Feature Request: Don't show folders/projects without actions in them
 

Sorry if I missed this some existing thread.

In projects view, when viewing by next, available or remaining, it would be tremendous if one had the option to not show folders & projects that had no actions in them.

I have tons of folders & projects that will never be truly completed but often don’t have a next, available or remaining action. So, when viewing the list I see every single folder & project. In my case, one example is a folder called Marketing with a Campaigns folder in it which then has projects in that. Currently I don't have any any next, available or remaining actions in it (they're all currently either dated ticklers or in brainstorming mode without contexts) but it still shows up in the projects view as 3 empty rows. This gets rough when one has dozens of such items: loads of scrolling to get through empty items.

Perhaps a "Show All (or Empty) Folders & Projects" checkbox in the prefs?

[QUOTE=spnyc]
Perhaps a "Show All (or Empty) Folders & Projects" checkbox in the prefs?[/QUOTE]

Would this be better as part of the filter settings? I can see wanting to switch between the two modes fairly regularly. If the option was part of the filter, then it could be saved in perspectives.

Cheers,

Curt

[QUOTE=curt.clifton]Would this be better as part of the filter settings? I can see wanting to switch between the two modes fairly regularly. If the option was part of the filter, then it could be saved in perspectives.[/QUOTE]

That would definitely do it too, and probably be more useful than a checkbox. Anything to make those empty entries disappear :)

yes. please.

Isn't a project without any next actions, that is either waiting for development, or currently being brainstorms, what the On Hold flag is for? I have a lot of projects like this too, and I just set them to On Hold and then adjust the filter settings to only show active projects. Once a week I go through all holding projects to keep my mind fresh of what is sitting there.

[QUOTE=AmberV]Isn't a project without any next actions, that is either waiting for development, or currently being brainstorms, what the On Hold flag is for? I have a lot of projects like this too, and I just set them to On Hold and then adjust the filter settings to only show active projects. Once a week I go through all holding projects to keep my mind fresh of what is sitting there.[/QUOTE]

That would meet my needs, except that currently folders cannot be "On Hold", only projects can be. The project filtering would be more powerful if folders had the same four states as projects.

I have no opinion on whether or not a folder should have all four states. I can see good arguments either way. But, you can set a folder to be inactive, and thus act pretty much the same way that holding projects act. They'll disappear until you set the filter mode to All.

[QUOTE=AmberV]I have no opinion on whether or not a folder should have all four states. I can see good arguments either way. But, you can set a folder to be inactive, and thus act pretty much the same way that holding projects act. They'll disappear until you set the filter mode to All.[/QUOTE]

Right, but there is no way to just view the inactive folders, which might be nice for reviews. If folders could be on-hold, then the On-hold Projects filter setting would show them...

But now I see the difficulty. Should only On-hold projects of On-hold folders show in that case? Or should everything under an on-hold item show, regardless of its own status?

I'll have to use On-hold project status more to reach a conclusion. Thanks for reminding me that it's there!

[QUOTE=AmberV]Isn't a project without any next actions, that is either waiting for development, or currently being brainstorms, what the On Hold flag is for? I have a lot of projects like this too, and I just set them to On Hold and then adjust the filter settings to only show active projects. Once a week I go through all holding projects to keep my mind fresh of what is sitting there.[/QUOTE]

I actually tried using the "on hold" option to accomplish this prior to submitting the feature request but it didn't work for me at all for a couple of reasons.

In my world, "on hold" projects usually have actions associated with them; imagine a project with tons of sub-projects and actions which you're plugging away at, and then for some reason, you or your company puts a freeze on it. You want the whole project to go away until you're ready to bring it back to active.

On the other hand, i have several "active" projects that don't have actions right now but they most likely will by the end of the day, or the next day, which more than makes them active. I just would prefer to not see them in my list if they don't currently have a next or available action.

Also, "on hold" projects are basically dead to me until my weekend weekly review when i review whether or not it's time to make them "active" and get them going again, or rather leave them be for another week. While I don't consider myself a GTD black belt, this was how I interpreted "on hold" in my GTD frame of reference.

Finally, "on hold" projects (thankfully) don't show up in the project auto-complete when entering new inbox actions. This actually is a barrier for using "on hold" for those empty projects. That being said, I am in complete agreement with this behavior; if a project is "on hold", I definitely don't want to see it in the list.

One place that I would agree on for sure is with grouping. Empty folders and projects shouldn't show up in the main area. Excluding them from the list though--I mean they are active like you say, just not filled in yet. Wouldn't it be difficult to add anything to them if you could not see them [i]anywhere[/i] with active filters turned on? Perhaps I am misunderstanding what you are wanting.