I don’t know your smart list criteria, but would have though tags in Things would solve most of your problem.
One of the understated features in Things is search. If you have a tag “critical” and do CMD+F and type “critical” you can search via tag across all projects and tasks. Actually all you need to do is press the first letter of the tag you’re searching for and search will immediately open. The same could be done with “Waiting” and “Presentation & Reports”. Tags can be setup with a shortcut key so you can add them swiftly.
The “1 Week”, I’m assuming is what’s coming in the next week. I find Things’ “Upcoming” perspective is sufficient for that.
I would also suggest looking at the feature set of a particular task manager to see if you can create a good workflow using those features. Trying to port one task manager’s workflow into another is never a good idea. You need to use the strengths of each programme. For example, I don’t need OF’s perspectives in Things because “Today”, “Upcoming”, “Anytime”, “Someday” and the search are actually built in perspectives with which I can create a good workflow. My workflow would be very different in OF or Todoist or on Paper or in Taskpaper. The reason I chose Things was that in the end simplicity was important to me and I tend to fiddle less and work more.
You are correct on all accounts, but the missing “feature” is the ability to save a search (equivalent to a perspective or smart list). I prefer not to search whenever I need a list of my critical tasks, a list of presentations, reports, etc.
I should have added that the other thing that keeps me from using Things is the friction involved in sending a task from my meeting notes in Apple Notes to Things whereas all I need to do when using Reminders is select the task in Apple Notes and share it to Reminders. The task is sent to reminders with a link to the Note with no intervention on my part.
IF a search could be saved in Things I’d probably switch to Craft and Things due to the tight integration between the two. The missing feature in Things is a “perspectives” or “smart list” feature. If it had that, Things would be ideal of my needs.
The new interface in OF4 did not appeal to me and basically did not bring anything extra from a features perspective that would make me pay for it.
I’ve moved all my projects and tasks away from OF into Apple reminders this week. It gives me all the features I need, works flawlessly with shortcuts and siri (wel… most of the time) and gives me the smart folders I need to get to my focus areas quickly. (just wish they’d allow me to pin more of them… did file a radar for that) It’s also very nice to use on the iPad and iPhone.
So far I really enjoy the simplicity, and just focusing on tasks with organisation through tags and smart folders / filters. And: no cost
I am looking to move larger projects into Vikunja (selfhosted) but that;s something for the coming winter months. FOr now extremely happy with reminders
I like to fully describe my tasks when defined or during the review, which leads to long, helpful task descriptions. Those are cut off by Things if longer than one line and replaced by an ellipsis. I then have to click or tap. I like to list all known tasks under a project. If there are more than Things wants to display, Things notes there are “x more tasks” and I have to click or tap to see those.
How can I tell the difference? What I’m experiencing is that if I make changes in one device they don’t show up until a good while later on other devices.
Does OF clear out old data once it’s completed? Is there a way to reset sync?
I was also experiencing this slow sync when I tested it. 5 mins or more from when I change something on my iPad to the Mac app updating. I reported the bug and I’ve not been using it for day to day task management as I frequently switch devices, I’ve just been using it to experiment.
You would have to use a network monitoring utility like Lulu (free) or Little Snitch if you wanted to investigate what’s going wrong with your syncing.
Here’s what working OF4 sync looks like.
I created a task on OF 4 for Mac. LS almost immediately showed brief network activity on push.omnigroup.com and the iOS app showed the task a few seconds later.
I then created a task on OF 4 for iOS. A few seconds later, LS showed similar brief network activity on update.omnigroup.com and the task immediately appeared in OF 4 for Mac. Sync.omnigroup.com is also briefly active and exchanges a little more data.
If there had been a network problem, I wouldn’t have seen any activity, or it would’ve been delayed or constantly churning. If there had been a UI problem, I would’ve seen the normal network pattern but not the new task (and might’ve seen the new task when re-opening the app.)
Thanks for that, I checked LS and it is working. I’m noticing that running v3 & v4 is probably causing the lag. As I find v4 still buggy, I’m going to stick with v3 for now.
FWIW, I have found the December 16, 2022 OmniFocus 4 TestFlight version to be buggy, and that is the most recent version. Yes, slow syncing, and other stuff as well. I didn’t have these issues with previous TestFlight releases. However, as indicated in that update, “This will be the final OmniFocus 4 TestFlight build of 2022, as the OmniFocus development team will be working reduced hours through the new year,” so I’m anticipating an update that I hope fixes these issues.
Yeah, the slow sync is definitely hurting me too. But it’s a beta, so it’s par for the course along the way. Pretty confident they’re working on it internally, but anybody who made a task on their phone over the holidays to fix it is probably still waiting for that task to sync on their Mac.
Somewhere (can’t find it) I thought they guessed early 2024, but it wasn’t a promise or deadline. It definitely won’t be released by the start of the school year.
When do we anticipate OmniFocus 4 will ship?
That’s a great question! As alluded to above, we do expect to ship OmniFocus 4 in 2023.
The exact timing is not predetermined, however: it will ship as soon as it’s ready
From my perspective, Omni is still struggling with the user experience. I run the Testflight release from time to time and while one can see advances, they seem to be happening at a slow pace. I’m curious about the hurdles they are facing because it’s not like Omni lacks knowledge of native apps!
