Move OmniFocus Task to Project

Software
1

I’ve been trying OmniFocus again and have not been able to find a way to quickly, with a single keyboard command, move a task to a project. By editing a task and then using tab I can get to the project entry and move it, but I’d love to see some ⌘ + ⌥ + M (or whatever) to just move a task without needing to enter the edit mode.

Is this possible?

2

I keep the Projects perspective open on the left side – it can also be starred and have a keyboard shortcut associated with it. Then tasks can be dragged from the project currently on view into another project in the Projects perspective.

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3

you could quite easily do this using omni automation - just link a script to a keyboard shortcut:

https://omni-automation.com/omnifocus/plug-in-move-tasks-to-project.html

3 Likes
4

Thanks, that does work but it still doesn’t free you from the keyboard. You can’t move to the dropdown with the keyboard or simply select the project as you type. You have to grab the mouse and select the project after.

5

So I recently switched from Things to OF, and this issue has been driving me nuts, since Things has such great keyboard support for moving tasks. For anyone who stumbles upon this thread, you can install the plugin mentioned above then enable Keyboard Navigation in the Mac Keyboard Settings menu. This allows you to tab to the project list and select a project without using the mouse. It’s certainly not as elegant as Things, but it’s close enough and has solved my biggest gripe with OF.

Happy automating!

6

Unrelated to this thread, but may I ask why you switched from Things to OF? I’ve actually been considering switching to Things from OF to see if I could simplify things.

7

I made the switch from OmniFocus 3 to Things a few years back. Never looked back.

8

I customized a plugin in an attempt to make OmniFocus more like Things 3 for moving tasks around.

What this one does is that it allows you to move tasks without needing to use your mouse at all.

  1. Install the plugin into OmniFocus folder.
  2. Assign a keyboard shortcut (CMD+SHIFT+M to match Things)
  3. Select a task, and invoke the keyboard shortcut
  4. Type into the field and then press enter

It will file it to the first match without moving your wrists. If you do want more granularity you can turn on “Keyboard Navigation” in the Keyboard System Settings. Then you can TAB to the dropdown menu and arrow to the specific project you’re looking for.

Overall it “works.” It’s still not as elegant as Things 3, but it does get you closer.

Example Video

**This is a similar workflow for attaching tags. You can’t remove tags, though but it’s a bit faster to just attach single tags for a few tasks.

***Also, I’m not actively using OmniFocus as my task manager, but I still play with it from time to time. There is a bug with these plugins where they can crash the iOS apps. I’ve reported it to Omni, but it still hasn’t been fixed to my knowledge.

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