[Speireag]

I routinely generate projects where I know the next step or two, but need to flesh it out more completely later. The first thing I put in that project is often an action entitled "Next action?" with a context of "anywhere". When I have a spare moment, I go down the projects in order of priority and add actions as necessary.

In many of these projects, there is a juncture where I need the project to go from serial to parallel. So I create a step with sub-steps, label it "parallel", and put steps in it. On my Mac, this is easy. On the iPhone, it is somewhat laborious.

I have not found a way to duplicate an entire project on the iPhone. Is there a way? Or, better yet, is there a way to invoke a template? To select a particular template from several? Or am I missing something else?

-Speireag.

[Brian]

We've got feature requests open on the ability to copy projects/folders/contexts, but it's not currently supported in the iPhone app. We've got a similar request open on the ability to set up project templates, as well. I'll attach your post to both items in our development database so the rest of the team will know you'd like to see these added. Thanks!

[whpalmer4]

There's kind of a sneaky way you can do this. Make your template project a repeating project. Now when you want to make a copy, you mark the project complete (thus generating a new copy), then mark the template incomplete once again. Might be helpful to keep the templates in a dropped folder so they don't show up in your lists (obviously, you'll want to move the new project out!) You'll probably want to make the new project not repeat. Also, you can't use the Undo feature to toggle the status of the template project!

[Speireag]

Thanks, Brian. I'll look forward to it.

Thanks, whpalmer4. That creative solution will probably work for me in the interim. I'll give it a try.

-Speireag.

[hpr]

Hi all,
is there a thread concerning how to handle recurring projects? I don't want to set up my projects again and again after completing all tasks. (Besides, as far as I have understood OF, completed tasks are erased and cannot be restored except in OF for Mac OS.)

Thanks a lot!

[Brian]

Welcome to the forums, hpr - I'm about to move your post (and this one) to a thread with the info you're looking for. Just giving you a heads-up.

[whpalmer4]

All 3 versions of the app support repeating projects, just as they do repeating actions. Set your project to repeat, put a start date on the project, and you're off to the races. The start date keeps the next copy of the project from starting immediately after you finish the last one, assuming you don't want that. A project to mow the lawn on Saturday morning every week might look something like this:

Mow the lawn (Start: May 4, 2013 10:00 AM, Repeat: Every week, Sequential)
Pick up sticks and other debris
Cut grass
Trim around trees
Wipe mower blades clean

If you've got the Mac app, there's an option in the Inspector to set the selected project(s) to automatically complete themselves when all of the actions are completed. The iOS apps heed that setting, but unfortunately don't offer the user interface to inspect or set it. With the settings mentioned above, when you complete the project, a new copy of the project will be created to start 1 week after the previous one did, and you won't see those actions for the upcoming project until the start date arrives, if you are showing Next Actions or Available.

To clear up a small misconception, completed tasks are NOT erased. Instead, they simply aren't shown unless you ask to see them. The eyeball icon allows you to see Next Actions, Available, Remaining, or All, and only the final option includes completed tasks and projects. On the Mac, there's a similar setting in the View Bar.

You may notice that there are multiple options for repeating. Repeat every gets you a repeat that is fixed to the calendar, regardless of when you complete the project. Paying the rent or mortgage would be a good example of this — the landlord or bank will want the next payment on time, regardless of when you made the last one. There are also options for Start again and Due again, which base the new dates on when you complete the previous copy of the project. Getting a haircut might be a good example here — if you skip getting one for a few weeks, there's no need to "catch up" and have two in quick succession.

[hpr]

Thanks a lot for pointing all this out! :-)