Bits, Bursts & Bongos

I get a lot of question on how to stay productive, agile and still keeping it simple when on the road. Here are a few thoughts as it relates to apps. General travel trips in another post.

The problem I’m trying to solve is avoiding schlepping around my Air (yes, it’s the lightest thing available but still doesn’t fit into my jeans pockets). I’m also trying to keep it real by using as few apps as possible. Simplicity leads to genious as per Fiat’s latest car ads.

My favorites:

• Docs2: Syncs brilliantly with GDocs and has offline file mgmt, lacks doc sharing, could be faster, access to all my docs to read and edit in the palm of my hand is critical
• Camera: I use the camera to take visual notes from whiteboards (one picture is more than thousand words) and share travel photos with friends and family
• Byline: Syncs with Google Reader and caches all feeds for offline (flight) news reading, email sharing, xlnt way to catch up and stay up to date
• Foursquare: Great to let friends know your in their part of the world and to get travel recommendations, it’s also very entertaining while on the road
• Things: The best task manager available, wish it had iCal integration
• iCal: Syncs with Google Cal feeds, just need to setup feeds for flights and hotel stays for offline usage

Room for improvement:

• An app that aggregates all my status updates across all social networks, like Tweetdeck or Silentale
• Hotels: Lack Remember Me, in general a bad user interface, lacks calendar feature
• Kayak: Great new interface, tricky to book or cancel trips but that’s not their fault, United should create an app with quick checkout
• OpenTable: great but lack inventory outside the US
• Skype: Really great but I’d prefer GV to leverage my GV number, well see what happens with the Gizmo5 integration
• Contacts: Duplication and l10n is driving me crazy, updating my AB as well, Plaxo was onto something but too early, a shared cloud-based AB like Goggle Apps would be awesome

What I really lack is a price / convenient comparison app for airport transfers and local transportation. What is the fastest, cheapest or most convinient way to get from LHR to my hotel in Notting Hill? What are the services offered? Food, WiFi, coffee et cetera. Google Maps is heading in that direction.

The cool thing is that this all works but forces you to change the way you think about productivity. In reality it means fewer emails and leveraging apps to schedule meetings, take notes, share data et cetera. Everything becomes realtime. The Meeting Minutes are available right away and not another to do on someones schedule. It’s all about giving access to all knowledge to accelerate the conceptualization process. Being on the road should not slow or hinder that process.

In the bigger picture what we are really doing is connecting our minds. Technology is there to enable collaboration and delivery.

[From Tom’s Deli in London]