[whpalmer4]

Originally Posted by fudster

Yes. Um, but I can't see how that helps here.

I try to get inbox to zero every day if I can. And it's not uncommon that an Action that I captured into the inbox, which, during my daily review, I corralled into its rightful project (assuming it exists already), needs to be the Next Action (perhaps after some clarifying). Until I review that project, and shuffle things around, that new action is going to live at the bottom of the action list in the project.

So - the reality has changed, the project is "dirty", and I need a clear way to see that it needs to be reviewed and brought up to date again. I think I need to be able to do this in order to trust the system.

If you've already drained your Inbox swamp before going through and marking projects reviewed (as recommended by DA), isn't the only way you have this issue is if you decide to do another review the same day?

[fudster]

Originally Posted by whpalmer4

If you've already drained your Inbox swamp before going through and marking projects reviewed (as recommended by DA), isn't the only way you have this issue is if you decide to do another review the same day?

Ah, I see what you mean. Yes it's true that the only time it wouldn't work at all, using the combination of the Next Review grouping and then the Changed grouping, is when I do more than one review in a day

But this'll happen more than you might think, at least for me. When I first encountered this, I'd completed a rather large review, marking a few dozen projects as reviewed, at about 1:30 in the morning. I did a daily review after my work day later that same day, to sort through some captures I'd done that day. To Omnifocus, of course, it's still the same day that it was when i did my big review the night (er, early morning) before, so everything so everything appeared in the "Today" band in the Changed grouping. Useless information.

I really have to say though, that even if this limitation wasn't there, using my script (which emulates what I think OmniFocus should be doing, or offering in a preference), it's much nicer to just be able to use the Next Review grouping to whip through all the projects, instead of also having to then use the Changed grouping afterward.

And the easier it is to do these little daily reviews and stay on top of things, the more likely I am to to them consistently, and then, I've found, the faster (and less scary) the weekly review will go too.

This is all about establishing a system that we trust, right? And I know from experience that if the system's contents are not kept clean and current, my brain won't trust it, and I'll fall behind. So for me, the system has to be so easy to use so I can use a spare moment here and there to clean things up, both the inbox and the projects too, without the system pushing back or requiring me to jump through too many hoops.

The way OmniFocus is today, it's fairly easy to stay on top of the inbox and keep it empty, using typeahead in the Project dropdown (or dragging) to siphon the inputs off into the appropriate projects. Add this script (or ideally an option in OF to nudge a project's review date whenever it's changed), and for me it's also pretty easy to review the impact those inputs are having on their respected projects and outcomes.

[fudster]

Here's my workflow, in Omnifocus, for the first parts of both the daily and the weekly review. The first parts are the same for both the daily review and the weekly review.

(this may not map 100% to the canonical GTD workflow, I'm just focusing on OF's functionality).

Precondition: I've already gathered inputs from all my various inboxes (usually there is very little of this, most of my inputs and captures come right into my OF inbox via OF iPhone, Jott/Twitter, and from my wife via email).

1) Get In to Empty (at least once, perhaps more than once a day)

Here, I'm going through my OmniFocus inbox.

Two minute rule in play, so I might make a couple calls or complete a couple things right now and mark them done.

For the rest, I have to decide where, in my project list, each item belongs. Some might wind up on a singleton list, but for most, they'll either relate to an outcome I've already identified, or they'll relate to a new outcome, which I'll create. The typeahead feature in the inbox's project list helps me to quickly find the existing projects and create new ones if needed.

During the weekly review, of course, I'll do it all in one sitting.

But sometimes, #1 is all I'll be able to do until a bit later. I might actually do step #1 once, twice or perhaps even three times in a day. (I'll confess to processing my inbox as procrastination).

If I know it'll be easy to identify the projects that were affected by sorting through the inbox, and if I'm reasonably sure that none of them will blow up over the next few hours, I have confidence that I can get back to work and come back to looking at the projects later.



2) Review all Due for Review projects (ideally at least once a day)

Right here, I run the Reset Review Dates script I posted earlier in this thread. After running the script, all projects that are newly created and not yet reviewed, or that are changed because something was moved from the inbox into the project, will show as due for review now (Today or earlier).

For each of the due-for-review projects, I make sure that the desired outcome is still clear, and that the Next Action is clear, actionable, and correct.

If the project is indeed due-for-review because of an input from the inbox, I have to consider the meaning of the input: perhaps the input is just some supporting reference information, which I'll either move to the project's notes or handle it appropriately as something that's not actionable. Or, maybe it's a subsequent (not next) action, and I'll drag it to a seemingly good spot in the project's contents.

Or perhaps, once clarified, the new input is actually going to be the Next Action. It goes to the top. It'll show now as a Next Action and Available. When I captured it, it was a new brainwave of how to get that project moving forward, and it's now reflected that way in my system.

Actually it all happens pretty quickly. This may be obvious, but I just wanted to add this narrative to the thread to help frame why I think the requested feature is important (i.e. where my script fits in now).

OF is now serving me better than it ever has. It took me a while to establish this rhythm - and to reveal for me this little part that I think should be improved.

[Vramin]

I think I'm going to have to try your script. I've been noticing some oddities with review dates as well. I have a project item open right now that says to review it every week, that the last review date was September 20th, and the next review date is October 7th in the due for review within next week grouping. September 20th to October 7th is a bit more than a week on most modern calendars, so I'm a bit puzzled.

I'm with you - I'd rather be able to flatten everything out when I'm ready to do a review and know that I've looked at *everything* without being too concerned about when I actually looked at it last. The way it's working right now I don't end my review feeling "clean" because I think things are being hidden by the date management in Omnifocus.