded to fix something every single time I pull into my driveway. But I do need to be reminded to put out the trash when I arrive home on Wednesday mornings. For this, I use Siri and it's the easiest method I've found so far. "Remind me when I get home to..." just sounds like the future, doesn't it? Apps: For daily routine stuff I do wind up using my squishy brain for a lot -- but I also have a variable schedule. If I have a set of routines for a day, I hop into 30/30, where I have a list. I also use Due to remind me about repeating items. Due is very insistent, but makes it easy to move an item to another day, plus it sync with my Mac. Conclusion I do not use a separate app for inboxing items. I do believe that this is important, because the more complexity in your task management, the less likely you're going to get things done. I still use OmniFocus+Siri to capture stuff. In rare cases I use Clear to make a quick list, but that list is very quickly sorted and knocked out, eliminating the need for messing around in OmniFocus for those tasks. Similarly, if you find yourself needing one-off or specialized lists, consider looking at a specialized tool. While OmniFocus and other power tools can be bent to your will, sometimes an app offers features you would have to spend a lot of time replicating elsewhere. And that's what this is all about, really: Getting things done and saving you time. Isn't that what technology should be doing? Shout out your favorite special-purpose apps in the comments below and we here at TUAW will try to review any we haven't looked at before.
Productivity Tip: Take a break
In the past couple of installments of TUAW's productivity tips, I've discussed a number of ways to keep you focused on your tasks. Managing those tasks will be the next big-picture topic, but this week I wanted to keep it short and simple, just like your breaks should be. Yes, you should take breaks, especially if you are a knowledge worker and/or you have to focus on tasks which require a great deal of problem solving. There's a lot of evidence that shows our brains need frequent rest in order to function at their best, so don't skimp on the breaks even if you are worried about a deadline. Why is this important? Aside from how you should really be taking a vacation, your brain can suffer from decision fatigue. While you're busy processing your inbox or responding to emails, your brain is getting quite the electro-chemical workout. As with any of our organs, after a while it tires out. Just like a physical workout, you should allow for a cool-down period to let your brain rejeuvinate itself. At AOL we're quite fond of naps, too. Timing breaks As I discussed in my article on timers, you should aim to take a quick break after a period of intense focus. Pomodoros are set up for this purpose, giving you 25 minutes of task time plus a five-minute break. I've read of 90-minute work sessions followed by a 30-minute break time (which allows time for a walk or run or yoga), but ultimately you'll have to experiment and see what works for you as a person and in your job. I like to take frequent breaks. The key to timing your breaks is definitely scheduling them around those periods of intensity. Again, your brain gets worn out after too many decisions in a fixed amount of time -- let that thing cool off! The time of your break should be somewhat proportional to the period of intensity, however. Five minutes after 25 makes sense, as does 30 after 90. Taking an hour nap after 20 minutes of email is a bit much, however. Types of breaks Now, do you need to rest or do you need to re-energize? One allows things to cool down, while the other is more like a warm up. Often we just need to rest our eyes, or just stretch to shake off the tightness of sitting for too long. For short breaks I tend to make sure I have a bottle of water, then go gaze out a window for a few minutes. Or, since I work at home, I'll go spend a few minutes washing dishes (a very peaceful activity, honestly). These short breaks help refocus you later, and serve as a brief cool-down for your brain. Be careful not to overdo it; tidying your desk or going to the break room might seem like a quick rest, yet you're still making all sorts of decisions, leading again to decision fatigue. A better short break fully disengages your brain for a bit. Staring is actually good. Stretching is even better, and there are lots of exercises you can do, even in a cubicle. The more you allow your body to work, the better it will be able to assist your brain. Anything that literally "takes your mind off of things" is good, which means social media checking is likely bad as you're likely to see things which make you angry as well as happy on any given day. Naps are excellent, but most people don't use them correctly. Here's a great primer, and here are some tips from the Mayo clinic. I have found that a 25-minute or less nap has made me feel more energized in the afternoons if I am not already sleep deprived. If I haven't had enough sleep that day already, I tend to get a headache later and feel sleepier. That said, naps can be very effective when done properly. I have found a short walk or run, or even time with a Kinect game, helps the afternoon doldrums significantly. A few jumping jacks or standing on your head can also get the blood flowing. Apps to help For simple breaks, I like to use Due's timers and have set a 5, 10, and 15 minute timer as default break times. Siri can do this in a pinch as well. For naps I use Naturespace (which has a timer), or Pzizz, a longtime Mac app which was ported to iOS some time ago. Pzizz is, in my opinion, the best napping app; it guides you into a restful state much like hypnosis, can be set for various times, and can be configured in numerous ways while still using a set of sounds and tones which help lull you to rest. Other TUAWers enthusiastically recommend Andrew Johnson's apps and audiofiles for guided rest periods. Meditation is a good rest plan, and we've already mentioned a few apps for this. I'm currently using Mind, which is as simple a meditation timer as you're likely to find. There are also a number of exercise apps on the store, including some niche products like Healthy Break, which adds simple stretches to a break timer. I haven't had much success with these, as I tend to look up things online, learn them, and have a few I do over and over again. It's best to discuss your options with your doctor or trainer (if you're lucky enough to have a trainer). Conclusion While you can push through a day with no breaks, you will wind up making worse decisions as time wears on, and as those decisions wear you out. As your productivity and quality of work decrease, you become less efficient. The best way to combat this: get plenty of rest to begin with, and allow yourself breaks through the day. By setting timers for breaks and having a collection of short activities to break to, you'll set yourself up to stay productive longer than before, with better results.
