I’ve been struggling with productivity tools for years. Most of them help me collect more tasks, but very few help me figure out which tasks actually matter. I kept finding myself busy all day, yet not making real progress.
I borrowed a concept from engineering: Signal vs. Noise. • Signal tasks: high-impact, goal-driven work. • Noise tasks: necessary, but low-leverage (emails, reports, admin).
So I built SigNull, a minimal to-do app that enforces this distinction: • New tasks go into an Inbox, where I classify them as Signal or Noise. • Each morning it surfaces a Top-3 Signal list to focus on first. • It gives me a Noise Budget (e.g., 45 minutes/day). Once that’s used, I have to either Defer the task or Justify why it’s worth extra time. • At the end of the day, it shows my Signal-to-Noise Ratio (SNR) so I can see if I spent my time on what really mattered.
It’s web-based, simple, and still pretty early. I’m looking for feedback: • Does the Signal/Noise distinction resonate with you? • Is the Noise Budget too rigid, or a useful forcing function? • Where might this approach fall apart in real-world workflows?
You can try it here: signull.app
Thanks!
