[Lucas]

One of the answers probably is to sort your list by added, take the tasks that you added a year ago and never touched, and delete them.

[sriggins]

Originally Posted by Lucas

One of the answers probably is to sort your list by added, take the tasks that you added a year ago and never touched, and delete them.

Which is just what I did with the boxes in the garage :)

[Brian]

We definitely want to make more videos, but it's a fairly labor-intensive process, and some of the questions you're looking for don't have a lot of hard-and-fast answers. Which contexts someone should set up tends to vary a lot from person to person, for example. For stuff like that, I think you've hit on the right solution - there's a ton of material here on the forums.

Now, I'm looking over your other questions, and I'm actually writing up a couple of bugs vs. our documentation; we explain the 'overdue' and 'due soon' badges, but we do so in the context of the menu bar badge, not the dock badge. We also don't explain the 'items in your inbox' badge, which is the specific one you hit. (FYI, if you click and hold on the dock icon, the menu that appears does explain what that badge means, but there's no way you could have known that in advance.)

In any case, if you haven't checked it out, the printed manual may be helpful; it starts off with a tutorial like you're looking for, and it does do a good job of explaining the general things you're struggling with. ;-)

Now, the item creation problem you hit sounds like a bug, but it sounds like one that should be fixed in version 1.0.2 - are you using that build? If so, there's some edge case of that bug that we need your help to track down and fix.

[sriggins]

Documentation? Who uses that! :)

I am on 1.0.2, yes.

I'll try and dig through for other's examples on how they organize OF. I have talked to some friends. One said "it's so confusing I just use one context for everything."

I think an application like OF needs to go beyond a powerful outliner and help people organize.

For example, have you seen del.icio.us? It suggests tags as you type, based on uri, context, etc. Quite nice so people are not making up 500 different tags that are synonymous with "Development"

Anyway, just feedback that I bet OF could go well beyond super GTD outliner. the iPhone location based ideas, that is what I mean, that goes beyond the organization and starts helping the user with their content. That rocks!

I'll go dig through the forums now, thanks!

[Toadling]

Originally Posted by sriggins

I have talked to some friends. One said "it's so confusing I just use one context for everything."

Wow, what a shame. That's like using a new widescreen HDTV for nothing but shadow play because the buttons on the remote are so confusing. And most TV remotes are far more complicated than OmniFocus. :)

I'd hate to talk someone out of buying an OF license, but maybe your friend would have been better off with TextEdit or iCal's to do list?

I'm puzzled by this seeming perception that OmniFocus is so complicated. Why are people so intimidated? I guess there's a lot of flexibility that can maybe seem a little scary at first. But I don't see what the big deal is. And I wonder what could be done to alleviate people's fears.

But I guess these questions are better discussed in another thread. Sorry for the digression.

-Dennis

[Brian]

Originally Posted by Toadling

I'm puzzled by this seeming perception that OmniFocus is so complicated. Why are people so intimidated? I guess there's a lot of flexibility that can maybe seem a little scary at first.

There's a lot of flexibility in the app, and if you haven't read David Allen's book, you've actually got two simultaneous learning curves to deal with. It's also fundamentally not a document-editing application, which folks are a little more used to starting from scratch in. It's a 'figure out how to run my life' app, which is somewhat daunting all by itself.

Originally Posted by Toadling

And I wonder what could be done to alleviate people's fears.

Well, more tutorials and videos, probably. If Apple would refrain from throwing total game-changing curveballs like new hardware platforms at us, we might have a chance to make some. :-)

Originally Posted by Toadling

But I guess these questions are better discussed in another thread. Sorry for the digression.

Apology accepted but unnecessary, in my opinion. :-)

[Brian]

Originally Posted by sriggins

I'll try and dig through for other's examples on how they organize OF.

Sorry, I meant to include more info here, but I had to run to an appointment.

My contexts are:
Job

Desk
Roaming
Mailbox
Other

Errands

Portland
Seattle

Home
Phone

I'm pretty minimalist; you may want more.

Originally Posted by sriggins

I think an application like OF needs to go beyond a powerful outliner and help people organize.

For example, have you seen del.icio.us? It suggests tags as you type, based on uri, context, etc.

This would be handy; you should use the Send Feedback item in OmniFocus' help menu to make sure that gets recorded properly. (Not being a jerk here - see this thread for reasons why email is better.)

Also, remember that every feature that we add is more that the user has to learn how to use, so your desires seem to be somewhat in competition with each other. Not that you're unique in this regard. :-)