Howard L. Wilson, creator of the Memindex system starting 1903 and in wide use through the 1950s, would be proud that a modern variation of his system is still living in analog form. While it doesn't provide the bench depth of options of materials and sizes, the system is compact, modern, and just as simple as the original. The handcrafted archive boxes now bring the system up to par with its predecessor with grace and an elegant minimalistic esthetic.

Perhaps in a few years we might see something akin to Yawman & Erbe or Shaw-Walker's 16 drawer filing cabinets for long term storage of multiple years?

Ugmonk released a limited edition of 100 archive boxes for their Analog productivity cards today at 7AM (Pacific) for $229.00 (including 12 card packs and a metal divider). It sold out within two and a half hours.

With the inclusion of this archive box it makes the system much more like the original Memindex system.

https://ugmonk.com/products/analog-archive-box-walnut?variant=43942761562262

A 9 x 5" card that folds in three to make a 3 x 5" card for planning out one's entire week.

This is quite clever with respect the space of cards like Analog and 3x5 Life.

Just like the imagery from the Analog System's promotion, this video features someone fed up with lots of notebooks pushing them off their desk in frustration—naturally to turn to index cards.

timestamp: 0:00:25

https://www.3x5life.com/

Compare with other products in this category: - Analog (Jeff Sheldon productivity system) - Memindex - Bullet Journal - Frictionless Capture Cards - Pile of Index Cards

My 3 Criticisms of Using UgMonk’s new ‘Analog’ Productivity System. by Jason Chatfield

https://fromthe.study/analog-review/

Ostensibly the text of the review in https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvLkVimqv8E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvLkVimqv8E

Review of the Analog productivity system. Quick overview with generally positive tenor.

The creator mentions that he collects productivity systems like Pokémon! A sort of affliction of shiny object syndrome in the productivity space.

Passing mention of Patrick Rhone's dash/plus system

The Analog system has a thin metal divider that separates two sections in the base. The broad suggestion is to use this space as storage and the divider for separating the blank stock of cards from used cards. One could also separate the next/someday cards from the today cards (new and finished).

The divider serves as a tabbed divider in many systems, but here there are only a total of three slots for differentiation: one slot for one card with today's list, and two other spaces for other cards that the user can determine their uses for. This definitely makes the system incredibly simple and minimal.

It's only slightly different from the old common Park Sherman Co. desk note pad systems which sometimes had a universal calendar and one tray space for notes.

Similar to the sorts of to do list task key in many bullet journals, the Analog system has "task signals" : - black filled circle means "complete task" - half filled circle means task is in progress - a right arrow in the circle means the task was delegated - a cross in the circle means that the task is an appointment, potentially with the appointment time added to the to do item

The system suggests that you can "create your own" task signals, though in true minimalist fashion, it doesn't give other suggestions. Presumably one could do other pattern fills of the circle or symbols within it to mean other things (example: bullet journal key symbols).

Interestingly, the to do circles start out not blank, but with a single thin line splitting the circle in half vertically. This is apparently a design choice, perhaps to make it easier to fill in half of the circle?

Though the Analog system clearly delineates cards of to do lists as "Today", "Next", "Someday", I've definitely seen this sort of delineation well before this system.

What other systems explicitly use this framing or similar framings?

While the today / next / someday cards are labeled, they're also color coded (white, light tan, tan) to help distinguish them.

Though not defined in the Analog system, these differently colored cards could also be used to indicate different sorts of data, though one would need to potentially ignore the pre-printed labels of "Today", "Next", "Someday".

The Analog system utilizes a simplified version of an Eisenhower matrix which we'll call "today / next / someday" as a means of prioritizing to do list items on a temporal basis.

Following a pattern seen in many modern wooden recipe card boxes to hold the current recipe one is working on, Jeff Sheldon has cut a long thin slot into his card holder to allow one to stand up today's card in the front as a means of displaying and featuring what needs to get done.

https://ugmonk.com/pages/analog

Jeff Sheldon describes how the Analog system works, generally following most of the outline of the Memindex method, but with some hints of the Bullet Journal method's notation.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ugmonk/analog-the-simplest-productivity-system/posts

Analog Kickstarter dates: - wrapped on 2021-05-07 - funded on 2020-08-07 - launched on 2020-06-23

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ugmonk/analog-the-simplest-productivity-system

Jeff Sheldon's Analog productivity system is a physical product consisting of a wooden tray, metal divider, 3 x 5" custom printed index cards (and refills), a felt carrier, and other accessories which functions as a minimalistic version of the old Memindex.

The someday card is described as being not only for individual to do items, but "big picture" goals.

The video shows the productivity books which Sheldon used to help design his system including 99u's Manage Your Day-To-Day, Unsubscribe by Jocelyn K. Glei, The One Thing by Gary Keller, Getting Things Done by David Allen, Deep Work by Cal Newport, and Atomic Habits by James Clear.

I started making lists on index cards—you know the ones we used back in school.

Note the total lack of any referent to why we used to use index cards in school.

https://vimeo.com/420319231?embedded=true&source=vimeo_logo&owner=8885398

In addition to using the three dots on the Analog system's cards to indicate how much one accomplished (modest value), Jeff Sheldon suggests using them to "link cards together", though he doesn't suggest how one could or should do this. Presumably he means to use the possible dot patterns as a code, but then one only has 2^3 or 8 ways of doing this, so the number of possible links is incredibly low. Some of this seems related to edge notched cards, though here, there's no suggestion of punching holes in these cards, so sorting or finding these cards isn't necessarily easy unless one otherwise indexes them, a functionality which falls outside of the minimalist scope of the product.

To expand on this method he also, more profitably, suggests adding titles to cards in the blank line at the top which is also frequently used for dating cards.

https://ugmonk.com/

Developed in a Kickstarter, ugmonk.com is where Jeff Sheldon now sells his Analog productivity system and refills as well as other related lifestyle brand products.