Are you a "Getting Things Done" dork? Oh boy, are you going to love this one...

As adherents of the time-management system can tell you, what GTD mostly hinges on is the activity of creating small (and sometimes large) lists; lists specifically broken down into contexts, in fact, like a list of things to do while out running errands, a list of things to do while watching television half-bored, etc. And then some of the items in all of our lives get shuttled off to an "email to write" list, while others get shuttled off to an actual calendar, with an alarm set to remind us of certain activities that absolutely must happen at a specific time and/or place.

Some GTDers, like me, go a Luddite route as far as maintaining our lists; I maintain almost all of mine in a plain ol' paper Moleskine notebook, except for date-specific stuff which I track on my Palm Treo. Others, though, are constantly on the lookout for a good electronic program that will let one add items to one's lists as easily as a paper system, and in as large a variety of situations; and based on what I've been hearing anyway, a new electronic personal-assistant system named Sandy might just be the world's first powerful yet elegant solution.

Sandy is the result of a sorta nerd dream team; it was created by Rael Dornfest, former CTO of O'Reilly Media, under the auspices of software designers Values of n, creators of Stikkit, is named after the actual personal assistant of Tim O'Reilly, and is even based on a logo designed by Boing Boing and MAKE magazine's Mark Frauenfelder. Whew, that's some indie nerd cred! And based on what I've heard, they put it to good use, too; Sandy is no less than basically all the applications found in a typical smartphone or PDA (calendar, address book, alarm clock, to-do list, GTD action lists and more), but with automated software doing all the input of data for you, with you only needing to send in plain-language messages via email, SMS, or Twitter. So for example, if you email a friend and CC: Sandy to it, saying something like, "Let's have lunch tomorrow at 1 pm at Cafe Bistro," Sandy will figure out what you're saying and will add the appropriate appointment in your datebook. It will then associate that appointment with your friend's listing in your address book, if they're already listed; and Sandy will also SMS or email you 15 minutes beforehand and remind you of it.

What's the big deal, you're saying? Well, the big deal is that you no longer have to deal with the interface of any of these applications at all; instead of having to stop at any point to actually pencil in an appointment in your calendar, then associate it with an entry in your address book, then turn on a reminder alarm, all you had to do was CC: your personal-assistant software to the email invite you were going to write anyway. Or if you're on the go, you can simply punch in nice, simple little additions to your personal database via SMS: "Remember Christmas flight number SWA1489," for example, or "Remind me tonight at 7 to call Jane." In effect it creates a situation all the electronic-friendly GTDers out there have wanted for years; a situation where they too can add to their various action lists just as quickly and in just as many varied and mobile situations as any ol' paper-based Moleskine owner out there. This has always been the main drawback of trying to maintain one's GTD system electronically, after all, is that for GTD to really work, your action lists must be on you and easily accessed at any time.

Anyway, I'm most likely going to stick with my paper system, but I did want to let everyone else out there know about this, for those who would like to try it out. And speaking of which, if you do end up trying it out, do feel free to leave your thoughts and opinions regarding the experience here as a comment below. I and my readers thank you!