Thank you Dwight! #2 It doesn't filter out, you filter in is what has been messing me up all this time. I just gave up on trying to exclude what I was trying to exclude. This is a huge help! Susannah On Thursday, September 10, 2020 at 11:18:28 AM UTC-4 Dwight wrote:
> Grant asks how to modify a view using Advanced Filters to filter out tasks > with a start time greater than four hours in the future. I'm spelling out > the entire process, including steps that Grant may already know or may have > already performed, in order to make this tutorial more useful to other > people. > > > 1. Find starting view > Find a view which shows exactly what you want except for the fact that > future tasks are still included > > 2. Write a precise description of what you want > MLO uses a "pass filter". It doesn't filter out, you filter in. Don't > describe what you want to exclude, rather you should describe what you > want > to keep. Grant wants to exclude tasks that start more than four hours in > the future. That (probably) means that he wants to keep tasks that > have a start time on or before four hours from now, and also tasks that do > not have a start time > > 3. Bring up the view definition > Look at the sidebar on the left side of your screen. Look at the title > at the top. If it's the name of the view you selected in step one, go to > step 3. The title of the left sidebar will be either the name of some > other > view or the word "views. If you see a view name as the title, click on it > and it will switch to "views". Now, scroll down the sidebar until you find > the name of the view you selected in step one. Click on it. The main > display will switch to show your selected view. Finally go back up to the > sidebar title (should still say "views" and click on it. The sidebar title > should now show the name of the view you selected. > > 4. *Bring up the advanced filter* > The sidebar shows the specifications for your selected view. The > specifications are shown in sections. The first one is called "general". > scan down until you find a section called "Advanced." In this section, you > will find a checkbox called "Add Advanced". Click it to check it. The > button called "Setup" will brighten up and become available. Click it to > bring up a window called "setup advanced filtering". > > 5. *Add a rule* > Click the blue plus in the menu bar. A new rule appears: it looks like > a checkbox followed by four control boxes and three icons > > 6. *Translate your requirement statement to a formula* > Your formula should make use of field names known to MLO. Click on the > first control box after the check box for a list of field names. For a > definition of any of the field names, consult the MLO documentation, but > many of them are self explanatory. In this case we want "StartDateTime". > Click on the field you want and then click into the second box to find out > the tests that are available for this field. Translate the requirement you > wrote in step 2 to a formula using the field names and tests that you have > found. In Grant's case that would be "StartDateTime on-or-before > four-hours-from-now or StartDateTime does-not-exist" . Now go back and > clear out all of the control boxes so they are blank like when you > started. > If necessary, click the red dash (minus sign) at the end of the line to > delete it and the blue plus to get a new blank line. If the boxes have > gone > away leaving a formula in their place, *triple click* the formula to > turn it back into boxes (i.e. make it editable), hit the red minus at the > end of the line to delete the line and the blue plus for a new line. > > 7. *Enter your first test* > The first test in Grant's formula is "StartDateTime on-or-before > four-hours-from-now". In the first box after the check, select > "StartDateTime". In the second box, select "on or before". In the third > box, type "Now + 4h". The conjunction is either And versus Or. In this > case, we want tasks with early start times and also task with no start > times, so the conjunction is "OR" - passing one test or the other test > will > do. Select "or" in the last box. > > 8. *Enter your second test* > Click the blue plus at the end of the line to add a second line. The > formula is "StartDateTime does-not-exist". Enter this in the first two > boxes. The third box is not needed and it will vanish. > > 9. *Save your work* > Click the OK button at the bottom of the advanced filtering window to > save your filter. Then, at the bottom of the left sidebar find a button > that says something about saving or discarding. You want it to say "save > view as". If it doesn't, click the arrow at the right edge of the button, > and select "save view as". Then click the button, and enter a new view > name > for your new view. > > > *Out of scope* > If your formula requires parentheses, like > ((is-goal and start-date has passed) or (has-star and due-date is soon)) > it gets more complicated. Find or request documentation. > > Also, if your starting view already has an advanced filter you need to > make sure that your new test and the existing tests are set up with the > appropriate parentheses and conjunctionc to get the result you want. That's > also out of scope. > > -Dwight > > > > > > > -- 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]. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/mylifeorganized/38d222d4-7d8d-4576-bfde-e2f2b4dcef14n%40googlegroups.com.
