Help: I use manual sorting, and I want new tasks to appear at TOP

[Ram Rachum]

Hello everyone,

I really hope there's a good answer to my problem, because I'm making a new productivity scheme for myself and it depends on this thing working.

I've set up manual sorting in my views. Unsurprisingly, the tasks that I put at the top of my list are the ones that I want to look at first.

Now, my problem is this. Every time I open the RTE dialog and create a new task, I expect it to appear at the top. If a task added by RTE would show up on the bottom, I would never see it because it'll be buried under a bunch of tasks that I'll never do. If I don't have confidence that the task would be given my attention after being put in MLO, I'd be reluctant to put tasks in MLO, which is very bad.

Unfortunately that's exactly what happens. New tasks appear at the bottom of the manual sorting. I desperately want them to appear at the top. How can I do that?

Thanks,

Ram.

[robisme (Olivier R)]

my two cents:

Firstly:

1) you should not have tasks you will "never do". If so, then try to wonder why you won't do them ? are they actionnable? do they need to be subdivised in projects with actionable nex actions?

2) you should always be able to trust MLO. If not, then you may want to make a more intensive use of MLO's power, and perhaps re-think your organisation scheme.

Secondly:

You are in manual sorting, thus actually a place to add, manage, move, etc. your tasks. You can put them wherever you want.

Try to insert your task in the outline instead of the RTE, which can rather be use to feed your Inbox.

Once you are processing the inbox (open the inbox tab, press F3 to open it in a new windows), you have 3 options:

- drag a task to a collapsed branch = the task will be placed at the bottom.

- drag it to an expanded branch (on the name of the branch) = the task will be place at the top.

- drag it wherever you want between two taks of an expanded branch.

Regards,

Olivier

[Ram Rachum]

Thanks for trying, but your advice isn't very helpful to me.

On Tue, May 7, 2013 at 3:41 PM, robisme (Olivier R) <robillar...@gmail.com> wrote:

my two cents:

Firstly:

1) you should not have tasks you will "never do". If so, then try to wonder why you won't do them ? are they actionnable? do they need to be subdivised in projects with actionable nex actions?

I disagree. If I know for a fact that I won't do a task, I won't put it in MLO, but I have about 1,000 tasks that are someday/maybe, and to be realistic, many of them I would never do. I still want to keep them in MLO because I can't know which ones I'll do and which one I won't.

 

2) you should always be able to trust MLO. If not, then you may want to make a more intensive use of MLO's power, and perhaps re-think your organisation scheme.

If MLO had the intensive power of giving me an option to put newly-created tasks at the top, that'd be great. I'd hate to rethink my organization scheme because I think it's great, and having to compromise because of MLO's shortcomings would be bad.

 

Secondly:

You are in manual sorting, thus actually a place to add, manage, move, etc. your tasks. You can put them wherever you want.

Yes, but that would mean that I would have to manually move each and every new task I create to the top of the list.

 

Try to insert your task in the outline instead of the RTE, which can rather be use to feed your Inbox.

I tried using Insert in the outline, the task still gets put at the bottom of the todo list. 

 

Once you are processing the inbox (open the inbox tab, press F3 to open it in a new windows), you have 3 options:

- drag a task to a collapsed branch = the task will be placed at the bottom.

- drag it to an expanded branch (on the name of the branch) = the task will be place at the top.

- drag it wherever you want between two taks of an expanded branch.

If something requires using the mouse for everyday work, it's irrelevant to me. I don't use the mouse.

Regards,

Olivier

Le mardi 7 mai 2013 11:17:14 UTC+2, Ram Rachum a écrit :

Hello everyone,

I really hope there's a good answer to my problem, because I'm making a new productivity scheme for myself and it depends on this thing working.

I've set up manual sorting in my views. Unsurprisingly, the tasks that I put at the top of my list are the ones that I want to look at first.

Now, my problem is this. Every time I open the RTE dialog and create a new task, I expect it to appear at the top. If a task added by RTE would show up on the bottom, I would never see it because it'll be buried under a bunch of tasks that I'll never do. If I don't have confidence that the task would be given my attention after being put in MLO, I'd be reluctant to put tasks in MLO, which is very bad.

Unfortunately that's exactly what happens. New tasks appear at the bottom of the manual sorting. I desperately want them to appear at the top. How can I do that?

Thanks,

Ram.

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[m...@grantsmiths.org]

Hi, Ram.

First, I want to validate your approach of keeping tasks you are never going to do in MLO. I do that, and it feels to me to be totally consistent with the GTD approach of freeing your brain to do something productive by removing the need to hold and manage your task list. There are some tasks that come up repeatedly, like dismantling the swingset my adult children used when they were kids. I would like to do it someday but I know that someday will not come this year and probably not next; there’s a good chance it will not come in my lifetime. By putting the task in the someday/never section of my outline I have dealt with it and I don’t have to spend any more brainpower on it except for an annual review of my “never” tasks.

 

Your situation is unusual because you want manual sorting without using the mouse. The mouse is very useful for tasks like manual sorting. But I think it can be done.

 

I see what you mean about using Insert in Outline. I have a couple of tasks “test1” and “test2” at the top of my outline. I created a manually sorted to-do list and dragged test1 and test2 to the top two positions in the list. Then I went back to the outline, selected the top task (test1), hit the Insert key on my keyboard, and added a task “new”. Back to the to-do view, and “new” was at the bottom. Back to outline, cursor to the top, and used alt-insert to create a subtask of the top task. Back to to-do and subtask was at the bottom. So I see your issue.

 

Question: why go to outline to create the tasks? It’s easy to put a new task at position #2 in the to-do, just <home>,<insert> and type the task name. If I wanted to do this I would create a dummy top-of-list task and insert everything else just below it. Or is there an additional condition we should know about, such as maybe you want to have the tasks appear in a particular structure in the outline that’s different from the order you have them in for the to-do?

-Dwight

[Ram Rachum]

On Tue, May 7, 2013 at 6:19 PM, <m...@grantsmiths.org> wrote:

Hi, Ram.

First, I want to validate your approach of keeping tasks you are never going to do in MLO. I do that, and it feels to me to be totally consistent with the GTD approach of freeing your brain to do something productive by removing the need to hold and manage your task list. There are some tasks that come up repeatedly, like dismantling the swingset my adult children used when they were kids. I would like to do it someday but I know that someday will not come this year and probably not next; there’s a good chance it will not come in my lifetime. By putting the task in the someday/never section of my outline I have dealt with it and I don’t have to spend any more brainpower on it except for an annual review of my “never” tasks.

 

Your situation is unusual because you want manual sorting without using the mouse. The mouse is very useful for tasks like manual sorting. But I think it can be done.

 

I see what you mean about using Insert in Outline. I have a couple of tasks “test1” and “test2” at the top of my outline. I created a manually sorted to-do list and dragged test1 and test2 to the top two positions in the list. Then I went back to the outline, selected the top task (test1), hit the Insert key on my keyboard, and added a task “new”. Back to the to-do view, and “new” was at the bottom. Back to outline, cursor to the top, and used alt-insert to create a subtask of the top task. Back to to-do and subtask was at the bottom. So I see your issue.

 

Question: why go to outline to create the tasks? It’s easy to put a new task at position #2 in the to-do, just <home>,<insert> and type the task name.

There are 2 problems with that:

1. For some reason, when I create a task like this it gets created with urgency somewhere between 2 and 3. I have no idea why. My todo list doesn't show tasks with that low of an urgency.

2. It's much more convenient to insert tasks with the RTE dialog than with the normal MLO interface. (I never advocated inserting tasks in the Outline, it's Olivier who suggested it.)

 

If I wanted to do this I would create a dummy top-of-list task and insert everything else just below it. Or is there an additional condition we should know about, such as maybe you want to have the tasks appear in a particular structure in the outline that’s different from the order you have them in for the to-do?

-Dwight

--

[m...@grantsmiths.org]

Ok, I’m tapped out.

 

To restate, you want a way to enter a new task

-          Entry must be via RTE

-          New task must appear at the top of a manually sorted to-do list

-          Use keyboard only, no mouse

 

I think you would have to request a new keyword in the RTE parsing, like this

New task name @home –s 4d –top

 

But I’m guessing that there are not a lot of other users wishing for this, so it might not get prioritized very high.

-Dwight

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[Lisa Stroyan]

I too would appreciate an option (I think it could be global? Not sure) to add new tasks to the top of manually sorted lists. 

I have no solutions for RTE. 

One of the problems with inserting into a manually sorted list is that they go in the tree next to their sibling.  But you could try this...Add a placeholder task to Inbox, "------- Ins New task ------" or something, move to the top of the view you add things from. Then you can press "Ins" while on that task, and the new task will go just below it.

While I support the idea of keeping "not sure I will ever do this" tasks in MLO, I can't imagine having them be in my daily/working lists. You could consider keeping them in a different list.

--
Lisa

---

Lisa Stroyan, mailto: lstr...@gmail.com

[robisme (Olivier R)]

Ok, I can understand, 

But why do you want to enter your task with the rapid task entry if you often change the destination branch?

What about,instead, going to the branch of your choice and type your shortcut to add a child task? It would directly be placed at the top of your branch.

And you could also filter you view to hide the "someday" tasks to unclutter your space

regards

Olivier

Le mardi 7 mai 2013 11:17:14 UTC+2, Ram Rachum a écrit :

[Ram Rachum]

On Wed, May 8, 2013 at 12:23 AM, robisme (Olivier R) <robillar...@gmail.com> wrote:

Ok, I can understand, 

But why do you want to enter your task with the rapid task entry if you often change the destination branch?

What about,instead, going to the branch of your choice and type your shortcut to add a child task? It would directly be placed at the top of your branch.

One of the things I like about RTE is that the first thing I do is type the task, so I won't forget it. Only then do I have to fiddle with flags, after the task is safely recorded. With your method, I have to fiddle first, and write last, which makes it more likely that I'll forget some details about the task.

(I could write to notepad first and then copy-paste... But that's more work a hundred times a day.)

 

And you could also filter you view to hide the "someday" tasks to unclutter your space

I have no problem showing the "someday" tasks since they are grouped in a flag indicating them as "Unlikely to do". My brain sees the flag and ignores them automatically :)

[robisme (Olivier R)]

sorry, my page wasnt refreshed, and I answerd without having read Dwight an Lisa's messages.

But I still think that you could ad a folder into your manual sorted view and enter your tasks from here.

But I have a second think: in your todo view, manual sorted tasks belongs to differents places, don't they? It's an issue.

[robisme (Olivier R)]

and I almoust never use the mouse neither. I have shortcut to move upd down right left, enter sibling and child task.

[Ram Rachum]

On Wed, May 8, 2013 at 12:43 AM, robisme (Olivier R) <robillar...@gmail.com> wrote:

sorry, my page wasnt refreshed, and I answerd without having read Dwight an Lisa's messages.

But I still think that you could ad a folder into your manual sorted view and enter your tasks from here.

That'll require me to first navigate and only then write the task, which is what I prefer to avoid.

 

But I have a second think:

 I loved the expression "I have a second think" :)

 

in your todo view, manual sorted tasks belongs to differents places, don't they? It's an issue.

I have multiple todo views. The ones where the sorted tasks matter are folder-specific, so there is no such problem.

 

Le mardi 7 mai 2013 23:23:08 UTC+2, robisme (Olivier R) a écrit :

Ok, I can understand, 

But why do you want to enter your task with the rapid task entry if you often change the destination branch?

What about,instead, going to the branch of your choice and type your shortcut to add a child task? It would directly be placed at the top of your branch.

And you could also filter you view to hide the "someday" tasks to unclutter your space

regards

Olivier

Le mardi 7 mai 2013 11:17:14 UTC+2, Ram Rachum a écrit :

Hello everyone,

I really hope there's a good answer to my problem, because I'm making a new productivity scheme for myself and it depends on this thing working.

I've set up manual sorting in my views. Unsurprisingly, the tasks that I put at the top of my list are the ones that I want to look at first.

Now, my problem is this. Every time I open the RTE dialog and create a new task, I expect it to appear at the top. If a task added by RTE would show up on the bottom, I would never see it because it'll be buried under a bunch of tasks that I'll never do. If I don't have confidence that the task would be given my attention after being put in MLO, I'd be reluctant to put tasks in MLO, which is very bad.

Unfortunately that's exactly what happens. New tasks appear at the bottom of the manual sorting. I desperately want them to appear at the top. How can I do that?

Thanks,

Ram.

--

[robisme (Olivier R)]

I'm not english native, so I may have awkward expressions;-)

But where is your new task supposed to end up ?

Do you often change the parent in the RTE ? then what is the difference with having your task in a "Inbox" and move them later?. I mean, RTE doesn"t allow you to enter task in a "view" but in a "branch". 

Oh, I imagine you enter the taks while you are not actually in MLO, so RTE is the fastest way to enter it, I get it: you are working on another stuff, then a task is coming, hurry get the RTE, type your task, and then, choose the place. And here is the problem : it ends up at the bottom of this place.

I have no more idea, and it could be great to have an option in the RTE to choose top or bottom.

[Ram Rachum]

On Wed, May 8, 2013 at 1:08 AM, robisme (Olivier R) <robillar...@gmail.com> wrote:

I'm not english native, so I may have awkward expressions;-)

But where is your new task supposed to end up ?

It's supposed to end up on the top of the green-flag 3-urgency group in the folder-specific view.

 

Do you often change the parent in the RTE ? then what is the difference with having your task in a "Inbox" and move them later?

I'm confused about the difference between which 2 things you mean... But never mind, I think we spent too much time and there isn't really a better way than what we discussed.

 

. I mean, RTE doesn"t allow you to enter task in a "view" but in a "branch". 

Oh, I imagine you enter the taks while you are not actually in MLO, so RTE is the fastest way to enter it, I get it: you are working on another stuff, then a task is coming, hurry get the RTE, type your task, and then, choose the place. And here is the problem : it ends up at the bottom of this place.

I have no more idea, and it could be great to have an option in the RTE to choose top or bottom.

So we're agreed :)