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If writing a letter a hundred years ago was the equivalent of sitting down with someone in a quiet room and talking face-to-face, writing an email today is like yelling at someone across a noisy intersection while they’re rushing to an appointment. "Everyone is overloaded and overbusy." Everyone is overloaded and overbusy. We exist in a state of continuous partial attention as we shift nimbly back and forth between email, text messages, social media, and the web. The email you send isn’t just competing with other email for someone’s attention; it’s competing with everything. Odds are, your email will be read on a phone, as are over 50 percent of emails . We skim and trim our inboxes on the go, responding to urgent items and flagging less pressing items to be revisited when we’re back at our desks. That means your email will most likely be digested in a quick glance while the receiver is on their phone, flitting back and forth between other tasks. At best your corresponde...

Email users set up autoreplies when they go on vacation. Slack doesn't offer this exact feature, but there are two options that work similarly: The Status feature lets everyone know what you're up to, like an old school AIM away message. Slackbot can automatically respond to specific words or phrases with a pre-set message. These are pretty different functions, and either could be what you mean when you say autoreplies, so let's go over both. Make Slackbot Automatically Reply to Any Word or Phrase Slackbot isn't exactly a mind-blowing AI. It can, however, be set up to instantly react to any specific phrase. This is useful if the same questions tend to come up again and again at your company: Simply set up an autoresponder for when certain words or phrases come up, and let the robot handle responding. Setting this up isn't hard. To get started, click your organization's name at the top-left, and then click Customize Slack . This will open the Slack admi...

Dropbox is great but the notifications can be a bit much sometimes. Here's how to manage which notifications you see on your computer, your mobile device, and your email inbox. Let's get this all under control together. Customize Dropbox Notifications on Your Computer Find the Dropbox icon in your system tray or menu bar. Click it. Here’s how that looks on Windows: Here you will see recent notifications, but what we're interested in are the settings, which you can find by clicking the gear icon at top-right. Click that followed by Preferences . A window will open; click the Notifications tab. From here you can disable specific kinds of notifications. I recommend turning off New files synced , because that, in particular, can get overwhelming quickly—it pings you every time any file changes. Feel free to experiment and find the settings that work just right for you. Customize Dropbox Notifications on Your Phone Dropbox notifications on mobile aren't as overwhe...

There are a lot of reasons why you might need a notes app . Maybe you're practicing GTD and are looking for a quick way to capture to-dos the moment you think of them. Maybe you need a record of decisions made and topics discussed during meetings at work. Or maybe you're a writer and need a place to collect articles and statistics to reference later. If you're in the market for a note-taking app and are trying to decide between Google Keep and Evernote , defining exactly what you plan to do with the app is an important first step. Each app is designed for very different purposes: Google Keep functions like a digital bulletin board covered in sticky notes. Its lightweight interface and minimal features make it perfect for capturing ideas and to-dos quickly and easily. Evernote is more like a multi-subject notebook or digital filing cabinet. It's better for writing detailed notes, saving a variety of types of multimedia, and building an archive of information you ...

Nearly 1.5 billion people use Gmail every month—and it's not hard to see why. Email remains at the core of many workflows, and Gmail is excellent when it comes to managing emails. It's familiar, sure, but it's also powerful, with features like automatic filters . And yet there's a lot that Gmail can't do out of the box. This is where Gmail add-ons and extensions come in. These tools make Gmail even more powerful by adding new features or by connecting other applications. Here are some the most powerful Gmail add-ons and extensions out there; consider adding them to your setup. In this article: Gmail Add-ons: Add Features Without Installing Anything Extensions and Third-Party Services: Add Powerful Features to Gmail Get Out of Your Inbox with Zapier Gmail Add Ons: Add Features Without Installing Anything Google added a panel to the side of Gmail in the summer of 2018. This row of icons is easy to overlook, but you shouldn't. Clicking one of these ico...

There are too many things on the internet to read at once. Read-it-later apps let you set aside articles or sites, download them to read at your convenience, and even organize them for research. Instapaper and Pocket are two of the most popular read-it-later apps available. They cover similar ground but offer various features geared toward different audiences. Here, we'll put them head to head to help you choose which app is right for you. Common Features and What We Looked For Instapaper solves a very basic problem. You find something to read online but can't read it at that moment. Maybe it's a long read and you don't have the time, maybe you found it while you're at work and want to save it for when you get home, or maybe you're trying to research a topic and you're gathering multiple resources to explore later on. Whatever the case, with a browser extension, or the Share function on your phone, you can send the article to Instapaper. There, the app ...

What do we gain by slowing down and not working? According to Chris Bailey, the answer is potentially a more productive life. When we take time away from working, whether to meditate or reflect on what we want to accomplish, we allow ourselves to see the big picture or better prepare for whatever it is we need to do. Taking 20 minutes to train the mind how to focus or otherwise get into the right mindset before tackling work can lead to more effective working time with fewer distractions, less procrastination, and more intention. Bailey is the author of The Productivity Project and Hyperfocus , both of which show how we can be more productive in a world full of distractions. Here, he shares some of his thoughts on what productivity means and how he thinks the typical person can increase their personal productivity. "The internet is where our intention goes to die." Jill Duffy: Personal productivity has become something of a marketing point or a sales point, not just in...