Ask HN: How do software engineers keep track of their projects/work items?

I currently use emacs org mode. Before I just kept TODO lists in plain text files.

I've been through them all and find that no one solutions is complete. I follow the basic principals of GTD focusing on safe places to collect tasks (inboxes), regular review of all inboxes to organize inputs. Important note: If you can do it in 2 minutes do so. If it has more than one step, spend time writing the all the steps you can think of to get a clear idea of what you need to do.

InBoxes: OneNote for easy input from every tech. Field Notes for hand writing which can't be beat. OneDrive for anything files I need to review. Blank paper at my desk while I work.

Then, for project execution, I follow more of a Cal Newport approach of Time Box Planning and unplugging to perform deep work. Hope this helps.

I'd be curious what a machine learning to do list would look like; something that can let you categorize tasks based on different categories, like sentimentality, genre, and even patterns it detects from common usage, like the fact that one may spend a long time on a particular subject.

Would be an interesting experiment.

Jira, of course. Everybody hates it, but you know, our managers can see nice burn-down charts, and discuss meaningless metrics.