I was working on a Workflowy project today, and it made me realize the the power of their interface (including filtering) is that so much can be done mousing around without menus or right-clicking. Focus in, focus out, filter, move up and down the hierarchy – it’s all a mouse click away.
I wish OminOutliner did that.
Hi,
I see the option to filter by Tag in the screenshot above but I don’t see that Tag filter in OmniPlan 3.3.3.
Cheers,
Steve
The OmniPlan document in that screenshot had a “Tags” custom data column. You can add custom data to your own tasks by selecting a task and using the Custom Data Inspector, at which point that custom data will become available in the main task outline as an additional column and will also become available for filtering (as in that screenshot).
Thanks for your quick, helpful reply, Ken. Of course it works perfectly.
The powerful combination of tagging, OmniPlan’s ninja filtering and hierarchical filter results is unmatched anywhere, I think, and very useful. I’m excited :)
For what it’s worth, I use the shift-option-9 character for my tags (in apps which don’t have a true tagging system). It produces an unobtrusive, tiny, vertically-certered dot which isn’t used for much of anything else.
All the best
Please at the very least just add the ability to filter columns in a way similar to excel. i.e. only show items marked “x” from a droplist. Keep in mind though that i need the parents of any items marked with “x” to also be shown (or at least the option to retain parents or not) as context is key!
And please hurry. I’m using NeO until this is possible.
Hi kcase,
I really like the Omniplan implementation, I’ve tested it out as well! Your email indicates it’s been implemented on on Omnifocus but I couldn’t see that. Any pointers?
Also, do you have an idea when OmniOutliner filtering will become available? Very much looking forward to it.
Thanks
Joe
Thank you everyone for your suggestions! Would you like to see where we’re at? Good news! We are just about ready to start private testing of OmniOutliner 5 specifically for feedback on filtering. Signup if you would like to give it a try – https://www.omnigroup.com/test/omnioutliner-mac
Warning: This is still a very early state of the app and there are many destabilizing changes to come so it should not be used for real work.
Hey Derek, hope the testing is tracking well. Any idea when this will be rolled out? It’s my one terminal feature.
Thanks
We’re not ready to announce a release date yet but I highly recommend signing up for the private test to make sure you’re able to do what you want with how filtering has been implemented.
DerekM, Thanks for the update. Can you remind us of Omni’s past practices on release dates?
Was a rough release date ever given for any of the OO releases or for any of the OF releases once they got closer to ready?
I thought I recalled once seeing a notice that one of the OF version was to be released in a specific quarter (along with the usual disclaimers). What I’m getting at, is whether or not there’s some policy that nothing is ever said about releases until they actually happen.
Also, is there any way I can look back at other Omni software and get a feel for how long things sit in private release before becoming beta and then becoming official? I just am trying to figure out if the path between Private-version and Released version has been measured in weeks, a couple months, or more than a quarter. Again, I’m not asking for information about the upcoming OO release, just about what past release timelines have been.
Thank you.
Excellent job on the filtering so far by the way. The combination of logical OR/AND on an individual filter plus the ability to sequentially apply them makes it very powerful. And being able to select what matches the filter is extremely useful. Nice work.
My (nonofficial-not-speaking-for-Omni-just-a-user-who-has-particpated-in-testing) experience is that test cycles are weeks rather than months, as a rule. Omni doesn’t normally open testing until the software is pretty stable. Filtering in OO my be a little different, because much depends on how users want it to work (as opposed to simply (ha!) looking for bugs). That might affect the user interface, which might mean much rework.
@carl123 Glad to hear you’re filtering is meeting your needs! Past information on test periods would not reveal any sort of pattern to go off of I’m afraid. Public test periods have ranged from non-existent to months. The best advice I can give is to keep track of the progress in test builds to get a feel for how finished it is.
ok, I see. Sorry for the off-topic, but is there an official way to comment on bugs I find in the private test build that don’t cause crashes, and so don’t bring up the crash reporter?
@carl123 There’s no automatic way to send us any information about the bug, but using Help > Contact Omni will at least autofill the build number of the app you’re using which is helpful to us.
I would like to re-emphasize what @hugosharp suggested above:
Keep in mind though that i need the parents of any items marked with “x” to also be shown (or at least the option to retain parents or not) as context is key!
@DerekM: Would you please shed some light on the possibility to implement this request?
Thanks,
Firas
I’d encourage you to sign up for the v5 private test to try out filtering for yourself https://www.omnigroup.com/test/omnioutliner-mac
The filter editor sheet looks near identical to what Ken posted at the start of this thread. It do have the option to show a flat list of just the matching rows or to show the ancestors of the matching rows.
