Michael Buffington is a pal of mine who's a talented developer and all-around swell fellow. I got to work with him a bit on the Stikkit project and, in some of our offline talks on productivity stuff, I was intrigued to learn about some of his ninja geek skillz.

I asked Michael to write up a series on some of his favorite tricks to get his stuff done, and he kindly obliged. Here's part one.

--Merlin

How I use iGTD

by Michael Buffington

This is the first part in a multipart series about using iGTD with Quicksilver and how it's changed my life, allowed me to grow hair where I never thought it possible, and more importantly, spend more quality time with my children (who are, as you might know, super humans with indescribable special abilities).

I'm a recent and somewhat enthusiastic convert to GTD. I have had the good fortune of starting to manage my digital life with GTD the same day Merlin first mentioned a great application for OS X called iGTD.

I have to admit though that I'm not a very hard core GTD follower yet. The most important parts of GTD for me are getting my tasks out of my head the moment they pop into existence, and putting them into some sort of system I can trust. iGTD allows me to do exactly that in a very intuitive way, but if I'm having a good day I only ever bring iGTD into focus when I'm not sure what's next on my list.

I always try to credit the source for stuff that I link to when I've learned about it from other sites. In addition to helping my readers connect with voices they may not have heard before, I believe it's just the classy thing to do. (I'm looking at you, "A Listers" -- a lot of you have started dropping vias for everyone but your highest-profile buddies: tacky, tacky).

Anyway, I admit that I'm not 100% either, but in the interest of trying to make good, here are a few of the sites that I find myself reading and linking to a lot. Thanks to their authors and contributors for sending me (and you) to so many interesting places.

Jason P. DeFillippo : 90 Days

My pal, Jason DeFillippo, has recently begun a project to clean up his act over the next ninety days. In preparation for hitting the big three-six, he's planning to tidy up, lose some weight, and start shedding the nonsense, clutter, and distractions in his life. Go, man, go.

Personally, I've had mixed to terrible results with things where I tried to invert too many habits at one time, but Jason is nothing if not a hardass and a man of firm resolve. I'm looking forward to watching his progress over the summer and learning what I can from him.

I'll tell you one thing we agree on; it's all about getting started:

I saw this over at Boris’s blog the other day and it really triggered something in me. I tend to think a lot about project and plans. I think about them so much I get paralyzed with option paralysis and stuff doesn’t get done. In an attempt to do something right the first time through it invariable almost never gets done at all. Thinking something through is an important part of the creative process but it means dick if you don’t ever start. And if you don’t start you don’t finish.

Good on 'ya, Jason. Rock it.

Here are Jason's "90 Days" posts so far:

TWiT 101: Moon over Google

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Merlin Mann, Wil Harris, Steve Gibson, and Denise Howell

Google Street View and privacy, Michael Moore and piracy, hackers and Safari...

• Leo has begun to use Facebook for only people he knows personally.
• Facebook has recently allowed for applications which enticed Leo.
• The People Aggregator will allow you to create a social network using your login from another social network.
• Create your own social network with Ning.
• Steve Jobs keynoted the WWDC conference announcing Safari for Windows, but no API.
• Apple has plugged several security flaws that were discovered in the Windows version of Safari.
• At WWDC, numerous new OSX Leopard features were unveiled.
• Steve Gillmor had a post called iPhonomics regarding the possibility of Google Gears coming to the iPhone.
• Linspire has made a deal with Microsoft to share numerous technologies.
• Mark Shuttleworth, founder of Ubuntu, somewhat chastised Microsoft regarding software patents.
• Microsoft has also partnered will LG for their Linux-based devices.
• Owen Thomas, the Business 2.0 editor, has been to Valleywag.
• Sicko, Michael Moore's new controversial documentary, has been leaked onto Bittorrent.
• The Manchester Cathedral is complaining to Sony about their appearance in the game "Resistance: Fall of Man."
• Google has launched a "Street View" service that are fairly recent. Leo's buddy Patrick Norton was actually caught on it crossing the street. Check out the top 15 sightings on Google Street View.
• Keep track of Google Street View sightings at StreetViewr.
• Audio is a Facebook application that allows people to upload audio - giving way for piracy to happen on the site.
• eBay threated to take their ads off of Google.
• It is the 50th anniversary of the Frisbee.

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TED | Talks | Stefan Sagmeister: Yes, design can make you happy (video)

I really enjoyed this 15-minute TED presentation by Stefan Sagmeister (watch out: flashy page with grabby browser javascript) on how specific instances of design have made him happy.