Notion - The killer organiser?¶
I know I've not long said I was going to focus on software development but I can't help but want to share a little bit of info about a product/service called Notion (a link will be posted below, with good reason), I promise this will be short 
In the process of trying to re-ignite my love of software development, I've been looking at various tools for managing issues, tracking what's in progress, keeping notes related to the project together. Previously I've used Redmine, Mantis, OneNote, a notebook, TUTOS, phpProject, Excel and YouTrack (I'm sure there are more including countless iPad apps) and whilst many of them do somethings well, I've always found it's not well enough or easily enough to make the lack of other things I want a non-issue.
Enter Notion.
Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying it is all singing and all dancing, but it's easy enough and feature rich enough to do most of what I want really easily.
It's similar to OneNote in that everything resides on a page, but it has database capabilities built in and they are dead easy to use. For example, if you want a Kanban style task board, no problem.. Add, select the Tasks and Issues template and away you go, a basic but useful task and issue tracker. You want a OneNote style notebook, no problem... Add, select the default page template and there you have a new notebook page which can contain pages of other types.
There is a free version which limits you to 1000 items of data but you can purchase an account upgrade for around $5/month.
And the best thing is you can earn some credit by signing up using this link. You'll get $10 worth of credit (and for transparency I'll get $5), then you can earn more credit through referring people yourself and just by logging in and doing certain things.
Whilst I've only been using it a short while, I'm liking it so far because it's easy to use and does most of what I want for managing small software projects. If you're looking for an easy to use organiser, use the link above, download it and give it a try.
Update 2023¶
At some point between writing this article and the present, the free account had most of it's limitations removed. The application has undergone continued development and is still an amazing product. Check it out at https://www.notion.so/. The referrals program has also ended.
I am planning on writing an updated piece on Notion covering how I'm now using it, in the meantime, here's a more recent screenshot of part of my project management workspace.
