Repeating options?

[TimothyMDean]

It would be really nice if the repeat settings for an action were a little more robust. Many tools I've worked with allow recurring events to be scheduled on things like the first Tuesday of the month, the last day of the month, etc.

Any way to set up actions this way in OF? I'm particularly interested in a recurring daily action that only occurs on weekdays to describe things I need to do every day at work.

- Tim

[Tim Wood]

Right now we leave the more complicated scheduling to iCal, though your request (daily on work days) seems common enough that we should look at that specific case. Logged as <bug://bugs/43583> (Add options for tasks to repeat only on certain days)

[Maurice]

This is something i would like to see in a future version. For example, i would want to do my monthly review always on the first sunday of every month.

[steve]

I would like to vote for the "recur on certain day" feature.

[pjb]

Another approach would be to have aspects which could be set for each Context such as "active during weekdays only between 9AM and 5PM" but that approach can quickly slip into tagging.

[slinberg]

Another vote for this, please. I want to set a repeating task (my monthly review) to "the first Sunday of every month".

Please! Thanks.

[sabeke]

Yet another vote for this feature...

I have a task I do every Monday and Thursday.

I have a task I do every other Friday.

I have a task I do every work day.

I would like to be able to set them all up in OmniFocus so that they automatically appear on the day they are due.

Thanks!

[gary]

Another request for this feature. To just be able to set a task to happen every monday and thursday for example would be great (and I wouldn't consider that 'complicated scheduling').

[Lizard]

gary & sabeke: you can get a Monday/Thursday repeat by having 2 tasks; one on Monday and one on Thursday and have them each repeat every 1 week.

[jamespro]

Every month I have to do 5 tasks. So I set a project to repeat every month with 5 tasks in it. Each task doesn't have a due date, but the project has a Start Date and a Due Date.

How can I do this?

But now I check off one task that I finish, and another task pops back up again, and the task has a due date of next week.

[Chris]

gary & sabeke: you can get a Monday/Thursday repeat by having 2 tasks; one on Monday and one on Thursday and have them each repeat every 1 week.

You can, but this is a horrible kludge.

And if you do this, every time you need to edit your tasks (which could be complicated, multi-action tasks) you have to edit multiple entries, or edit one and re-clone it all over again. Ugh.

[smithsamuel]

Please Please Please Please make this feature a priority. Rich repeating tasks are essential to truly integrating tasks with real world calendar. Can't do it with iCal as iCal only allows repeating events (time) not tasks. Completely non GTD paradigm to shoe horn events for tasks.

[sabeke]

You can, but this is a horrible kludge.

And if you do this, every time you need to edit your tasks (which could be complicated, multi-action tasks) you have to edit multiple entries, or edit one and re-clone it all over again. Ugh.

I agree with Chris. Having multiple copies of the same task just so they will show up on different days seems like to perfect solution for NGAD (Not Getting Anything Done). :)

[DFHarwood]

Please Please Please Please make this feature a priority. Rich repeating tasks are essential to truly integrating tasks with real world calendar. Can't do it with iCal as iCal only allows repeating events (time) not tasks. Completely non GTD paradigm to shoe horn events for tasks.


To be completely functional in any meaningful sense, this capability for repeating tasks is just essential. Please address it soon.

[smithsamuel]

The most disappointing feature hole for OmniFocus is the lack of rich repeating tasks like first monday of the month etc.

At least two other GTD paradigm tasks managers (Things and EasyTask) have this level of repeating tasks.

Its so basic and useful. I don't understand why the developers don't make it a high priority.

[smithsamuel]

Ditto. Please ASAP

[smithsamuel]

Exactly. Absolutely essential feature. Don't know why its still not a high priority

[Toadling]

This would be a nice addition. Although, I must admit that so far, the existing level of control has been sufficient for my needs.

[Dogsbreath]

Consider my woe then:

I need to have a repeating task for the penultimate banking day of the month!

Oh woe is me!!

[pturner]

I don't know if posting to this forum counts as a vote for a feature but this feature seems key for me. 1 More vote.

[billback]

I would love to have this feature. I have certain things that are due on specific days of the month (currently two tasks that repeat every month). I also have a number of tasks that repeat only on work days.

Finally, I would like to have the ability to specify the repeat time. For example, every day, I have to enter time by the end of the day (5pm). Yet, the auto repeat sets it to 12 AM, meaning it's overdue at the beginning of the day. This is especially distracting on the iPhone version since you have two different views (Overdue and Due Soon) (Note: if someone knows how to fix this, then that would be great).

[Tim Reger]

Were this to be added as a feature in a future release, I, too, would find this very helpful.

[Ken Case]

I would love to have this feature. I have certain things that are due on specific days of the month (currently two tasks that repeat every month). I also have a number of tasks that repeat only on work days.

We definitely plan to add more complex repeat scheduling, it just wasn't as important as shipping 1.0 in the first place or as adding synchronization to OmniFocus for 1.1.

Finally, I would like to have the ability to specify the repeat time. For example, every day, I have to enter time by the end of the day (5pm). Yet, the auto repeat sets it to 12 AM, meaning it's overdue at the beginning of the day. This is especially distracting on the iPhone version since you have two different views (Overdue and Due Soon) (Note: if someone knows how to fix this, then that would be great).

Hmm, this sounds like a bug.

But I think I have a workaround: try setting the repeat period to "24 hours" rather than "1 day". (My guess is that OmniFocus is currently rounding the next repeat target to the nearest day or hour or minute, based on whichever units are selected for the repeat interval.)

[Sappetta]

I also vote for the "recur on certain day" feature, but:

My repeating tasks are not at regular intervals: they just start again on given dates.

So what I would really need is to specify the actual *calendar date* when the project should become active again, es September 15th, 2008, and *not* intervals like "the first Tuesday of the month, the last day of the month".

Is this somehow possible?

Thanks!

[Dale]

I ran into this problem today. I just started using OF and needed to schedule an insect spray project for my lawn here in Florida. I want to spray that lawn in June, July, August, September, December, and March. There is no way that can be done on OF that I can see. I also need to trim the palm trees the day after Thanksgiving. That can't be done on a yearly repeating basis either. So it would be nice to have several schedules available within one action or project.

[whpalmer4]

I ran into this problem today. I just started using OF and needed to schedule an insect spray project for my lawn here in Florida. I want to spray that lawn in June, July, August, September, December, and March. There is no way that can be done on OF that I can see. I also need to trim the palm trees the day after Thanksgiving. That can't be done on a yearly repeating basis either. So it would be nice to have several schedules available within one action or project.

You want this to recur every year, right? Refactor the schedule a bit; think of it as a handful of similar, possibly identical, things that happen yearly, not one thing that happens on an arbitrary schedule.

Make your project for June's spraying. Select the whole thing, copy it, and paste additional copies into your document for July, August, September, December, and March. Set the start dates for each one. Set the repeat interval to 1 year on each one. You won't see these "extra" projects unless you're viewing pending or remaining instead of active. Note that this setup allows you to customize each month in a fashion that wouldn't be very practical if it was the same project repeating for each month.

For the "day after Thanksgiving" task, put in a task every Nov. 1 to fix the start date for your "day after Thanksgiving" project for that year. Let the program help you help it do the things it can't do yet!

Having experimented with both, I find I get better results from repeating projects than from endlessly repeating actions in projects.

I would make use of a richer set of scheduling choices if it existed, but I don't have enough need to bump it very high on my personal priority list, nor a well-defined vision of what really needs to be added.

[billback]

Hmm, this sounds like a bug.

But I think I have a workaround: try setting the repeat period to "24 hours" rather than "1 day". (My guess is that OmniFocus is currently rounding the next repeat target to the nearest day or hour or minute, based on whichever units are selected for the repeat interval.)

Thanks - that did the trick. Was really annoying to check my tasks for the day and be overdue first thing in the morning.

[Lizard]

Another way to do this would be to have a single spraying project with an annual repeat cycle. Create an action for each month you need to spray and set its dates for this year's spraying. (And you can add actions inside these and make them into groups.) At the end of the year, mark the project complete, and it'll create a whole new project with all of next year's sprayings listed in it.

[directo]

Another vote for this feature...
There are certain tasks I'd like to repeat only on workdays....

I'm sure I could find other examples but this would be handy...

[tsanders]

But I think I have a workaround: try setting the repeat period to "24 hours" rather than "1 day". (My guess is that OmniFocus is currently rounding the next repeat target to the nearest day or hour or minute, based on whichever units are selected for the repeat interval.)

I have a similar (or the same) issue and nothing really works quite the way I'd like. I didn't really care with OF 1.0, but now with the iPhone caring about "Due Soon" vs. "Overdue" it's annoying that I can't set tasks up the way I want.

Here's what I want to do: I want to have a task that starts at 8:00 am and is due at 12:00 pm. I also want this to repeat every day. If I don't do it at all then it should just roll over (being overdue) until I get it done. As soon as I mark it off I want to get a new task that starts the next day at 8 and is due at noon.

If I set the repeat to "assigned date" the start and due times work correctly. Every time I check it off I get another task set for the next day. The problem is that if I don't do this at all on Monday when I check it off on Tuesday I get a task for Tuesday. If I skip two or three days then I have to click through each day or go edit the recurring task to realign it.

If I set the repeat to "completion" date then the start and due times key off my completion *time* and slowly precess around. For instance, right now it's 10:47 in my time zone. With repeat on "one day" if I check off the task the new one starts TONIGHT at 8 PM and is due at midnight. With a repeat of "24 hours" the new task will start at 6 AM tomorrow and be due at 10 AM.

So I guess what I want is to repeat the _date_ based on completion date, but repeat the _time_ based on assigned time. Basically if I check it off at any time on day N, the new task should start at 8 AM on day N+1 and be due at noon on N+1.

I know there's an argument that this isn't really that GTD, but I'd argue the iPhone version is encouraging this sort of behavior. Frankly getting up in the morning and having a big stack of "overdue" stuff isn't the best motivator. I'd like to spread due times for daily tasks spread across the day, so they tick over into "overdue" in a controlled fashion. That's a motivator when one task "goes red" at 2 PM, and another one at 4 PM. But right now I can't quite get that behavior without constantly fussing with the recurrence.

[getling]

So I guess what I want is to repeat the _date_ based on completion date, but repeat the _time_ based on assigned time. Basically if I check it off at any time on day N, the new task should start at 8 AM on day N+1 and be due at noon on N+1.


I completely concur that this option would be very helpful to keep track of daily recurring tasks that don't always get done...the current behavior ends up giving you only two options:

1) Have to check off tasks that you did not do (!) because its repeating every single day (when using 'assigned date')
2) End up throwing the timing out of whack for time-dependent (or non-time dependent, if you just want to have the due time cover the whole day) actions (when using 'completed time')

[cebailey]

Everyone,

I have a ton of tasks that I need to repeat every day M-F at work, but I don't want them cluttering stuff up with overdue notices on the weekends. Currently I have to create 5 versions of each task, one each for M-F, and tell them to repeat weekly. Is there any way to make a task repeat each weekday, but not on the weekends?

[curt.clifton]

I have a ton of tasks that I need to repeat every day M-F at work, but I don't want them cluttering stuff up with overdue notices on the weekends. Currently I have to create 5 versions of each task, one each for M-F, and tell them to repeat weekly. Is there any way to make a task repeat each weekday, but not on the weekends?

Only the way you're currently doing it.

Use Help --> Send Feedback to add your vote to the others requesting this feature.

[colicoid]

I want to spray that lawn in June, July, August, September, December, and March.

There is one dirty workaround for all you multiple-copies-of-repeating-tasks people out there. Instead of using repeating tasks at all you can just skip that and push start dates forward. E.g.:

1. It's June now and the spray task/project becomes available.
2. After spraying set the start date of the spray task to July (don't check off the task.
3. ...

[nurkkala]

I also vote for the "recur on certain day" feature, but:

My repeating tasks are not at regular intervals: they just start again on given dates.

So what I would really need is to specify the actual *calendar date* when the project should become active again, es September 15th, 2008, and *not* intervals like "the first Tuesday of the month, the last day of the month".


I also would like this feature. I use OF to keep track of when I have to prepare lectures and other materials for teaching. I always want a recurring tasks in the future, but it isn't always on a given day. I end up keeping one task all semester and update the due date each time I complete (say) a lecture. This is a workable kludge, but it means that I don't get any historical information on when I did what. It's also tempting to check the completion box, but then I'd lose the task altogether (to my horror and the delight of students!).

I would like to see OF support a process like this:

I check off a task (e.g., lecture prep)
OF adds a recurrence of the task and also prompts me for the new due date
OF adds new task to task list.


Thanks!

[c.nick]

One more vote for the "repeat on a certain day of the week" feature. Many actions don't neccessarily recur on a 23rd of a month but on "mondays" or every 2nd weekend, etc.

Best regards and keep up the excellent work!
Christian

[popcornflix]

As requested in another thread, I would really like a ROLLOVER feature. So if an action is not completed by its Due Date, it would automatically be rolled over by the increment specified.

So an action could be (for example) "repeat every 2nd Tuesday of the month" and "if missed, roll over to Next Tuesday."

Please send feedback to Omni if this sounds good to you.

Thanks!

[sangha]

I love a lot of the features of OmniFocus, but this lack of robust repeating is driving me toward Things or Life Balance. I can hang on to Omni, but need some reassurance that this feature is coming soon... please!!

[whpalmer4]

I love a lot of the features of OmniFocus, but this lack of robust repeating is driving me toward Things or Life Balance. I can hang on to Omni, but need some reassurance that this feature is coming soon... please!!

Perhaps if you tell us exactly what "this feature" is.... I've got countless repeating tasks in my database, and have since before OF 1.0 shipped.

[stevenind]

I would like some type of feature that is something like:

Task Due Date
Renew car tags Last day in January
Check bank statement 24th of every month
Attend Exec Mtg Every first and third Tues of Each Month

Thanks and great program!

Steve

[curt.clifton]

I would like some type of feature that is something like...


Use Help --> Send Feedback (http://forums.omnigroup.com/showthread.php?t=3734) to submit your feature request.

[ThannClark]

I have this very same need, after noticing that my tires were low, I have started a "Check my tire pressure and oil" On the first Sunday of every month. It makes absolutely no sense to have this repeat on the first of every month, this can only get done for me on a Sunday. SO one more vote. Thanks!

[Toadling]

SO one more vote. Thanks!

As Curt already mentioned, you really need to use Help -> Send Feedback (http://forums.omnigroup.com/showthread.php?t=3734) to place any kind of a vote. Posting a "me too" message here doesn't count. :-)

-Dennis

[LizPf]

I have this very same need, after noticing that my tires were low, I have started a "Check my tire pressure and oil" On the first Sunday of every month. It makes absolutely no sense to have this repeat on the first of every month, this can only get done for me on a Sunday. SO one more vote. Thanks!

These sound more like Calendar tasks than OmniFocus tasks. As I use them, OF is for tasks that don't necessarily have to take place on a specific date, and can "float" if necessary. I put tasks like "trash cans to curb" on my calendar.

Speaking of calendars, as I really don't like iCal, I've found that Sunbird works well with both my Google calendars and anything in the ical format. I haven't tried to see if I can synch it with OF, as I don't synch, but it is a good, full-featured calendar app at the best price possible (free). [Though I would happily pay for OmniCal, if this ever gets developed.]

[tedhogan]

Fuzzy repetition like that found in Scrial Consistency. THAT is what we also need added to repeating tasks. It's exactly what many on this thread are talking about.

Instead of relying on a voting system of what users talk about or say, get everyone together at Omni for a common sense test on this one. I think that if you were to really examine this capability, it would become clear what an asset it would be to the software.

Have to remind yourself to clean the fish tank? What about keeping track of getting some monthly reports together? Do you need to prepare and submit paperwork that works of a really funky schedule like every other month on the 3rd Friday? What about reminding yourself to get the oil changed in your car?

A very robust repetition scheme that included fuzzy tracking like Consistency does would be a killer feature for OmniFocus. The test of this is to get together and ask yourselves at Omni, "would I use this?" I think if you did that, it would become more clear just how killer of a feature this would be.

Obviously, stability and syncing were far more important essentials. Now that they are more robust, it's time to take OmniFu to the next level and this whole repetition enchilada could do just that. People still buy enough copies of Consistency at $20 or whatever a pop (ridiculous price) to keep it in (slow) development. People want this even if they don't realize it yet. People want to be reminded of the things that they are responsible for that do not comfortably fit into the tracking systems we currently use.

[Brian]

I don't think there's any doubt that more flexible action repeat patterns would be useful. The best way to figure out what our customers want is to pay attention to what they tell us. Right now, there are things that our customers are telling us they want more than this feature.

One example: adding UI for creating repeating actions to the iPhone version; it can't yet do what the desktop app does.

Despite the desktop app having over six months of a head start on the iPhone one, there are more votes attached to the "I need repeating actions like the desktop" request than to the "I need more flexible repeat options" request.

More requests in less time means we should probably pay attention to that. :-)

Not saying that we're not going to do this; just partially explaining why we haven't done it yet. (Another reason is localizations: if we add a bunch of new repeat UI, we have to localize it for all the languages we support.)

[tedhogan]

The feedback you get is probably only a portion of the user base. Also, it does not include the potential market that innovative features might bring to OmniFu.

Don't forget that many people don't like and won't use this product for whatever reasons (primarily the complexity/UI). Repetition is a key feature that is often requested and none of the task management applications do it very well. Absolutely nobody does fuzzy tracking. It offers a competitive advantage.

The iPhone app is nice, but the key driver should be the desktop app. With competitors out there stealing mindshare at every opportunity, it's critical that Omni continue to differentiate itself and justify the premium. (Sync was absolutely huge in that respect.) Feature parity with the desktop is definitely a worthy goal, but nobody on the outside is probably going to notice.

Design by committee does not produce excellence. Creativity, vision, knowledge, and dedication do. Far too often I see Omni being almost dictated to by some of the more vocal OmniFu zealots and I don't think that's a good thing. Design what you think will do well. Listen to feedback, but at the end of the day use those in house talents that have made Omni so successful in the first place.

:-)

BTW - I congratulate all of you on a job well done with this app! Please don't take my comments as negative. They are not meant that way.

[whpalmer4]

Design by committee does not produce excellence. Creativity, vision, knowledge, and dedication do. Far too often I see Omni being almost dictated to by some of the more vocal OmniFu zealots and I don't think that's a good thing. Design what you think will do well. Listen to feedback, but at the end of the day use those in house talents that have made Omni so successful in the first place.


Out of curiosity, could you give us some examples of decisions where you perceive Omni let itself be pushed by outside feedback into doing something that it didn't think was the right thing to do? I've read every post on the forums since the first announcement that they would build what turned out to be OmniFocus, and frankly, I don't see it.

My perception is that they have a long list of their own ideas about how their products should develop. They like to hear from us, because they don't think that they are the only ones with good ideas, and it helps keep them pointed in the right direction, but when push comes to shove, they build the stuff they believe in. Our feedback helps them fine tune the decisions about what happens when.

[sculwell]

I would like to vote for the "recur on certain day" feature.

So would I...

[whpalmer4]

To vote, you need to use Help->Send Feedback or send email to omnifocus@omnigroup.com; posting in the forum doesn't get your vote counted.

[BevvyB]

I want this too, with a bit of extra functionality too..

I need reminders to check to see if money has moved from my account

Certain bank withdrawals go out on certain days of the month like every 2nd of every month. So would like to be able to type 'every 2nd of month' and OF knows what to do about it.

However

Banks don't do transactions on weekends. If the 2nd lands on a Saturday or Sunday the transaction happens on the Monday, so it could be as late as the 4th. Would be terrific if you could have a tick box to make these repeating events day-aware with a 'rollover' feature.

This stuff is super important to me and it should be in OF. Many bills, transactions and standing orders work by day of month. It's the world we live in. I don't make the rules!

[whpalmer4]

Have you come across any calendar software that will do this automatically? iCal will let you do the 2nd Monday of each month, for example, but I don't see a way to get the 2nd of each month when it is a weekday and some nearby date when it falls on a weekend or bank holiday.

What I do is not bother making it a repeating event, and instead just enter a year or two of them all at once with start dates so I only see 1 at a time, and a reminder action to put in more near the end of the run. Or I enter it as a repeating action (or action group) with a note (or an explicit action) to fix up the date on the next one. Which approach I choose depends on whether or not it might be useful to see a list of upcoming actions instead of just the next one.

[jdavenport]

...there are more votes attached to the "I need repeating actions like the desktop" request than to the "I need more flexible repeat options" request.

I think as soon as you give the first to the iphone, you'll get the second.

I am an iphone user and I just ordered a MacBook Pro. I'm taking the plunge after being a PC and Pocket-PC user for many years. I have always used tasks on the Pocket-PC and MS Outlook. I am trying to find a good iphone/Mac applications now as replacements. I've been using Appigo’s ToDo and have become intrigued by the GTD concept. Omnifocus looks like the application I want to use, but I need repeating task. Not just repeating tasks. If I cant set tasks to repeat at the times that I need them too, its pointless. I, like others here from what I gather, need things like... repeat on last weekday of the month, repeat only on weekdays, repeat on the 2nd Tuesday of the month. A task manager is supposed to help you be more productive, not kill your productivity trying to find a work around for what I think is the basics, scheduling the task when it is to be done. Your product looks fantastic and does way more then what I was even expecting to find, however its missing something crucial for me. Its kind of like having all the bells and whistles on a sports car but the engine was left out. Please develop this as quickly as possible and I'll be the first in line to place my order. (Heck I'll probably go ahead and buy it anyway to mess with it, but it will never meet my needs until more options are added for scheduling.)

Thanks

J Davenport

[whpalmer4]

I think as soon as you give the first to the iphone, you'll get the second.

Is there some reason to believe that iPhone/iPod users need a richer set of repeat options more than the desktop users?

In any case, the latest version of the iPhone/iPod client has repeating options, just like the desktop.
Omnifocus looks like the application I want to use, but I need repeating task. Not just repeating tasks. If I cant set tasks to repeat at the times that I need them too, its pointless. I, like others here from what I gather, need things like... repeat on last weekday of the month, repeat only on weekdays, repeat on the 2nd Tuesday of the month. A task manager is supposed to help you be more productive, not kill your productivity trying to find a work around for what I think is the basics, scheduling the task when it is to be done. Your product looks fantastic and does way more then what I was even expecting to find, however its missing something crucial for me. Its kind of like having all the bells and whistles on a sports car but the engine was left out.

I think you'll find that OmniFocus is rather more useful than a car without an engine! A better comparison would be a car whose radio didn't let you have preset stations. You have to tune the radio every time you want to go to a different station, and it seems like a nuisance at first, but if you just do it for a week, it turns out not to be nearly the obstacle you originally thought. Sure, it'll be nice when the new radio comes out that has presets, but the old radio doesn't prevent you from listening to music, much less driving places in the car.

I've got hundreds of repeating actions, many of them on schedules that OmniFocus can't handle automatically. I spend about 5-10 minutes per month adjusting dates, at most. It's only as big of an obstacle as you want to make it. To quote Henry Ford, "whether you think that you can, or that you can't, you are usually right." These tasks can be handled quite adequately with the tools provided; when Omni adds the richer repeat support, which I am confident they will, it will be easier, but not in a life-changing way. I haven't seen a calendar program yet that didn't force me to do most of the same things I do in OmniFocus. Yes, the startup cost will be a bit higher, but these are repeating actions, and in any month after the first one, I'll bet that by far the majority of your repeating actions will be ones previously set up, and thus the amount of time spent setting up new repeating actions will be quite small.

[jdavenport]

whpalmer4, there isn't a reason that iPhone/iPod users need a richer set of repeat options than the desktop users. To use your analogy of the radio (which I like much better than mine by the way) I think the only reason they are hearing more from iPhone users than desktop users is because iphone users didn't even have the radio, so why would they be complaining about presets. Like I said give them one, and you'll get the other. The desktop version is what attracted me to Omnifocus in the first place. I love my iphone, but I would not want to enter in my "brain dump" into the iphone. I think of it as a great extension to the desktop.

[c.nick]

I, like others here from what I gather, need things like... repeat on last weekday of the month, repeat only on weekdays, repeat on the 2nd Tuesday of the month

Dear OmniFolks, what between earth and sky keeps you from implementing such a basic function? Schedules like these simple examples are absolutly common in many occasions: Financial deadlines, sports schedules, deadlines for writers, school and university schedules, business reporting, - the world is full of "needs to be completed by every 3rd friday of the month"...

The only "reason" I can think of is that you probably want to keep the program as simple as possible. OF is all about simplicity and "not getting in your way".

But friends, if I as a user need to remind myself every single week or every second month - or so - and think of this and build workarounds in order to not forget and to perform a very common recurring task - then I must say: It would be MUCH simpler for me if you could add a button for that.

It's the workflow, st... sweetheart ;-)

Cheers, Christian

[Toadling]

Dear OmniFolks, what between earth and sky keeps you from implementing such a basic function?

I suspect it's other feature requests. Everyone has one or two features they really need right away. And Omni is stuck with the rather difficult task of deciding which has priority and when each should be implemented.

I do vaguely remember reading that more repeating/scheduling options are planned, but I can't remember if it was slated for a release before 2.0 or not.

If you really want this feature, be sure to let Omni know directly via Help -> Send Feedback. That's the best way to "vote" for a feature request.

-Dennis

[JayEpoch]

+1 vote for weekday recurrence. No reason the recurrence options shouldn't be as robust or better than iCals imo.

[babbie]

I agree with the above suggestions for a more flixible set of options for repeats (though I don't need the rollover from weekends, but would not oppose it).

I would add a more modest request. I am now using OF for a bunch of daily chores. I appreciate the reminder, but I do not need to accumulate thousands of "completed" tasks. How about an option to [ ] Do not save completed task.

[curt.clifton]

Use Help → Send Feedback to submit bug reports and feature suggestions to get them entered in the development database. (See this sticky thread (http://forums.omnigroup.com/showthread.php?t=3734) at the top of the forum for details.)

[msmith6869]

This thread and the numerous requests it contains for this feature have been ongoing since Nov 2007. Surely after over 2 years this has made it into the rotation for a release. If not, I would love to hear why. This is not an extremely hard feature to add. Most GTD clients have this feature.

[whpalmer4]

It may not be a hard feature to add (though as you are not an Omni developer, and have no access to the source code, that's just speculation on your part) but it does require work, testing, and documentation, and the time and resources spent doing those things aren't available for doing something else which may have gotten more requests, or that Omni's management thinks will produce a superior product which leads to more revenue and happier customers. It does require coordinated changes to both the desktop and iPhone applications, and might also require a file format change, both of which are complications not necessarily encountered by many other feature requests.

[msmith6869]

You are correct that I am not an Omni developer. But judging from the number of posts on this thread common sense would tell you that this feature has received numerous requests over the 2+ years it has been open. Surely it has received enough requests to make it into a release at some point. Of course it would taking testing, documentation, etc. All new features do. However, it seems based on nothing more than the fact that this feature exists in almost every similar product regardless of cost (some being less than $20) that this common feature should be available in one of the more expensive products in the GTD-based task management arena.

[curt.clifton]

Surely it has received enough requests to make it into a release at some point.

Your confidence is refreshing in our skeptical age. On the other hand, since the feature isn't in the any of the released versions of the software, I'm not clear on what your confidence is based. There are thousands (tens of thousands?) of threads on the OF forums. One thread that you happen to agree with wouldn't seem to provide overwhelming evidence of anything.

Use Help → Send Feedback to submit feature request to get them entered in the development database. (See this sticky thread (http://forums.omnigroup.com/showthread.php?t=3734) at the top of the forum for details.) Me-too posts don't count. I would also like to see more control of repeating actions, and have submitted my feedback.

I cringe when people claim to know what's easy in software. Developing quality software is hard; anyone who claims otherwise is ignorant or selling something.

Cheers,

Curt

[msmith6869]

You have a good point, there are thousands of posts and tens of thousands of requests I am sure. But here is the truth of the matter. Both Things and My Life Organized have rich repeating options. Both cost roughly half of OF. If you are going to charge one of the highest license costs in the industry for a product you better well make sure you have the functionality of the cheaper products. That is a competitive issue not a software issue. As a formers software engineer (mainly testing) I know very well what it takes to get a piece of functionality into a release. Alot of work! That being said if we knew our competitors had functionality we did not and there were requests for it (even if it was not the most requested item) we put that at or near the top of our list of needed items. I am not sure how many releases there have been since this thread opened. However, I am sure the list of new and improved functionality in OF since that time is staggering. Are you telling me that every piece of new or improved functionality since then has been more highly requested than rich repeating?

[curt.clifton]

Are you telling me that every piece of new or improved functionality since then has been more highly requested than rich repeating?

Yes.

More specifically, since you know a bit about how software is developed, you recognize that sometimes a third tier feature is added at the same time a top tier feature is added, simply because the developers have that part of the system "on the operating table".

Skimming through the release notes, here's what's been added for top tier features:

Improved Styles
Sync-compatibility with updated iPhone versions
Snow Leopard support
Redesigned Perspectives with support for syncing Perspectives to iPhone
Improved attachment support to reduce sync times
Redesigned repeat inspector
Bug fixes
Auto-complete for projects and action groups
Various UI improvements
Archiving to keep databases small and sync speed fast
Faster creation of new contexts and projects
Synchronization between multiple Macs
An iPhone version of OF
Parsing of tasks from message in Mail


It's a spurious argument to compare OF to competing applications on the basis of a single "missing" feature. That would only make sense if the competition had all of the features that OF had. Instead, each program is at a different point in the feature and cost space. Customers can choose the product that comes closest to their needs, and (in the case of OF) use Help → Send Feedback to cast their vote for the missing features. I assume you've taken the time to do so for enhanced repeat options.

Cheers,

Curt

[whpalmer4]

You're making an assumption here which is unwarranted; namely, that a higher price tag means a superset of the functionality of all applications with a lower price tag is a necessity. That's simply not true. What you do have to deliver is a package which provides functionality sufficient to persuade customers to buy it. Look how many iPods Apple sold without an FM tuner at a higher price. That functionality can be features that the other products don't have, or features that the other products don't implement as well, or even things like superior customer support.

Number of requests is only one factor in how Omni decides what to implement next. It's an important one, but doesn't override all else. For example, there are frequent requests for OmniFocus to have a calendar view or to make iCal appointments instead of iCal tasks, but the OmniFocus team feels that is not the correct thing to do, and are on record saying so. But they also pay attention to the experiences reported by their customers, and change the product where they think they can improve on something they've done before. There are a number of changes which have been made relatively recently to make life easier for those trying to use the product from a non-GTD viewpoint.

[msmith6869]

I have indeed added my two cents via feedback and hope that everyone else who posted here did as well. I agree with Curt and whpalmer and understand that not all GTD software packages have identical functionality. There is no question that OF is the premier GTD software package for the Mac OS. I fully intend on purchasing two licenses plus iphone in the next week. My hope is that rich repeating will be added very soon.

It would seem to me that someone who is operating the to-do portion of their life base on David Allen's principles would desperately need this functionality. I have nearly as many items on my list that repeat on a schedule of the 1st Thursday of every month or 4th day of the month than I do that repeat every 2 weeks or 17 days. If OF is meant to allow us to operate based on a GTD-centric work flow then the omission of rich repeating from even the initial release severely hampers ones ability to truly follow the principles from the book.

[msmith6869]

One other thing to note. Even though there are thousands of posts on this forum asking for countless features, other than sticky posts this thread is the 16th most commented post in this entire forum. I think we can all agree that this fact says something about importance and popularity of this feature set.

[whpalmer4]

I just make a note in the notes field for the (very small) number of such actions that I have describing the repeat -- fourth Wednesday of the month, every other blue moon, etc. Then when I complete the first action, I adjust the newly created one accordingly.

[Scott TX]

Well for the record my eval of OmniFocus is on hold while I spend the next week looking at Things. This feature is a deal breaker for me. Not being able to simply say I want something to repeat only on weekdays seems overly simple and if it is not then all the other developer must be brilliant (to use a Steve Jobs word!).

I hope the devs listen and you guys get this feature. If I find some glaring hole like this in Things I may be back. Can't have everything but right now intelligent repeating is is on my "must have" list.

BTW....The comments about using the in app functionality to report this seem a bit misplaced. This is an OmniFocus forum. They set it up and they are paying for it's operation so I am going to guess they are reading it and paying attention. Besides given the huge number of "me to!!!" posts I would imagine it has been submitted in app more than a few times.

[curt.clifton]

BTW....The comments about using the in app functionality to report this seem a bit misplaced. This is an OmniFocus forum. They set it up and they are paying for it's operation so I am going to guess they are reading it and paying attention.

You are, of course, welcome to guess however you'd like. On the other hand, you could also read and see that you're mistaken (http://forums.omnigroup.com/showthread.php?t=3734).

[Scott TX]

Curt I would guess you have lots of friends. You have added so much value with your positive upbeat and constructive comments to this thread. Do you add this much value everywhere you go? I feel so much better about OmniFocus as a product and great community members like you.

Way to be a great contributor!!

[whpalmer4]

Curt is not only one of the most insightful and prolific contributors to this forum, he's also one of the least likely to respond in anything but a calm, reasoned fashion. I can only surmise that due to that tragic childhood accident, it takes him much longer to count to 100 during his cooling-off phase before responding, giving me an opportunity to beat him to the punch (I usually only count to 2 or maybe 3) :-)

So, let's go down the list. You made a statement that reflected a mistaken understanding of the purpose of these forums, and Curt pointed you to an official statement (a sticky at the top of each page of forum posts, no less!) so that you could get your feedback heard (whether or not Curt might agree with the request). In fact, it appears that every one of his posts in this thread includes directions on how to get your opinion heard by Omni, whatever it might be. With enemies like that, who needs friends?

Or perhaps you didn't like his assertion that developing software is hard? Not much reason to think that a professor of computer science who actually develops software would know anything about that, is there?

Frankly, if you're interested in learning about OmniFocus and its use, just reading Curt's posts would be an excellent approach. His knowledge of the product is as comprehensive as that of anyone outside of Omni. He's contributed widely-used scripts that substantially extend OmniFocus' usefulness and illuminated the path for others to do likewise. He gives assistance to the community freely and at length -- he's posted more times here than there are total postings on the Things iPhone/iPod Touch forum!

Speaking of Things, while browsing their forums to see if I could find out if they have a Curt equivalent over there, I came across this thread (http://culturedcode.com/forums/read.php?7,34151) which merits reading for a number of different reasons:


A reminder that Things doesn't offer sequential projects, etc.
Users pointing out that development appears to have ground to a halt
A reminder over to the right that just like with the Omni forums, if you need to contact the Things developers, you need to use a different means of communication


I think you should use whatever tool best fits your needs -- if that's OmniFocus, that's great, and I'll do my best (as will Curt, I'm sure) to help you over any bumps in the road. If it is Things, or The Hit List, or any of the other tools out there, best of luck, and if it doesn't work out, come on back!

[Scott TX]

Thanks for your comments. I just think a little less "you are an idiot", RTFM approach goes a long way.

Pretending like the project mangers and the devs are unaware of this request and we just need to tell them is crazy given the level of attention this topic has gotten here. They know it and for whatever reason they don't want to do it or don't think it is a priority and that is certainly their choice.

As an owner of a software development firm with about 20 developers working for me, I certainly know what it takes to implement new features or make changes. As this one goes it is not a big one. If you look at the list of changes since this thread started there are lots of features that have been added which were significantly more complex and difficult. The fact this feature is not included is a choice, and that is perfectly fine. For me this so severly limits the usefulness of the program that I find myself spending more time working around it and given that this application specifically should keep me organized, on-track and save time that is a problem.

Thanks for the insight on Things. I am not keen on the lack of sync. A issue similar to this for their user community. It is something users have requested for a least a year. In the scheme of things that is much harder to develop than some logic around reoccurring tasks but it is still a huge problem for their users.

I really want OmniFocus to work. I spent time going through all the documentation and videos provided, went out an got the ScreenCasts Online tutorials and really have committed more time than I would with most any application, and I regretted moving away a few days ago, but this one feature is really that important to me, and unfortunately the only place to deliver a message like that is through email or a forum post. Both of which I have done.

[whpalmer4]

Pretending like the project mangers and the devs are unaware of this request and we just need to tell them is crazy given the level of attention this topic has gotten here. They know it and for whatever reason they don't want to do it or don't think it is a priority and that is certainly their choice.

They are aware that some users want the feature, yes. Many of them probably could use it themselves. However, as the list of desired features is much longer than the list of available resources to implement them, they have to make judgment calls on what will do the most good for the product and its users, and one of the factors they use is just how many people are willing to go to the very minimal trouble of sending an email to register their interest in the feature. If one isn't willing to do that, in my book you aren't all that interested in the feature in question. Think about it -- Omni is specifically asking the user population for input in prioritizing features! Now, why is it so hard to believe that the general opinion might be that there are other features that more of the people who are willing to submit feedback want than this feature? Especially when Brian, the guy who manages the people who fill that database with your feedback, says that very thing earlier in the thread?

There are a number of workarounds for this issue; I don't know if you haven't come across them or have rejected them out of hand. If the former, here's a thread that covers some of them: http://forums.omnigroup.com/showthread.php?t=15120.

[Callen]

Would like to have a repeat feature like ToDo App.

This will make it the best App for to dos.

[herbgarden]

I love a lot of the features of OmniFocus, but this lack of robust repeating is driving me toward Things or Life Balance. I can hang on to Omni, but need some reassurance that this feature is coming soon... please!!

I've just come from Things as I was expecting more but ..... the very excellent thing about Things is the repeating capability with Tasks. I have things that need to be done weekly, monthly or yearly but always on a working day so setting say the 1st is no good. The first Monday or second Wednesday each month or other month, week or other week would be great.

If not then maybe this isn't for me after all. Its great in many other respects but this one is a major GTD need.

[whpalmer4]

I find it takes me very little time to make up for the lack of "first Monday" repeating. I put a note in the notes field (first line) of the repeating action that more precisely describes what the desired repeat is, and set it to repeat for the closest available option. When I check something off that has such a note, I fix the date for the next one. Or, I don't bother — I work mostly on a start date basis, with a perspective that shows me all the items starting that day. If I see something that obviously needs to be done on a work day, and it is a weekend day, I just bump the date to the next work day. Sure, I'll be happy to skip doing this when they deliver reacher repeat date support, but I find OmniFocus superior in so many different ways that it would be crazy to stop using it because of something like this. Your mileage may vary, of course.

I suppose I ought to point out that the former approach works better with things where it is important that it be scheduled for the earliest possible date (1st Monday may actually fall before a month is up, for example), and the latter better with things where the date is approximate and just needs to meet some constraint like banks being open, etc. Don't want anyone coming after me in early March and blaming me for leading them astray :-) There are some other approaches outlined in the thread I refer to earlier in this thread, too.

[c.nick]

I can't understand why people keep discribing all sorts of WORKAROUNDS to cope with missing features of the product. After all we love our OmniGroup products because they offer great FUNCTIONALITY instead of the hassle with workarounds in the first place.

I'm sure most of us figure out their own workarounds for whatever they feel missing on the feature list so far.

I engage here not to discuss workarounds but to find the leanest and meanest possible ways how to implement and enhance features.

If I wanted to discuss all the needs and possibilities of workarounds over workarounds of workarounds I'd have more food for thought on the Things forums ;-)

[whpalmer4]

I can't understand why people keep discribing all sorts of WORKAROUNDS to cope with missing features of the product. After all we love our OmniGroup products because they offer great FUNCTIONALITY instead of the hassle with workarounds in the first place.

Because most of us don't have the ability to make changes to Omni's source code to implement that functionality, and yet are interested in using the product, we do what we can — discuss workarounds, and encourage others to send in feedback requesting changes.

I'm sure most of us figure out their own workarounds for whatever they feel missing on the feature list so far.

And yet, there are numerous posts asking "how do I do X?" and often only small differences in X change the answer from a matter of describing how a feature works to suggesting a workaround. Allow me to apologize for the many posters who thought they may have missed something while learning the program and didn't realize they would pollute the purity of the forum experience by talking about workarounds rather than page numbers where the answer could be found!

Heaven forbid anyone should be interested in learning how to approximate some desired functionality with the resources at hand while waiting for Omni to deliver a native version.

I engage here not to discuss workarounds but to find the leanest and meanest possible ways how to implement and enhance features.

If I wanted to discuss all the needs and possibilities of workarounds over workarounds of workarounds I'd have more food for thought on the Things forums ;-)
As long as we are here, let's hear some of your ideas for lean and mean ways to implement richer repeat options. Can you offer any improvements on iCal's custom repeats? Any unusual repeat patterns that you would like supported?

[IntlOrange]

One more vote for this feature! Would love to be able to repeat a task, say "starting on the last Monday of each month, and due on the last Friday of the month."

[KKOB]

I would also REALLY REALLY like to see this feature added. I don't want to use iCal/Calendar to remind me of non time specific things as the repeating task is part of a greater list of things I need to get done in a specific order.

It seems to be a relatively trivial feature to add, but one which most people would find incredibly useful.

[drking]

I would like to vote for this feature.
Thank you,
drking

[Leo Pedersen]

Dear OmniFolks, what between earth and sky keeps you from implementing such a basic function? Schedules like these simple examples are absolutly common in many occasions: Financial deadlines, sports schedules, deadlines for writers, school and university schedules, business reporting, - the world is full of "needs to be completed by every 3rd friday of the month"...

The only "reason" I can think of is that you probably want to keep the program as simple as possible. OF is all about simplicity and "not getting in your way".

But friends, if I as a user need to remind myself every single week or every second month - or so - and think of this and build workarounds in order to not forget and to perform a very common recurring task - then I must say: It would be MUCH simpler for me if you could add a button for that.

It's the workflow, st... sweetheart ;-)

Cheers, Christian


This sums up my feelings about this issue very well. This functionality seems so basic and obvious I'm still surprised that it wasn't part of the 1.0 release.

OmniFocus is a fantastic and powerful application, I just hope this problem will be resolved soon :)

[ape]

Hopefully this might be the correct thread for this, but one feature that I'm missing from a recurring action is to recur until a specific date. For instance, I'd like the action to recur every 1 day until a specfied date (or time for that matter).

I hope I haven't missed some preference for this.

Thanks,

Steve

[whpalmer4]

Steve, you haven't missed it, it isn't there...use Help->Send Feedback to send in a feature request, and maybe we'll get it one of these days.

In the meantime, what I do is set a separate action with a start date to remind me to cancel the repeating action (if it has lots of repeats), or just enter duplicate, non-repeating actions with start dates (if there are only a few).

[c.nick]

It would be really nice if the repeat settings for an action were a little more robust. Many tools I've worked with allow recurring events to be scheduled on things like the first Tuesday of the month, the last day of the month, etc.

That was November 2007.

But hey, some time last year we got redesigned icons!

I understand that Omni needs to prioritise. And I think they're generally doing a fabulous job there, including explaining why what gets prioritised.

It's only here that I don't get why a rather surprising redesign seemed more important than a basic feature, that's relevant to many practical use scenarios.

Let's wait for 2.0 and keep fingers crossed.

Chris

[whpalmer4]

Chris, that's much like asking why my yard was mowed yesterday instead of the kitchen getting cleaned up. The guy who cuts the grass (or in this case, designs the icons) is not the person who cleans the kitchen (writes user interface code).

[c.nick]

Fair point. So, take away the comparison with the redesign.
Reduce it to the observation that struck me:

2007.

[whpalmer4]

They've done plenty of work since 2007, so my conclusion is that the number of people who have actually bothered to send in a request for that feature hasn't been as large as one might expect, and the number of requests for other features has prompted them to apply the grease to squeakier wheels (or equally squeaky wheels that don't have easy workarounds).

I've got feature requests from 2007 I'm still waiting on, but I have reluctantly accepted that there aren't enough other people who have the good sense to be demanding the same things :-) Now, if they start putting in features that are just eye candy and don't add functionality, I'll get grumpy, but so far that hasn't been a problem.

For this particular need, a pretty easy workaround is to put the event in iCal (which has more powerful custom repeats) and have it email you a reminder the day before. Clip the reminder email into OmniFocus.

[albyrne]

... but it does require work, testing, and documentation...

Obviously documentation is the lowest priority of these! I see that the latest OF manual available is still at v1.5!!!

a

[Brian]

Sorry for the confusion, Albyrne - that version number is for the manual itself, not for the version of OmniFocus the manual refers to.

[Greg Jones]

Sorry for the confusion, Albyrne - that version number is for the manual itself, not for the version of OmniFocus the manual refers to.
Brian, the manual on the OmniFocus product page (v 1.5) does look like it is for a much older version as the copyright is 2008. Is there a link to a more current version of the OmniFocus Mac documentation?

[DrJJWMac]

I very much agree -- the scheduling of repeating tasks needs to be better handled in OmniFocus. I strongly prefer not to have to schedule TASKS as EVENTS in iCal, leading me to need two tools to manage my tasks instead of one. One should be able to schedule a task as repeating ...

* after every so much time (the only current option)
* at certain times during a week (eg, every MWF), month (eg, every 1st and 3rd Friday), year (eg, every other month)
* to re-occur only AFTER completion

Might I suggest OmniGroup has a look at the (far more flexible) way that Things handles repeating tasks as a template.

[Brian]

Brian, the manual on the OmniFocus product page (v 1.5) does look like it is for a much older version as the copyright is 2008. Is there a link to a more current version of the OmniFocus Mac documentation?

Last time I checked, the manual was written against OmniFocus 1.7, which looks like it was released in August of '09. I'm betting we forgot to update the copyright notice when we did that rev of the manual, though. (Yeah, the file was created in May of 2009 - copyright notice is out of date. Bug filed!)

Revising the printed manual to account for the workflow changes we made in version 1.8 is on the to-do list.

(The online help has been updated since them, I believe - I emailed the appropriate folks here to double-check on this. Will report back when I hear from them.)

[heroman]

One more VOTE to add more functionality to the repeating option in OmniFocus. Sure would like to have repeating tasks not occur on weekends. And, yes I know of the work arounds.

[awlogan]

I'd really like to have this as well. I don't want to keep things in iCal or Outlook if I can avoid it, especially if they may not be able to be done on that day and would then slip off the radar. Many things I need to do are 'first work day of the month' or 'second Saturday'. Not having this feature when it was available in Outlook was the main reason I gave up on the Palm platform.

Also, as someone who writes documentation, keep your manual numbered the same as the SW version. Even if all you do is update the title page and copyright it saves a lot of confusion for new users.

[skillet]

Wow I am totally shocked that for a planning app that something like repeating events for weekdays isn't a standard feature. I am 1 1/2 weeks into learning this app because repeating tasks in my Franklin Planner that I have been using for 15 years is driving me crazy.

I almost bought an iPad 2 today (I did and then canceled my order because I need to do more research) 90% because of OmniFocus and the need for a mobile planner and because I have found the syncing of OF between macs has been awesome!

Anyway repeating tasks that I can check off days of the week they repeat is vital as well as first Saturday of the month, Last Saturday and 4th Saturday as examples.

I read through page after page since this was thread was started in 2007 and hoped it would have a happy ending. None of the tips I read really cut it for me as valid work arounds.

I have to say though that I have been very impressed with OmniFocus in so many of its features. It was vital for me to be able to archive tasks that I have done for record keeping and from what I can tell OmniFocus does this well (that would have been a deal breaker for me if it didn't). Love the exporting to cvs and html as back ups for me to keep of what I have done.

I digress though, just didn't want to be all drama, but **PLEASE** add robust repeat options!

I didn't see in the help menu a feature request option there as was mentioned, was that in earlier versions then OF 1.9?

[whpalmer4]

None of the tips I read really cut it for me as valid work arounds.

And yet many, many thousands of repeating actions have been handled with those approaches. By all means, send in your request for better repeat support (see below), but the amount of time it takes to set things up is rarely an appreciable fraction of the time spent actually doing them. Warren Buffett's comment about "Well, it may be all right in practice, but it will never work in theory" often comes to mind when discussing this topic.

I didn't see in the help menu a feature request option there as was mentioned, was that in earlier versions then OF 1.9?
Help→Send Feedback is the command you want. It's been there for years...

[Dogsbreath]

Just think of me then, I want an action that repeats on the penultimate working day of the month!

As WHP says, there is always a way around it!

[Lucas]

Just think of me then, I want an action that repeats on the penultimate working day of the month!

As WHP says, there is always a way around it!

I don't think I've ever seen desktop software that makes that calculation.

[Dogsbreath]

You are absolutely right. Setting the date to the 28th is about the best I can get!

[awlogan]

Outlook for mac will let me select last day, last weekday, last weekend day, or any last Monday through Sunday for an event. Quick screen capture:

http://autumnpeople.org/images/outlook.png

[Lucas]

Outlook for mac will let me select last day, last weekday, last weekend day, or any last Monday through Sunday for an event. Quick screen capture:

http://autumnpeople.org/images/outlook.png

Wow - no kidding. I guess, then, use outlook.

[awlogan]

Or Omnifocus could add repeat functions. I've been able to do this in Outlook for 6-7 years at least on Windows...

[santra]

I'm sorry, but this is insane: two threads on this, one almost 3 years long; Outlook can do it, and OMG Things can do it, but OmniFocus can't?

Ken? Are you there? This is INSANE.

OF is the reigning supreme king of the Mac/iDevice to-do apps, and it can't do this?

I was all ready to completely junk Things today, after years of using both concurrently, because I know OF is superior, and now I find out it can't do this.

Sorry, I'm appalled. Things is low rent compared to OF, and yet it can do this. Outlook is a disaster—a bloated piece of elephant rump—and yet it can do this.

Where are your brilliant programmers????????????

There are NO excuses for this.

[Oogiem]

Just think of me then, I want an action that repeats on the penultimate working day of the month!

Palm OS did that from the very beginning since at least 1996.

You can set a repeating action that repeats monthly on the last Friday of the month. Or any other day you choose.

Palm OS has much more robust repeating actions and still is head and shoulders above anything OF can do.

[santra]

OK, I just set up five separate tasks for one of my weekday items. Now I only have about 20 tasks left to apply the same hack to = over 100 new tasks to create. :-)

Brian, I think you said about five pages ago in this thread:

"The best way to figure out what our customers want is to pay attention to what they tell us."

Over 100 postings in this and other threads over the course of a few years is not enough?

[Xeijin]

I have to say this really is the only thing preventing me from splashing out on a license for OF.....

[david94133]

In addition to the basic repeating options others have been asking for, I'd like to see an option to run an applescript when a task is completed, similar to what iCal can do with reminders.

This will allow those of us who have esoteric repeating requirements to solve it ourselves.

And yes, I did submit this option as feedback direct to Omni Group.

-dp-

[BomShelter]

I'm sorry, but this is insane: two threads on this, one almost 3 years long; Outlook can do it, and OMG Things can do it, but OmniFocus can't?

Ken? Are you there? This is INSANE.

OF is the reigning supreme king of the Mac/iDevice to-do apps, and it can't do this?

I was all ready to completely junk Things today, after years of using both concurrently, because I know OF is superior, and now I find out it can't do this.

Sorry, I'm appalled. Things is low rent compared to OF, and yet it can do this. Outlook is a disaster—a bloated piece of elephant rump—and yet it can do this.

Where are your brilliant programmers????????????

There are NO excuses for this.

I totally agree! I am beyond upset. The $10 app I purchased can pick up my daily tasks for M-F (sorry OGF but I don't work Sat and Sun and Im not deleting these tasks each weekend!).

Had I known this before I purchased it I would have never done it. What a complete waste, I could understand if this was something oh perhaps 1-3 months old, but 3 YEARS??? Really? I guess they just don't care. I think I'll go back to my $10 2Do task manager. At least there I can manage my to do's.

Beyond disgusted...What a waste of money!

[whpalmer4]

And yet, some of us manage hundreds or thousands of tasks, many of them repeating, with very little trouble. Go figure.

The clear bottom line here is that despite the expressions of outrage on this thread, customers are asking for other features in larger numbers. There's no question that Omni could implement richer repeat options, so why wouldn't they do so if that's what the request numbers showed people want?

Take advantage of Omni's 30 day money back guarantee. Details on the website.

[keynotes]

I was also astonished that the most powerful task manager can't set tasks to repeat only on certain days. I was about to post a thread but figured there must be hundreds of requests for this basic feature already, and sure enough there are. I'd like to add my vote for this critical feature!

[nfultz1]

This is also a major challenge for me as well. Omni Focus was recommended to me by a friend so I downloaded the free trial. It really is a great software, but the fact that I can't repeat tasks on specific days of the month caused me to thoroughly test other TM software first. If Things had a more intuitive use of start date I would have purchased it instead.

This really needs to be addressed. It has been requested for more than three years and is available by all of OF's major competitors.

[inkspot]

need to be able to schedule x days in the week where x is particular day or on a certain day in any given month.

I am trialing Omni as I currently use "things" but I am not going to move over until recurring items is part of the funcationality.

[Christian]

Just for my understanding, I get it right that you are essentially asking for a kind of calendar view in which you can check off the days on which a given task should be repeated, right?

[mike808]

11 people from the company I work for recently attended a GTD seminar.

All came back excited, and looking for tools to implement. I suggested, OmniFocus, what I use.

A couple of people downloaded, and asked about repeat options. I said that repeat options were limited, and showed them some of my work arounds.

They left shaking their heads, deleted OF from their Macs, and went on to search for other options. I tried to point out OF's other substantial benefits, but I couldn't persuade anybody. ALL 11 people went with other choices.

Omni says this isn't a priority because not enough people are requesting it, but I would submit, how many users consider lack of repeat options a "deal breaker" and don't use OF long enough to request it?

I know this is based on an a statistical sample bordering on the irrelevant, and maybe it has been proposed before -- I haven't read the entire thread(s) on the subject. I just thought I would throw it out there.

I think OF is an amazing GTD tool, but how much better would it be, with robust scheduling/repeating?

[CatOne]

ALL 11 people need to regular schedule things on "Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday?"

c'mon. REALLY? It's THAT hard to create 3 different repeating tasks in that scenario? How common is this, ACTUALLY?

I agree that it's be nicer to have that functionality. But there are many other things I'd put higher in the list, personally.

[DrJJWMac]

... I said that repeat options were limited, and showed them some of my work arounds.

Repeat options you ask? Why of course! Here is where you set repeat options. Oh, repeat on a fixed schedule of certain weekdays? Certainly ... here is how you make that happen too. What ... why is it so complicated? Hmmmm .... well how many of these repeating type options do you need to set all the time. Just two or three ... no problem. What ... you say that you live and die by a Monday, Wednesday, Thursday schedule every third week ... then maybe you need a calendar scheduling app either with or instead of this top-notch GTD app.

... there are many other things I'd put higher in the list, personally.

I agree here.

I think the example is better viewed as an illustration that some folks have a mindset that will turn them away immediately when their favorite bell or whistle is not present in an app. It is just another example of leading thirsty horses to water that they then don't even want to taste (possibly because it does not make the right noise flowing over the stones).

The proper response at that point might be ... oh well, figure it out on your own time then. Here's a Windows 7 system for you to play with while you're at it.

But then, sometimes I get myself in trouble being slyly cynical.

That said, I too would like to have more refined repeat options on occasion (and have requested such at OG support).

--
JJW

[Christian]

A more flexible way to set reoccurring tasks would have benefits, no doubt. But essentially, as I see it, it's

(a) not the idea that you use OF to organise such tasks which reoccur on a fixed date evey Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday. Those are date-fix events that belong into your calendar, not your task manager. Make a reoccurring event in iCal on these days and you should be fine. That's how GTD is constructed.

(b) It is also no problem to set up such reoccurring tasks in OF if you really need to. Maybe you have no calendar or such, then you can simply take a few minutes to create some tasks with due dates on the dates you need them to be done. All you really have to do is make one task, duplicate it 10 times, set the due dates of each (which is no additional work since you would have had to do that even with the added functionality we are discussing here) and then you have some weeks covered. Doing that ahead for an entire year should not take more than half an hour, provided tasks are similar which I base this on since you want them to be reoccurring.

Is that really that much effort? I think not.

From what I can tell, adding a simple calendar view in which you can set date-fix events which then automatically translate into tasks plus a simple notepad of sorts that allows to capture some todos in a meeting and quickly process them to become tasks would enhance OF a lot. It would basically make it an all-round tool for people like me who use it to organise date-specific tasks with holy deadlines. Is OF a great software without such? yep! Can I just use any other notebook app installed on the very same iPad? Yep! Can I just use the calendar also installed on the very same iPad? Yep! All just one click away. Think of the iPad as one large app if you will. All you have to do is tap the icons for different views :)

That being said, Brian, Ken, Anybody....can you please FINAllY implement that coffee-machine feature I have been asking for since three years?? All my coworkers are using the large machine in the canteen because OF really sucks at this simple yet needed task!!

Go figure.

[c.nick]

I scratch my head wondering ... why some people oppose so aggressively to a simple feature request that just aims to get rid of workarounds. After all OF and GTD is all about getting things (and esp. workarounds) out of your head to free up capacity for the fun stuff.

Life has endless examples for "every 3rd Saturday of the month".

It's not about making things pretty.
It's not about making things just differently.

It's purely about ease of use.

So why not just include the option and that's it. No big deal. And certainly no reason to get up in arms to rather stick with workarounds - one should think...

I thought the discussion here would rather be around the HOW to implement such a basic in a lean and beautiful way...

Cheers everyone
Chris

[whpalmer4]

There is an endless list of enhancements that could be made. There isn't an endless supply of resources with which to implement them. Omni tries to work on the ones with the biggest return first.

[Stargazer]

Personally, I don't really need this feature, but on the other hand, there is a bit of a self-selection process going on in that the only people who stick around long enough to actually make new feature requests are people who basically already like OF the way it is.

[whpalmer4]

Possibly so, though I'm sure the people who ask for a refund are asked for feedback about what they didn't like. I don't think sticking with OmniFocus should be interpreted as a blanket approval of the program as it is today, however; rather a belief that it is the best tool available to the user in question, yet with plenty of room for improvement. The 1500+ emails I've sent them over the last 5 years are mostly bug reports or suggestions for improvement. Sometimes they adopt the suggestions, and sometimes they don't.

All else being equal (which of course is rare), as a user of the program, I'd rather see them work on things that do not have a suitable workaround. If it is important to me and there's a workaround, I can do it, with some inconvenience. If it is important to me and there isn't a workaround, I'm stuck. I'd rather be inconvenienced than stuck :-)

[GeoffAirey]

All else being equal (which of course is rare), as a user of the program, I'd rather see them work on things that do not have a suitable workaround. If it is important to me and there's a workaround, I can do it, with some inconvenience. If it is important to me and there isn't a workaround, I'm stuck. I'd rather be inconvenienced than stuck :-)

I'd normally agree with you (and usually do on most things), but for me this is a real teeth grinding annoyance which requires several workarounds, not just one. Workarounds should be for the short term, rather than a long term.

e.g. I have a project I carry out on the first working day of each month, unfortunately I've had to set it for the 1st of each month and as it appears I reset it for the first working day.

I have several projects and tasks which I do two or three times a week, this leads to that number of identical copies which, when these require amendment, I have to amend the two or three copies individually.

I have a weekday morning routine which when I complete it on a friday, I have to find the next version of the project and move the start and finish dates to the monday.

I know you handle these differently and I've tried having a single reminder and a link to a list in Evernote, but that doesn't work for me. I need to check things off as they're done so I know exactly where I'm up to.

The way OF does projects works perfectly for me in every way but the rudimentary recurrence options. and that's why I stick with the solution.

The situation is though that OF is pretty open regarding how and why they add features at this time. I've logged my request and I have to wait until they decide whether to implement or not.

[whpalmer4]

Geoff, I actually do think they ought to add those options, and I would certainly use them quite a bit. But given that just about any feature request tends to be somewhat, mmm, deliberate in its appearance :-) I express the preference that I do.

[Lucas]

I wonder if another way to handle this would be to trigger an applescript from ical to create a new particular project or task group in OF with custom due dates. It could trigger automatically from iCal and use iCal's more detailed repeating options and could probably do some things that are pretty rare for repeating options, like find the last working day in the month.

[GeoffAirey]

I wonder if another way to handle this would be to trigger an applescript from ical to create a new particular project or task group in OF with custom due dates. It could trigger automatically from iCal and use iCal's more detailed repeating options and could probably do some things that are pretty rare for repeating options, like find the last working day in the month.

A good idea, but this wouldn't work for me. I mostly use OF for iPad, and like these actions checked off in OF.

[Lucas]

Why does that cause a problem? iCal can just add in tasks set for the first working day of the month or of the week without having to know whether the previous one completed, so long as iCal and OF stay open on your mac.

[GeoffAirey]

Hi Lucas, I assume your post was addressed to me?

Two reasons which I put above

1) I mainly use OF on iPad (98% of the time)
2) I like things checked off in OF as a record for myself of whether things were completed and if required, when.

[Lucas]

Hi Lucas, I assume your post was addressed to me?

Two reasons which I put above

1) I mainly use OF on iPad (98% of the time)
2) I like things checked off in OF as a record for myself of whether things were completed and if required, when.

I understand what you're saying; the solution that I've described above doesn't depend on checking tasks off in iCal, checking tasks off in OF your mac, or using much of OF on the mac at all. The only thing it depends on is having iCal and OF *running* at least once a day so that new tasks are added to OF on the mac based around a certain schedule, which will then get synchronized to the iPad or whatever. I can't see a reason why the place where you check off tasks has any effect on that method.

[c.nick]

I just found that this discussion ranks 5th in terms of replies on the forum and I found that I've been following it now since several years.

I know and appreciate that Omni makes very thoughtful decisions around which features to work on at what priority. Also everything is a question of resources. I've worked as a product manager in b2b IT, so I've faced these challenges myself. Omni has a fairly big portfolio of high class products that play on various devices - which experience enormous growth in popularity. All of which multiplies the sheer volume of tasks and complexity in product management. So my sympathy is with the Omni management who succeed at keeping quality and development speed up to their high standards despite of all the challenges of their own success.

Still, I'll quit following this particular thread now after several years of reading the back and forth.

I'm tired of reading how people religously defend and rate workarounds over(!) a feature which the entire industry regards as basic. No doubt - workarounds are a good thing and deserve our praise as long as they are needed for the lack of the real thing. But no longer than that.

I trust that Omni at some point will incorporate a rich repeat option ("every 3rd Friday of the month"). It'll help me automate many preparation tasks for recurring meetings, finances, hobby activities, etc. and thus get the workarounds out of my head into a system that I can trust even more.

Cheers everyone.
Chris

PS:
For those who still don't understand the difference between "every 3rd Friday of the month" and a selected "Friday every 4 weeks" - do yourself a favor and ask someone.

[whpalmer4]

Some of us point out workarounds to help the people who feel they need such functionality, you know, actually get stuff done while they wait for this feature to be implemented! More than a few requestors of this feature are new to the product, probably also new to Omni and thus may not realize that a feature request is usually not fulfilled as quickly as one might wish. If you have a genuine need for some functionality, most would agree that means you need it now — I've yet to see someone say that they'll need more repeat options in 6 months, but are fine with the current ones for now!

We could endlessly debate Omni's original decision not to put in the richer repeat options initially. My take is that they probably made the right choice in terms of functionality, and anything that went into FCS was probably of more value to more customers than custom repeats. Which core feature would have been better to omit so that custom repeats could have been there for 1.0 instead? It is easier for someone building a new product to deliver yet another feature that seems like they need to have because everyone else has it than to figure out what is really most needed (take the brilliant implementation of reviews, for example). Thankfully, the guy steering Apple over the last decade wasn't like that!

Arguments along the lines of "even this low-budget app has custom repeats, why doesn't OmniFocus?" are silly, I think. If that other app is cheaper and does what you need, why are you using OmniFocus? The other app doesn't have some important feature that OmniFocus has? That feature is more important to you than custom repeats, you say? Hmm...perhaps Omni did do a better job of choosing which features to implement...

[Christian]

To be fair though, seeing the money I invested in three versions of OF I hold OF to higher standards than the low budged app you are comparing with. I get your argumentation and I agree that it comes down to prioritising features since you can not code them all at once. However, if one app costs me 3.99 and OF costs 40 then I expect more features, not a different selection.

Seeing how old this thread is I wonder why there has been so low priority for this feature. I myself have had situations in which I would have needed to set up a certain pattern (the 3. Friday of the month scenario is pretty common amongst business people) and OF could not offer me an elegant solution. It did not kill me but if many people need it and say so since 2007 then that's something I would rate important. But maybe there are reasons not to do it.

[iriusman]

Is there any way to set up an action to repeat on, say, the third Friday in October every year?

[CatOne]

Is there any way to set up an action to repeat on, say, the third Friday in October every year?

No. You could pick October 20th of every year, but you can't have single repeating tasks which do something like you asked (or, say, repeat on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday of each week). You'd need multiple repeating tasks to do that.

[rdr]

I'd like to add my voice to the choir here asking for more robust options on repeating tasks. It's important to me to be able to have reminders for tasks that need to occur, say, ever fourth Thursday of the month. Appreciate your consideration for this capability.

-- Robert

[GeoffAirey]

Rodriguez, if you could contact the ninjas with a feature request, that would be grand.

[skillet]

Thank you Omni Group for OmniFocus 1.10.1! I have been waiting for the iPad update that corresponds to this update for a few weeks (since seeing the sneaky peek http://www.omnigroup.com/products/omnifocus/download/sneakypeek) and it is out today! It looks like 1.14 has yet to make it to the store for iPhone as of right now.

This is a huge step forward and allows me to retire a few scripts I have been using as work arounds. I recently bought OmniFocus for a colleague and he just started using it this week. So glad to see this update and had to come back and find my first post ever on these forums.

It was interesting to read all the many posts of despair since I last posted. I just spent an hour reading them to see if anyone came up with a good solution to the repeat on every third Saturday of the month. I like the iCal script idea.


I have several projects and tasks which I do two or three times a week, this leads to that number of identical copies which, when these require amendment, I have to amend the two or three copies individually.


It is really hard for me to find too many things that have really plagued me like the repeat feature. My workflow/workaround has been that I have a project for all my monthly actions that happen on a certain day and repeat them monthly. I put all of these in the same project (less then ideal) to make them easy to find and group. Then go through at the start of each month and move them to the right day. That way when they change I don't have to update a bunch of duplicates that I did at the start of the year when something is updated as GeoffAirey pointed out. This is similar to what whpalmer4's suggested in post 26.


For the "day after Thanksgiving" task, put in a task every Nov. 1 to fix the start date for your "day after Thanksgiving" project for that year. Let the program help you help it do the things it can't do yet!


I am so glad to retire my scripts for weekday actions, that forward start and due dates by 2 days and that I don't have to be slowed down by reading them on Saturdays anymore!

If it is important to me and there's a workaround, I can do it, with some inconvenience. If it is important to me and there isn't a workaround, I'm stuck. I'd rather be inconvenienced than stuck :-)

I agree, and between whpalmer4, Rob Trew and Curt Clifton they have helped solve 90+% of my OmniFocus problems. Whpalmer4’s scripting helped solve most of my biggest frustrations of working with repeating actions in other threads. Thank you Bill you're amazing!!!

I feel blessed that for my needs I don’t feel "stuck" on anything that readily comes to mind. There are many things that could be faster, but it is really about speed. This update is a greatly appreciated step in that direction.

http://www.macstories.net/stories/interview-the-omni-groups-ken-case/

"Don: Are there any plans to update OmniFocus for Mac this year?

Ken: Absolutely. There’s an update planned for this quarter for OmniFocus – not OmniFocus 2 to be clear, but we think a lot of customers will be really happy in what’s coming up in this release.

Don: You mentioned on your blog about possibly doing a bit of a visual upgrade to OmniFocus and pull over some of the features of the iPad app.

Ken: That’s not this quarter’s release either, but it’s work that’s in progress. This quarter’s release we thought we’d hop on a feature that is requested a lot and doesn’t require big changes to the user interface, rather than having people wait indefinitely for a feature they’ve been wanting a lot."

Thanks Ken for not holding this back until OmniFocus 2!! This seemed to be the biggest complaints people had with low star reviews on the App Store. I wish I could post there my appreciation and rave review but I didn't buy my copy through the app store (let more income go to Omni Group!)

[skillet]

By the way the repeat options thankfully stay locked to the day they have selected. For example if there is a start date, and you change, it when marked off it will start on the day you have it set to repeat on. If you have a start and a due date it will use the due date for the repeat option and keep the same relative start date. Seems like a good and logic way to set it up if I understand the new rules right.

The logic obviously gets more complicated with multiple days of the week selected to repeat on.

[keynotes]

Thank you for adding the ability to select days for repeating tasks! I'm sure this has been requested before, but could a "repeat until" a specified date be prioritized on the OmniGroup's to-do list?

[ak56]

Nice to see day of the week. Really need monthly options as well. i.e. First monday of month etc.

[Oogiem]

I don't think I've ever seen desktop software that makes that calculation.

I have, Palm Desktop circa 1998 or so

[ralphdb]

Nice to see day of the week. Really need monthly options as well. i.e. First monday of month etc.

I was surprised, not seeing this option in OF. I have some tasks, which are due at special weekday of month (1st Monday, 2nd Tuesday, last Friday)

[AlphaSmith]

Count me down a someone who has owned OF for FIVE YEARS and still not done more than futz with it…BECAUSE it does not have a rich repeating to do function.

I appreciate the move in that direction, but I simply cannot use the software until this is implemented and it's incredibly aggravating.

Right now I'm using BusyCal (which integrates nicely on iPad and iPhone using Busy To Do). PLEASE look at BusyCal's slick, flexible repeating to do list. It's easy to understand and implement and works perfectly.

As has been said before, such functionality has been accessible for ages (Now Up To Date was the first one I used regularly).

Why do people want the repeating to dos and calendar in OF? Because they want ALL their actions in ONE PLACE. OF is the BEST at the GTD model, but, hello, scheduled events and repeating tasks are a huge part of the THINGS we are trying to GET DONE. Forcing hopeful OF users to spread their information out in multiple programs is less efficient and makes it more likely that things will get lost, forgotten, misplaced, or overlooked.

[whpalmer4]

You cannot use it? Why not? I've completed thousands of repeating actions with it over the years. Some things are a bit inconvenient without built-in support, but I haven't encountered anything impossible, and refusing to use OmniFocus would be much more inconvenient!

[AlphaSmith]

whpalmer, I am unsure what purpose is served by arguing with my comment. The fact that you can reasonably accommodate the deficiencies in OF's repeating actions, doesn't address whether or not I can, in my circumstance.

I think you've made it clear throughout this enormous thread that you are satisfied with the functionality and your workarounds. I — and dozens of others — are not. Don't you think it's possible that the OmniGroup wants feedback from people besides you?

That said, almost every project I work on includes multiple repeatable events based a monthly calendar. First Thursday, last Monday, first and third Wednesday, third Friday every other month, first Saturday every six months, etc.

With OF finally implementing flexible weekly repeats this past March, I feel they are clueing into this need. The OF blog itself called this addition "the extremely useful and oft-requested feature."

They noted that this feature replaces a kluge that "required a bit too much initial effort." (Which is an understatement given the available alternatives AND the problem when this "too much initial effort" is required again and again over dozens of projects.)

They conclude with:

"We’d like to add more functionality for repeating actions in the future, too."

I look forward to this! I hope it doesn't take five more years to reach this functionality. I'd love to incorporate OF into my project work.

[Rebel Egg]

Another passionate plea for monthly options (First monday of month, Every 3rd Friday).

P.S. It would also be nice for The Omni Group to have an easy-to-find site where users could suggest and vote for feature requests.

[dgki]

Help us manage our task and people better by adding this type of repeat option.

[whpalmer4]

Help us manage our task and people better by adding this type of repeat option.

Note that "to vote" you need to send email to omnifocus@omnigroup.com (or use Help->Send Feedback) — posting to the forum will not suffice.

[dgki]

Note that "to vote" you need to send email to omnifocus@omnigroup.com (or use Help->Send Feedback) — posting to the forum will not suffice.
Thank you.

[Forumposter]

I need the following (maybe it's a bug?):

I have repeated tasks. Let's say there is a daily task and I am busy for 1 week. Then I have 1 task I can check off, but it will reappear in an instant (for the next day) and so on until all 7 are checked off.
I need a "repeat 1 day after check off".

[whpalmer4]

If those tasks are truly identical, and it is mainly important that you do one every day going forward (as opposed to needing to do one for each day that you missed), I suggest a repeat policy of start again after 1 day, and use a due date on the action. You'll get an indication that you've missed one, but you won't get a pile of overdue actions as you catch up.