Useful software?

[swedguy]

Insomnia is kicking in again and I figured I'd do something useful instead of counting bumps in my ceiling
I'm looking for things to oganize myself better. Right now I'm using too many different things that doesn't work together.

What kind of software are you using and find useful?

Accounting
Project management
...you name it

[Mishi]

Originally Posted by swedguy

Insomnia is kicking in again and I figured I'd do something useful instead of counting bumps in my ceiling
I'm looking for things to oganize myself better. Right now I'm using too many different things that doesn't work together.

What kind of software are you using and find useful?

Accounting
Project management
...you name it

I have a piece of to-do list software called Personal Assistant. I used it often enough during the trial period to pay the $25 or so to register it; have hardly used it since. I like to think that's because it got me so organized, I don't even need it any more! It is very handy for keeping track of my lower-priority "to dos" that might get lost in a sea of papers; I just work better day to day off a written list.

I know there are tons of similar free programs; this was only one I could find that gave me just what I wanted without so many bells and whistles that it became ridiculous.

You can get it here if you are so inclined.

[Greenguy]

I have this little program called Kana Reminder that I use for my "to do" stuff & of course, reminding me of things

I use MS Money for my accounting.

Pretty much everything else is on a text file or spread sheet

[bstrawse]

On a PC, I use Quickbooks Pro for accounting.
Quicken for Personal Finance
StatsRemote for stats

But i'm mostly a mac guy
b

[Cleo]

iCal for my appointments and todos. Address book for contacts. MYOB for accounting.

Now that Quickbooks is being made for the Mac again I have been thinking of switching back to make my accountant happy.

[bstrawse]

I bought quickboos on the mac, but it doesn't support many of the same features on the PC, so I went back to the PC version. I need some of the missing features unfortunately.

Quicken is the same way (same company I know) - they can't sync w/ many of my investments that the PC version can.. irritating as all get out.
B

[Chop Smith]

Have you looked at The Webmasters Tool Kit - www.twtk.com/ ? Folks using it seem to swear by it. I downloaded it but never got around to work with it.

[Cleo]

I heard that the latest version finally was on par with the PC version. This is a newer version then the first one they came out with for the Mac again.

I also use Excel for keeping a profit and loss sheet for my web business. It is nice to quickly seeing what sponsors I'm doing well with.

I no longer keep any kind of books on my personal fiances but when I did I used Quicken. These days the Bank Of America online admin provides enough for my needs and I love not having to write checks for anything. In fact about the only reason that I still use an account program is for my accountant and knowing how much my tax deposit needs to be each month.

[bstrawse]

Originally Posted by Cleo

. These days the Bank Of America online admin provides enough for my needs and I love not having to write checks for anything. In fact about the only reason that I still use an account program is for my accountant and knowing how much my tax deposit needs to be each month.

I use the same bank - I was with BankBoston, then bought by Fleet, now with BoA - I haven't written a check to pay a bill in years.
B

[Cleo]

I was with Barnet Bank that got bought by National Bank that got bought by Bank Of America. I really disliked the people that took over the office but their online banking IMO is the best of the best and being as it is completely free what more can you want. I spilt a lot of my payments between my business account and personal account so not having to pay any fees is great. When I needed to borrow money on my house to remodel they cam right through very fast with a home equity loan for my and actually have been just great so these days I'm very happy with Bank Of America.

[swedguy]

Lots of things to look in to today. Thanks guys

I use Stats Remote to keep track of all sponsors.
Pretty much everything else is in Excel, text files or in a pad. I can't remember where I have everything any more, that's why I need to find something else.
Excel is pretty nice. Too bad I only know how to make two columns and add up the numbers at the bottom hehe.

[bstrawse]

Originally Posted by Cleo

I was with Barnet Bank that got bought by National Bank that got bought by Bank Of America. I really disliked the people that took over the office but their online banking IMO is the best of the best and being as it is completely free what more can you want. I spilt a lot of my payments between my business account and personal account so not having to pay any fees is great. When I needed to borrow money on my house to remodel they cam right through very fast with a home equity loan for my and actually have been just great so these days I'm very happy with Bank Of America.

The only complaint I have with them is that we're moving to Minnesota from Boston and they don't have branches in Minnesota. Argh!

I hate - HATE - changing banks.
B

[Cleo]

I also see that my spelling and typing functions of my brain still haven't woken up.

Maybe I should make more use of that big rectangle soft thing in my bedroom and get horizontal on it more.

[swedguy]

Microsoft Money Small Business 2005 looks really good. Takes care of both personal and business in one for only $90, sounds like a steal to me. That will get me rid of couple of Excel sheets
Just have to see if it can handle multiple currencies.

I looked at some of the todo/project managers but they lacked one thing, sub-projects.
A simple example -
Main project: Link List
Sub projects: create template, create 100 ads, add 1000 links, ....

I found some that had that feature and will post later after I've tried tested them.

[swedguy]

Now I found 2 Project/Task Managers that works well, one is more simple than the other

CheckList - http://www.4thsoftware.com/
Very basic and easy to use.
Assign unlimited amount of tasks to each project.
Prioritize tasks (this one you can see high priority tasks pretty easy, you can't do that in the one below).

DevPlanner - http://devplanner.com/
Assign tasks to each project.
Track exact how much time you spend on each task.
You can also have project templates (fits me like a glove). Perfect if you have projects with many different tasks that last for a week and then it starts all over again.


I went with DevPlanner since it has project templates.

[swedguy]

MS Money is much harder than my old Excel sheet
It's going to take me forever to learn this thing.

[GeorgeTH]

Originally Posted by swedguy

MS Money is much harder than my old Excel sheet
It's going to take me forever to learn this thing.

That's why I'm using QUICKEN Personal - it's really easy to use, even pre-fills recurring bookings and stuff (Excel won't do that for you), and offers the option to split amounts (like phonebill: part biz, part private expense)...

[Cleo]

I like Excel

[swedguy]

Originally Posted by GeorgeTH

That's why I'm using QUICKEN Personal - it's really easy to use, even pre-fills recurring bookings and stuff (Excel won't do that for you), and offers the option to split amounts (like phonebill: part biz, part private expense)...

Why didn't you say anything earlier?

I was deciding between MS Money Small Business and Quicken Home & Business. They seemed to be pretty equal, but decided on MS since at least Greenie is using it successfully.

[Greenguy]

MS Money prefills areas & lets you split things as well

[rtv]

Thank you guys for a lot of useful information! I've just downloaded this:
CheckList - http://www.4thsoftware.com/

We'll try to be more organised!

[GeorgeTH]

Originally Posted by Greenguy

MS Money prefills areas & lets you split things as well

That might be, it just has one major flaw: it's from Microsoft

Wherever I can avoid I'm not using anything MS...

[MrYum]

Can't speak highly enough about QuickBooks for business and Quicken for personal finance management.

Been using both for over 10 years...all the way back to the DOS days. Think the first version I used came on 3.5 floppy disks...although it might have even been 5.25 inch floppies! Sheesh...I must be getting old! lol

Anyway...both great software packages...easy to setup/use...and reasonably priced

[Greenguy]

GeorgeTH - no biggie - I was just making sure swedguy knew that it did what he needed it to do.

I used to use Quicken til I got a new system & it wasn't pre-installed, but MS Money was. So I converted the files & never looked back. I think that was 1998

I don;t use nearly all the features that it has, it just keeps track of money coming in & going out & then I print up the totals for my accountant at the end of the year.

[facialfreak]

On the topic of organization, no webmaster should be without Pa1m One's Palm desktop!

It has an address book, calendar, TO DO list, budget, Photo Albums, and Voice memos that integrate right into your desktop.

Even if you do not own a PalmPilot™, this is one piece of freeware that you can not afford to be without ... makes organizing things a fucking breeze !!

http://www.palmone.com/us/software/palm/

Did I mention that it is FREE?