What's the use case for Taskpaper integration?

Hi,

In the release notes, I’ve seen that OF is getting Taskpaper integration. What’s the use case for this functionality?

/Anders

Hi Anders,

TaskPaper format enables reuse of projects and tasks by keeping the hierarchy and details rather than just providing the text in the title or a link to the OmniFocus task. You can also bring TaskPaper in to OmniFocus by pasting into the Outline view.

TaskPaper Reference Document has specifics about what is included. One of the best ways to get started learning about the format is to copy a project as TaskPaper from the Edit menu or the Context menu, and paste into your favorite text editor.

I hope this helps give you some ideas to explore!

Thanks,
Lanette

Meaning that one now can create project templates using Taskpaper syntax? Exactly the answer I was hoping for! Are you considering extending the Taskpaper syntax with placeholders for text/variables, so that one could create a couple of tasks with %contact%, for instance, and have each %contact% replaced with a name that’s entered into a input field?

/Anders

Thanks for that tip. I’ve not been paying attention to the TaskPaper feature but this has opened my mind to some possibilities!

Hi Anders,

I hope I wasn’t accidentally misleading. TaskPaper support isn’t fully enabling templates because it has some limitations based on what the format supports. It does enable more workflows that are template like. If you want to reuse projects, action groups, and items with their hierarchy, that is where TaskPaper format shines.

My favorite advantage it offers is the ability to define due and defer dates in a more flexible way. If you want to re-use a project, try the relative dates which support some basic math like adding or subtracting days, so for example use (Today +3d) or (Friday 18:00) instead of a set date. Those relative dates which support + or - number of days (d) or weeks (w) or month (m). If you do not specify a time, it will default to 00:00 in 24 hour time.

Example item that is due a month from tomorrow, but deferred until 2 weeks from Sunday:

  - Testing TaskPaper. @due(Tomorrow +1m) @defer(Sunday +2w)

There isn’t variable support like you mention currently, but one way to accomplish that end result is using find/replace under Find in the the Edit menu. Once you’ve pasted in your TaskPaper to Projects view, under the Edit menu use Find/Replace to step through each one or replace all.

Tip: If you need it, the Find/Replace dialog has a Regular Expressions option allows you to find things in a more specific way. For example, if I wanted to search for either “email” or “phone” I could use “email|phone” with Regular Expressions selected and it will find either word.

Thanks,
Lanette

You were not misleading at all. This was exactly what I was hoping for. I’ve some repeating nested project hierarchies where this feature will be really useful.

Thanks!