[eddyparkinson]

In depth knowledge of the problem matters with an ideas list. ... When I was doing my PhD, I had lots of ideas, but limited knowledge of the subject (Logistics) and limited knowledge of what needs to be in a thesis. So my lists of ideas were child like. They had little value. I soon moved on. After I had done lots of reading about logistics and what people expect to find in a thesis my ideas changed. I had a list of ideas that were connected to knowledge of the problem. It was very easy to rank the ideas and work out what gets done next and throw out the rubbish. The list of ideas were not some random guess, but informed and clear. These days I try to ensure my list of ideas is based on indepth knowledge and if not, then the top item is "get some indepth knowledge". This tends to mean the other items in my list have no value a all.