PS Dwight I have found a major flaw in your proposal, for using Next Actions which is that what you suggest only works in the *root* directory. Whereas I am using a different folder for each of my Areas of Life. The problem is that the Next Actions view in MLO hides all stand-alone tasks. And MLO fails to treat tasks that are within a Folder as if they were in the root directory.
The only workaround I can find is to manually make all my standalone task become "Projects"! (This is slightly painful to remember to hit Alt/J for every standalone task...). Obviously if you make everything in sight into a Project, then the Next Action view simply would simply shows everything in sight! So in order to just have only the *genuine* next actions within each project become visible in the Next Actions view, I would need to make sure that all actions within a project are NOT be flagged-up as being also Projects. This would be possible. Although given that I like to move stuff rather fluidly between projects and actions this wouldn't be ideal. J On the up-side I guess I could manually flag any actions up as being "Forced Next" actions (see my previous comment) simply by making any action I wanted to see on the the Next Actions list become a project (e.g. using Alt/J) On Tuesday, December 13, 2016 at 12:04:28 PM UTC, John . Smith wrote: > > Hi Dwight > > Wow - I had no idea that all that stuff with the Todo List format, showing > the Task Path was even possible! I learned various things there - thank you! > > Yes that looks useful. But I shall need to digest this properly when I > have more time and revert... > > > In the meantime I have two other related problems: > > A) How can I get to show not just ONE next action within a major project > but THREE? > To explain: I find that quite often the actions within a project are > neither to be executed strictly "in series" nor completely in parallel. > i.e. If I have a large number of actions within a project I don't want it > to overwhelm my view by showing them all, nor to I want to just show one > project because the next 2 or 3 can often be done simultaneously (i.e. "in > parallel"). > > I am have been assuming that "Next THREE Actions" is probably impossible > in MLO but if anyone out there knows, Dwight would know! > > > B) Forced Next > I know that this is an 'old chestnut' that has been previously discussed > but I cant remember the conclusion! > But in GTDNext there is an extremely useful featured which they call > "Forced Next" which allows the user to manually put additional tasks onto > the Next (one) Actions view. I have never quite managed to create some > such thing in MLO. The obvious thing to try is to create a flag called say > "ForcedNext", but I don't think there was any way to create a view that > shows NextActions AND Flag="ForcedNext". > > Wait, it's coming back to me, now - or was that the intractable problem?! > > > General point: > Having recently been experimented with competing products I keep coming > back to the same feeling. MLO really is amazing in so many ways. BUT > personally I keep finding that it's like "the monkey's claw", all the > really important things that I want a task management system to do aren't > just difficult, after hours of trying complicated workaround, it turns out > that they all have terrible unwanted side effects that are worse than the > original problem. To me it is clear that MLO has long ago lost the battle > of overwhelming the new users with too many features, but unfortunately > they haven't quite finished job of making it technically possible to do all > the really important things. > > J > > Dwight wrote: > >> Hi, John. First, let me say that I am surprised to find you clicking >> triangles, I thought that you were keyboard-only. You must have found a >> better mount? :-) >> >> I know that there are outliner is which "join rows" is a small deal - >> MLO's not one. The only way I know to do what you are asking would be >> with cut & paste which is cumbersome and I'm sure wholely unacceptable. >> >> But let's go over why Next Actions isn't working for you. I made a new >> profile and put in a half dozen or so tasks at the root and then added a >> folder named HOUSE ORGANISED with the four child tasks you specified. I >> created two tabs: the first one showed the All Tasks view, the second >> showed Active Actions. The second tab was set to synch selection with >> the first tab, and I had the view specifications showing in the left >> hand panel. I changed the first filter from ShowActions:Active to >> ShowActions:NextAction and saved the updated view as Next Actions. I >> created a third tab and loaded the Active Actions view. In Options:to-do >> list format I turned on the top Encode checkbox, turned off encode for >> projects, turned on prefix encoding for task path with a path depth of >> one, name limit of 20 characters, no start or separator string and enc >> string of " - " (blank/dash/blank). >> >> The Next Actions view shows seven tasks, root tasks one through six, and >> one that showed >> HOUSE ORGANISED - Clear Bedroom >> >> I marked the House task completed and it changed to >> HOUSE ORGANISED - Clear TV Room >> the six root tasks were undisturbed >> >> In order to view the other tasks involved in house organization, I have >> several choices >> >> 1. click on the home tab. To go back, click on the nextactions tab. one >> click each way. drawback: if you have a lot of concurrent projects like >> this they will all be expended at once. But the one you are working on >> will be the selected task so it should not be challenging to find. >> >> 2. Doubleclick on the current task. Everything past the initial click is >> identical to option 1 >> >> 3. Click on the ActiveActions tab. After the initial click it's the same >> as #1. Difference is that #1 gave a hierarchical view which allows you >> to see the parents and the completed tasks, also, the view in #1 may >> have been sorted which may or may not help. >> >> 4. Stay in the current tab. Change the first filter to >> ShowActions:Active. When you are done, change it back. Advantage, only >> uses a single workspace, if that matters to you. Drawback: two clicks to >> change, And a risk that you are going to leave this expanded without >> resetting it and get a surprise the next time you use the view and it >> doesn't do what it is supposed to. >> >> 5. Stay in the current tab but keep the list of available views in the >> left sidebar instead of the view definition. Click on "active actions" >> to expand, click on "next actions" to revert. Same as #4 but single >> click and without the risk of leaving the view incorrectly defined. >> >> Reviewing your concerns: >> >> - you want to expand in a single click. Of the five ways of expanding >> shown above, four are single click. >> >> - you find changing tabs clunky. I don't understand why changing tabs is >> challenging but two of the five methods work in a single tab. >> >> - you experience a slight pain making the parent a project. There are no >> projects here but it would work about the same if you used a project. >> >> - other tasks vanish. No tasks outside of the clean house structure >> vanished during this test. The cost of this is that all of your >> non-project tasks have to be at root, something that you previously said >> was your intention. >> >> - the parent takes up display space. The parent is not displayed in this >> test unless all of the subtasks are complete. >> >> To your conclusion, it is incredibly simple to prepend a project name >> onto its subtasks using the option described above. The challenge is to >> do this only for the next action while continuing to display the other >> tasks without the prepend. For that I think you have to use cut and paste >> >> -Dwight >> >> On 12/8/2016 1:32 PM, John . Smith wrote: >> > >> > Hello >> > >> > What is the quickest way to join two rows together? >> > i.e. I keep wanting to the first child task onto the end of a part >> > task's name >> > >> > e.g. I would want: >> > Line 1: HOUSE ORGANISED >> > Line 2: - Clear bedroom >> > >> > to now become: >> > Line 1: HOUSE ORGANISED - Clear bedroom >> > >> > i.e. now all on the one line! >> > >> > >> > *BACKGROUND* >> > >> > I am in the habit of writing a task in the form: >> > [PROJECT NAME] ==> [next action] >> > >> > e.g. Suppose I had a project like this: >> > HOUSE ORGANISED [as a Project] >> > - Clear bedroom [as a task with the Project] >> > - Clear TV room [as a task with the Project] >> > - Clean Kitchen surfaces [as a task with the Project] >> > - Clear Kitchen cupboards [as a task with the Project] >> > >> > Ideally I like to see: >> > "HOUSE ORGANISED ==> Clear bedroom" >> > >> > And then at a single click (on the small triangle before the project's >> > name) I could see all the tasks below it by "un-collapsing" the child >> > tasks. >> > HOUSE ORGANISED ==> Clear bedroom >> > Clear TV room >> > Clean Kitchen surfaces >> > Clear Kitchen cupboards >> > >> > >> > Yes, I know that I want to see /*just*/ the first task within the >> > project, obviously I could use the MLO functionality of "Show Next >> > Actions", however there are problems: >> > >> > 1. I want very quickly (i.e. at a single click) see what all the other >> > tasks within the project are. And in order to to this in MLO using/not >> > using Show Next Actions, I would need to *change workarea* (i.e. tab). >> > And this is rather clunky. >> > >> > 2. The project name "HOUSE ORGANISED" *must *be made into a MLO Project >> > (e.g. using Alt+J) . This is only a slight pain but... >> > >> > 3. Any other parent tasks that have not been made into MLO Projects >> > simply disappear from the "Show Next Actions" view! Which can be >> > extremely confusing. >> > >> > 4. In any case rather than all being on the one line, it would then >> take >> > up two lines which wastes precious vertical space: i.e. >> > Line 1: HOUSE ORGANISED >> > Line 2: - Clear bedroom >> > instead of just: >> > Line 1: HOUSE ORGANISED - Clear bedroom >> > >> > >> > My conclusion is that in many cases I would prefer to not bother with >> > allocating formal MLO Project, and not bother with having to change >> > tabs, I would like to have sub-tasks within a task and simply manually >> > append the next task on the list onto the project's name. >> > >> > But how can I do this in MLO? >> > >> > Cheers >> > >> > J >> > >> > -- >> > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >> > Groups "MyLifeOrganized" group. >> > To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send >> > an email to [email protected] >> > <mailto:[email protected]>. >> > To post to this group, send email to [email protected] >> > <mailto:[email protected]>. >> > Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/mylifeorganized. >> > To view this discussion on the web visit >> > >> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/mylifeorganized/16bd53fd-5ea3-449a-b4be-2ffb3b1f291d%40googlegroups.com >> >> > < >> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/mylifeorganized/16bd53fd-5ea3-449a-b4be-2ffb3b1f291d%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer>. >> >> >> > For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout. >> > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MyLifeOrganized" group. 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