Add-On Of The Week: GTDInbox

GTDInbox could be one of the best add-ons I’ve ever found. In fact, it’s altered my inbox beyond recognition. Once upon a time, email was a great boon, keeping us connected with everyone wherever they were in the world. But that boon has a dark side, as your email inbox becomes flooded with newsletter subscriptions, WordPress backups, comment moderation posts and spam. Even the email you want to receive can soon become overwhelming. GTD Inbox has saved me from having to periodically clear out hundreds of emails. Here’s what it does.

GTD And Your Email

Simply put, it takes a Getting Things Done approach to email. Created by Andy Mitchell, this Firefox add-on transforms your inbox and makes you more productive. It uses Gmail’s labeling system as a starting point, adding five new labels that indicate the status of your emails (and the tasks that go with them). The trick is to label everything as soon as it comes in and get it out of the inbox. If something can be completed in a couple of minutes, then you do it. Otherwise you label it next action, action, someday or finished. If you are waiting for info, then there’s a label for that too.

Scripting Woes

These labels use some script, and you can make it so that no email can have more than one label. To complete your tasks, all you do then is take the labels in order of priority and work through them. I’ve had trouble with some of the scripting, which has meant that an email cycles between action and next action. However, my work around was to remove the labels I didn’t want and use the archive button. The approach is still the same.

Project Management

GTD Inbox also helps with sorting your emails by project, context or contact, making it great for project management. I haven’t tested that feature yet, but it’s had great feedback from those who have. It’s been used to enable team working, customer support or just to create a to-do list from your email. I am still learning all the uses of this wonderful add-on, but here’s the getting started guide to help you.

The Verdict

In less than a day, I went from having hundreds of emails to sort through to an empty inbox. I now work through my emails by urgency and feel a real sense of accomplishment.  This is one extension I’ll definitely be keeping.