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"Projects" view + "Contexts" view are slightly mis-named / misconceived Thread Tools Search this Thread Display Modes
I suppose the real question is why OF lets actions with no assigned context out of the inbox at all. Not sure why that design decision was made, to be honest.

However, even if it does, that doesn't stop you assigning a context to everything as you process it. So, having an "unassigned" context is not really a problem is it? If you're rigorous with your workflow it'll never be needed, but it's there as a safety net if it is (e.g. if you absentmindedly hit "clean up" by mistake when you haven't finished processing a particular action).
 
If we were all rigorously disciplined, David Allen wouldn't be a best-selling author. If you give people a feature that can be used for procrastinating, it will be used for procrastinating. Letting unprocessed actions out of the inbox at all is not a productivity aid that helps people get things done. It's a tool that allows and even encourages people to routinely neglect potentially large portions of their action list. Why would we want that in any task management or productivity app? It's not a selling point, it's a flaw.
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by MEP View Post

It's not that GTD software forces the "InBox --> planning --> work" method of doing things. It's that GTD does. That's part of what GTD is. ...

OF doesn't have to work for "both types of people", and it probably shouldn't. The point of GTD is to change your life in a positive way, not to facilitate messy and broken systems. The point of OF should be to facilitate a good GTD workflow and to encourage good habits while discouraging bad ones (to help you use and improve your own GTD system).
MEP, maybe I should explain how my mind works on these things. [Though I'm spacey and probably have about half my usual IQ, due to a sinus headache ...]

Throughout my day, I have two sorts of Action ideas that come to my head:

A. Specific Actions, "I need to e-mail that R.s.v.p." or "I need to talk to DH about Tuesday night's schedule". These are usually singletons, and I already know the Project/Context when the idea comes to me. If it's something I need to enter in OF, I go directly to the correct Project and type it in. [BTW, I rarely/never have Contextless things on my lists. I agree with you here; nothing without a Context should leave the InBox.]

At some later point the item may become a Project, but probably not. In any case, I have no need to go through the full GTD process to get it out of my head.

B. Fuzzy Projects, "Do something about my geeky wardrobe", "I've got a great idea for the next GT Conference, and I need to bounce it off some people" These are definitely Projects, and how I handle them varies.

If I have a few minutes (85% of the time), I'll think about them and enter them directly into the Projects section. They won't be fully planned, but I'll have a Project and a couple of actions. Again, no Inbox is used.

If I don't have time, I'll throw the idea into the Inbox, for later processing.


MEP, note that 95% of the time, I don't use/need the Inbox or the full Collect -->Process -->Organize -->Review -->Do method. In fact, going through all the steps would slow me down A LOT. I doubt David Allen goes through all the steps for every Action, either.

The reason other GTD programs don't work for me is that they enforce the InBox --> Plan system, even for trivial tasks. [Do I really need to go through all the steps just because I remembered I need to buy a birthday gift, or mop the kitchen when I get home?] I agree the steps are necessary for Big Projects, and I do go through them when I need to, but most of the things I need to remember to do are Small Potatoes.

As far as messy and broken systems, any system that lets me get my ideas out of my head in a way I can recover them later, without tying me up in planning flow is better than no system at all. A system that forces me to go through a 5 step process when an Action needs only 2-3 steps (Collect --> (Review -->) Do) is a system I won't use ... and I'll be back to my messy, broken non-system.

Sorry for the length of this post ... I hope it makes sense.

--Liz
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by al_f View Post
I suppose the real question is why OF lets actions with no assigned context out of the inbox at all. Not sure why that design decision was made, to be honest.
I keep hoping it's just a bug.
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by LizPf View Post
As far as messy and broken systems, any system that lets me get my ideas out of my head in a way I can recover them later, without tying me up in planning flow is better than no system at all. A system that forces me to go through a 5 step process when an Action needs only 2-3 steps (Collect --> (Review -->) Do) is a system I won't use ... and I'll be back to my messy, broken non-system.
I'll admit to being a little confused by your Inbox hangups, but I'm not going to argue about them - I'm certainly no stranger to personal stubborn hangups.

I understand that you use OF with a non-GTD system, and that OF is designed to be a task management program that's flexible enough normal people as well as supporting the workflow for GTD fanatics. But as accessible as it is, it must support the GTD workflow, or it fails one of its primary goals.

It's not a question of whether a feature is GTD 'canonical', it's a question of whether a feature circumvents the implementation of the GTD workflow. And so I think it would be useful to look at where OF fits into the GTD workflow (Collect-Process-Organize-Review-Do).

Processing, Reviewing, and Doing all require our input. A computer program can't determine what to do with the miscellanious pile of stuff that ends up in the inbox. Nor can the system review itself. Nor do we have robot slaves to do all our unpleasant tasks, much as I would love to send a robot to the dentist instead of going myself.

This leaves Collect and Organize for OF to help us. How OF helps us with collection is obvious, and I think Quick Entry and the Inbox are superbly done when they don't try to process your items for you.

Organize is a little more complicated to think about because what we think of as organizing isn't exactly what GTD means by organizing. The only things GTD wants to keep track of are:
1. A list of every next or single action you have
2. A list of every project in your life, with its status and next action
3. A list of things you might one day like to do (Someday/Maybe)
4. A list of things you are waiting for.

And this is where OF should shine, because this is what computers are good at - keeping track of lists, and looking at parts of lists, and reordering lists based on different criteria. Only things aren't showing up in their proper lists, and that's a problem with processing. Things are skipping the Inbox by default. Things without a context can leave the inbox, even though lacking a context indicates they haven't really been processed. Things without a project not appearing in your list, and not being able to be processed!

While OF can't process for us, our ability to process items in OF is getting less and less GTD like.
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by GeekLady View Post
Only things aren't showing up in their proper lists, and that's a problem with processing. Things are skipping the Inbox by default. Things without a context can leave the inbox, even though lacking a context indicates they haven't really been processed. Things without a project not appearing in your list, and not being able to be processed!
This is interesting. I wonder what the official take is on these points?

Things skipping the inbox is easy to change, isn't it? I set my quick entries to go to the Inbox even if they have a project and a context, and now everything shows up there until I say they should leave (I click "clean"). I think this should be the default behaviour, but at least it's settable.

Things without context can leave the inbox: I think it's not just leaving the inbox that matters. If things without a context are by definition unprocessed, then if you set the context to nothing, the item should go back to the inbox.
I'm currently abusing the system by using context-less items as a someday/maybe category. If they change it so that contextless things are in the inbox, I would change my workflow. It would probably be an improvement.

Things without a project are invisible: I'd rather the singleton actions did not require the bucket projects, but I also need a way to put singleton actions in folders. So unless they switch to labels instead of folders, I think this is the best I can do.

The fact that context-less actions can be considered processed might be necessary for the "as complicated or simple as you need it to be" ethos. Should people who want a simple program be forced to assign contexts? I know some people are in favour of forcing users of the program into GTD, but I like the invisible scaling, as long as it's possible to do GTD (as GeekLady said above).
 
Well, I maintain that implementing a GTD workflow does place certain limitations on how the application can work. As MEP said, there is a leak in processing, and trying to plug it in later steps is not helpful.

Quote:
Originally Posted by anna View Post
The fact that context-less actions can be considered processed might be necessary for the "as complicated or simple as you need it to be" ethos. Should people who want a simple program be forced to assign contexts? I know some people are in favour of forcing users of the program into GTD, but I like the invisible scaling, as long as it's possible to do GTD (as GeekLady said above).
 
Getting Omnifocus to growl and crack a whip when poor contextless actions tried to leave the inbox would only make any sense at all if all actions were forced to come through the inbox in the first place.

This would either involve disabling the freedom to enter an outline of actions directly beneath a project heading (skipping the inbox), or requiring that no actions and sub-actions can be entered directly until the parent project has a default context.

Crippling a tool in the hope that it will enforce discipline on its users might be considered just a little eccentric.

Servile discipline is never as productive as self-discipline ...

Last edited by RobTrew; 2007-08-21 at 08:21 AM..
 
OF obviously has no problem with showing an action in multiple lists. Ideal behavior would be for any actions without a context to appear in the Inbox regardless of whether they were entered via QE or while fleshing out a project. It shouldn't effect their location in a project's heirarchy in any way, so I fail to see what the issue is.

Quote:
Originally Posted by RobTrew View Post
Getting Omnifocus to growl and crack a whip when poor contextless actions tried to leave the inbox would only make any sense at all if all actions were forced to come through the inbox in the first place.

This would either involve disabling the freedom to enter an outline of actions directly beneath a project heading (skipping the inbox), or requiring that no actions and sub-actions can be entered directly until the parent project has a default context.

Crippling a tool in the hope that it will enforce discipline on its users might be considered just a little eccentric.

Servile discipline is never as productive as self-discipline ...
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by GeekLady View Post
Ideal behavior would be for any actions without a context to appear in the Inbox regardless of whether they were entered via QE or while fleshing out a project. It shouldn't effect their location in a project's heirarchy in any way
OK - that sounds interesting - the "Inbox" becomes a query listing any incomplete records, and ceases to be simply a point of arrival.

It might need a new name, but it sounds useful.

I would be happy to submit that as a request.
 
 


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