[Lecter]

Hey Abates,

You are looking for a feature that is unnecessary for GTD. And OmniFocus is developed and designed with GTD principles, for GTD users. Without GTD, OmniFocus wouldn't exist. Sure, OmniFocus can be shoehorned into other systems and/or productivity processes, but one should expect some personal desires not being met when one tries to shove a square peg into a round hole.

No one is denying you the ability to request the Life Balance feature (and I've given you every opportunity to expand your reasons for the request). You "dredge up" (interesting choice of words for you to use) a thread that has been dormant for quite a while, in which a great amount of passion and thought has been invested by numerous people. By doing this, you are welcoming history and existing opinions along for the ride. Out of curiosity, why jump in the middle of the ocean, when one could have a calmer swim in a less turbulent lake (aka, starting a fresh, clean thread to discuss your ideas)?

Aaaaaaaaand there it is, indeed. When you don't respond to points and counterpoints that serve the needs of your agenda, are you truly surprised that someone disagrees with your position? The last example is the customization of iTunes View Options. I feel that I made great points there. Did you miss them? Or did it just not provide any grist for your agenda? This lack of response on select topics really makes me feel like my points are not worth your time if they don't reinforce your position.

I've invested a lot of time absorbing GTD principles (through seminars, books, audio and Connect). I'm sharing what I've learned when I observe something in processes that I honestly believe could be better than they currently are. These aren't attacks, but suggestions. If you find my suggestions disagreeable, tell me that we should agree to disagree, and I'll drop the specific discussion. Really. However, if you make statements that are misconceptions (or are misleading), expect reciprocal clarifications/discussions.

Speaking of misconceptions, lets try a little experiment. Do you see the little button in the upper left corner of the Inspector palette? Its the one that highlights in red when your mouse cursor is over it. Click that button. Now tell me if you can see the Estimated Time in the Inspector palette. No? That is probably because the Inspector palette is completely hidden. I've never said that the feature has to be removed — I am talking about hiding them. Since the Inspector palette can be completely hidden, it handles the issue of hiding the unused features that are contained in it.

I do feel that the Inspector palette has its own issues (which have lead me to using keyboard shortcuts instead of the palate), but this is a topic for another thread.

The reason why there is concern over a (potential) priority field always being visible, is exemplified in the existing Flag column. Unlike the Context, Estimate, Start Date, Due Date and Completion Date columns, Flag cannot be hidden. It shows up whenever I move my mouse near it. I'm not sure why the OmniFocus designers & programmers have made this choice, and that is the reason why I am defending the position here (so the Support Ninjas et al can see why they should offer users the choice of which columns are visible).

It is unreasonable to force users to view fields that are unused. If you honestly don't get this, then this is a area where we will need to agree to disagree.

Flexibility is a key way for Omnifocus to grow and evolve. Adding optional new features is great. Forcing new features to always be visible (particularly ones that go against OmniFocus' GTD centric design) will result in alienating the existing GTD user-base.

Sure, Things' tags could be used for priority fields. OmniFocus' contexts and/or flags could be used as priority fields too. This doesn't make them priority fields. When I've seen comments regarding Things or Hit List as the preferred option, priority fields aren't mentioned — complexity and the interface are the motivational factors.

My concern (not complaint) is that OmniGroup may make poor decisions about the planned "metadata" (priority) column. They may make it like the existing Flag column (aka, of limited use and unable to be hidden). By voicing concerns early, users' thoughts can be noted during the designing and planning stages, thus avoiding subsequent recoding and redesign. Its about being proactive versus reactive.

I ran across this article in ATPM:

http://www.atpm.com/15.04/gtd.shtml

I think it is a fair example of why I've stated my concerns regarding users choosing other applications. Of particular note:

The problems with OmniFocus are its bells and whistles, the rigidity of its system, and hence the extra time it takes to enter information. As one of the tutorial notes, “[o]nce you have a significant amount of information in your OmniFocus database, it can start to get overwhelming.” That is an understatement.

And:

Like the hero in a Greek tragedy, its greatest strengths are its greatest weaknesses: it has so many features that it is too complicated for most purposes.

Read the full article. OmniFocus is given reasonable praise, but the reviewer ends up choosing Things as his final solution.