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subtasks
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luispfonseca

Posted: Mar 06, 2011
Score: 0 Reference
Hello everyone,

(I'm a new guy here, been using this for, maybe, 7 weeks and can't imagine now my life without this; everything has been going much more smoothly, and not only my prodcutivity increased, but most important my stress level decreased a lot. This was realy the first time I could the whole GTD idea thing working, after almost a year of failed attempts.)

Anyway, I'm now experimenting the week free pro trial to get a feel for the extra features and consider whether they are valuable or not. Only two features are of interest to the use I give to Toodledo: the Scheduler, which is awesome, and subtasks. What I'd like to ask you is to show me where can I read examples on how to use sub tasks. For me, it seems that it's just a neater and cleaner way to organize the tasks if you have many, but that they don't really add much functionality. Where am I wrong, can you show me good examples?

Thanks a lot
PeterW 

Posted: Mar 06, 2011
Score: 0 Reference
Hi lpfo,

I guess it depends upon the way you are using Toodledo. For my GTD implementation, projects (i.e. multi-step tasks) are handled using parent tasks & subtasks. The parent task is the project name and the subtasks are each project action.

I've explained how I have setup Toodledo: http://www.toodledo.com/forums/5/8933/0/the-peter-question-folders-vs-status.html
Salgud

Posted: Mar 07, 2011
Score: 1 Reference
From the non-GTD perspective, I use sub-tasks almost entirely for recurring projects. I have ad-hoc projects that I do here and whenever one comes up, I just take the project template, kept in a "Templates" folder, Mulit-edit the parent task and it's subtasks, moving them to my "Work" folder to be processed in with my normal workflow. Works quite well, saves considerable time.
luispfonseca

Posted: Mar 07, 2011
Score: 0 Reference
PeterW, I'll check your explanation, thanks.

Salgud: that's a good idea, exactly the kind of suggestion I was expecting to hear.

Thanks to both of you :)
splante1

Posted: Mar 07, 2011
Score: 0 Reference
I've got mine setup like the suggested setup for Outlook in some of the David Allen company white papers. I use the context field to separate out next actions from projects. Some of the contexts I use are:

.Projects - list of the projects I am working on
@Agendas - next actions that involve communicating with someone else
@Computer - next actions that require a computer
@Errands - next actions that are errands
@Home - next actions that can be done at home
@Waiting for - next actions that I'm waiting for others to complete
Someday/Maybe - things I would like to do in the future, but am not working on currently

The period in front of Projects makes sure it is at the top and the @ in the action lists make sure they are grouped together.

I've tried subtasks, but it makes it hard for me to get the right granularity for my next actions. A lot of projects do not necessarily need you to plan out every next action. I will sometimes put an outline in the notes field to serve as a project plan for my project tasks if I need more of a plan. David Allen often says that the next action can be thought of as a stake in the ground that you use to help you figure out where you are. For most projects, once you get going on the very next action, the next steps will follow. The key is to have all of the next actions, the next possible steps, somewhere you will have access to them.


This message was edited Mar 07, 2011.
luispfonseca

Posted: Mar 12, 2011
Score: 0 Reference
I use contexts for places or activities (home, outside, study) and folders for projects/areas (personal, career, learning a new language). I'm not entirely sold on using subtasks but I'll keep them for a while to really test what I can do and then reevaluate.

Thank you all. It is with great satisfaction that I report that today I became a pro subscriber to Toodledo.

Thanks to the developers and to everyone who helps here at the forums.
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