Eighteen months ago, I began my adventure with Tinderbox. I have a lot more to say about it. But today, I’m pleased to report that I’ve switched this site to a static publishing system using Tinderbox. I’ve had a blast learning its export system and implementing, feature for feature, what I had on my former Ghost-backed site.¹

With the change, I took the opportunity to make several enhancements, including:

1. Dark mode. The site now has dark and light modes, honoring the reader’s system appearance settings.
2. Code highlighting. For posts that include code, I’m now leveraging Prism to provide syntax highlighting; neat, huh?
3. Site search. On all the site’s pages, there’s now a search box in the footer that uses DuckDuckGo’s index. As I add content, I hope this feature becomes more useful.
4. Link post archive. I added a dedicated archive page for the link-type posts.

What I love about using Tinderbox to manage my blog is that I can make changes rapidly. Ghost’s templating system, while good, requires some setup, compilation, and upload steps. For me, the friction of making a change—even a simple one—was always a bit too high. Also, switching to a static site means I no longer need to pay for or manage a VPS. Yay!

I’m excited to write more here. It helps that I have a backlog of posts to publish.

A special thanks to Dave Rogers, Jack Baty, and the venerable designer of Tinderbox, Mark Bernstein, all of whom blog with Tinderbox. Their work inspired me to build a static publishing workflow. If you want to learn more about how all this works, there’s an excellent Tinderbox meetup where Jack and Dave detail how they blog; give it a watch.

Like many of us these days, I use ChatGPT to streamline various productivity workflows. This week, I set out to integrate Tinderbox with ChatGPT to enhance my note-taking and thought organization.

Below is a simple yet flexible integration that requires minimal command-line (or Terminal) knowledge. No API sign-ups or subscriptions are needed—this works with the free version of ChatGPT. However, you do need to have the ChatGPT macOS app installed and set up.

Setup Steps

Get the integration working by following five simple steps.

1. Install the Shortcut. First, install this Shortcut, which allows Tinderbox to send input and receive output from the macOS ChatGPT app. Here’s a screenshot if you want to create it yourself. (NOTE: The name of the shortcut needs to match the Shortcut name specified in the following step, which is ChatGPT.)

   

2. Add Functions to Tinderbox’s “Library”. Next, add the following three functions to a note in your Tinderbox “Library” located in /Hints/Library:

   //
   // Returns the POSIX directory in which this TBX
   // file is located.
   //
   // NOTE: If the document's path contains special RegEx
   // chars, this function may fail.
   //
   function getDir() {
      return document["path"].replace("/" + document["name"]);
   }
   
   //
   // Runs the "shortcuts" command with the specified
   // shortcut name and input in data.
   //
   function runShortcut(stdin, shortcut) {
       // Construct the Shortcut command
       var:string cmd = 'shortcuts run "' + shortcut + '"';
   
       return runCommand(cmd, stdin, getDir()).trim;
   }
   
   //
   // Prompts ChatGPT with the given text.
   //
   function promptChatGPT(text) {
       // Display a waiting message
       show("⏳ Prompting ChatGPT, please wait...");
   
       return runShortcut(text, "ChatGPT");
   }
   

   The second function, runShortcut(), allows you to run any Shortcut, while the third function, promptChatGPT(), calls runShortcut() to execute the ChatGPT Shortcut that was added in Step 1.

3. Create a Stamp to Send Notes to ChatGPT. Next, create a Stamp that runs the promptChatGPT() function, using the $Text of the selected note(s) as the prompt:

   $Text += "\n\n---\n\n" + promptChatGPT($Text) + "\n\n---\n\n";
   

   NOTE: This Stamp appends the ChatGPT results to the selected note(s) using the selected notes' $Text as input, effectively simulating a “chat”.

4. Run the Stamp. Create a new note with a prompt as its $Text and apply the Stamp created in the previous step to it.

5. Use and Enjoy 🍻. That’s it! Now, you can use this setup to quickly query ChatGPT from within Tinderbox.

Limitations & Future Enhancements

One downside to this approach is that each time you prompt ChatGPT, it starts a new chat. Unfortunately, there doesn’t seem to be a way to programmatically delete chats or mark them as temporary. If anyone finds a workaround, I’d love to hear about it!

I hope this integration proves as useful for you as it has for me. Happy Tinderboxing!

There’s this wonderful bit of dialog, written by Arron Sorkin, from the second episode in the fourth season of The West Wing entitled, “20 Hours in America: Part 2,” where Toby Ziegler (played by Richard Schiff) outlines the qualifications for the country’s next president:

If our job teaches us anything it’s that we don’t know what the next president’s gonna face.

If we choose someone with vision, someone with guts, someone with gravitas, who’s connected to other people’s lives and cares about making them better; if we choose someone to inspire us then we’ll be able to face what comes our way and achieve things we can’t imagine yet.

Perhaps dated, but those qualifications for president still resonate with me. Go vote.

Over the last few years, I’ve been on a journey to wrangle the many digital assets that make up my work. After a short dalliance with DEVONthink, this journey has led me to implementaing PARA in Obsidian. However, I’ve struggled to find a good way to capture and curate long-term notes and visualize their relationships. So, I’ve determined, after much consternation, to give Tinderbox (TBX) a try.

Unlike Obsidian, Tinderbox doesn’t have first-class support for Markdown. However, with a little bit of action code, Keyboard Maestro Markdown shortuts, and a bit of perserverance, I’m fairly confident I can bend TBX to my will.

For me, the appeal of Tinderbox is five fold:

1. Exportability. It’s export system is impressive. Done right, for each TBX document, I can generate a custom, static website. I could see this being really useful to share information with several audiences I interact with regularly.
2. Note visualization. I want to experiment with visualizing large collections of notes in TBX’s map view. I suspect for certain projects it will help me conduct better “forest management” of my various projects and passions.
3. Custom attributes. Every note in TBX can have one or more custom or built-in attributes. These attributes can be used to track discrete note properties and metadata. I can see this being particularly useful when creating goal trackers. For example, I would like to experiment with using TBX for tracking the progress of my team’s quarterly assigned OKRs and SMART goals.
4. Programmability. TBX has extensive support for performing various types of actions on notes. While Obsidian is also programmable, TBX makes it trivial to tinker “under the hood.” As a software developer, this appeals to me immensely, making my note repositories infinitely extensible and malleable.
5. Importability. While TBX doesn’t have a mobile app, it does provide ways to ingest notes via a watched Finder folder. Done right, this will allow me to add notes, and, perhaps even publish them to the web, while I’m mobile.

As my adventuring progresses, I intend to post regular updates here.

I’m delighted to announce that Leader Fables has been renewed for a second season! And by “renewed,” I mean that Casey and I loved making season one of the show so much that we decided to do another one about a favorite topic of ours: intentional productivity. During this season, we’re dedicating an episode to each of the Five Altitudes of Planning, including:

1. Weekly preparation
2. Daily planning
3. Quarterly reviews
4. Live planning & Annual reviews
5. Putting It All Together
6. Managing Margin (bonus episode)

We kick off the season with an overview episode packed with tips and strategies to help us prepare to plan our weeks.

Finally, this season, we’re starting a show newsletter. Signup for the newsletter to receive exclusive content, and enter to win a free copy of two books: Free to Focus and Deep Work.

I’m super excited to announce a podcast that’s been in the making for quite some time. It’s called Leader Fables, and we think you’ll like it. My cohost, Casey Clark, and I use the power of storytelling to examine leadership strategies and tactics. You will enjoy the stories and may even enjoy our commentary.

In the first six episodes, we discuss leadership topics through the lens of middle management, including:

1. Strategies for new leaders
2. Tips for building and inheriting teams
3. Developing team norms and rhythms
4. Strategic planning
5. Maintaining focus amid chaos
6. Team celebration

The first two episodes are available now, where all fine podcasts are found. Please give them a listen and let me know what you think. New episodes drop every Tuesday at 10 AM MT.

Over the last couple of years when traveling internationally, I have packed a separate “day bag” to use when out-and-about and I thought others might find the contents of my day bag of some interest. Usually the trips I take involve frequent multi-hour bus rides and I have found it invaluable to pack a small bag that includes travel necessities as well as some of the tools I use to get work done when away from my desk.

The Bag

I usually take two bags with me when I travel: a day bag and a larger backpack that accompanies me on the long plane rides. The key difference between the two bags is the larger one carries my laptop, which will not fit in the smaller day bag (nor would I want it to). When flying, I fold up the day bag and store it in my carry-on rollberboard luggage as I only ever need one of the two bags with me at any given time. Put simply: my day bag contains a subset of the items packed in my backpack.

After trying a few different bags to serve as my day bag, I settled on an all-canvas brown messenger-style bag by Gearonic. It’s light, has plenty of pockets and ample storage. It’s easy to sling around one shoulder and is comfortable to walk with. Without question, it’s one of my favorite bags and the most inexpensive one I own.

Productivity Tools

I have strived to pack the minimum amount of technology in my day bag with the goal of keeping the bag relatively light and minimal. For example, I have deliberately chosen not to pack a power brick or an external battery to charge my iPad and iPhone as the tablet gets all-day battery life and in a pinch can be used to charge my iPhone using a USB-C to lightning cable.

There are two key pieces of technology I carry with me, they are the 2018 11" iPad Pro with Apple Pencil and Magic Keyboard, and the Amazon Kindle Oasis.

Over the last three years or so, the iPad has become a trusted productivity tool for me instead of just a media consumption device. While there is some work I can only perform productively on my Mac, I can do most things on the iPad, such as writing prose and status reports, reading and annotating PDFs, performing desktop-class web browsing, and processing email and Slack messages. Honestly, if I had to pick between owning an iPad or iPhone, I’d pick the iPad every day of the week and twice on Sunday.

My iPad is also equipped with a cellular radio. Fortunately, Google Fi includes international roaming at no attitional charge so I often have connectivity to the internet whereever I happen to be in the world.

Since getting my first Kindle back in 2008, my reading habits have changed dramatically. Being able to read in a comfortable position and have control over line spacing and font size on a screen that doesn’t strain my eyes has turned reading from a chore into joy. I couldn’t imagine going back to reading voluminous paper books or performing marathon reading sessions on my iPad. I read over 1,000 printed pages a month all on my Kindle Oasis.

In addition to packing an iPad and Kindle, I also pack a USB-C charging dock for my Apple Watch as well as my AirPods Pro. While my Apple Watch doesn’t often run out of battery in the middle of the day, it’s the one device for which I haven’t determined the best time to charge as I often use it as a my morning alarm. There have been moments when my watch has died mid-day—having a charger on hand for these rare occasions is nice. I also use my AirPods quite a bit, either paired with my iPad or iPhone, to listen to podcasts and infrequently music.

Lastly, I often carry the Apple USB-C Digital AV Multiport Adapter and the USB-C to to 3.5 mm headphone jack adapter as there are times when I need to transfer files to a friend’s USB dive or plug my iPad into a projector for a presentation. Admittedly, these times are pretty rare, however the adapters are light and easy to pack,

The Bare Necessities

A day bag wouldn’t be complete without packing necessities to get you through the day. I have found the following items to be very useful and often invaluable:

• Field Notes notebook. Whenever I need to jot down a note, or a thought, I’ll whip out my field notes notepad and jot it down. I’ll review the notebook later process any pertinent into my trusted systems for note taking or task management.
• Pens and a highlighter. Having a fine-point everyday pen that you like to write with is a must and you never know when you might feel the need to highlight a note in your field notes or a travel itinerary you received on a bus ride.
• Travel tissues and hand sanitizer. You never know when we’ll need a tissue and hand sanitizer is a must when in developing countries. I usually sanitize my hands before eating food and always after using an outhouse.
• Travel Tylenol and Carmex. I’ll admit, I don’t always drink enough water when traveling and therefore sometimes I get mild headaches. Having some Tylenol on hand during these moments is a god-send as is having chapstick to rub on sun-parched lips.
• Lens wipes. Anyone who wears glasses should carry a couple lens wipes to wipe sweat and gunk off glasses. They’re also useful for cleaning screens.
• Snacks. My snack of choice to pack in my day bag is fruit leather. You can usually find all-natural varieties that taste good and don’t dry out your mouth and, more importantly, give you a boost of energy or help you stave off hunger.

These items are placed the the front-most outer pockets of the bag for ease of access.

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I love to travel and having a day bag with just the right things and no more has really helped me enjoy my time away from the confines of a hotel. It’s even helped me be a little more productive during down time without having to lug around all of my technology tools. My day bag is one of my favorite travel necessities and I couldn’t imagine going on another trip without it.