7 Goals of Pomegranate
When you consider a new system, it is important to know the principles behind its development, the design guidelines, and the context in which it has/is being developed and the problems that it aims to solve. This knowledge gives you the deeper properties of a system, and allows you to make informed decision about it.
The principles often directs the future development of the program. So you will know if it will fit you in the future, not just in the present.
7.1 What were the goals that Pomegranate PKM were meant to achieve?
Stable digital environment… to mimic paper office. things should not change except for a good reason. change has to be difficult otherwise we may be tempted to change it everyday and hope that (be fooled) a change in the environment will lead to more productivity and more organized space.
Action connected with the knowledge that inspires the action
A long term repository of information and files
he goal is to have all goals, tasks, important notes, and document stored as long as I am using computer. So to have the same structure over the years.
examples of long term documenting: all books and articles read, all lessons learned from people, all important notes from the internet, books etc, all events attended and all tasks completed or we set to do
A centralized repository of information and files
The objective is to have all goals, tasks, important notes, and document stored in one place.
As we are living in an information (-overloaded) age, it is imperative that we take control of our digital life and raised up to the challenges posed by the new trends in social media, connectivity, cloud, etc.
Resolve the information overload
internet is bringing more information to people that they could possibly digest and filter. Uncontrolled this overflow of information make people overloaded, helpless, confused and passive. There are many ways to resolve this problem, and many books have been written about this problem. One way in which a system like Pomegranate can help, is to have the system with which we do work, offline, to reduce internet time. Another technique is to enforce the schedule of internet times. Read this post for more details. The effective cures lies in changing our approach to information. Less is more principle and knowledge in action.
information overload, product reviews overload lead to not believing in your work. How can my product compete in such fierce competitors.
Control over operations
To be able to control how easy or difficult an activity is, in order to help new good habits or get rid of bad habits. If I want to have more book highlights taken, I make is very easy to do new one. Conversely if I want to reduce the volume of documents I bring from the internet, I make their import a bit difficult e.g. by requiring certain fields to be filled before a document can be imported.
Aid focus and concentration
Pomegranate should show in one screen the essential and top priority information that I should work on, specifically the goals and courses that I planned to focus on in a prioritized sequence, and the books that I want to read first.
In other words, it should be very clear what I should be working on next.
Set productive limits
It is counter-intuitive that limits help productivity. Less is more principle. Operating systems give user limitless possibilities in how files can be organized. You can easily create as many folders and nest them as you like. The result is a loss of stability and predictability. Just compare the stability and predictability of paper office and operations to electronic files and operations.
Productivity needs stability. Paper work and office is much stable, reliable and predictable than electronic environment. No wonder that many people prefer to work exclusively with paper (at the expense of tree cutting and deforesting!).
There are endless configuration options that can equally work. Not lured to change to get more productivity. Often an escape from doing the hard and essential step and more important work.
Automate processing of files
Processing the information and files manually one by one is often time-consuming, error-prone activity. As the volume of information and files increases, management time and effort grows as well. When information and files are stored in a system and database, management will be done by code and this eliminates manual processing and reduce time substantially.
Combat perfectionism
Computer software often can fuel perfectionism by the limitless options in formatting and structure. To have work done, we have to reduce the options and stick with a good enough presentation and structure.
Track procrastination
One way to fight procrastination is to track when (and how many times) we plan to do a task or work on a goal. Each day, when we assign a task or goal to a day, we can track how many times we assigned this goal or tasks. This is not achieved if we just fill in a free text plan, but by always link to the task or goal that we want to do. This linking making it possible to visualize how many time a task or goal has been planned to be done.
This is an clear case where a system can help be more productive and not postpone but it does not guarantee that. It does not enforce you to write down your plans and to link to the task. The system does not even enforce you to use in the first place. It takes determination and persistence to acquire the habits.
Privacy and security
One of the requirements of prolific output especially in journal writing is to be assured about the privacy and security of your system. Online tools are subject to security attacks and privacy breaching accidents for various reasons. A bug in the system, a hacker attack, a disaster in the data center, etc, let alone new government laws all raises security and privacy concerns.
Pomegranate PKM is my evolving answer to some of the current challenges of the information age and the challenges of productivity and focus that are common to all ages.
7.2 Design guidelines
To have supporting technology that accommodate easily future changes, no matte how radical they are.
Simple design
Minimal features to get maximum functionality for the purpose of the system.
Flexible design
To be able to adapt the application to my changing needs without having to change the code as often. Saved search, text-based data entry and query, and extensive styling options are examples of this flexibility.
Powerful features
Often popular applications tend to offer easy to use interface at the expense of powerful and highly configurable features.
The crowd wants easy application, as easy as possible, ideally single click solutions, with immediate results, flat learning curve and that does not require adaption.
Plain text philosophy
Even in the 21th century, plain text has still lots of merits. It is the most universal format of information, and the most easily generated in any situation. The ability of the command bar to add, search, filter, update, assign records is part of this plain text philosophy.
Styling for best presentation
Pomegranate tries to give the user ample room to style the information for best visual clarity e.g. how the status ‘Completed’, task type ‘Bug’, or writing status ‘Draft’ are shown.
PKM has not stretched the limits of the technologies that it uses, whether on the front end (interface, user interactions, reporting), or the back end (data transformation, searching options, controls on data, actions on data etc).
In fact, the challenge is to keep the focus on what implements the fruitfuil ideads instead of implementing new features just because they are trendy in web applications. More is less. This is as relevant in application features.
Progression updating of record fields
Only one required field to enter at first. Later more fields are entered throgh one or more scans of the records.
Records in progress panel for saved searches that show that needs to be updates.
7.3 Systems are never enough
Perfectionism, procrastination, information overload, choices overload, etc will not be solved by systems only. A system is not a substitute for character. Long and hard work is needed on the personal and inner level. This work cannot be shortened or substituted, but can be supported by the right environment and systems.
Productivity needs unsystematic activities such as brainstorming, free writing, mind mapping, jotting down a plan on paper. These activities are essential for productivity and work and they are not subject to systems.
7.4 Pomegranate in Perspective
The journey is long. There are not shortcuts or tricks. It took a long time. lots of months if not years. it is a journey. you build them incrementally and gradually. then one day you feel you become a different person. persistance is the key habit to start with.