The issue of not being able manipulate Start and Due Dates with hotkeys

[Josh P.]

I decided I would spend some time revisiting this issue that has resulted in a definite decrease of enjoyment using this product. Years ago a fellow named Jon created an advanced set of Auto Hotkey scripts called MLO Hotkeys and one of the key features was a set of shortcut keys that allowed automatically setting start and due dates of specific intervals. I would personally always choose the option of having the Start Date set to todays date when changing a due date as it is a key part of the way I do filtering for to do lists.

Ever since MLO Hotkeys stopped working with newer versions of MLO the ability to manipulate Start and Due Dates has been sorely lacking and the speed at which I use MLO has decreased. All that I really require is the ability to set both the Start and Due dates to Todays date as a starting point and from there the ability to change the due date using hotkeys WITHOUT affecting the start date. It seems like a simple thing but today we don't even have a hotkey to set the start date.

I have several questions and debated creating multiple threads but i've decided to contain this to a single thread for now. 

It appears that there is no longer the ability to change the due date hotkey and it is set at Alt + D.

In addition there are the following hotkeys that appear to do nothing in my install with the most current version of MLO. What function (if any) do these keys perform? And any ideas as to why they do not do anything on my install?:

Insert Date/Time  F4

Insert Time           Ctrl + T

Insert Date           Shift + Ctrl + T

Does anyone use any hotkeys, AutoHotkey scripts, or other methods to manipulate start and due dates in MLO?

Thanks,

Josh

[Josh P.]

How about even a simple AutoHotkey script that would set the Start Date to Todays date and work with recurrences?  Anyone?

[Josh P.]

OK, I figured out that these functions input text into the notes field. Not related to what I am looking to do.

[Josh P.]

I also see where you can set the hotkey for "Set due date to Today" as you always have been able to do. Still looking into scripting for setting the Start date. Any help appreciated.

[Josh P.]

Making more progress on my own. I just found a hidden hotkey Alt + S that set the start date to today !!! Not sure why this is not published nor can it be changed. I've noticed some interesting behavior. 

If you have a Due date set and then hit Alt + S it will set the start and due date to todays date.

If you have both the Start and Due date set to todays date you can use the Ctrl + = to advance both dates. But then if you hit Ctrl + - only the start date moves back but the Due date does not change. 

Very interesting. Not sure if this is good or bad. It may work well for what I am trying to do and i'll have to play with it some.

Ctrl + = and Ctrl + - do not work with recurring dates unfortunately. However, hitting Alt + S or Alt + D when you have a recurrence will open the recurrence dialog box.

Please, more investigation and feedback from others. Especially on scripting to improve this.

[Stéph]

Hello Josh. I thought I'd come and keep you company. I don't really have a solution for you, though.

I often use Alt-S and Alt-D to set start and due dates, but tend to type text, because I'm reasonably quick at touch typing. It can parse expressions like "today" and "next Friday", which is good enough for me. I did also start experimenting with terms like "+1", but haven't completely got the hang of which terms work, yet.

F4 is very useful for date-stamping comments in the Notes field, by the way.

Stéphane

[Andrei]

Hello Josh
I have replied to you in another thread ("Looking for your favorite hotkey....").
The modified script can change the due date without affecting the start date.(ctrl+1,2,3 etc).

Unfortunately the start date can't be changed with that script.

When I have some time I'll ask for help on autohotkey forum. Maybe the autohotkey Gurus will help.

Best regards
Andrei B

[Josh P.]

Andrei,  I appreciate your post.  I've gotten very busy this week so haven't looked into it further. Finding the Alt + S really helps though so I'm working using this for now until I have more time to investigate some auto hotkey scripting.

[Alexis]

I use some Hotkeys (Macros) for manipulating mainly Start Dates and Times. This is necessary as my tasklist combines a ASAP with a chronological list. My most used functions are:

One hour, Day, Week - later, earlier
Typing directly the time in a window with 1, 2 or 4 Digits (Minutes) and the choosing the date with the build in calendar.

The option to defer tasks easiliy surely is a weakness of MLO.

[Dwight Arthur]

Alexis wrote “The option to defer tasks easiliy surely is a weakness of MLO.” . . .

 

No, I don’t think so. Before I found MLO I was managing my tasks in Microsoft Project and syncing them to my Blackberry. I found then (as I still do) that every day comes with more tasks than I can get done. At the time my tasks were all scheduled, with each one showing when I planned to start and finish it. Every day there would be some tasks that I would have to postpone and other tasks that I would have to re-postpone to make room for the newly postponed tasks. Eventually I found myself spending maybe 25% of my time in any day managing and massaging the dates in my task list. I decided that this was no good, and set out to find a different way to manage tasks that would not lead to this problem. What I found was the “Getting Things Done” methodology with the radical (to me) idea that tasks should not be scheduled unless absolutely necessary. “Lunch with Bill next Tuesday at noon” obviously gets scheduled. I’m allowed to make changes to my health insurance from October 15 through December 7, that should be scheduled at well. But the schedule tells me the period of time when it can be done, not the day on which I’m currently planning to do it. “Buy ink refills” doesn’t get a date, even if I think I will probably get to it tomorrow. After a couple of years of fiddling with importance, goals and flags I am to the point that the stuff at the top of my to-do list is the stuff I need to do today. I spend very little time postponing tasks and I’m really happy to have it that way.

 

By the way, you can quickly postpone a non-recurring task with Ctrl/= or Ctrl/Alt/=, recurring tasks are a whole different issue: are you postponing just the next occurrence or the whole series?

-Dwight

 

[Alexis]

Dear Dwight, nobody want´s to schedule ASAP tasks. Why should one? But if you know you can reach someone at 10:00 and his secretary then says he´s now reachable at 12:00 you need to postpone that task, right? I programmed hotkeys for that. So i just press the one hour defer button twice for defering that task. I think many users would appreciate such a function too. Some taskmanagers offer that functionality.

Actually the problem scheduled tasks vs. ASAP tasks is an interesting one. A thinkable solution would be the possibility to have a chronological sortet list with the option to sort tasks which are not scheduled manually in this list. Let´s open a new thread for that.

BTW Dwight i don´t get your hotkeys. What do i have to press and how much (time) are the selected tasks postponed?

Alex

[Dwight Arthur]

Ctrl/= postpones the selected task one day (24:00) and Ctrl/Alt/= postpones it 7 days.I don't know of a hotkey for postponing one hour and I can see that this would be useful.

If you select a task and you have the task properties palen showing in the right-hand sidebar, you will see a section "timing and reminders". The second line within this Ctrl/Alt/= is the hotkey for next week.

-Dwight