[bemental]

Anyone have any idea what happens to geolocation reminders that are set to repeat if you're not at the location?

Example: "Take out the Trash" @ "Home" repeats "Weekly"

What I'd like to see happen is that when (and only when) I'm at home I get a reminder to take out the trash. If I'm not at home on the particular day, I want OF to ignore this reminder and remind me once again only on the particular day.


Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

--

Also, any chance we can get an option to trigger an action while AT a location (instead of leaving/arriving)? I'm going to try using the arrive at location on the lowest setting and see if the threshold is low enough, but it might not work out.

[whpalmer4]

Geolocation reminders don't repeat — actions and projects repeat. They are independent concepts. If you have an available action, and you come within the active area of the location for the context assigned to the action, you'll (probably) get a notification. If you have multiple available actions at a given location, you'll get a reminder to do one of them, with an indication that there are a number of others to be done there as well.

In your example, if your "Take out the trash" action has a start date which is in the past, when you enter the Home context (if it has a location reminder set), you should get a notification that you can do that action (or some other available action assigned to that context). It matters not whether it is set to repeat hourly, daily, weekly, or not at all.

The Map view (in list mode) gives you your list of available tasks at your current location, or nearby. You do have to check it. Given that the location-based notification reminders are edge-triggered, I'm not sure what you envision for when the "at" notifications are going to appear. After you've completed all the "arrival" actions? After some arbitrary amount of time? Magically, halfway through the time you'll be in this spot? On launch?

[bemental]

Originally Posted by whpalmer4

Geolocation reminders don't repeat — actions and projects repeat.

Semantics at this point. A geolocation reminder is merely a reminder for an action that can take place at a particular location on the earth. If the action repeats I expect the reminder to repeat. I apologize for not being specific enough!

I'm working my way through David Allen's GTD book currently so I'm not as hip as I'd like to be on the terms, but we'll work through that.

Originally Posted by whpalmer4

They are independent concepts. If you have an available action, and you come within the active area of the location for the context assigned to the action, you'll (probably) get a notification. If you have multiple available actions at a given location, you'll get a reminder to do one of them, with an indication that there are a number of others to be done there as well.

In the end you understood what I was getting at.

Originally Posted by whpalmer4

In your example, if your "Take out the trash" action has a start date which is in the past, when you enter the Home context (if it has a location reminder set), you should get a notification that you can do that action (or some other available action assigned to that context). It matters not whether it is set to repeat hourly, daily, weekly, or not at all.

This is where OmniFocus isn't quite set up to accomplish what I'd like it to. My intention is to set the task used in the example to be hidden from view all of the time, EXCEPT when the task is available to me (for the trash example, Sunday evenings when I'm at home).

The only point of contention is that I would like to establish both a TIME and a LOCATION parameter as opposed to one or the other. This would be very helpful in other situations as well, i.e. if you knew the hours of your local grocery store or post office you could add those to the context so when you looked at your map view (or set the location to a specific location) you would or would not see it (or be reminded, respectively) at the current point in time.

This could help avoid the situation where you get out late from work and pull up your map view, see that you have actions in the locale you're currently in, only to show up and have the store be closed (or to continue on with the previous example, perhaps you aren't home when the trash needs to be taken out, OmniFocus realizes this based on your location and you aren't bugged to take out the trash when you can't do it).

Originally Posted by whpalmer4

The Map view (in list mode) gives you your list of available tasks at your current location, or nearby. You do have to check it. Given that the location-based notification reminders are edge-triggered, I'm not sure what you envision for when the "at" notifications are going to appear. After you've completed all the "arrival" actions? After some arbitrary amount of time? Magically, halfway through the time you'll be in this spot? On launch?

Yea, I realize that if it's a search-based location then you won't get the reminder and that you have to check the map. I'm referring specifically to "points on the deck" with reminders set to specific distances around them.

The confusion with the arrival actions you mentioned is merely a means for me to hack or "trick" OmniFocus into thinking I'm arriving when I haven't moved, utilizing the general imprecise nature of geolocation on the iPhone (big blue circle when establishing your location, until narrowed). What I was trying to accomplish is making the geofence the smallest allowed, checking if OmniFocus will trip that because the nature of my location isn't as accurate as possible.


I've attached a screen shot from the iOS app 2Do that phrases my requirements nicely.



Merely testing this out to see if it accomplishes what I envision it to, as discussed. Used to use this app before OmniFocus came into my life.

[denrael]

Originally Posted by bemental

I've attached a screen shot from the iOS app 2Do that phrases my requirements nicely.

2Do does a very nice job of implementing geofencing. I've used the app and love many aspects of it. I agree that OmniFocus could learn from them how to better implement that feature. On the other hand, nothing implements reviews as well as OmniFocus on the iPad. I also love the Forecast feature on iPhone and iPad.

I used to use a program called Life Balance. In many ways it remains my favorite app from the heuristics they implemented to make sure aspects of your life weren't forgotten about. Similar to OmniFocus, they used nested contexts which I think make a lot of sense. The one aspect that Life Balance had for contexts though is open times. For each context you could set the weekly schedule of when that context was open or closed. That meant for example that I could insure I never saw work things on the weekend, or I never saw errands when I could not go to a store. It was an elegant feature that I've not seen again.

[bemental]

Originally Posted by denrael

The one aspect that Life Balance had for contexts though is open times. For each context you could set the weekly schedule of when that context was open or closed. That meant for example that I could insure I never saw work things on the weekend, or I never saw errands when I could not go to a store. It was an elegant feature that I've not seen again.

Just came across a situation where this would be nice. Woke up this morning and saw something that was due for work yesterday (I didn't do my review and take it off my lists even though it was done, welcome holidays!).

Would be a very welcome feature indeed!