Hello

Confession time:
I thought it would be helpful to this community to report back after a few 
months of use just how *little* of MLO I am using. In part I am also asking 
for practical advice on how to make better genuinely *time-efficient* use 
of more features of MLO.
 

SUMMARY
I have discovered that in practice all I am using MLO for is:
a) A glorified To-Do list - mostly for today
b) A list of major projects (although this gets less attention that it 
should)

HOTKEYS
In practice I am using VERY little of MLO. Here is what I am using: 
- I use *Alt/Shift/arrow keys...* a LOT to change priority and indentations 
into Projects. This is one of the best features of MLO interface.
- I use Stars (*Control/Shit/S*) for "do today " - however I am NOT using 
the Star outline because I think *visually* and like to see the 2D shape of 
projects (indentations etc) on the page.
- I use Highlighting (*Control/H*) to flag up IMPORTANT stuff to do 
(today). 
 
- I sit mostly in the Active Tasks outline view(**) and insert 
tasks/projects directly into it using *Insert* and *Alt/Insert*.
- I use *Control/S* to input the Start date (e.g. "6h" or "2d") to get 
things to disappear off the view for a few hours or days.

>From time to time I look at the (long/medium term) Goals outline view.

...and (slightly shamefully) that's about it.


BACKGROUND
I discovered that I was wasting far, FAR too much time learning the system, 
trying to set things up and discussing the technology... and not getting on 
with my life!  i.e. Not actually Getting Things Done fast enough!
 

WEAKNESSES OF MLO
I still think MLO is massively confusing to any newbie. "Bloatware" comes 
to mind. And until this is sorted out I don't think MLO will ever make many 
significant sales to consumers. I like and use this product. However I am 
unable to recommend this product to any of my productive/busy friends due 
to the hideous learning curve. This is product (productivity platform) only 
for my friends who are hard-core geeks.  I cannot imagine any highly 
productive CEO of a major corporation using this stuff. 

Also the Andriod app is - to be brutal - appalling. 
1. It should sync automatically with my PC. [That's it - no discussion!]
2. I want to be able to drag & drop items up and down my lists (equivalent 
to using the Alt/Shift/arrow keys on my keyboard) and also sideways - in 
and out of a hierarchy. [No discussion on this either!]
Sorry but *only* if MLO gets these two things right does the app even 
*begin* to become useful to me.


ADVICE SOUGHT

a) Moving tasks between lists
>From time to time I do a "weekly review" but I now have a ton of stuff (250 
- 500 items) on my various GTD style 'lists' and partly as a result moving 
tasks/projects in out of my different lists is just too hard. i.e. I can't 
do it in a couple of clicks. So in practice I just don't do it!
- Is there a quick hotkey or 2-click way to move an item between my various 
GTD type lists?  (e.g. I have: "Someday-Maybe" list, "Definitely Do - but 
not yet" list, "Reflective thoughts" list ...)
If I got this going I might find GTD "Weekly reviews" become easier and 
became a more productive use of time
==> Any suggestions?


b) Contexts
I have completely failed to make Contexts work! Yes, when I remember I do 
put Contexts into some tasks, but mostly I can't be bothered. What I really 
mean is that it doesn't seem to be worth the input time because I don't 
currently actually use Contexts!  I think maybe I have too many Contexts - 
I ended up with about 25. 

- Is there a *single-click* way to filter my Active Tasks to just show just 
the tasks that match a given Context?

[ASIDE: Because I think so *visually* ideally I would like to still see the 
entire tree structure of my projects, but: 
i) it would be great if just the relevant tasks leapt out visually (e.g. 
became highlighter, or the others became greyed out)
ii) It would also be great to have some hotkey way of skipping to the next 
relevant task (i.e. that matches the selected Context)   ]

==> Any suggestions?

J


P.S. (**) Btw, why is an MLO Outline called an "Outline"?  This is 
confusing for newbies. Why not "View" or "Report" ?





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