Importing nested tasks (that is, with an indent level) and notes from a text file

[Rodrigo de Salvo Braz]

Hello all,

Is there a way to import tasks from a tab-delimited text with nesting (indent level) and note information?

It seems that the MLO tab-delimited import only takes flat lists of items, and does not not take notes.

My tab-delimited file has 3 fields

- indent level (0, 1, 2, ...)
- item description
- note

I would like to have the first field indicate the nesting of the item in relation to its parent, and to have the third field be stored in the item's note.

I installed MindManager to see if I could import the text file there, and export it as an XML file for MLO, but MindManager does not import text files.

Any ideas on how I can do this?

Thanks,

Rodrigo

[Dwight Arthur]

Hi, I can get you part way there. In the user guide, look up "Rapid Task Entry" and you will learn how to use the RTE popup. In "Options" turn on "multiple task entry". Then, use copy and paste to move indented text into the RTE popup and click the "add _x_ tasks" button. Your tasks will be added as a hierarchy with the first task as the root and the subsequent tasks added according to number of indents. Note that this requires actual tabs, it will not work with a field containing a number representing the number of indents. Also, I do not think that there's a way to populate an MLO task's Notes field via RTE.

-Dwight

[Stéph]

Hello Dwight. If that won't import notes, then it won't be any more functional than Task - Advanced - Paste text as subtasks menu options. Mind you, there is an option to set MLO to put anything more than 'x' characters into the note field when parsing something pasted into the RTE input box - that may help.

I don't think there is a quick way to import tasks with their notes. I've asked Andrey to consider Markdown or OPML import on the iPad, to bring items in from mind maps created in iThoughts or other apps. If there are enough votes for it, perhaps he'll improve task import.

The other hope is that we'll find an MLO user who knows how to write XSLT templates for converting items to and from MLO.