Auto-file everything as a time-stack:

- new files go on the desktop

- if I didn't name file right rules automatically rename it per ISO 8601 to "YYYY-MM-DD - title.ext"

- after the file isn't opened for >2 days, it gets auto-sorted into (more or less) "archive/yyyy-mm/yyyy-mm-dd - title.ext"

- note: stick to ISO 8601 across tooling: https://www.iso.org/iso-8601-date-and-time-format.html

With this system, the effect is:

- my desktop has today's and yesterday's working files, everything else is auto-cleaned (you may want 5 or 7 days depending on nature of file work)

- when i need something, I "lookup around that date in my stack" because I find it easier to find things by time than by trying to re-imagine what I'd named it.

- when working somewhere where i create more content then I consume, I group by weeks not months: "archive/yyyy-ww/file" (given ~520 folders per decade, you may, or may not, want "archive/yyyy/yyyy-ww/file" depending on your file system's speed at iterating dirs)

- turn week numbers on your calendar, and you can directly open any folder for any week you did stuff.

- no brain power needed!

More about usage:

Method works beautifully even if you prefer topical folders like project-name or finances or whatever, and computer search is fast/easy at still showing you everything made in a given month no matter what folder it's in.

Seeing files by when made visually 'bundles' files made around the same time (e.g. several days' or weeks' work on the same project). Update dates for new versions and a find by name for the rest of the file name will show you all the versions you have, sorted.

This is infinitely superior to the standard workplace practice of "Title Whatever v3 (tim edits B) jfk (copy).doc".

Thanks to the date prefixed name, if I email files, backup/restore them, or otherwise round trip them to some other file system (looking at you, most NAS, SANs, and object stores), I don't lose the metadata of when created, meaning I can still sort round tripped files by name reversed and see files by recency or clustered by when made.

If I can't find by looking around the date, I can always fiddle with search to find things.

I now get unhappy any time a file doesn't start with a date.

Pro-tips: Apple Shortcuts supports ISO 8601 by name for dates and time. On MacOS I use Hazel to maintain this w/o touching it: https://www.noodlesoft.com ... On Windows I use powershell, Linux perl.

For some reason in early 2020 all the car industry execs were convinced that people would buy dramatically fewer cars in 2020, due to pandemic crashing demand. Because they have a religious aversion to holding any stock they decided to shift the risk over to their suppliers, fucking said suppliers over, as the car industry normally does when they expect demand shifts. The thing that made this particular time special as opposed to business as usual is that the car execs all got it wrong, because people bought way more cars due to pandemic rather than less, due to moving out of cities and avoiding public transit. So they fucked over their suppliers a second time by demanding all those orders back.

Now, suppose you're a supplier of some sort of motor driver or power conversion chip (PMIC) in early 2020. You run 200 wafers per month through a fab running some early 2000s process. Half your yearly revenue is a customized part for a particular auto vendor. That vendor calls you up and tells you that they will not be paying you for any parts this year, and you can figure out what to do with them. You can't afford to run your production at half the revenue, so you're screwed. You call up your fab and ask if you can get out of that contract and pay a penalty for doing so, and you reduce your fab order to 100 wafers per month, so you can at least serve your other customers. The fab is annoyed but they put out an announcement that a slot is free, and another vendor making a PMIC for computer motherboards buys it, because they can use the extra capacity and expect increased demand for computers. So far so normal. One vendor screwed, but they'll manage, one fab slightly annoyed that they had to reduce throughput a tiny bit while they find a new buyer.

Then a few months later the car manufacturer calls you again and asks for their orders back, and more on top. You tell them to fuck off, because you can no longer manufacture it this year. They tell you they will pay literally anything because their production lines can't run without it because (for religious reasons) they have zero inventory buffers. So what do you do? You call up your fab and they say they can't help you, that slot is already gone. So you ask them to change which mask they use for the wafers you already have reserved, and instead of making your usual non-automotive products, you only make the customized chip for the automotive market. And then, because they screwed you over so badly, and you already lost lots of money and had to lay off staff due to the carmaker, you charge them 6x to 8x the price. All your other customers are now screwed, but you still come out barely ahead. Now, of course the customer not only asked for their old orders back, but more. So you call up all the other customers of the fab you use and ask them if they're willing to trade their fab slots for money. Some do, causing a shortage of whatever they make as well. Repeat this same story for literally every chipmaker that makes anything used by a car. This was the situation in January 2021. Then, several major fabs were destroyed (several in Texas, when the big freeze killed the air pumps keeping the cleanrooms sterile, and the water pipes in the walls of the buildings burst and contaminated other facilities, and one in Japan due to a fire) making the already bad problem worse. So there are several mechanisms that make part availability poor here:

1. The part you want is used in cars. Car manufacturers have locked in the following year or so of production, and "any amount extra you can make in that time" for a multiple of the normal price. Either you can't get the parts at all or you'll be paying a massive premium.

2. The part you want is not used in cars, but is made by someone who makes other parts on the same process that are used in cars. Your part has been deprioritized and will not be manufactured for months. Meanwhile stock runs out and those who hold any stock massively raise prices.

3. The part you want is not used in cars, and the manufacturer doesn't supply the car industry, but uses a process used by someone who does. Car IC suppliers have bought out their fab slots, so the part will not be manufactured for months.

4. The part you want is not used in cars, and doesn't share a process with parts that are. However, it's on the BOM of a popular product that uses such parts, and the manufacturer has seen what the market looks like and is stocking up for months ahead. Distributor inventory is therefore zero and new stock gets snapped up as soon as it shows up because a single missing part means you can't produce your product.

So here we are. Shameless plug - email me if you are screwed by this and need help getting your product re-engineered to the new reality. There's a handful of manufacturers, usually obscure companies in mainland China that only really sell to the internal market, that are much less affected. Some have drop-in replacement parts for things that are out of stock, others have functionally similar parts that can be used with minor design adaptation. I've been doing that kind of redesign work for customers this whole year. Don't email me if you work in/for the car industry. You guys poisoned the well for all of us so deal with it yourselves.

  In an effort to get people to look
  into each other’s eyes more,
  and also to appease the mutes,
  the government has decided
  to allot each person exactly one hundred
  and sixty-seven words, per day.

  When the phone rings, I put it to my ear
  without saying hello. In the restaurant
  I point at chicken noodle soup.
  I am adjusting well to the new way.

  Late at night, I call my long distance lover,
  proudly say I only used fifty-nine today.
  I saved the rest for you.
  When she doesn’t respond,  
  I know she’s used up all her words,
  so I slowly whisper I love you
  thirty-two and a third times.
  After that, we just sit on the line
  and listen to each other breathe.

  Jeffrey McDaniel, “The Quiet World”

Under article 20 of the GDPR ("Right to data portability"), subsection 2 states that "[i]n exercising his or her right to data portability pursuant to paragraph 1, the data subject shall have the right to have the personal data transmitted directly from one controller to another, where technically feasible" [2].

Seeing how this has been previously been done, Spotify has already shown it to be technically possible. Enough users should be able to pressure Spotify to re-enable the API.

I just sent a mail to privacy@spotify.com:

  L.S.
  
  I'm a paying user of the Spotify music service. I want to exercise my rights under the GDPR article 20 subsection 2 to data portability to transmit my data, namely playlist information, directly to another controller, namely SongShift.
  
  It is clear that this is technically possible, as it has been possible in the past. However, Spotify has chosen to force SongShift to disable its API. This is in violation of my rights under the GDPR. I demand that you re-enable this API to allow me to exercise my rights under the GDPR.
  
  I expect a notification of receipt within 5 days. I expect a full answer within 14 days. In case of no reply, or no satisfactory reply, I will enter a complaint (verzoekschriftprocedure) at the Dutch civil court (Rechtbank Midden-Nederland).

[2] https://gdpr-info.eu/art-20-gdpr/