OF2 iPad Navigation

OmniFocus OmniFocus for iOS
#1

Hey all,

I emailed this to Omni crew, but thought I’d share it here for your feedback. Interested in what others think!

I’m loving OF2 iPad, but one thing I have found is that while working, it seems unnecessarily hard to get back to the top level of perspectives in the left navigation.

As an example:

I start from top level perspectives nav, and go in to my inbox. From there, I see an item which really represents what should be a project, so I convert it to a project inside the appropriate folder. I create an action for this newly created project to keep it moving forward.

But… to get back to the inbox or the top level perspectives launch, I now have to tap Back to get from my folder to Projects, then Back again to get to Perspectives, and only then can I get back to the inbox.

I might suggest a sticky for the Inbox, Home/top level button, or even configurably sticky perspectives to make the left hand navigation more useful when you’re a level or two (or more) in.

Thoughts?

Thanks!

ScottyJ

#2

Pressing and holding the “back” will go all the way to the perspectives view like on the iPhone.

2 Likes
#3

Ah! So it does - this didn’t seem to work the first time I tried, but perhaps a restart or something fixed whatever was preventing.

I still wouldn’t mind a single touch to Inbox or Home, though. ;)

Thanks for helping, @dmullins!

ScottyJ

1 Like
#4

In my experience, iPad version is just not designed for “inbox processing” and review process. Similar to the iPhone version, it only works for “collect”, “execute” and “plan A to Z” usecases. Especially true if your Omni database is anything more complex than one-level list of projects, with one-level list of actions in each.

Interested in hearing if anyone actually succeeds with inbox processing and review process – maybe I am missing something.

1 Like
#5

Hi Yurkennis,

I disagree with your assessment, I use the iPad version for all activities, including Inbox Processing, Reviews (easier than iPhone or Mac IMHO) forecasting, and completing actions. I regularly have around 15 active work projects, plus personal ones.

I use the iPad version about 95% of my omnifocus use and find very few things which slow me down massively. it’s a big step forwards from version 1 and very, very usable.

#6

Geoffairey, could you share your experience with a little more detail? What is your “secret sauce” for doing it efficiently?

Specifically:

  1. do you use subtasks in majority of projects–or primarily flat lists only? Subtasks are one of the largest timewasters in inbox processing, in my experience–and iPad version does not work well for them, as for me. How you deal with that?

  2. how often you create actions before actually completing the nearest “next action”? Another timewaster from my experience is placing a “future action” into the right place in the sequence of actions in the target project–how you deal with that?