[SuperCloud]

Is there a way to import my tasks, projects and information from other programs?

The import function seems to me more as "import from other Omnigroup products or Mail.app", not "import data from the world" :) unless I am misunderstanding something?

I have a vast amount of projects, tasks and ideas collected and structured as GTD in DevonThink. I would love to move these into Omnifocus, have Omnifocus concentrate on GTD and Devon focused on research.

DT can export a multitude of ways, the simplest being files (rtfs) and folders. DT can also export to OmniOutliner document, but sadly the OF import does not recognize these.

Am I overlooking something or is there no way to import data into OF?

[steve]

SuperCloud,

You aren't overlooking something— from what I know you would have to import information one item at a time. I'm not sure what your system looks like in DevonThink, but it actually isn't to hard using the Services menu which you can be assigned a keystroke combo.

To put a positive spin on your situation, this might be a good opportunity to a deep clean and review of your system. As you go through each of your hundreds of items, you'd be forced to evaluate your commitment to each of the projects, ideas, and tasks.

From my perspective, it is good to have an external reference file such as Devonthink, Yojimbo, or OmniOutliner to augment OmniFocus.

Perhaps I'm giving advice to myself. I haven't been consistent with my reviews and my system needs a deep cleaning.

Good luck!
Steve

[Ken Case]

Originally Posted by SuperCloud

Is there a way to import my tasks, projects and information from other programs?

You can import from an OmniOutliner document by choosing Import from the File menu and selecting the document.

You can also copy multiple lines of plain text from any application and paste them into OmniFocus as actions, project lists, or context lists: just make sure you select the appropriate target by clicking on a similar object and make sure you're in row selection mode (not text editing mode) before you paste (otherwise your text will get pasted into the text field you're editing).

You can click on the left edge of a row to go into row selection mode. (Or if you prefer to use the keyboard, you can press Escape to stop editing your current text field and select the row.)

(In OmniFocus 1.1, we've also added the ability to copy and paste from OmniOutliner into OmniFocus.)

Hope this helps!

[SuperCloud]

Originally Posted by Ken Case

You can import from an OmniOutliner document by choosing Import from the File menu and selecting the document.

...

Hope this helps!

Thanks Ken, good ideas! but the import function won't select the MyData.ooutline document (it is inactive/disabled/not recognized, impossible to select in the import dialogue).

[Toadling]

Originally Posted by SuperCloud

but the import function won't select the MyData.ooutline document (it is inactive/disabled/not recognized, impossible to select in the import dialogue).

Could it be that your OmniOutliner file is using a ".ooutline" extension? I believe that should be ".oo3", which seems to work fine when imported on my system.

Have you tried opening the export from DevonThink in OmniOutliner?

-Dennis

[SuperCloud]

Thank You Dennis - the extension info helped me. I suppose the export from DevonThink is a wrong format (ooutline).

I downloaded a trial of OmniOutliner, and it could open the exported ooutline document. Then I saved it again in oo3 format.

Omnifocus could then read this oo3 file.

Thanks!

[Lizard]

[For the curious, .ooutline is the format for Outliner 1 & 2.]