Clutter on my desktop PC? Technology tools for organization, time management, and productivity

Winter break time is a time for cleaning out the house, new year’s resolutions, and circulating physical items for many people around the world. For many academics like me, it is time for annual cleaning and organization of cluttered desktops, apps, and organizing our folders on computers and have a fresh start into the new year. Here is what I tried and liked leading into the process of doing my annual cleaning ritual. The apps and techniques I will recommend are not linked to any endorsement or affiliate program. As a public intellectual, researcher and professor in a public university, all of my work and writing is for service to community. Here it goes:

Changing from Dropbox to Google Drive: Dropbox offers an annual storage plan for 2TB for $119. I have been a big fan of Dropbox over the years because of this one simple feature: The ability to see all of my Dropbox in the file explorer in my left part of the PC. Dropbox makes it so easy to drop documents back and forth from desktop, to directly into its folder and automatically expands folders once you hover over it with the cursor. This feature helped me so much that I have done numerous collaboration and handled large projects over Dropbox for the last 7 years. This all changed when I got my new personal laptop 2 years ago. I realized at the time I purchased the upgraded Dropbox, it would take all the space in my laptop and I am unable to use my 2TB, defying its purpose. That is, it would use my hard disk space. This was a bummer for someone like me who use technical photography and videos a lot. So I figured the way out of this: Unsynching my photo folders from my Dropbox. While it was very inconvenient to try to use the photo folder over the internet version of the Dropbox — you cannot really drop documents into the internet version or vice versa. In order to move, you need to use commands and it does not talk to your desktop — I stuck to it. I also liked the ability to use the mobile version, which stored things on cloud. However, I was not willing to pay this much for another year for partial use.

I have gotten a generous Google drive space through my university. However, this is not a place to have my personal documents and photos. So I knew I would not use my work Google drive for my personal big space needs. I got a SandDisk 256 GB flash drive instead. I will buy a couple extra to store my photos and double copy all to avoid losing my files if drive becomes corrupt. I have decided to use these little flash drives as places to store my personal documents, photos and videos. With Google drive, one thing I disliked was and still is its clunky and unattractive user interface and the inability to drop documents and having to upload everything instead. Plus, Google drive initially made it impossible to use and save Microsoft documents as Microsoft apps, so that limited people’s ability to collaborate and edit things in the original format. Now that Google made it possible to edit things as Microsoft apps, I grew to like Google drive a lot better. But still, I could not stand the difficulty of opening up a web browser to do my work in a visually tough interface of google drive. Then I found a super helpful solution: Apparently, there is a way for you to be able to use the Google drive in your file explorer. Voila! I love seeing my Google drive in my file explorer now. Here is a way to accomplish this: https://www.digitalcitizen.life/set-up-add-google-drive-file-explorer/

There are still some issues with using Google drive in your file explorer. One is the difficulty of not seeing the sub-folders expanding vertically like you had your Dropbox when you hover on a folder. You have to click, open the folder in a new window, and click again to open up the subfolders. I hope Google reconsiders this. However, when you are there, you can use all of your Microsoft documents as usual and when you save in your Microsoft app, it actually saves it into the drive. Super cool! Another limitation of using Google drive in my file explorer is that it does use your hard drive space. However, since I was used to this from Dropbox era, I now use my photos in flash drives. I can live with it for now.

All this brings up a big equity issue: Space is for a fee now, as an increasing trend. This is an area we need regulations for human rights and social equity. Otherwise this will mean people who cannot afford the space will be unable to participate in the digital community.

Changing from Evernote to Bublup: Bublup is a nice relatively new cloud app that you can use in Evernote style both for your desktop and on your mobile phones. For me, it is a collection of colorful folders, lists, checklists, photo albums, “rolls” — what Bublup calls a selection of weblinks — you would like to store. All of my digital clutter and misc items, such as photos of someone’s business card, my travel items checklist, or my favorite recipes are now in Bublup. It has a feature to share folders, files and photos, making it useful for informal collaborations. One downside is that you have to sign up with Bublup in order to view someone’s materials. There is a free version as well as a paid version. I am using the least expensive paid version. Why I have changed from Evernote? Evernote seems more static and passive compared to how Bublup stores things. One feature I do not like in Bublup is that it forces you to click on a + button and choose the format of whatever you are uploading. I wish it automatically recognized the type of file unless you were trying to create a new folder.

Discovering Wrike: Wrike is another relatively new and free project management tool that has a planner, checklist, and powerful ways to manage your project, while keeping your job so simple. I always loved seeing long term timelines visually and colorfully for my writing and research projects and this new free app helps you to do that. In addition, you can plan subtasks in a project, and view it in multiple ways, including a tasklist version (paid version), Gantt chart (paid version), board view, list view, and analytics (paid version), which shows you in powerful visuals where you are in accomplishing your goals, without overwhelming you with unnecessary input on your end. Another cool feature is that you receive an email with your daily tasks each day. I just love using it so far and have not seen any downsides yet.

Changing from Cold Turkey to Intention: Cold Turkey is a nice tool which has a free version that helps you to block distracting websites. When I began using it, I blocked Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest and others till I realized that I really cannot use them when I need them for work. Once Cold Turkey blocks something, it is gone forever, unless you pay for the upgraded version in order to have the feature to schedule the block for the specific hours. It bothered me as someone who uses public communication for work and research purposes. So I recently discovered Intention, yet another newer app, which allows you to block the websites on a schedule on the free version. Currently, I cannot have anything open till 2 pm, which allows me to focus on writing, reading, evaluation, analysis, teaching preparation and intense projects, while I know I can plan to use it after 2 pm. I absolutely love this new arrangement.

Hope this is useful to my fellow office work people and specifically academics, writers and educators thinking about decluttering for the upcoming year so your productivity can bloom!