DEV Community

Cover image for The Productivity apps I use in 2022
Cassidy Williams
Cassidy Williams

Posted on • Updated on

The Productivity apps I use in 2022

I often get asked what my favorite tools are and how I use them to get my work done, and I'm writing this both to answer that question, and also for me to just paste a link to this post next time I'm asked. Efficiency!

This post will not cover my code editor(s), terminals, or other developer tools. This is just a list of the tools I use daily to get my tasks done!

All of these tools you can use for free, and a couple have paid upgrades. That being said, you don't need to pay money to use them to the fullest, if you don't want to! Also, all of them work across operating systems. I use both a PC and a Mac, so that's important to me.

Obsidian

Website

I take notes with Obsidian, write blogs with Obsidian (like this one), keep track of projects with Obsidian, plan classes with Obsidian... I'm alllllll in on Obsidian.

It's a local-first markdown editor. I love that I can keep everything local to my machine (so I don't have any slow load times), and just write markdown without anything getting in my way. Beyond that, they have an open plugin + theming setup, and you can pay for syncing across devices as well. I made a theme for it, if you want to check it out!

Centered

Website

When I use Centered, I get more work done, simply put. I was a little slow to get into it, but now I can't imagine getting all that I want done without it, honestly. I often have trouble focusing throughout the day when I have a lot to do, and Centered helps a ton with that.

Centered is a flow state to-do app. It's kind of hard to explain in one sentence, because it does so much while being pretty simple, too. Long story short, you plop in your to-do list for the day/session/whatever, each task has a certain amount of time assigned to it, and then you hit start. It'll play some music designed to help you focus, and it has a coach that speaks to you about how much time is left in your current task, gives you breaks, and pokes you when you're distracted. I made a group in it if you'd ever like to flow with me!

Cron

Website

Cron is a keyboard shortcut-powered calendar app. I've tried a bunch of calendar apps over the years, and Cron is my current favorite. It lets you quickly use keyboard commands to see your teammate's calendars, share availability, view multiple timezones, and create events.

Update from the Cron team: anyone who signs up in the 24 hours after this was posted will get an instant invite skipping the waitlist (as fast as Cron can send them)!

todometer

Website

This is a shameless plug, but I use todometer for task management, and... I built todometer.

todometer is a meter-based to-do list for your desktop. I use this to keep track of things that I'd like to get done throughout a given day or week, without the restrictions of a flow state session. I made it because I am motivated by progress bars, and sometimes I just need a simple list prominently on my desktop of what I need to get done. Plus, it's local-only, so you don't have to worry about loading times. Here is the repository if you'd like to see how I built it (full disclosure: I want to maintain it more, but I've got other things to do, so if you make an issue, I'll get to it... someday).

That's it!

I've tried a lot of different tools over the years, and this is just my current "stack." I do think that it's worth reassessing your tools fairly regularly. I used to use other ones, like Bear, and Notion, and Vimcal, etc, and they all worked for me at the time, but figuring out what you like and don't like about your "stack" is super helpful for upgrading how you work over time.

It's not just the applications, it's the dedication to them that really make them work for me. If something is scheduled on my calendar, whether it's flow time or dedicated time to one specific task, I follow it. If I put a task in todometer, I have to get it done that day.

If you don't commit yourself to your tools, they are just extra overhead to getting things done, and the tasks get overwhelming as they pile up. Keep that in mind as you hunt for tools that might work for you!

Until next time!

Latest comments (33)

Collapse
 
jschleigher profile image
James Schleigher

Thanks for sharing an interesting post! Will try out the todometer soon! I like to use task management software to manage my tasks as well. I have yet to try many tools, but so far, I like Todoist and Quire.

Collapse
 
andrewbaisden profile image
Andrew Baisden

Great list i'm using Obsidian and Centered.

Collapse
 
juristr profile image
Juri Strumpflohner

Obsidian FTW!

Collapse
 
peterseo98 profile image
peter

Great post

Collapse
 
m4ntaray profile image
nickbenedetti • Edited

For text that I want to reference later, I use "Paste" (pasteapp.io/) - where I type command-shift-v and I can get text I've copied in the past, and organize copied text into categories for later reference. For ex. bash and Github-Actions and git are some of mine. In bash I'd put useful bash commands that I want to remember later.

For longer working notes on a problem, I use Evernote for daily notes, with links to pages for each work issue - ex. on Mar 23, 2022 I worked on JIRA-1234. This keeps the daily mash of what I did more organized.

Collapse
 
hebros profile image
Kalin Georgiev • Edited

Thanks for sharing it! You can check logseq.com as it is a really nice companion tool to Obsidian.

One thing I would add to this list is nighteye.app to enable dark mode on nearly any website on the web.

Last but not least I would add blockzilla.app that helps me remove all promoted tweets and sponsored posts across social media. It is especially helpful for LinkedIn.

Collapse
 
kartikgargg profile image
Kartik Garg

Thanks for valuable information about productivity apps for 2022. I read your information. Nice info.

Collapse
 
ivana_vnucec profile image
Ivana Vnucec

These 3 are really interesting!

A few days ago I wanted to make an overview of all more productivity tools I know and organized them by categories. Such as code writing, task management, knowledge collecting, time-tracking, keeping the focus. Then explained each of them.

➡️ Productivity tools

Hope this helps someone to pick their favorites ✌🏽

Collapse
 
drunkensponge profile image
Marco

Started using todometer today, and its really nice! I was always somehow „overwhelmed“ from apps like Todoist etc., even though they‘re not really complicated or anything those apps never felt focussed enough on the main reason why I‘m using some tasks app - quickly taking random tasks per day that I need to finish (or maybe not).
I dont want to catergorize every task or spend more time writing and structurizing it down than the actual execution of the task would take (yeah thats probably a bit exaggerated, but at least it feels like that…).
So props to Todometer, works pretty good for me! :)

Collapse
 
cassidoo profile image
Cassidy Williams

Thank you! I agree completely with the way you think. I'm glad you like it!!

Collapse
 
drmikecrowe profile image
drmikecrowe

Obsidian, all the way. I found it worth supporting them by paying for sync. I like having my work Mac sync'd with my home linux and having it available on my android phone (yeah, not a very homogeneous setup, I get it). Given how much I code in vs-code, live in Github and write in Markdown, Obsidian became a no-brainer.

Collapse
 
nishrico0098 profile image
Nishant Mishra

add xournal++ to it for note making

Collapse
 
rossveth profile image
Rossveth Lopez

Thanks for sharing this! I agree with Notion loading times, that's why I haven't fully utilized it. But I still use it for project management. I use Obsidian too for the rest and am curious how you handle projects there. Would love to use Obsidian for everything. Do you use any plugins?

Collapse
 
cassidoo profile image
Cassidy Williams

You might like the Kanban plugin for Obsidian!

I personally use Templater and Dataview the most, but also the Tag Wrangler for organizing things!

Collapse
 
rossveth profile image
Rossveth Lopez

Thanks for taking the time to respond. Will check these out!

Thread Thread
 
juanlanteri profile image
Juan Lanteri

Thank you for sharing your list!

Collapse
 
imsiaw profile image
Imsiaw

use notion :)

Collapse
 
cassidoo profile image
Cassidy Williams

The load times are too slow for me! I allude to that in the article.

Collapse
 
camco profile image
Camco

Great list!

I haven't yet tried Obsidian, but I am a huge notion fan, and about a year ago discovered coda.io

It was a game changer for me and took my organization to another level. It's looks very similar to Obsidian. Which means I'm definitely going to have a look!

That so for the list;

Collapse
 
hjneves profile image
Humberto Neves

Somehow when I find a new productivity tool, one of the things that came into my mind is, ok this tool is nice but, how can I have my old data into it?
Is this something that you face?

Collapse
 
cassidoo profile image
Cassidy Williams

I do! That's actually why I really liked switching to Obsidian. They have a variety of importers and since it's all local + markdown, I know if I ever switch, it's a standardized format!