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The way I'm using action groups is to set my desired outcome as the parent, and then subtasks as the children. I would love to be able to have the parent show up as an available task within a context when all the children tasks are completed. Am I using action groups wrong?
 
That's a popular and much debated request. OF seems to work better when you have lots of projects that are fairly shallow in the hierarchy. Nevertheless, I also use action groups like you suggest. By design, the action group parent never shows up in the context view. But an action group whose children are all completed will not block subsequent actions. I have a script that will check for action groups and projects where all the children are completed. It tags these as missing their next action. Then you can search for the "Missing NA" string and decide whether you need to add an action or can complete the project or action group. I do that as part of my daily review, though weekly might suffice depending on the general urgency of your tasks.

The Verify Next Actions Exist script is available from my software page.
__________________
Cheers,

Curt
 
I'm in favor of having the parent appear in the contexts.

My usual mode of processing GTD is not to plan out every last detail, but to define a next step to complete the parent or move the parent toward completion.

When I complete the last child of a parent, I want to see the parent in the context so I can determine if the parent needs more actions to complete it, or if the parent is complete.

A second best alternative would be to have the stalled projects filter in the projects view to look for parents or projects that have no children. Currently, the stalled projects filter only shows projects with tasks in the future. To me this isn't a stalled project because it has children they just aren't active yet.

The way OF is set up now, I feel like I am flying blind.

Curt's script is a brilliant use of recursiveness and a great script to run for double checking. I modded it so it doesn't require Growl and shows a display box instead. I've also changed it to flag the parent instead of adding the text, for the main reason that it's easy to click on the flag to de-flag it. Although Curt has another script to remove the text.

The problem I have now is, I also use flags to tag items I want to get done today. I may go back to the text at some point so I don't have two sets of tags.

Curt's script is a tremendous help. Thank you Curt.

I also use a widget that will bring up the parent item when there are no more children to complete. You can then complete the parent or add more children to it. The only problem is the widget doesn't work on projects, because I haven't found a way to complete a project through Applescript.

Here is the widget:
www.krank.us

There is an updated version to be released soon to polish some UI issues in the widget.
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by SpiralOcean View Post
I also use a widget that will bring up the parent item when there are no more children to complete. You can then complete the parent or add more children to it. The only problem is the widget doesn't work on projects, because I haven't found a way to complete a project through Applescript.
Can you get the task of the project—every project has an associated task object that carries some of projects attributes—and mark that complete? (In Applescript the task of the project is distinct from the child tasks of the project, which are the ones we see in OF.)
__________________
Cheers,

Curt
 
Quote:
Originally Posted by curt.clifton View Post
Can you get the task of the project—every project has an associated task object that carries some of projects attributes—and mark that complete? (In Applescript the task of the project is distinct from the child tasks of the project, which are the ones we see in OF.)
Interesting, I haven't tried that yet. Maybe if I complete the task of the project, instead of completing the project it will complete. I'll give it a shot. Thank you for the suggestion.
 
 


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