[blewis]

How did I accidentally redefined all the default Due Times to be 11:59PM instead of 12:00AM?

How do I get it back to 12:00AM so my Due items are colored Red instead of Orange?

Confused again... Brandon

[brianogilvie]

You didn't do anything. Omni introduced this change because many users thought that red should be used only for items that really were overdue, i.e. not due today but due yesterday.

Personally, I agree with you. Omni should make this an option. Suggestion to any Omni folks reading this: perhaps this could be part of an "Advanced" preferences tab, along with a few other things like count projects in the due soon/overdue badges and sort by project due date in Planning mode. I'm not sending formal feedback on this because you probably have enough to do as it is! But marking them as advanced settings might please some users while not overly confusing new users.

[blewis]

Hmm... this isn't working for me. I have things due today that are not showing up in my Available Actions sorts because they're not due until 11:59PM tonight. I've got exactly one minute in this day to sort that things are due and then complete them before they go red and the day expires. What?

Now I have to assign a time to _every_ Action that has a due date in order to get it to sort in a way that makes common sense. Well common sense to me... as in "every todo/calendar system I've ever used up to this point" kind of sense...

Is this another GTD construct that I don't understand?

[ptone]

Originally Posted by blewis

Hmm... this isn't working for me. I have things due today that are not showing up in my Available Actions sorts because they're not due until 11:59PM tonight. I've got exactly one minute in this day to sort that things are due and then complete them before they go red and the day expires. What?

Double check that you are talking about a due date of 11:59 or a start date of 11:59

I'm not seeing the effect on due today items you are...

-P

[brianogilvie]

Originally Posted by blewis

Hmm... this isn't working for me. I have things due today that are not showing up in my Available Actions sorts because they're not due until 11:59PM tonight. I've got exactly one minute in this day to sort that things are due and then complete them before they go red and the day expires. What?

If they're not showing up in your Available actions, then their start date has not yet arrived. Due date has no effect on whether an action is Available.

[blewis]

I've double checked and it's my Due Dates. 11:59PM

I don't seem to be as tied to Start Dates as GTD or OF wants me to be so I don't use them much. That has lead me into several periods of adjusting my expectations between what I expected a general purpose "todo tracker" to do and what OF does.

I suppose this is another reminder that OF is very GTD centric. Good thing I'm getting a copy of the book for Christmas so I'll have documentation for the software. ;-) It'll be interesting to see if I view things differently after the read. I'll get used to it.

[curt.clifton]

Due date has absolutely nothing to do with whether an action is available. If you are not using start dates, then your actions are not available for some other reason. Most likely because they are part of a sequential project and some prior action isn't completed.

[dsolomon]

(sent as feedback)

I really really wish there was an option to have start and due dates not have a time associated with them - My Life Organized does this...

This could be a global preference for the default behavior.

My guess is that most people do *not* have specific times associated with start/due dates, but rather just the date.

This also would solve another issue I reported: changes in time zones. I entered a bunch of tasks while on Pacific time: when I changed back to Eastern Time, the due dates changed to the next day at 3am (!)

I don't know if others do, but I always change the time zone on my computer when I travel...

So now if I'm on a trip, I have to reset my time zone back to my home time zone before entering any tasks - this seems really yucky...

--David Solomon

[otter]

As I expressed in the previous thread on this subject, I was really bothered by the unilateral change in the default time.

In the few days since I last posted to the previous thread, I have had the opportunity to experiment in light of the new status quo, and made a few adjustments to make the situation a bit more tolerable.

Still, all and all, this small change has drastically reduced my enjoyment of using the software, and led me to question my own sensibility in buying a license before seeing the final product.

I continue to hope that the default time will be made a user preference.

[otter]

As I noted at length in the previous thread, my issues with the change relate to the fact that items with 'today' due dates no longer show up as red, but are now orange (unless I change the due times, of course). This devaluing of the 'present' (i.e. today) is at the core of my reaction to this change.

But, setting that aspect of the issue aside for a moment, I would also point out that the other issues with time-dates that are being pointed out stem from the design decision to compress date and time effectively into one field. I'm not exactly sure of the rationale behind the decision -- it may have been to save display space by eliminating the need for an additional column, or it may have been that date-time was inherited as an existing database object. Regardless, this decision can be regarded as akin to creating a mailing database in which First Name and Last Name are contained in the same field. (That kind of sometimes convenient decision leads to pain down the road.)

In OF, it would be far preferable for due date and due time to be fully separate fields. In addition to relieving the the life of everyone who doesn't care a whit about due time (such as myself), this would be of tremendous benefit for people who do enter a lot of due times.

As it is now, the ability to access a tremendous amount of information about due times is being lost. If due times were a separate field, it would be possible to filter actions for those that have due times -- and end up with a list of only those actions for which one has actually actively set due times. In effect, this means it would be possible to easily filter ones actual appointments and other scheduled actions from those that have due times because OmniFocus says you have to have one.

Right now, both those who are have no need for due times and those who frequently use due times are both losing out.