Why So Much on Evernote and What is DevOps?

You may have been wondering what my last three posts were all about with topics like Outlook, Evernote (EN), and Getting Things Done (GTD).   I recently took a new position at my company.   I had come from a position that had never allowed to get organized or feel productive -- in work or life in general.    I took some time to try use these tools in a very prescriptive to way to get organized.   The prescriptive nature of the approach would allow me to "live the GTD lifestyle while I was not under constant pressure to get things done.     Now 2 months into the new position and the GTD approach to work and life is helping -- stay tuned.

You may be wondering what the the position is.  I joined a newly formed organization focused on "DevOps".  If you are not familiar with this burgeoning discipline, here is an "is"/"is not" exercise.    The source of this comes from "Continuous Delivery and DevOps: A Quickstart Guide ", by Paul Swartout.

• DevOps is another way of working whereby developers and system operators work in harmony with little or no organizational barriers between them towards a common goal.
• DevOps is not a way to get developers doing operational tasks so they you can get rid of the operations team or vice versa.

If you took that Wikipedia link for DevOps above, you would also find the graphic shown below that should give you the sense that DevOps is the intersection of Development, Quality, and Operations.

You can expect to see much more from me on DevOps as well as an occasional post on on productivity tips for GTD using EN and Outlook.

Send to Evernote or Add to Evernote?

In my last two posts, I discussed:

• Using the Bcc field to send a message to the Evernote inbox and create a note.
• Using the "Add to Evernote" Outlook Addin to create a note.

Are you confused about when to use one and when to use another? I encourage you to use each to see how if feels for you, but here is how I am currently using *both*. (Editorial note, this usage came out of my desire to apply the GTD (Getting Things Done) and TSW (The Secret Weapon) approach to Outlook and Evernote--EN).

Add to Evernote Button -- I use this when:

1. I am not immediately responding to an e-mail, but I know that I will want to later. I use EN to prioritize and make sure I don't forget.
2. I will not be responding at all, but I want to save it in EN for archival.

Bcc to Evernote Inbox -- I use this when:
I am responding immediately, and I would like it in EN either because:

1. I think I will need to respond later.
2. I doubt I will be responding later, but I still would like to archive it in EN.

I should add that both are functionally equivalent when it comes to putting the note into any folder or adding any tags that you would like. Although sending to your Evernote Inbox requires that you add folders and tags to the subject line in the correct order, which I sometime struggle to remember.   You also might get questions about what the folder and tag items on are on the subject line.