HELP!! Even longer project names!
 

A couple of days ago I posted here ([url]http://forums.omnigroup.com/showthread.php?t=4538[/url] ) about long project names making to-do lists hard to read on my PDA,

I hadn't updated builds in a few days. When I did so today, the displayed project names now incorporate the entire folder hierarchy.

This makes for *really* long project names (at least for me). Because the width of the column that displays the project name is not adjustable, the project name occupies four lines/rows. This means that every single action now occupies four rows. That means that my whole computer screen can only display about six actions at a time.

This *SERIOUSLY* affects the usability of OmniFocus (at least for me), even on a desktop with planty of screen real estate. On my PDA -- my earlier concern -- the problem will be even worse -- basically, to-do lists will take so much time to scroll through they'll be useless.

Support Ninjas, please hear my plea! PLEASE provide an option to control the verbosity of project names!

Anyone else finding this difficult to work with...?

update: project names aren't any longer in iCal/Treo
 

update: The project name hierarchy information doesn't get synced as part of the project name to iCal (and thence to Treo). So, the project names aren't any longer than previously in iCal/Treo.

But they *are* much longer (in the new builds) in the OmniFocus context view, so my request stands: can we have options to control the elements of the project name that are displayed?

I'm not a big fan of the "full hierarchy" names as well. At least not without column resizing. In fact, I'd even suggest an option to turn off the display of the projects all together. In my mind, a well written task should be able to stand alone (i.e. I should be able to do it without being reminded at that time what project it is for).

Try selecting "Collapse Row Text When Not Editing" from the View menu. Does that help?

[QUOTE=Ken Case;19563]Try selecting "Collapse Row Text When Not Editing" from the View menu. Does that help?[/QUOTE]

Not really. Assuming I have nested folders containing a project, only the left-most part of the folder name(s) show, but the project name itself is buried in the "...". This makes the context view's project column worthless.

[QUOTE=pvonk;19568]Not really. Assuming I have nested folders containing a project, only the left-most part of the folder name(s) show, but the project name itself is buried in the "...". This makes the context view's project column worthless.[/QUOTE]

I was finding myself adding more information to the project names so I could differentiate them easily in context view. E.g. under my Work folder I had a project "Work tasks". In project view this is redundant (Work -> Work tasks). Now I can name it "Tasks" and I get "Work : Tasks".

For deep hierarchy's I can see how it would suck though.

[QUOTE=pvonk;19568]Not really. Assuming I have nested folders containing a project, only the left-most part of the folder name(s) show, but the project name itself is buried in the "...". This makes the context view's project column worthless.[/QUOTE]

Have you considered using a shallower (or no) folder hierarchy? I used to use quite a complicated folder system both for projects and general reference filing, but since reading GTD I've taken up David Allen's suggestion of having a single alpha general reference filing system (both electronic and physical) and a single alpha projects list. You may for convenience want a work and personal projects folder, but I can't see much reason to go deeper than that: as it says in GTD, the more complicated the filing system the more potential places there are to lose something. I think OF actually supports this really well with the focusing system.

[QUOTE=al_f;19592]Have you considered using a shallower (or no) folder hierarchy? [/QUOTE]

You're suggesting *not* using a feature of OF because of a GUI limitation?

I only have at most three levels of folders which suits my organization perfectly (and have very few such triple levels). Not using them makes the projects view more difficult to visually scan and maintain. This issue points out the difference between simplifying a structure and simplifying the processing of data.

[QUOTE=pvonk;19612]You're suggesting *not* using a feature of OF because of a GUI limitation?[/QUOTE]

No, I'm suggesting using a flatter folder hierarchy because it might make your workflow easier: it did for me. YMMV.