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Search results for "Posted by Folke X"
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Folke X |
Posted Sep 02, 2011 in: From 2 to 3 logical levels in Search
Score: 0
In Toodledo there are currently two logical levels available when you specify a search. At the highest level you select AND or OR ("all" or "any"), and at the second level - in each darker blue block - any additional conditions automatically get the opposite type (OR or AND).
This is a very handy and easy way to set up saved searches - overall much better than RTM, where you have to set up the whole structure manually using some kind of "programming language", but RTM does have one little thing going for it - the capability to nest search criteria to virtually any logical level. I sometimes miss the ability to simply include or exclude something within one of the blocks of my 2-level searches. Not having a third level causes quite a lot of unnecessary repetition. I think it would be fully adequate, and fully in line with Toodledo's very user-friendly structure for how searches are set up, to simply extend the number of logical levels from two to three, where the 3rd level would be opposite to the 2nd level (and same as the 1st). In other words, You would set up either an AND-OR-AND hierarchy or an OR-AND-OR hierarchy. This message was edited Sep 02, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Posted Sep 02, 2011 in: Include/Exclude Saved Search in Saved Search
Score: 0
(EDIT: This is a feature request, not a question, but I made a mistake and cannot change the icon from blue question mark to yellow light bulb.)
____________________________________ One neat little feature in RTM and their "smart lists" (i.e their saved searches, or "custom views" as I prefer to call them) is: The capability to specify in the smart list's selection critera that you want to include or exclude any tasks that are identified by some other particular smart list's selection criteria. This is useful when you have many lists with complex criteria, and wish to avoid unnecessary repetition. Let's say you have made a saved search with half a page of selection criteria. And you want to keep this as it is, because you are going to be using this often. Then you realize that you also need something quite similar. Then, obviously, it would be very handy to be able to specify in Toodledo, in the Search criteria: Saved Search | is | NameOfMyPreviousList OR any criteria for widening the selection AND any criteria for narrowing down the selection Cute, huh. This message was edited Sep 02, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Just click on the Tag field and write whatever you like.
Can't find the Tag field? - in Grid mode (column mode, like Excel) it is a directly visible "cell" in the "table" - in Multi-line mode, you must first click the little arrow on the left to "unhide" all the fields - if it is not visible, then in Settings/Tasks you can make sure the Tag field is enabled - when you "Add Task" (just to the left of Quick add box) all enabled fields will be available - in the Quick add box I don't think you can specify a tag This message was edited Sep 02, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Just change the due date.
Comment: From a general point of view, my advice would be to use due dates only when they have a "real" external meaning, usually relating to other people. For your own purely personal scheduling I would advise you to use some other variable. As for myself, I use Status for this purpose (always - even if the task also happens to have a due date). Others use Priority, or even Context, Goal or any of the other variables to set up their "queue". By using this kind of "relative" timing you don't have to constantly readjust the dates - you just process your "queue" (your "pipeline"; your "ladder"). The only changes you need to do is occasionally move items up or down the "ladder". This message was edited Sep 02, 2011. |
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Folke X |
No, don't delete it - just check off the checkbox on the left.
If you actually want to erase it off the system completely, you can click the other little icon on the left and choose Delete. No drag-and-drop, but you don't need that for this purpose. If you have set the task to repeat weekly, it will do so automaticaly when you check it off. So in your case, if you didn't do the task this week, you could simply check it off anyway, and it will autorepeat next week. Or there are other settings available to, e.g. conditional repeat etc. - see the help section. This message was edited Sep 02, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Posted Sep 02, 2011 in: GTD setup with toodledo and Ultimate To-Do List for Android
Score: 0
Pablo,
There are so many ways to organize things that I really do not dare to say for sure what will work for you, but here are a couple of my thoughts: Projects: I am aware that "project" is a key concept in many people's setup. I use projects too, but more as an occasional "add-on" than a fundamental organizing principle. I perceive my life and work more as a big bunch of miscellaneous (half-independent) tasks that I need to "herd" forward. Very often, each individual task can serve many purposes (goals, projects etc) - a precondition or platform for all kinds of of further development. But I do use a project approach whenever there is a large number of tasks that I often want to look at as a whole. In those cases I use the Goal field to keep them together. (The Folder field I use more as a fall-back or last-resort structure, if I get totally lost or something - I have a dozen or so permanent "areas" such as Family-admin, work-marketing etc. by which I can locate things if all else fails.) Key fields, sorting and display: Either way, regardless of how you do with projects, you also need to think through how you want to set up all the rest. You did not describe this in your post. It all really needs to be worked out and seen as a "system" of fields and display options - not just Folder/project. The single most important thing is to implement some mechanism or other for ordering your tasks with respect to time. This can be done in lots of different ways, but it needs to be there in one form or another, and whatever mechanism you choose will have consequences for how you set up all the rest. Personally, I rely on Status (for timing) and a Work/Private tag as my main (mandatory) fields (along with Folder, my "backup" field). I also use due date and context for some tasks, whenever relevant. I also use priority as a pure "gain" indicator (benefit/effort - totally unrelated to timing aspects) to speed up my reviews a bit. I also make extensive use of the task notes and the wording of the task name to speed up my reviews, i.e. my recurring reassessments of what to go ahead with next. I rely almost completely on customized views (aka saved searches) for anything I do frequently, which makes my lists shorter and saves me time. This message was edited Sep 02, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Maybe you can also use this (temporary) workaround:
Right-click the link and select "open in a new tab". |
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Folke X |
Posted Sep 01, 2011 in: Recent - not sorting by hidden date field
Score: 0
Further correction - another thing I did not think of before I opened ny big mouth:
By sorting the "Recently modified" list by "Date modified" (using the Sort dropdown) and including Completed tasks (using the Show dropdown) I seem to get exactly the list I want - all tasks that have been either added or modified or completed, beginning with the latest one. All these settings then remain in place automatically. As soon as I hit "Main" I get this list, and I don't seem to have to set up the filters or sort order or anything again. (Luckily, I do not use the other views under Main, because then I would have to fiddle with the sorting order etc every time I switch to another view, but as it is now it works perfectly.) So, thanks Purveyor for pointing me in the right directon! And I also think Toodledo drew the right conclusion when the same subject was brought up at an earlier time (which I found in the forum) that this whole issue really boils down to the old request that list settings should be on a per individual view basis rather for a group of views as a whole. To some extent it is also related to my own suggestion that the top of the left-hand menu should hold a set of user-selected Favorite Views, some of which could be out-of-the-box views (such as Recently modified) and some of which could be customized views (saved searches, such as personal hotlists for various purposes). The reason why these two different requests are related is the fact that it "costs" yet another couple of unnecessary clicks to also have to move up and down the hierarchy of views to get from one part of it to another. With a list of favorite views at the very top, each one individually having its own sort and show criteria etc, it would be as smooth as it ought to be to gho ahead and work with the tasks from the various perspectives that the individual user would most frequently need. This message was edited Sep 01, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Posted Aug 31, 2011 in: Recent - not sorting by hidden date field
Score: 0
I found a workaround. I already had a "Completed Today" saved search that I modified such that it also includes Added Today and Modified Today - three-in-one, just for today. I usually find errors quite shortly after they were made.
Most days I will probably get so few tasks in this all-comprising "Recent.." list that I will not need any particular sorting order at all (not very often, anyway). This message was edited Aug 31, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Posted Aug 31, 2011 in: Recent - not sorting by hidden date field
Score: 0
Oops, sorry, I didn't see that. My mistake. Thanks for telling.
But I still think it should be automatic - because if not, if I have to do it via the sort menu, then why would I go to a special view first, if I can do it from anywhere? |
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Folke X |
My direct URL (from FF Home screen settings) reads:
http://www.toodledo.com/views/search.php Maybe there is yet another one that takes you straight to the one you wanted (due date). Try to go to the screen you prefer, copy the URL, and paste it into the bookmark/icon/shortcut that you use, and see if it works. |
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Folke X |
Posted Aug 31, 2011 in: Recent - not sorting by hidden date field
Score: 0
OK, this maybe is not a bug, maybe just an instance of poor design, or maybe I missed something somewhere, but in either case:
There are views for Recently Added, Recently Completed etc. In principle this is very good. It would be very useful to have, if they worked. It would help you find mistakes etc that you recently did, so that you can correct them. The key word here is Recent. Obviously you would want to see these lists sorted by "date changed", with the most recently changed ones at the top, because that is where you will tend to look for your most recent mistakes (changes). As it is now, you get the list sorted by "Importance", which has nothing to do with when you made the mistake (i.e. changed the item). And you cannot change the sorting order to "date changed" because this field cannot even be enabled in Settings. And even if it could be enabled I would not want to have this date permanently clutter all my screens. The only time I can think of that I even need this field to exist is for these particular "find recent" views. So, a special hidden implicit sorting order is called for in these lists - otherwise they serve little or no real purpose. This message was edited Aug 31, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Even though we like Toodledo very much, there are things we would like to have on top of that. And these things take time and money to develop. When reading the forum it becomes obvious that we all often look for very different things.
I suggest that Pro functions be implemented according to certain groups of functionality, such that the entry price remains pretty much unchanged (say $15 like today), but the total price increases for users who want to have full access to all the various kinds of new functionality. (There should be a discount structure, though, such that those who subscribe to many different Pro packages gradually get a lower price per package.) Remember, the reason I am suggesting this is because I understand that Toodledo needs income to live and to develop, and if we all get something we want in return, then I do not see why we should not be willing to contribute to sustaining a faster rate of development of the specific types of functionality that each one of us personally feels that he or she wants. Here are some tentative suggestions for such packages, in general at $15 each, but cheaper and cheaper the more of them you buy: Free service More or less as it is today, with some sporadic develepment at the rate it has been going over the past few years. Pro Classic Essentially the current Pro package - a mixed package with certain small enhancements to the free version. Pro Sharing There are many requests for advanced sharing and collaboration features, assignment of responsibilities, checking off the tasks of others etc, and probably this functionality can be taken to higher and higher levels. Pro Projects Similarly, there are many requests for advanced project management functionality, such as keeping track of hours for each worker, critical path, parallel and sequential tasks, automatic scheduling of next tasks, sub-projects and multi-level subtasks etc etc. Pro Views (Pro "Search and Display") This is the kinds of stuff that almost all of my own suggestions are about - ways to customize even more powerful selections, dashboard multi-seraches with customized dividers, multilevel logical search definitions, highlighting of list items based on different kinds of criteria - anything that makes it possible to select and see better exactly the things you want to be able to see. Pro Sync There are soooo many kinds of apps and devices out there ..... Pro Capacity Probably the current Plus package, making it possible to store more info than the other packages permit. Well, those were just a few possibilities. Obviously, there would have to be some degree of overlap between the packages (some functions can serve more than one purpose), which is one of the strong reasons why there needs to be a discount structure in place for those who buy more packages. ... and one more thing: Limited Free Sharing? Sharing is an excellent way to get new users to try Toodledo - if it is free to try. If there is a way to limit the "power" of this free sharing, while still making it meaningful to use at least for small and simple things, it could become both a useful new feature for the existing free community (say, for family use) as well as a very powerful promotion mechanism. In this way, I believe it would be possible to get entirely new users to sign up, some of which may choose to become Pro users, but even if they do not, they may continue to invite others. There would be limited functionality, true, but no costs or time limits creeping up on them, so Toodledo might become something they (we all!!) could make a habit of promoting perpetually in this way. (Maybe the limit could be a certain total number of tasks shared? And/or a limit for shared tasks for each collaborator? And/or max collaborators? And(or certain advanced features blocked? Something like that.) This message was edited Aug 31, 2011. |
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Folke X |
@steve
You can hide it under Settings / Tasks / Display Preferences This message was edited Aug 31, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Posted Aug 30, 2011 in: Needed: individual subtask settings (views) for each search
Score: 0
Yes, it is my opinion, too, that all such choices should be on a per-view basis (not for Search as a whole).
It probably would be most convenient both for the developers and for the users if this was implemented in such a way that the choices were "auto-remembered" individually for each search rather than explicitly saved by the user for each search - or could I be wrong here? |
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Folke X |
Although it does not matter all that much to me personally, as I have already found my way around here with Toodledo, I still feel it would be in the best interest of new users and of Toodledo as a business and therefore of the Toodledo community as a whole to review and modify the usage of the term Search and some related words.
The word Search, to me, makes me think of something I do on an ad-hoc basis, when I need to look for something special that just popped up in my mind that I normally do not look for specifically. In Toodledo, whenever this situation arises, an ad-hoc search, I either use the Quick Search or I use the standard view-by-x views, usually Folder, and search optically on the screen. Therefore, it might be worthwhile to consider using the term Search for all these modes of finding tasks. In Toodledo, there is also a very powerful mechanism called Search, where you can even save your searches and use them as often as you want. Obviously, saving a search is nothing you would typically do for an ad-hoc search. The kinds of "searches" you actually save are the ones you intend to use on a daily basis to manage your life. In other words, they are your "favorite customized views" that you use either instead of, or as a complement to, the predefined views. Personally, I rely totally on "saved searches" for all my normal things, such as all my hotlists for "Today at work", "Planning overview" etc etc. I hardly ever leave Search. I use the "standard views" only occasionally when I need to do an ad-hoc search, e.g. find a misplaced item. This might seem a bit upside-down, but the question is whether it is really this usage of Toodledo that is upside-down. In my opinion is is rather the terminology that is upside-down. I understand from the forum that a substantial number of users use saved searches in pretty much the same way I do, so I know I am not alone. The current terminology obscures the fact that Toodledo has one of the most powerful customization feature sets in the market. I believe it would benefit the whole Toodledo community to consider: - renaming Search and saved searches to something more descriptive of their actual important main use: "customized views", "streamlined views", "personal workflow views" or something similar. - renaming the out-of-the-box views (all the view-by-x views and the special-purpose views) to something more descriptive like "standard views", "singular views" or "manual search views" or simply "More views.." (As far as I am concerned they could all be moved one click further away - they do not need such a predominant and potentially confusing presence on every screen.) - demonstrating the customization potential more clearly, and allowing more frequent one-click access to frequently used views, by substituting the whole fixed "View by" upper portion of the left side bar with a new set of fixed options: first (or maybe last), two new fixed options "Custom views" and "Standard views", both of which would open their respective wealth of further choices (just like today), and thereafter a fixed number, say 12, of reprogrammable "Favorite views", each of which would open the respective view directly (no more clicks). This would make 14 fixed lines in total. For a new user the 12 "favorite views" would be a selection of some of the more commonly used standard views (and maybe some sample predefined "saved searches" - just to illustrate the customization potential), but these "favorite views" would be replaceable at any time by the individual user (e.g. via the Organize menu) once he or she has learned how to use "saved searches" and/or has had the time to try out more of the out-of-the-box views. This message was edited Aug 30, 2011. |
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Folke X |
Posted Aug 30, 2011 in: Three Tips for Streamlined Toodedo Usage
Score: 0
I also use Goals for projects. It has worked very well for me so far. It seems to give me "total control" of how I select and display tasks (i.e search and sort tasks), just as you say.
Also, I am a bit scared of sub-tasks for many different reasons. One reason is the fact that there is always (at least in other systems, e.g. Todoist) additional separate fiddling required for whether you want the tasks collapsed or expanded, indented or not indented, etc. I prefer to set it all up as a saved search. As for waiting: What I do is I set the Status to Waiting or Delegated and set a due date for when I need to check up with them. I have had no problems with this setup. I suppose the difference is that I make use of the Status field generally - for pipelining, sorting and "everything" - whereas you don't. This means that for me the Waiting Status fits well into the overall picture, whereas for you it is an awkward oddity sticking out just for handling this particular kind of case. |
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Folke X |
@mike
"Next action" is the GTD term for what you or I perhaps more intuitively would have termed "current action", "immediate action", "first action", "now active" or something like that - in other words the first to be done. I suppose it is smart of Toodledo to adhere to GTD terminology (despite its peculiarities) since GTD has quite a few followers. In addition, Toodledo have implemented a number of other statuses, some of which are definitely GTD and some of which are perhaps their own enhancements (but I don't know for sure, as I never read the GTD book). The statuses Active and Hold I believe are Toodledo's own inventions, and I make use of them to identify the second and third wave in my main pipeline. Actually, I make use of all the statuses, almost all of them the way they were probably intended. I think they are very useful. As for sorting, I think your problem actually begins before that. First of all you need to create a saved search for what you really want to see (and don't want to see). This you might call a hotlist. Actually you will probably need several such saved searches, as you probably need a variety of predefined hotlists for different purposes, such as Today's work, today's private, week ahead, while out and about, etc ...) For a "today" type hotlist you would typically select the tasks that have: due date before tomorrow OR status is next action OR whatever other things you would like to include. (In my case I have some error checking that catches any incompletely entered tasks, and this mechanism also serves as a temporary inbox in case I am too busy to enter all task details straight away.) For a "some time ahead" type hotlist you might alter your scope a bit, for example: due before tomorrow or in the next 15 days status is next action or active or planning but perhaps exclude trivial routine reminders You can have a second and a third sorting order in addition to the primary one (see the navy blue bar). I normally have Star as my second sorting order. I use the Star to increase the "granularity" of the status, perhaps especially on a temporary basis (it is so quick to turn off and on), but also to maintain some degree of uniformity when occasionally I change the primary sorting order, say, from Status to Goal. This message was edited Aug 29, 2011. |
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Folke X |
You can acutually enter a much longer text (although you cannot see it all while typing)
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Folke X |
Posted Aug 26, 2011 in: The Ability To Hide Left Frame
Score: 0
I think they already did. It is under Settings.
This message was edited Aug 26, 2011. |