Often a a long-ish drive, I find myself thinking of things I want to add to my OmniFocus Inbox.
Is there currently a supported way to add actions to OmniFocus using Siri?
The “Capture Methods” section of the OmniFocus 4 Reference Manual does not list using Siri as a capture method.
I found the appendix “Interacting With Siri” in the OmniFocus 3 Reference Manual for iOS but did not know if that information was still valid or out of date.
When I have tried using Siri to add items to OmniFocus, it has not worked.
Is this still supported in OF4? And if so, what are the magic incantations that need to be spoken to get it to work?
Yes it still works. You need to enable “reminders capture” (on iOS) in Settings/automation. Then (for me anyway!) “remind me to X in OmniFocus” works reliably. There’s a “learn more” button there that takes you to an Omni support page about Siri in OF. FWIW I have found that with reminders capture enabled the “…in OmniFocus” suffix isn’t needed: “Siri remind me to X” puts X in my OF inbox
That article refers to Reminders Capture as a “a legacy method of adding tasks to OmniFocus using Siri”.
That article refers to the ‘direct Siri integration’ which links to the appendix in the OF3 iOS reference manual.
When I try the command in that appendix, "Add a task named ~ in OmniFocus” Siri adds a task to the Reminders app with ‘in OmniFocus’ added as part of the text of the reminder.
Is Reminders Capture the only thing that currently works to add actions with Siri in OF4?
You could create one or more Shortcuts shortcuts to facilitate capturing to OmniFocus on your iPhone and other Apple devices.
For example, here’s a simple shortcut that prompts to dictate text and adds the dictated text to the OmniFocus Inbox. It can be invoked by activating Siri and saying “Dictate to OmniFocus”.
When I get a moment I’ll need to investigate whether I have some other particular settings configured but for me currently, using the OF4.7 TestFlight, “Siri remind me to X” puts X in my OF inbox, not the Reminders app, so it is possible!
`I do that you want using Siri / Reminders. I use Siri with Reminders to save things to Reminders, so I don’t have to worry about saying “to Omnifocus”, as I sometimes forget and sometimes Siri does not fully understand. In Omnifocus in Settings you can set a folder in Reminders to automatically sync with Omnifocus (Settings>Automation>Reminders Capture). The only thing to make sure is that the default folder in Reminders is the one that Omnifocus syncs with too (to save having to say which folder to save to in Reminders)
FWIW - I don’t use Shortcuts nor the Siri-Reminders bridge - I just say “Siri, add a task using OmniFocus” - Siri then asks me what I want to add, and I say it - e.g. “Take a look at the garden fence”. Hope that helps.
