Philofaxy: August 2017

31 August 2017

The Hitchhikers Guide to the Plannerverse - Episode 62

Staying in two sizes of planner.

This is part 2 to our previous episode. This time we go in to how you might use more than one planner, or combinations of planners, journals, notebooks to keep your life organised and in check.

If you have ideas for future episodes please send them to steve at philofaxy dot com

Show Notes (timings approximate)
00:00 - Introduction
00:10 - Maths lesson!
02:00 - Using multiple planners
03:00 - How many calendars?
04:30 - Using colour coding
07:00 - Avoiding duplication
10:30 - Mixing digital with analogue planning
12:00 - Project management on a digital application
13:00 - Reasons to use Pen and Paper instead of a digital device
15:00 - Master task list
16:00 - Disable notifications so you can concentrate on the task in hand
18:00 - Mastering your own system
19:30 - Be flexible
21:00 - Mixing different format of paper planner/notebook
22:00 - How to use more than one calendar if you must
25:00 - Using Monthly and Year Planners
27:00 - Using undated daily/weekly pages to record future events
28:00 - Travel Planning for personal organisers .docx .pdf

Episode 62 - Staying in two sizes of planner.

A direct download is also available here: Episode62.mp3

Show notes: A5 docx pdf Personal docx pdf

NB: A5 is in A4 format so it can be scaled to suit A5 or A6 size. Personal is for printing direct on Personal size paper.

Presenters - Karine Tovmassian and Steve Morton
Editing and production - Steve Morton

Our Websites:
Karine: Plannerology, Karine Tovmassian (IG)
Steve: Philofaxy, Travellers Notebook Times, Mr Philofaxy (IG)
Naturally we would love to hear your feedback on the podcast. If you use iTunes please gives us your rating or reviews of the podcast.

If you want a quick link to all the podcasts remember: http://philofaxy.com/podcast/

Remember if you have liked this podcast, don't forget to like it, share it and subscribe to the podcast.

Previous Episodes:

2017

61 - Staying in one size of planner. - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
60 - Functional Planning - Macro and Micro Planning - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
59 - PlannerCon Europe - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
58 - Speeding up by slowing down - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
57 - To Do Lists and Diary Pages - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
56 - Hints and Tips on making planner videos - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
55 - Keeping up to date - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
54 - Interview with Jennifer Powell at PlannerCon - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
53 - Conferences and Meet Ups - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
52 - The Magic of Contextualising Your Life - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
51 - Guest Interview - Rose Orchard - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
50 - Organising your significant other - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
49 - Creating the ultimate planner - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
48 - Getting past New Years resolutions - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
47 - How to understand being a planner newbie - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
46 - Buying and Selling 101 - A5 docx pdf Personal docx pdf
45 - A5 or A6 - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
44 - End of Year - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf

2016

43 - Digital Planning vs Analogue Planning - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
42 - Planning vs Organising - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
41 - Short and Long Term Planning - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
40 - Good and Bad Planner Habits - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
39 - Tackling Planner Size Change - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
38 - Self-Improvement or Personal Development - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
37 - What is productivity anyway - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
36 - The Planner Community - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
35 - Wellness Planner - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
34 - Listeners Question - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
33 - Pens and other writing instruments - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
32 - Proper storage, care and shipping of planners, rings etc - A5 docx pdf Personal docx pdf
31 - Guest Interview - Louise Umeki - Plannercon 2017 - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
30 - Form Following Function - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
29 - Seasonal To Do Lists - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
28 - Making and keeping annual goals - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
27 - Organising the family - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
26 - Guest interview - Theresa Hall - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
25 - Guest interview - Ray Blake - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
24 - Defining the important things from the urgent things - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
23 - Guest interview with Rita Sedani - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
22 - Printing your own inserts - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
21 - How to derail your planning system by over thinking - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
20 - Digital devices/services and your analogue planner - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
19 - What To Keep In Your 'Others' Tab - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
18 - Zombie Apocalypse Preparation - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
17 - Managing Finances In Your Planner - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
16 - Planning for those of us who actually can't live without planning, with guest co-host Carie Harling - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
15 - Automation Nirvana - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
14 - Work Life Balance and Your Planner - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
13 - GTD Productivity And Using Your Paper Planner - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
12 - Job Seeking and Keeping - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
11 - Planner Fail - A5 docx pdf Personal docx pdf
10 - Planner Hacks - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
9 - Planner Planning - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
8 - Choosing Inserts - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
7 - How do you carry your planner - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
6 - Planners on the go - A5 docx pdf  Personal docx pdf
5 - Why would you pay more than the price of a Filofax? - A5 docx pdf Personal docx pdf
4 - Using Your Planner To Create Permanent Habit Changes - A5 docx pdf Personal docx pdf
3 - Getting on with two or more planners - A5 docx pdf Personal docx pdf
2 - Where to start your planning journey and why - A5 docx pdf Personal docx pdf
1 - What size and why.... - A5 docx pdf Personal docx pdf

30 August 2017

A5 Year Planner (Vertical Format)

Another insert that we have never been asked for, a year planner but in vertical format rather than horizontal format.

Unlike our traditional 'horizontal' format it is spread over two pages but as two individual pages instead of a fold out format.

So this insert is a year on two pages, it is formatted in vertical format for A5.

You can download and print finished versions for this year from our diary inserts page.

If you want to customise this insert to your own requirements you need to download the source files here Word file and the Excel file, you will need both.

We have also done this one a single A4 page in the more conventional way that you can print out and then 'Z-fold' to fit an A5 organiser.

It looks like this:

When you've made all the changes you like to the template, you can perform a mail merge to create your own insert for any period you like. Check out our Free Diary Inserts link if you want more information on how to do this, including videos.

Once again a big thank you to Ray at 'My Life All In One Place' for his hard work and co-operation with helping to create and support us with all these inserts.

This work by Philofaxy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License. Please download, adapt, use, share, but don't charge or use commercially.

29 August 2017

Web Finds - 29 August 2017

So I hope you have had a good weekend.

So now it is time to enjoy a great collection of blog posts and videos from around the internet.

Meanwhile here are a selection of the latest Filofax videos for your enjoyment.

For tips on how to improve your videos, please see this post. Also this video too Webfinds
Your Filofax/Organiser Videos could appear in this list, just contact philofaxy at gmail dot com to be added to our monitoring list.

My Week Posts

Enjoy.

Free For All Tuesday - No. 343

So what questions or discussion points have you got for us today?

It doesn't matter if you are a beginner or a more experienced user of organisers, we want to hear your thoughts, questions, opinions etc.

Make today the one day you post a comment or a question.

It is Tuesday after all so fire away.

28 August 2017

A Date For Your Diary - 3 September 2017

We are going to run another conference round-table voice/video chat using Skype.

When? - Sunday 3 September at the following times:

London 10:00 am,
Paris 11:00 am,
Brisbane 7:00 pm time.

Additionally we will be on line later in the day at the following times:

Los Angeles 8:00 am,
Denver 9:00 am
Dallas 10:00 am,
New York 11:00am,
London 4:00 pm
Paris 5:00 pm etc.

The timing of these two sessions have been chosen to hopefully allow as many people to join in compared to previous round-tables.

Do not worry if you aren't available at the start of one of our sessions each one lasts 2-3 hours so pop up when you are available and say hello.

Where? - an on-line chat using Skype. with voice and video (if you wish)

What do I need? - just a micro-phone and some head phones(in ear phones work fine) and a free Skype account. Using headphones or earphone reduces 'echo' on the call. Video is optional, but a few of us will be on video as well.

Who - All of you... connect up with Philofaxy and we will attempt to get as many of us linked in to the audio conference as possible. Come and listen if you don't want to chat. What do we talk about? Filofax stuff... but anything else as well. It's like long lost friends meeting up for coffee and a catch up.. but don't worry if you have never joined in before... you are an old friend too!

If you have any questions you want to ask then please let us know in the group or before we start.

How -

Connect to Philofaxy by firstly searching for Philofaxy in Skype, I will then add you as a contact.
Then 'Send Contact Request', I will then add you in to the chat room.
Then if you request it, I can add you to the audio conference as well. But if you just want to chat via keyboard that's fine. That way it's slightly less hectic for me!

Come and join in the fun, even if you only pop in to say hello... but don't be afraid to join in the discussion.

As with previous round-tables there will also be a parallel text chat room going at the same time as the voice conference, so you can listen to the voice chat and type if you wish, just mute your microphone in Skype

If you need any assistance setting up Skype, please pop a comment in this post and I will try and help you get one line. Skype is free for computer to computer calls....

Here is my post on how to improve your Skype audio with headphones or a headset.

Hope to be chatting with you on Sunday 3 September 2017.

27 August 2017

Win Tickets To PlannerCon Europe

It's 'Back To School' this coming week. So today we have the 'Philofaxy Entrance Exams' to win tickets to attend the Plannercon Europe in Brussels on 28-29th October 2017!!

In all of the exams I have taken in my education, none of the exams required me to get 100% of the questions correct, there was always a pass mark of around about 40-50%. Our entrance exams are the same. You only have to get 3 out of 6 questions correct to be included in the draw.

Sadly there are only 10 free tickets available from Philofaxy for the event in October. Ticket winners will be responsible for their own travel and accommodation costs. The tickets are not transferable to someone else. We want you to attend as one of the winners.

The ticket will entitle you to attend Plannercon Europe on both days, entry to all talks and workshops in the same way as all other attendees.

You will also if you wish get the chance to meet me at the conference, on both days if you are (un)lucky!

How to enter.

Study the picture below which shows 6 different organisers/planners. And answer the following questions:

This is a Filofax ........ (model)
This is a Filofax ........ (model)
This is a Filofax ........ (model)
This is a ..................... (make)
This is a ..................... (make)
This is a ..................... (make and/or model)

We are not interested in the sizes, so don't worry about that!

Just send in your answers to all six questions to steve at philofaxy dot com with the subject 'Entrance Exam'

Entries must be in by 18:00 (Paris time) Saturday 2 September.

I will then sift through the answers and do a random draw of all the people that got more than 50% correct answers.

The ten names that come out of the hat will be contacted and informed that they are a winner of a ticket to Plannercon Europe in October.

Rules:
1. Entries must be in by 18:00 (Paris time) Saturday 2 September. You will be informed by mid-day on Sunday 3rd September.
2. No cash alternative is available.
3. Tickets are not transferable to someone else. Photo ID will be required to enter the venue. Ticket winners will be responsible for their own transport costs and accommodation costs and bookings.
4. 10 names will be chosen at random from the people that have answered 3 or more questions correctly.
5. The judges decision will be final
6. No correspondence will be entered in to.
7. Philofaxy is not responsible for changes to the planned schedule at Plannercon Europe.

For full details about Plannercon Europe please visit the website.

Thank you to Mella at PlannerCon Europe for sponsoring this competition.

26 August 2017

Web Finds - 26 August 2017

So I hope you have had a good week

So now it is time to enjoy a few blog posts from around the internet, so grab a drink and make yourself for our weekly round-up.

Here are some Philofaxy posts you might have missed this week:

So here are the latest Filofax and other brand blog posts from around the Internet. Don't forget to leave a comment on the posts you enjoyed reading, all bloggers enjoy getting comments.

We monitor over 400 blogs and sites, your Filofax/Organiser blog posts could appear in this list, just contact philofaxy at gmail dot com to be added to our monitoring list.
We can not guarantee people will read your posts, but we know there is a higher chance of people reading your posts and returning to read other posts if you make them interesting with pictures and good hints and tips. Do not forget to give your posts a title...
Your Filofax/Organiser posts could appear in this list, just contact philofaxy at gmail dot com to be added to our monitoring list.

25 August 2017

Free For All Friday - No. 458 - Steve

How many of you have ever signed up and paid for a service from an IT company and been happy with that service for a number of years, then all of a sudden the IT company discontinues that service or goes out of business.

Leaving you either out of pocket or without a service you valued but no longer have or both? The service might not be planner related.

I seem to be the un-lucky one, because over the years I can count at least half a dozen instances of this happening to me in one form or another.

Sometimes the company just wants to move you to a higher costing service, in one case this week for on-line back up I was potentially facing a bill of 4-5 times more per year compared to the fixed price I've paid for the last 4 years. Or in another instance instead of a fixed one off price for an application they want to change you to a new version of the application that is on an annual subscription charge.

These sort of things can cause you a lot of grief in terms of data loss or having to move to another service and then reload your data etc etc.

Fortunately.... these things rarely happen with paper planners! OK a size might be discontinued, for example Deskfax or Mini or M2. But Filofax and other vendors will continue to supply their inserts for a number of years afterwards until the point at which the number of sales has decreased to a point where it isn't economical for them to continue to supply such a small market.

However, it's only paper and printing... so you can print your own given suitable files and printing skills, so it's not a total disaster?

These sort of IT issues/changes often make me reevaluate my actual requirements, quite often I've found that I don't need a complicated solution, a much simpler one will be perfectly adequate. The same is often the case with our planners and organisers.....

How often do you re-evaluate your actual requirements for your planner?

Of course it is Friday so please feel free to discuss anything organiser/planner related.

Have a safe and relaxing weekend.

24 August 2017

Month on Two Pages - Horizontal format

We get frequent requests for new inserts in designs we don't already have in the extensive collection on our Diary Inserts page. Additions to the collection depend on a few factors:

Will this new design suit more than just the person requesting it?
Can one of our existing designs be easily adapted to the requested design?
Does the new design replicate an existing commercially available design?

Today's new release satisfies all of the above as far as I can tell.

So this insert is a month on two pages, it is formatted in landscape format, so when turned around the two pages can be easily written on as shown above.

This version is formatted for printing on Personal Size blank paper. For instructions on printing on personal paper please see this post.

You can download and print finished versions for this year from our diary inserts page.

If you want to customise this insert to your own requirements you need to download the source files here Word file and the Excel file, you will need both.

Once again a big thank you to Ray at 'My Life All In One Place' for his hard work and co-operation with helping to create and support us with all these inserts.

This work by Philofaxy is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported License. Please download, adapt, use, share, but don't charge or use commercially.

23 August 2017

Gillio A6 Mia Cara/William Hannah A6 Notebook/planner

After completing the review of the new William Hannah A6 leather disc-bound notebook/planner last week I had a sudden idea spring in to my head that I had to try out...

Yes you guessed it, instead of the ring bound organiser of the Mia Cara, would the disc-bound William Hannah A6 notebook fit the outer jacket of the Mia Cara... in short yes!

And the colour match is quite good too.

It fits in perfectly.

The William Hannah leather A6 notebook doesn't have any pockets so using it with the Mia Cara outer jacket is a way of solving that should you want pockets.

The disc-bound system is a lot more compact compared to the 23mm ring mechanism, this results in about a 15mm reduction in width compared to the Gillio organiser section, so the pen slot in the spine of the Gillio Mia Cara organiser section is still very useable with even more space than normal.

Thank you to Gillio Firenze for supplying the A6 Mia Cara, and to William Hannah Leather Notebooks for the A6 Notebook.

22 August 2017

Web Finds - 22 August 2017

For tips on how to improve your videos, please see this post. Also this video too Webfinds
Your Filofax/Organiser Videos could appear in this list, just contact philofaxy at gmail dot com to be added to our monitoring list.

My Week Posts

Enjoy.

Free For All Tuesday - No. 342

21 August 2017

Guest Post - Filofax Winchester Price History by gmax

I created these graphs of price vs. time using old price lists I’ve seen and the Bank of England inflation calculator. The exact Filofax models are indicated here in the captions – I believe they are all equivalent, except that the 1937 model used has 1” rings instead of the 7/8” rings on all the rest.

On this data, the price of a Winchester in real terms remained pretty much the same for half a century. Then, a couple of years after buying the company, David Collischon took a decision that would spark a huge boom, but would also plant the seed for an equally huge bust. He decided to virtually double the prices across the range, and position the product as something exclusive, which you could use to organise your life. You can see the massive price increase on our graph reflected in the 1983 data.

The strategy worked very well at the start, with Filofax becoming a premium product. Annual sales revenue increased by a factor of 120 between 1981 and 1987. But, from 1988, cheaper competitor products and falling sales sent the company ever deeper into crisis, and the “golden age” of Filofax drew to a close.

Thank you Max for another informative post. I had forgotten what I paid for my Winchester back in 1986!

20 August 2017

PlannerCon Europe 2017

PlannerCon Europe is taking place on the weekend of 28/29 October 2017. That is just 10 weeks away.

Have you got your tickets yet?

Full details at PlannerCon.eu

19 August 2017

Web Finds - 19 August 2017

So here are the latest Filofax and other brand blog posts from around the Internet. Don't forget to leave a comment on the posts you enjoyed reading, all bloggers enjoy getting comments.

We monitor over 400 blogs and sites, your Filofax/Organiser blog posts could appear in this list, just contact philofaxy at gmail dot com to be added to our monitoring list.
We can not guarantee people will read your posts, but we know there is a higher chance of people reading your posts and returning to read other posts if you make them interesting with pictures and good hints and tips. Do not forget to give your posts a title...
Your Filofax/Organiser posts could appear in this list, just contact philofaxy at gmail dot com to be added to our monitoring list.

Enjoy

18 August 2017

Free for All Friday No. 457 by Nan

Cross-pollination... Some of us who use a Filofax have used a different kind of planner either in the past or at the same time. Perhaps a bullet journal, a Franklin Covey system, a bunch of small Travelers-style notebooks, or even a stack of index cards.

Have you ever adapted something you learned from a different system and used it in your Filofax? For example, do you do bullet journaling, but keep the pages in your Filofax? Did you read Stephen Covey's book and then use his ideas in your Filofax instead of buying a Covey planner? Do you use your Filofax as a commonplace book? Do you use a pocket-size Filofax for "index cards"? (I do!)

And as always on Fridays, feel free to discuss anything ring-binder related. Have a great weekend!

17 August 2017

Pocket size organisers

Pocket size organisers are still very popular. For a lot of people they are a very convenient size of organiser.

The paper size is 120mm by 81mm which falls somewhere between A7 and A6. The organisers all have 6 rings each spaced 19mm apart. I'm not aware of any other configuration in this size apart from the older 4 ring pockets, see this post for those.

The rings sizes vary considerably with the range of sizes between 11mm and 20mm, we will cover who sells what size in a moment.

I think pocket size is a compromise between the super small Mini and the regular Personal size, it still gives you a usable page size in a size of organiser that will easily fit a small bag or normal size coat pocket.

Naturally the internal layouts vary quite a lot on Pocket size organisers. Some for instance have the full width back pocket, some don't. This can be very useful if you are using the organiser as a wallet as well as your planner. [Video link]

The Filofax Malden Pocket does have the full width back pocket as well as 19mm rings.

Internally it also has a useful zip pocket which can be used for coins. The Pocket size is taller than the width of a normal credit card, so you might be happier to use a Credit Card insert to hold your cards more securely.

The Filofax Holborn has the full width back pocket and 15mm rings

Internally it has an excellent layout with correct size vertical card slots. The zip pocket is tucked away in the back cover which isn't so easy to access in a hurry!

The Filofax Chameleon is unusual in that the pen loop is on the inside front cover. But this means it is out of the way of the zip pocket in the rear cover.

It also has a reasonable number of vertical card slots and 15mm rings.

The Eton Pocket is one of my favourites just for its luxury in them cramming in as many features as possible! The leather on this model is super soft and delicate!

There is no full width back pocket on this model, but it does have high quality 15mm rings. Ring protectors, two pen loops, five card slots which are a mixture of top and side entry ones in the front cover. A zip pocket in the back pocket, also large gusseted pockets in the front and back pockets. So you can hold a lot of things in this one.

A pocket I have shared with you before is of unknown make, but it has small 11mm rings

The Gillio Compagna Pocket comes with 15mm rings.

Internally it has a very usable pocket layout

Van der Spek Junior (Pocket) come with either 16 or 20mm Krause rings. Of course the Van der Spek Custom models can have all sorts of internal layouts. Including full back pockets, secretarial pockets, second pen loops etc etc the list is almost never ending.

Van der Spek also sell their Junior Touch Me organisers which is an 'off-the-shelf' model in a limited range of 5 colours, all of them come with 20 mm rings and a full width back pocket and a very good internal layout too.

Both the Gillio and Van der Spek use rings that are removable/replaceable. I'm often asked can the 15/16 mm rings be swapped for 20mm ones. Sadly the mounting points are different spacing, so the swap isn't very straight forward. The backing plate needs to be changed and that requires the leather of the organiser to be unstitched to replace it.

This is only an overview of what is available in Pocket size, there are of course a whole lot more models and makes out there.

Do you use pocket size on a regular basis or have you used it in the past?