[bigcloits]

I had a complex project hierarchy — lots o’ folders and subfolders. Last week I flattened that hierarchy almost completely, and I’m rather happy with the results.

I have about two dozen active projects from every part of my life, and they are all visible in the sidebar at once at the root level of the library.

Another 3 or 4 dozen on-hold and pending projects inhabit the root as well.

Then there’s a rather heavily populated “someday, maybe” folder.

And that’s pretty much it. A nearly folderless arrangement!

Personal projects are snuggled right up to worky projects, and it’s not bothering me. I thought it would mess with my head, but it’s not. It turns out that being able to see all my active projects is so pleasingly easy to absorb at a glance that the organizational melting pot doesn’t bother me.

This partially came from the insight that I should not really have any more active projects than I can see at once. Any more than that is probably delusional — many of them probably aren’t really “active,” just wishful thinking. But if I only have a relatively small number of active projects at any given time, I thought, why bury them in a hierarchy?

Probably not for everyone. I didn’t think it was for me, until I tried it. So I thought I’d share the experience.