OmniFocus: Someday/Maybe as a context and On Hold

jenkins

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I'm wondering how people handle Someday/Maybe lists in OmniFocus (or other similar software).

Right now, I have a folder titled "Someday/Maybe" with various single action lists all set to "On Hold." Another way to handle it would be to leave the status of the single action lists as "Active," create a "Someday/Maybe" context, and set the context to "On Hold." Thoughts?

Bonus question: Do you use the "On Hold" feature to pause active projects, or do you move those project to a Someday/Maybe list?
 

Gardener

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These days, I mostly don't have them in OmniFocus at all. But I'm the one with a very very low tolerance for long GTD project lists--even when they're someday/maybe'd. I do have a SomedayMaybeTo context, set on hold, but its purpose is just for marking items to take out of OmniFocus and put in my various lists or notebooks or whatever.

I also have On Hold contexts WaitingFor and List. List is also mostly items that should be moved out and put somewhere else. Really, it would probably make more sense to name that context NotAnAction, because that's really what it means. But I'd probably forget that and be searching my context list.

When I did have Someday/Maybe in OmniFocus, I believe that I had a Someday/Maybe top-level folder, and when something went to Someday/Maybe I moved the project and also set the whole project to On Hold. I think.
 

Oogiem

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jenkins said:
I'm wondering how people handle Someday/Maybe lists in OmniFocus (or other similar software).

Right now, I have a folder titled "Someday/Maybe" with various single action lists all set to "On Hold." Another way to handle it would be to leave the status of the single action lists as "Active," create a "Someday/Maybe" context, and set the context to "On Hold." Thoughts?

Bonus question: Do you use the "On Hold" feature to pause active projects, or do you move those project to a Someday/Maybe list?

I use several methods.

The majority of my someday/maybe items are not in Omnifocus at all. Instead I have them in notes in DEVONThink. I find it faster to review them by reading a page of one liner project titles vs using OFs review facility.

For those projects that are closer in timeframe, as in I expect to move them out of someday/maybe and actually work on them this year I have them in a folder called Someday/Maybe Projects but they are all On Hold. I try to keep that list to around 120-150 projects at most. More than that and I'll pull them out of OF and back into DEVONThink. I also pull out of OF projects that I won't get to for a year or longer, even if I was working on them for a while. In my world projects can take decades to finish and things move in and out of S/M regularly.

I also have about 100 projects that are pending, as in waiting for some start date, and about 120-150 active projects at any given time. For me, once I get to more than about 350 projects to review in Omnifocus I get frustrated and that's a sign for me to pull the older S/M projects back into DT where it is quicker to review them.

I also have custom perspectives set up so I can review stalled, active, pending, on-hold and remaining projects separately. I do them in that order during my weekly review. Then I read my DEVONThink notes of someday/maybe projects, partly to see if I need to make any active and partly because I fairly frequently discover that I actually completed one without remembering it was on one of my S/M lists. I love it when that happens. ;-)

I don't like having S/M projects active in OF because then their actions show up on my lists so I always use the hold option to hide those projects and actions from my doing views. I also don't like on-hold contexts because that just seems wrong to me. A context is never really on hold in my mind. It's just not where you are right now or requires equipment or tools you do not have with you right now. It's always someplace you could move to or go get if necessary.

Keeping my Omnifocus system thin and streamlined is critical but it's taken a while to get it working smoothly. I know it sounds big but in my world with 1800+ potential projects in my someday/maybe lists keeping about 350 in my Omnifocus system is small.
 

jenkins

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Thank you for the thoughtful reply Oogiem!

Oogiem said:
I have them in a folder called Someday/Maybe Projects but they are all On Hold. I try to keep that list to around 120-150 projects at most.

So you don't just drag those projects into an on-hold Someday/Maybe single action list? That's what I'm doing right now -- I used to "pause" projects and keep them in their regular folder, but I didn't like the visual clutter. I guess I could have created a separate folder for paused projects like you have. But I'm not sure what the point would be. So just to clarify, you keep Someday/Maybe Projects separate from S/M single action lists, e.g., "Restaurants to Try"?

Oogiem said:
I also have custom perspectives set up so I can review stalled, active, pending, on-hold and remaining projects separately. I do them in that order during my weekly review. Then I read my DEVONThink notes of someday/maybe projects, partly to see if I need to make any active and partly because I fairly frequently discover that I actually completed one without remembering it was on one of my S/M lists. I love it when that happens. ;-)

Can you expand on the differences between "stalled" "pending" "on-hold" etc? Also, how do you create a custom perspective for just "on-hold" projects? I don't see that as an option in "Filter by availability" in OmniFocus.

Oogiem said:
I don't like having S/M projects active in OF because then their actions show up on my lists so I always use the hold option to hide those projects and actions from my doing views. I also don't like on-hold contexts because that just seems wrong to me. A context is never really on hold in my mind. It's just not where you are right now or requires equipment or tools you do not have with you right now. It's always someplace you could move to or go get if necessary.

I don't care much for on-hold contexts either. My follow-up question would be, Do you add any contexts to your on-hold S/M actions?
 

Oogiem

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jenkins said:
So you don't just drag those projects into an on-hold Someday/Maybe single action list?

No I only have 2 single action lists, one for Errands and one for Miscellaneous. They tend to be short action lists, Errands has 8 things on it and Misc has only 15. Everything else is a project.

jenkins said:
So just to clarify, you keep Someday/Maybe Projects separate from S/M single action lists, e.g., "Restaurants to Try"?

Correct. That is the sort of thing I keep in a DEVONThink note in a folder called Someday/Maybe. I can look at a single page with 50 books to read faster than I can evaluate 50 projects or click on 50 actions in Omnifocus during review. I don't need to see them until I am ready to start a new book, then I review that list. Ditto for things like Knitting projects to do, Scrapbook Projects to do, and similar items. In fact my books to read lists are even more finely divided, I have a Books to Read - Non-Ficiton, Books to read - Mystery, Books to read - Sci Fi, books to read - Travel and more. Books never really make it into my Omnifocus lists but a Weaving project might. So I have a DT note that is Weaving Projects to Do. When I finish my current weaving I'll take a look at that and decide what I want to work on. I see that I actually have say, 3 projects, one for linen dish towels, one for linen napkins and 1 for a linen curtain for the shower. If I decide I want to weave linen I'll make a project in OF called something like Linen weavings and the first action would probably be, decide if I can use the same warp and threading for napkins, shower curtain and dish towels, because all 3 items can probably be woven off on the same warp. I won't know until I design the warp if that is true but it's a place to start. There is no reason to even have it in my Omnifocus system as long as the loom is warped up with something else as I can't change the warp. SO I need to finish the current weaving, or abandon it and cut it off the loom before I could even consider starting a new project. I have 4 looms, I can have up to 4 separate projects but typically projects are best suited for one or the other of the looms. I can't do a wide warp on the table loom, I rarely do tapestry and that is the only thing the upright loom is used for, I have a 4 harness counterbalance loom that can't do anything but 4 harness weaves and I have an 8 harness countermarche loom that can do everything including double weave and wider warps. Most projects are pretty loom specific though.

jenkins said:
Can you expand on the differences between "stalled" "pending" "on-hold" etc? Also, how do you create a custom perspective for just "on-hold" projects? I don't see that as an option in "Filter by availability" in OmniFocus.

Stalled are projects that do not have a next action. In my world they are either finished and I forgot to mark them complete or I was in a hurry and when I finished the action I didn't make a placemark next action to work on or they are in serious need of detailed project planning and may actually be multiple projects.

On Hold is a drop down in the filter projects section in the info pane below filter by duration. I group by folder, unsorted, use preferences for layout, any status, remaining, any duration, on-hold and saved that as a perspective.

jenkins said:
I don't care much for on-hold contexts either. My follow-up question would be, Do you add any contexts to your on-hold S/M actions?
Sure, if they already had them. I put projects in and out of hold as needed. They go into hold if I really need to clear the decks or the season is wrong (although I might put a start date instead for next year when the season is correct) Hold is suspended, all the details, planning, actions etc are kept as they were. when I re-activate them and make them active I review the actions and plan to be sure it hasn't changed. Sometimes it does but usually not, at least not if I did it right the first time.

Edited to add:

I don't typically put ACTIONS on hold, only full projects. Once you put a project on hold the actions are easily hidden, just look at only next or available actions and you'll never see them. It also means that when I do decide to activate a project it's a single change, make the PROJECT active and all my previous planning and actions are suddenly available to me in my lists by context.
 

TesTeq

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In the Things application there's a separate folder called 'Someday'. You can move your Projects freely between three folders: 'Active Projects', 'Scheduled', and 'Someday'. Besides you can assign tags (keywords) and due dates to Projects and "star" them to appear on the 'Today' list.
 

jenkins

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Oogiem said:
No I only have 2 single action lists, one for Errands and one for Miscellaneous. They tend to be short action lists, Errands has 8 things on it and Misc has only 15. Everything else is a project.

Correct. That is the sort of thing I keep in a DEVONThink note in a folder called Someday/Maybe. I can look at a single page with 50 books to read faster than I can evaluate 50 projects or click on 50 actions in Omnifocus during review. I don't need to see them until I am ready to start a new book, then I review that list. Ditto for things like Knitting projects to do, Scrapbook Projects to do, and similar items. In fact my books to read lists are even more finely divided, I have a Books to Read - Non-Ficiton, Books to read - Mystery, Books to read - Sci Fi, books to read - Travel and more. Books never really make it into my Omnifocus lists but a Weaving project might. So I have a DT note that is Weaving Projects to Do. When I finish my current weaving I'll take a look at that and decide what I want to work on. I see that I actually have say, 3 projects, one for linen dish towels, one for linen napkins and 1 for a linen curtain for the shower. If I decide I want to weave linen I'll make a project in OF called something like Linen weavings and the first action would probably be, decide if I can use the same warp and threading for napkins, shower curtain and dish towels, because all 3 items can probably be woven off on the same warp. I won't know until I design the warp if that is true but it's a place to start. There is no reason to even have it in my Omnifocus system as long as the loom is warped up with something else as I can't change the warp. SO I need to finish the current weaving, or abandon it and cut it off the loom before I could even consider starting a new project. I have 4 looms, I can have up to 4 separate projects but typically projects are best suited for one or the other of the looms. I can't do a wide warp on the table loom, I rarely do tapestry and that is the only thing the upright loom is used for, I have a 4 harness counterbalance loom that can't do anything but 4 harness weaves and I have an 8 harness countermarche loom that can do everything including double weave and wider warps. Most projects are pretty loom specific though.

Interesting, thanks for explaining this. I definitely understand how it's easier to scan a single page list than projects/actions in OF. I'm tempted to try something similar. Although, I use the Custom Columns layout in OF, which is much easier to read IMO than the standard fluid layout (I also collapse the sidebar and inspector and use hotkeys to navigate between perspective to get a very minimal view).

Would you take an active or on-hold project and decide "Not gonna happen" and move it to DEVONThink?
 

Oogiem

Registered
jenkins said:
Interesting, thanks for explaining this. I definitely understand how it's easier to scan a single page list than projects/actions in OF. I'm tempted to try something similar. Although, I use the Custom Columns layout in OF, which is much easier to read IMO than the standard fluid layout (I also collapse the sidebar and inspector and use hotkeys to navigate between perspective to get a very minimal view).

Would you take an active or on-hold project and decide "Not gonna happen" and move it to DEVONThink?

I'm just starting to work in the custom Columns layout, it does fit better for some things, not so much for others. I'm tweaking that a little at a time right now.

Yes, I often put projects in and out of OF/DEVONThink. For example, a project to import semen from UK rams has been in and out of my OF system for going on 7 years. Whether it was active or not was dependent on things like new US federal regulations, Approval by the EU. new export permit process in the UK and more. Sometimes it would lie dormant in DT for a year or more as the political process worked is slow way to a resolution. Right now it's active and hot, as in very high priority, and I'm in the process of purchasing rams and getting blood testing and other vet work done for collections this fall and importation early next year.
 
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