Hi everyone,
I wanted to share a simple way to make your own daily routine checklists. I make my own schedule and I'm very distractible, so if I don't start my routine at the moment I get up in the morning, it's likely to be noon before I get around to being productive.
My requirements: all items on the checklist must be displayed in the correct order, they must all be shown at once, they must be separate from my other tasks, they must be easy to change, and most importantly, they must disappear when I check them off and reappear the next morning, without fail, whether or not I checked them off the day before. And they must not appear as due, so they don't flood out my truly "due" items.
I think it was the update to 1.6 or 1.7 that made it easy to do this, with the new way of specifying start dates for repeating tasks.
How to do it:
Let's make two daily routines: "Morning" and "Evening". Create a new context called "Routines" and inside that context create a "Morning" context and an "Evening" context.
Now switch to projects mode and create a single folder called "Daily Routine". Inside this folder, make two new single action lists*. Name the first "Morning" and the second "Evening".
Now list your routine items as actions inside these two projects, giving each step the context of "Morning" or "Evening" as appropriate. For example, your list of "Morning" project might contain:
- Shower
- Dress
- Believe six impossible things
- Breakfast
etc.
Also fill out the estimated time for each item, if possible**. Now select all the action steps and in the inspector, where it says "Don't repeat" change it to "Start again" 1 day after completion.
Now go to context mode, apply the following filters: Context Filter (Remaining), Grouping (Context), Sorting (Project), Status Filter (Available), Estimated Time (Any), Flag Filter (Any). Now select the "Routines" context from the left hand sidebar. If all went well, you should see your daily routine items listed in the right order and under the right heading.
Now type control-P to bring up the Perspectives window. Create a new perspective and call it "Routine". Now make sure that Focus, Layout, Expansion, and Selection are all checked.
I think that's all there is to it.
*If you'd like the option to show only the next item of your routine or highlight the first item of each routine, then change your Routine single action list(s) to parallel instead of single action list. Then, to show just the next action in context mode, change the Status Filter to Next Action.
**There's a useful applescript for showing total time required for selected items, and it can help with figuring out how long your routine will take and how much time you'll have left for other projects.
Other Notes:
- The reason for putting your single action lists inside the "Routine" folder is that, besides keeping your projects library organized, it allows you to easily remove them from your other action list perspectives, if desired.
- You can have any number of routines you want, as long as you make a new context for each (and, for organization's sake, a new single action list or project for each).
- By clicking in the sidebar (context mode), you can show the whole day's routines or just morning or evening. By selecting the items and using the Sum Items script, you can calculate the total time they will take.
- You can include items in your routine that repeat only every other day. Just change the "Start again" to after 2 days.
- There's no way to make them only repeat on weekdays, but you can have a separate Routine context for weekends, and when Monday comes around, your weekday routines will be right there ready to start again, with no nagging overdue notices.
I wanted to share a simple way to make your own daily routine checklists. I make my own schedule and I'm very distractible, so if I don't start my routine at the moment I get up in the morning, it's likely to be noon before I get around to being productive.
My requirements: all items on the checklist must be displayed in the correct order, they must all be shown at once, they must be separate from my other tasks, they must be easy to change, and most importantly, they must disappear when I check them off and reappear the next morning, without fail, whether or not I checked them off the day before. And they must not appear as due, so they don't flood out my truly "due" items.
I think it was the update to 1.6 or 1.7 that made it easy to do this, with the new way of specifying start dates for repeating tasks.
How to do it:
Let's make two daily routines: "Morning" and "Evening". Create a new context called "Routines" and inside that context create a "Morning" context and an "Evening" context.
Now switch to projects mode and create a single folder called "Daily Routine". Inside this folder, make two new single action lists*. Name the first "Morning" and the second "Evening".
Now list your routine items as actions inside these two projects, giving each step the context of "Morning" or "Evening" as appropriate. For example, your list of "Morning" project might contain:
- Shower
- Dress
- Believe six impossible things
- Breakfast
etc.
Also fill out the estimated time for each item, if possible**. Now select all the action steps and in the inspector, where it says "Don't repeat" change it to "Start again" 1 day after completion.
Now go to context mode, apply the following filters: Context Filter (Remaining), Grouping (Context), Sorting (Project), Status Filter (Available), Estimated Time (Any), Flag Filter (Any). Now select the "Routines" context from the left hand sidebar. If all went well, you should see your daily routine items listed in the right order and under the right heading.
Now type control-P to bring up the Perspectives window. Create a new perspective and call it "Routine". Now make sure that Focus, Layout, Expansion, and Selection are all checked.
I think that's all there is to it.
*If you'd like the option to show only the next item of your routine or highlight the first item of each routine, then change your Routine single action list(s) to parallel instead of single action list. Then, to show just the next action in context mode, change the Status Filter to Next Action.
**There's a useful applescript for showing total time required for selected items, and it can help with figuring out how long your routine will take and how much time you'll have left for other projects.
Other Notes:
- The reason for putting your single action lists inside the "Routine" folder is that, besides keeping your projects library organized, it allows you to easily remove them from your other action list perspectives, if desired.
- You can have any number of routines you want, as long as you make a new context for each (and, for organization's sake, a new single action list or project for each).
- By clicking in the sidebar (context mode), you can show the whole day's routines or just morning or evening. By selecting the items and using the Sum Items script, you can calculate the total time they will take.
- You can include items in your routine that repeat only every other day. Just change the "Start again" to after 2 days.
- There's no way to make them only repeat on weekdays, but you can have a separate Routine context for weekends, and when Monday comes around, your weekday routines will be right there ready to start again, with no nagging overdue notices.
Last edited by abh19; 2009-10-03 at 11:27 AM..
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