[mpw]

I have OmniFocus on my work computer and sync to my Palm via iCal. At home I work through my list of tasks, but I also add new tasks on the Palm, using it as a quick entry tool. The next time I'm on my work computer, the new tasks all sync to OF nicely via iCal and wind up in my Inbox. All of that works peachy keen.

However, when I process my Inbox I am very often frustrated because I'm not able to control where a new task is placed within a project.

Let's say at home I get three new ideas about project X and enter them in on my Palm. Project X already has ten tasks in it. After I sync to OF I want to put the first new idea at the top of the project list so it becomes the new Next Action. I want to put the second new idea at the very bottom of the project list, and the third idea somewhere in the middle.

I enter the project and appropriate contexts while in the Inbox, but when I do a clean, the tasks are all tacked on to the end (?) of the project list, the Inbox is cleared and I'm left with no quick way to get to the projects I need to fine tune. That means I have to remember which project I just added new tasks to, search through my long list of projects, navigate to the correct one, open it and juggle around the tasks appropriately. That's no problem if I can remember the name of the project I just added to, but that's an extra something in my head to distract from the workflow.

Things get really difficult when I have several ideas each for several different projects. I want to make sure all the tasks are properly positioned in all of the projects. I either have to remember all the projects, or what I often wind up doing is open new windows and focus on each of the projects. After I clean up, I process the order in each of the focussed project windows. It works but it's very clumsy.

Suggestion:

I'm thinking it would be helpful to be able to double click on a task in the Inbox task list to have OF open up a new window and focus on the project I've already entered. I could then drag and drop the new tasks for that project to the proper spots in the second window. When I'm done with that project, I could close the window, double click on the next Inbox task and do the same thing. I wouldn't use the clean up button for these tasks.

I just realized what I ought to do now is open a second window next to the Inbox window and navigate to the appropriate projects there. Being able to double click on an Inbox task would be a lot more convenient, though, since I wouldn't have to search through my long project list for each project.