What is Microsoft To Do?​

I was originally going to rant here about frustrating or negative stuff, but I Microsoft publishes a free To Do app (actually a collection of web, desktop and mobile apps, plus it now backs To Dos in Outlook) that originated years ago as the Wunderlist app, which they bought, sunset, and converted the foundation over to what is now Microsoft To Do. It works with free personal Microsoft accounts, as well as business Microsoft Entra ID/365 accounts, and integrates with Microsoft 365 accounts to optionally let you see flagged emails and tasks assigned to you in Microsoft Planner alongside your own personal tasks. It's been such a great part of my life for several years now that I thought I'd provide a positive rant in the hope that it may be helpful to someone else!

High Level Overview​

I've never quite managed to solve the issue of staleness in to-do systems, but it's a significant problem! The systems that avoid stale data often don't hold enough information to be useful for supplementing the forgetting parts of my brain. Conversely, the ones that do hold enough data end up being ignored until some things get stale. However, Microsoft To Do has been a game-changer for me. It resurfaces enough tasks frequently enough, and the "My Day" view offers a manageable number of "do today" items (though I sometimes overestimate my capabilities!). This balance has made it the longest-lasting solution for me.

Occasionally, I do revisit old, stale items and find things I still need to do. I also maintain lists that are collections without due dates, such as "check out software X." These lists don't interfere with my main to-do items but are easily accessible when I need them, thanks to tags and search functionality. Microsoft To Do also serves as a quick brainstorming tool on my phone, and adding new tasks is a breeze.

Before Microsoft To Do, I stuck with Microsoft OneNote for the longest time, originally going back on around 20 years ago, just as OneNote moved from local-only application to cloud-backed (thus finally being available easily from mobile, as smart phones arrived and became popular!). OneNote's checklist functionality was incredibly user-friendly: Ctrl+1 added a checkbox, checked it, and removed it in a cycle. I could create lists, drag and drop to reorder, make sublists with tabs, and format text to emphasize urgent items. When overwhelmed by the sheer quantity of tasks, I'd create a new page, copy only the urgent items, and start fresh. This method worked for a while, but the mobile app proved too cumbersome for quick use. Eventually, I tried other apps, stuck with Toodledo for a while, also tested Todoist and a vast number of others (because of course, trying new apps is more fun than doing the items inside!), and finally transitioned to Microsoft To Do after it was developed from Microsoft's acquisition of Wunderlist.

My Day: The Feature​

The headlining feature for me in managing my tasks with Microsoft Do is the "My Day" view. It's a feature I've not seen duplicated elsewhere, though it's very simple: A special list that resets to empty every single night at midnight. I really hate deleting a to-do item, or acknowledging that I might not get something done, or even picking through the very long list of items I have to choose from at any given time, to focus on a few. With other task list apps, I would accumulate items until my list was so large I would just start using another app from scratch to avoid cleaning up the old items that I couldn't bear to delete (and lose them) or mark complete (if I hadn't, but to keep them around for reference), or even to move them to a someday list!

What the heck is 10DLC and why do I care?​

Recently a friend of mine who works at a church asked a question, and I provided some details that qualifies as a rant:

Does anyone have a cheat sheet for the 10DLC rules that I can give to leadership. There's a lack of understanding why I'm deploying SMS is a challenge. In their mind everyone texts all the time, so it's no big deal.

Quick aside: 10DLC stands for 10-Digit Long Code. It's how electronically sending SMS is referred to from full 10-digit phone numbers, versus the SMS short codes that are 5- or 6-digit numbers you've likely received text messages from before (these have their own rules already and generally cost thousands of dollars per month to control and use).

Anyway, there are a number of other resources out there for more 10DLC info; Telnyx has this one for example about 10DLC Campaign Compliance. The important parts are: fines are insanely expensive, and there's zero concept in the rules for person-to-person communication outside of a cellular phone—every rule assumes you're sending bulk messages via an API/application whether you intend to or not. So sending one-on-one messages must still go through the same vetting and rules as someone sending a low-volume 10DLC campaign, meaning 3.75 messages per second and up to 6,000 messages per day sent. And registering costs up-front to get verified as a brand, and ongoing fees for each "campaign" you send, that each phone number must be associated with. It's likely carriers will eventually just outright block SMS messages that aren't registered with 10DLC.

Lets add a couple of other links for reference if you want more context:
https://help.twilio.com/articles/4407882914971-Comparison-between-Sole-Proprietor-Low-Volume-Standard-and-Standard-registration-for-A2P-10DLC

That article is linked from:
https://www.twilio.com/docs/messaging/compliance/a2p-10dlc/direct-standard-onboarding

So the gist is, the cellular carriers don't have a concept of person-to-person texting outside of a physical cell phone, and otherwise they assume you're a spammer and require registration with heavy authentication requirements of you as a business entity (with up front and ongoing fees through your provider--some providers eat these depending on their pricing, but they are either paying them or passing them through) so that when you do send spam SMS, they can 100% identify you and shut you down, and if you send spam without registering, you can be heavily fined for doing so (or your carrier that enabled you to do so will be fined and they're going to pass it along to you, or more likely not let you access SMS without being compliant so they don't have to, and so you agree to be responsible).

The reason foe this is that SMS spam got super bad, and the FCC was going to make the carriers fix it with regulation like the STIR/SHAKEN rules they're forcing compliance with (slowly) to cut down on spam robocalls and make Caller ID names more trustworthy. The carriers saw the writing on the wall and decided to "self-regulate" in a way that would let them both charge fees and enforce their own rules rather than the government forcing less favorable rules on them if they did nothing.

So you get the bucket of suck that only large bureaucracies can come up with by committee to cement their own control and revenue while avoiding the big bad (to them) government bureaucracy from being forced on them. And if they can accidentally ignore person-to-person texting existing outside of their actual cell phones and no one big enough complains, they can keep that monopoly for themselves (plenty of companies are using low-volume 10DLC campaigns for person-to-person texting anyway, but it's not an explicit reason you can provide for the campaigns when you register).

A blog of rants by a David. Usually tech related, but no promises. Sometimes explantory or useful, usually too long.

Start of the Rantings​

There is a good chance this is the shortest post this blog will have. I'm good at stream-of-consciousness, bad at self-editing, and having opinions, which I'm 100% willing to be wrong about but unlikely to go back and update or revise.

The rants here might be useful, they might be informative, or they might be completely pointless. They'll usually be tech-related, usually random, may involve quotes from friends, colleagues, or acquaintences and not just me, and will usually involve run-on sentences, typos, and even emotionally-based, biased information that I might have changed my mind on in the minute to years since posting!

Who?​

At least initially, they'll be semi-anonymous. There are lots of Davids in the world. I'm sure some will recognize my writing style, I may link some people to my posts, so I'm not shooting for perfect anonymity here, just a little less looslely tied to the real me than most of my online life :-)

(You will likely also encouter many parenthetical statements and smileys, and many bunny trails. Enjoy--or not! No one is forcing you to read :-D )