Today I finally decided to stop using Tags and Perspectives.
Why?
Too cluttered
too complicated
too much to organize
friction of organizing the app
I just found out I dont need those. If I should have a packing list etc. I will just have a Template project inside OF and I will just duplicate it and and add it to the dedicated journey project. Fine adjustments will be done there. If I feel like in the process of editing that there have to be changes being done in the template I will just switch to it via the tab navigation.
Im aksing myself why I didnt come up with this idea more early.
So now basically Omnfocus is kind of like an todolist-outliner for me. I like it. It is simple and fast. even if I come to the app after a long time, everything makes sense and is all clear.
What do you think about my new approach? I could never be friends with tags and perspectives ā they are too complicated for me and never have been helpful to do my tasks.
Quite the opposite here. After nine years with Omnifocus, I still keep getting more thankful for the custom perspectives. They are not complicating anything for me, instead they are making things more simple and let me finetune Omnifocus for my actual situation and personal needs. Tags for me is primarily a way to organize tasks in my custom perspectives and to make manual reordering of tasks possible there.
I like flagging new, urgent tasks as a quick way to keep them in sight, with the highlighted tab of the standard Flagged perspective indicating that there are tasks there not to be forgotten. But with too many unrelated tasks continuously appearing, the Flagged perspective tend to be overpopulated, resulting in too many tasks to handle without the possibility to manually reorder them and the highlighting always there, losing its meaning. A custom Flagged perspective recently solved the problem. The perspective shows flagged tasks and tasks with a tag āFlagtagā. The tasks that are flagged are shown at the top, easy to take care of. If they are too many to handle immediately, I simply drag them downwards to the āFlagtagā part and remove the flag. VoilĆ ā the highlighting in the standard Flagged perspective disappears, and the tasks in my custom perspective are now possible to reorder manually by dragging.
I canāt imagine being without my custom perspectives, but if you can, you probably donāt need them, and Omnifocus will still be an excellent help for conveniently getting things done.
This is a good tip and a nice feature of perspectives: when the grouping is done by Tag, you can drag a task to a group and its tag is automatically added, without removing any tags already applied.
We use the features of an app when we need it. OmniFocus is flexible enough to allow you to use it as you desire.
When life gets complicated and tags make sense then itāll be there. When your demands are not as high, using tags and/or perspectives will accommodate.
Iād reckon this idea applies to any app. I probably use 3% of the features in Microsoft Word and Excel and maybe 1% of the total features in Photoshop. Itās nice to know itās there but I wonāt have to use them until I need them.
Itās interesting, after years (literally) of me trying to convince my Wife to use OmniFocus I gave up and showed her Things. She loves it. I think the main reasons are itās lack of flexibility and features. She didnāt have to think āhow am I going use thisā before using it. All the features I heavily rely on in OmniFocus (defer dates, tags, perspectives) are just encumbrances for her.
Itās a flexible tool for different needs. In my case, not using tags would just mean me hunting though lots of lists trying to find things to do when tagging would save a lot of time.
I make use of the block scheduling method. I have the main tasks in my calendar which have a link to of OF-Project with lots of different tiny tasks. My Mainprojectkeeper (kind of) is my daily calendar with block-scheduling etc.
I thought about switching to things, but it doesn thave the āoutlinerā type of taks management like in OF. I cannot have sub-sub tasks. Nevertheless I hope that OF will get more features in the future. Like a command-delete option or a warning before deleting takss or projects. Ken wrote something regarding this recently.
While Things doesnāt have the full outliner capabilities of OmniFocus, it does have Projects/tasks/checklists if 3 levels of hierarchy is all you need and the ability to add named sections in projects which is nice - but itās not for meā¦
I think as long as you donāt over complicate things itās fine. Like with anything if you overuse something it does more harm than good. So I do use perspectives and tags when needed, specifically to batch tasks such as phone calls and quick tasks.
I review my tags and perspectives on a quarterly basis. I create disposable tags and perspectives that I need for a particular season. When Iām done with them, I delete them.
I have tried some tags and perspectives that Iāve found on blogs for a spell. Iāll see if I still use it after 2-3 months. If I havenāt touched a perspective or tag after 2-3 months, Iāll delete it.
Tidying up the tags and perspectives is part of my OmniFocus hygiene program.
Thatās a bold move and I agree the simpler the better, if it meets your needs.
I interpret your position like you have defaulted to using only the built in tags and perspectives which come in the OF Box (i.e. context/Tag list, project list, forecast view)
I would agree that OF has so many features it is easy to get lost in the woods, or spend too much time searching for the ārightā tags and perspectives for my needs. It is a common criticism to OF that you need to devote way too much time to fiddling with all these perks instead of doing the real tasks. I guess thatās a balance act each of us have to do personally.
Let me see if it would work for me:
Checklists and templates are separate, self contained elements, and donāt need further metadata besides a clear title to find them.
Recurring, maintenance type actions (BAU, run your life), can probably be also organized and timed to pop up when due with no tags or perspectives appended. These are usually grouped within single action lists which is just a container for single tasks.
So we are left with Projects. I guess if I entered in OF only 2 or 3 active projects, I could manage working off the project or context lists without needing other tags/perspectives, if you can pick up what to do anytime without further considerations.
However, I guess if you have more than maybe 50 tasks and 10 projects active at anyone time (just a guess), you need tags and perspectives to survive.
Just a feedback afte rnearly a month. Its a bliss. I have around 5-10 tenplates (packing, cleaning, travelling, places to visit, etc.) Whenever I need to travel I combine all the ātempaltesā in a new project (copy & paste) and use the kanban-style inside the new project (do before travelling; do while travellin; do after travelling; done). All the tasks fromt the tempalte porjects are being ordered according to their state. Super easy fast and no headche. no tags, to perpectives jus plain and simple. can access it from my iphone more easily and have a better overviews, since I dont have to struggle with finding hte right perspective etc. Make your todo list managemet effortless guys. Try it you will feel happy.
Omnifocus was developed based on Getting Things Done to have a tool for implementing this method. Packing lists are actually out of place in Omnifocus. Rather, these lists should be placed in Evernote, Outliner, or Notes, as well as other reference material. Nobody would have the idea of āāentering recipes in Omnifocus. It is easily feasible to store Evernote links to material in tasks (note field).
The Getting Things Done method is about collecting and structuring tasks !!!, projects, goals and their implementation and not about managing checklists. I record all tasks in single-action lists or projects and try to relieve my brain and to proceed in a structured manner. On the way to or from the office, I dictate to Siri everything that comes to mind and still needs to be done to Siri (in a holder on the windshield). āHave the management sign the rental agreement.ā, āCall XYZ to remind them to keep the appointment.ā, āBuy cleaning materialsā, āTeach trainees how to use FUNCTIONS in Excelā "Prepare practice materials for Visual Basic for Applications ā,ā Call training company regarding XYZ ", ā¦ and so on. I clean my inboxes, structure the tasks, do a āreviewā every morning, which is very quick with my structure with projects, tags and perspectives in Omnifocus. Without perspectives and tags I would have the ānaked chaosā, as we say in Germany. About 500 tasks that require action are in my Omnifocus database.
After reading your post, I have the impression that you do not know the details of Getting Things Done. If using the features of Omnifocus is too complicated for you, there is a reason: You donāt have a concept for personally implementing Getting Things Done (regardless of Omnifocus or other tools). Only when GTD is so well known that it can also be used, for example, as a method with index cards and pen, then you can also recognize the sense and benefit of the omnifocus features.
I had though the days of GTD fundamentalism were gone. Apparently not. I disagree fundamentally with the notion GTD-conformity is a requirement for OF users. Setting aside questions of personal choice; the value of strict GTD; the relevance of canonical GTD in a world where concepts like office/home contexts have blurred their meaning for many people, Iāll just make this one point:
Tags are not part of GTD. For details, I refer you to reams and reams and reams of debate in the forum archives. The fact that OF introduced tags quite some time ago is an explicit recognition that it supports a wider set of work methods than GTD.
More generally, itās not really helpful, IMO, for any of us to instruct others on how to work - offer examples to assist in solving problems/answering questions by all means. But please letās not go back to wagging our fingers at Omni customers who choose to work differently.
Thank you so much dear @Nick I couldnt have responded better to @Monika.
Therefore I will just use your answer as my answer. You summed up all so well.
I am using OF since nearly 5 years and trying to ācrank the producitvityā widgets since 2013/2014. What I found out for myself. The more free / and the less functions I āhaveā to use in an App to make my life going and achieving my plans / goals etc. the better. I want an āeffortlessā productivity system.
I want to it to be easy peasy. My thoughts > organizing > action > results > be happy with life > repeat.
