Apologies if this has been talked about at length (every time I peruse the forum, I haven't seen discussion of it - so I am taking a risk and putting the idea forward).
I love OmniFocus. There are a few enhancements that would make it even better - and the one I would most like to see is an added field that would serve as "Do Date" (as distinguished from "Due Date").
When planning my work and thinking about particular Action items and when they should happen - I would like to designate the date I plan to do that work (this helps me make sure I 'schedule' myself to be in certain Contexts at appropriate times). This is different than indicating a "Start" date, because the action item is already "Available" and it certainly isn't the date the item is "Due" (and I _really_ don't want to put phony deadlines on my Task List - that just creates doubts about which are real and which can be delayed).
I have been using Flags to indicate action items that I will work on today (sort of a Hot List), but it isn't really the complete solution.
What would be nicer is a way to specify on what date an item will become Flagged (it is something to "Do" on that day) with a provision for deferring that item until a later date (I'm traveling unexpectedly, can't possibly Do this until I get back - defer for __ days, etc.).
The Perspective that shows all of today's "Do" items should include anything that was a "Do" item prior to today and is still incomplete.
This new field would be a natural fit with iCal if, when syncing with iCal, it were to populate the Due Date for iCal tasks. The reason this would work so well is that iCal uses "Due" date to determine on what date a task will appear on the calendar. For anything that you would like to accomplish before "the last minute", that really shouldn't be the date it is due but some time earlier (and I don't like guessing whether a date I entered in a "Due" field is a real or fake deadline).
So, while iCal has a field named "Due Date", it really serves as "Do Date". Making the change to OmniFocus that I am suggesting would make it possible to sync with iCal, then print your Day or Week plan from iCal and see your appointments and action items on a nice clean print-out (but still clearly distinguishing hard landscape (appointments) from action items).
Thanks for reading this,
Bruce
I love OmniFocus. There are a few enhancements that would make it even better - and the one I would most like to see is an added field that would serve as "Do Date" (as distinguished from "Due Date").
When planning my work and thinking about particular Action items and when they should happen - I would like to designate the date I plan to do that work (this helps me make sure I 'schedule' myself to be in certain Contexts at appropriate times). This is different than indicating a "Start" date, because the action item is already "Available" and it certainly isn't the date the item is "Due" (and I _really_ don't want to put phony deadlines on my Task List - that just creates doubts about which are real and which can be delayed).
I have been using Flags to indicate action items that I will work on today (sort of a Hot List), but it isn't really the complete solution.
What would be nicer is a way to specify on what date an item will become Flagged (it is something to "Do" on that day) with a provision for deferring that item until a later date (I'm traveling unexpectedly, can't possibly Do this until I get back - defer for __ days, etc.).
The Perspective that shows all of today's "Do" items should include anything that was a "Do" item prior to today and is still incomplete.
This new field would be a natural fit with iCal if, when syncing with iCal, it were to populate the Due Date for iCal tasks. The reason this would work so well is that iCal uses "Due" date to determine on what date a task will appear on the calendar. For anything that you would like to accomplish before "the last minute", that really shouldn't be the date it is due but some time earlier (and I don't like guessing whether a date I entered in a "Due" field is a real or fake deadline).
So, while iCal has a field named "Due Date", it really serves as "Do Date". Making the change to OmniFocus that I am suggesting would make it possible to sync with iCal, then print your Day or Week plan from iCal and see your appointments and action items on a nice clean print-out (but still clearly distinguishing hard landscape (appointments) from action items).
Thanks for reading this,
Bruce
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