I love OmniFocus

[SpiralOcean]

Here are some of my favorite things:

1. Ability to search! Great for when I need to see if I already have something added or to find something quickly.

2. Keyboard support!
Using the tab is extremely fast. Entering the dates is mind numbing easy.
Still some improvements needed, but the core is there.
Hitting enter to create new tasks/projects.

3. Crossing out tasks when I have completed them!
Gives me a sense of satisfaction when completing.

4. Clean Up!
Allows me to wipe the slate clean.

5. Numbers to show me what is coming up and what is due.
Keeps me on target and motivated.

6. Filter bar!
Allows me the flexibility of slicing and dicing for my needs at the moment.

7. Focus!
Allows me to gear down and focus on one thing, or on a folder such as work or home.

8. Emailing items to my OF inbox!
Great way for me to get things out of my head & add items when I am out and about and have a brainstorm.

9. Mail clippings.
Allows me to capture actions from email and move them to OF!

The list goes on and on...

[SpiralOcean]

10. Having a Review option.
Allows me to set different review times and makes reviewing fun. Moves reviewed items away from my today focus, this helps if I get interrupted.

[SpiralOcean]

11. Pending & On Hold Project designation
gets projects that are someday/maybe out of my way. I can also use the review feature on those someday/maybe projects when doing my weekly review.

In other systems I would create another project called someday maybe, and move projects to that project so they would be subprojects. whew

[SpiralOcean]

12. Ability to view completed projects by date!
I've never had this before. It's extremely satisfying to view my completed projects to see what I have completed! Especially with the date groupings of last week, last month, last 6 months.

[SpiralOcean]

13. Underlying Database format!
For all the actions I have in OF, it is still quite speedy.

[SpiralOcean]

14. Quick Entry Box!
Finally... I can push actions out of my brain & directly into my inbox without having to develop a forth party solution!

[SpiralOcean]

15. Projects are searched for within an action!
This is huge. With a couple keystrokes I can search to see if a project exists for my action! The search algorithm is incredible! Example: If I have a project called Test Omni Focus. I type in tof and the project is selected!

Not to mention if the project doesn't exist I can create the project from within the action!

[OOO]

#0: I can plan my projects as sequential steps, but then group everything by context when it's time to "get things done".

(Yeah, kinda obvious, but hey, that's my favorite part of OF).

[pjb]

+1 Perspectives (on the toolbar with custom icons, to boot).

[davisre]

12. Ability to view completed projects by date!
I've never had this before. It's extremely satisfying to view my completed projects to see what I have completed! Especially with the date groupings of last week, last month, last 6 months.

Just curious: what view bar settings do you use to see this. Sounds nice.

Also, how do people typically mark a project as completed? I find that I often have empty projects (actually projects full of completed actions) that hang around until I mark them as completed in the Inspector. But that seems a little clunky, not as satisfying as checking them off.

[curt.clifton]

Also, how do people typically mark a project as completed? I find that I often have empty projects (actually projects full of completed actions) that hang around until I mark them as completed in the Inspector. But that seems a little clunky, not as satisfying as checking them off.

Right-click the project and choose Completed.

[SpiralOcean]

Just curious: what view bar settings do you use to see this. Sounds nice.

Also, how do people typically mark a project as completed? I find that I often have empty projects (actually projects full of completed actions) that hang around until I mark them as completed in the Inspector. But that seems a little clunky, not as satisfying as checking them off.

In the project view:
make the view filter visible
select completed for the projects (top left)
group by completed (second from the left)

[SpiralOcean]

16. Full blown applescript support!
For people like curt clifton to enhance OF. :-)
And for people who want to tweak OF in some way that Omni may not support.

[pictor]

2. Keyboard support!
Using the tab is extremely fast. Entering the dates is mind numbing easy.


How do you use the keyboard for date entry?

This is driving me bonkers...I can use the keyboard up to the point I have to put in due date, then I stall.

[Craig]

How do you use the keyboard for date entry?

just tab over to the column and type "friday," "tomorrow," "12/4," "Dec 10," etc.

[SpiralOcean]

just tab over to the column and type "friday," "tomorrow," "12/4," "Dec 10," etc.

yep... or

t will work for tomorrow
fri will work for friday
t+3 will work for today plus three days
jan will work for january of this year (small bug. Someday it will work for january of the next year)
dec will work for december of this year

and my new favorite...
071201
will work for 12/01/2007

[brianogilvie]

How do you use the keyboard for date entry?

This is driving me bonkers...I can use the keyboard up to the point I have to put in due date, then I stall.

If you haven't activated showing start and due date columns, then I feel your pain! Go to View > Columns and then choose the columns you want to show: Start Date, Due Date, and Estimate. Once they're visible, you can tab to them just as you do from action to context or project.

[brianogilvie]

SpiralOcean: thanks for the list! It was nice to see, especially now that the forums are full of new users who are encountering some of the UI quirks that we've had half a year to get used to.

[Craig]

yep... or

t will work for tomorrow

t gets me today rather than tomorrow.

[SpiralOcean]

t gets me today rather than tomorrow.

my mistake. :-)
tom is tomorrow

another one I found was
jan 1 08

I love that format. Mostly because I don't like typing the /
But it's not /'s fault.

[SpiralOcean]

17. Projects with future dates automatically get put into the pending project filter.

This one drove me crazy today.
I had always seen that pending project filter, but didn't know how to get a project into it or what it was for.

Today I changed a project to have a future start date (I just started using start dates) and the project disappeared. I panicked for about 5 min thinking my project had been deleted. I kept reproducing it over and over... until I looked up at my project filter, and changed it from active to pending. Bravo!

There it was. I like getting those projects out of my active projects list.

Although... it would be cool to have some kind of visual indication to what had happened. Like it swooping over to... hmm... there's nothing for it to swoop to. Okay... maybe like a horizontal twist so that it disappears. But then I would also probably want some indication when things are deleted. Like it being shredded. :-)

[SpiralOcean]

18. Another cool thing I love about OmniFocus. I can have two project files open, select multiple projects, and then drag them to another project and they are added.

This is gorgeous!

[SpiralOcean]

19. Backup files! More than once I've been saved by the OmniFocus backup files. This is something that iTunes doesn't have. Although there is time machine, now. Which I haven't started using due to the gobs of data I have. Maybe I'll fool around with Time Machine. I've been using Retrospect, another backup software that is extremely customizable. Anyway...

And here is where Omni bangs it on the head! Backups. Out the wazoo. Bang on!

[coconino]

20. I have tested ninety-seven builds of OmniFocus since May and it has crashed numerous times, yet none of my data has been lost. I feel very secure about my data in OmniFocus.