Glad to hear that. The ability to select someone from my contacts and have email, calendar entries, and messages in one place made my job much easier.
I use this capability of BusyContacts relatively frequently. More reliable than searching for emails inside of Mail which one has to get the search criteria just right, it seems.
That is true many times but not always. I also use my calendar for reminders: birthdays, holidays, certain events I want to be aware of but may need need to attend), etc.
The Reminders app has kind of a strange name in my opinion. 
Having it all in one place would cause me too much distractions. I don’t want to see all my todo’s when I’m in my calendar, although sometimes you might want to have them side-by-side (which is certainly possible).
For work we use Microsoft 365, it comes with Outlook, which combines E-mail, Calendar, Tasks and Contacts all in one app. They also have a separate app for ToDo’s but it does sync (partly) with the Outlook (or better, Exchange server) tasks. I personally am on the Mac and use Apple Calendar and Omnifocus, and I like the separation very much also because I do not get confronted with ‘bloat’ in my calendar app and/ or todo app which I do not use.
I think tasks do not belong on your calendar.
If I want to do a task at a certain time I drag it to my calendar and then I have reserved a block of time for it. The calendar item links back to the todo item. The todo item is still without a due date, and if something unexpected happens and I do not get to spend time in the reserved block on the particular task the task still remains unchanged in my task system and will not disappear which it would do if it was only on my calendar.
A ‘solution’ would be to have tasks on your calendar that you did not finish automatically rollover, but this makes you system more complex and also less reliable.
This is actually a best practice for GTD. The argument can be made that not everybody does GTD, but GTD is based on psychological research - and a research basis for a practice makes it far more likely that it’s the route Apple will take by default.
And psychologically, it can create overwhelm and numb one to the items - in which case a calendar becomes far less useful.
As for combining the two apps, I think it would make sense for reminders to show up on the calendar - but anything undated should be somewhere separate. That could be a separate sidebar or something in Calendar on desktop, but I think trying to manage it all in one app on iOS could get weird.
1 Like
No but then again you aren’t handling 3 properties, dealing with county government on septic system installs, trying to import one batch of sheep from Canada, trying to export another batch of sheep to Canada, write at last count 2 major Android apps talking to a very complex SQLite Datbase, Maintain a 3rd one and simultaneously learn Python and write 3 major desktop apps also using the same databse, convert over 15000 sheep pedigree records into a new structure, scan and document over 30,000 slides and negatives and another 40,000 digital images,manage a flock of sheep, run a registry for all US and Canadian BWMS, Scan and document nearly 2000 historical negatives and glass plates, be an officer in 2 organizations, write letters and participate in political issues like wolf introduction and fracking that threaten to destroy our flocks and farms and more. So busy doesn’t mean you need both things in one app it’s more what you like and how you work.
Not usually. Entries in my calendar in the future are for appointments (doctor etc.) or they are possible events I might want to attend, a concert or a party. The tasks for those would be things like Decide on whether to go to the String quartet concert at the Blue Sage followed by (If I decided yes) Call X to see if they have any spare tickets followed by Call the Blue Sage to see if any are available from patrons who are not attending. (Since those types of things here are usually sold out to the season pass holders )
Most of my calendar is a record of what I worked on during the day. I do not need nor do I want my tasks there because they get impossible to manage.
Case in point today: I had planned to spend all morning working on year end filing and scanning and shredding stuff I do not need. Instead we had a sheep emergency and had to stop everything to deal with it first. I have it easily documented that I spent an hour dealing with ram 1688 and only after that was done did I get to start on the work I had in my task manager. By leaving it in my task manger I didn’t have to change and move things around on the calendar and when I was able I could just look at the list of stuff to do inside by myself and pick the one that I needed to work on.
I have been using GTD as a framework for accomplishing things for over 13 years. I never was successful using calendar scheduling of todos and struggled until I finally grokked GTD and now I can’t imagine working any other way.
I like clear separation between the apps that I use to manage things.
1 Like
Oogie’s usage is dead-on consistent with GTD.
Imagine a Venn diagram. “Tasks” is a huge circle. “Calendar” is a smaller circle, within “Tasks”. All Calendar events are logically signifiers of some kind of task (even if that task is “decide whether to go to XYZ concert”).
But not all tasks are calendar events. The average person, per David Allen, has something like 100 to 150 projects (not tasks!), some of which have multiple associated do-able tasks. And many of those likely don’t have hard-and-fast date/time requirements.
This causes problems when people try to unnaturally force that huge “Tasks” circle into the smaller “Calendar” circle.
That’s why there are two lists. Per GTD (and many other productivity methodologies!), things that MUST happen on a date or at a time (the smaller “Calendar” circle) go on the calendar. And really, the Calendar app - not Reminders - is the most logical place for anything that’s scheduled like this. It supports recurring events, alerts, etc. and should really offer just about everything somebody needs for scheduling. Things that don’t have to happen on a particular date or at a particular time go on a separate list. That’s where Reminders or another list manager comes in handy.
I’m glad this method works for you, and wouldn’t suggest you change it if it’s working - but for many people I can say that this leads to numbness and a general distrust that things on the calendar are important - which is why there’s typically a separation between the two lists.
This is where I get confused - I’m not seeing why you’d use zero-minute reminders for any of this stuff…?
To use your examples, I’ve baked cakes, and “bake a cake” definitely isn’t a zero-minute task. If it has to be done on a day at a time, is there a reason you’re not just assigning it a 1-hour (or so) time block on the relevant day?
Same with “go to the shop on the way”. If the birthday party is at 4:30, and the trip takes 20 minutes plus a 10-minute stop at the shop to buy party hats, why not just block off 4:00-4:30 as “buy party hats on the way to the party” instead of a zero-minute event?
As far as Apple’s implementation, I agree that “let me show my scheduled, dated reminders on my calendar” - settable with a Preferences option, not on by default - would be pretty low-hanging fruit. It would probably fit your use case, and not cost the more traditional task management people any hassle. The other items could still be stored in Reminders.
1 Like
Too right! They belong in your inbox.
4 Likes
Like many people I too have my share of responsibilities, beside that I also have ADHD.
When a meeting runs longer, or you get an unexpected call, or any other event disturbs your planned event the entire schedule breaks. The result will be that you need to spend a lot of time rescheduling tasks on your calendar and the change that tasks get lost in the proces is high.
I think it is a better workflow to use the empty slots on your calendar to work on your tasks, and if your tasks are in a task list you can easily find them. Off-course regular reviews of your task list (and calendar) are very important, also categorizing the tasks in a way that fits your workflow will help.
But it also depends on what you call a reminder. If a reminder is something that needs to be done on a certain time and day then it should be on your calendar. If a reminder is something that you want to do on a certain time and day it is a task.
1 Like
But only for a short time, they should be put on your task list(s) regularly 
. As I have many inboxes this is something I mostly do at least once a day.
They used to be the same. As usual, Apple did a half-done job when they separated them.
-
The Calendar still allows you to send “Notifications” based upon Calendar events, which is a reasonable thing to do. But why do these go through the notification system and not simply generate a Reminder that would show up at the appointed time in the Reminders application? So you have Reminders and “things” that look, feel, and act like reminders coming through as notifications originating in the calendar. Why WOULDN’T I want those together in the same interface??
-
Calendar specifies date dependent activities… times where my schedule is filled. Reminders can have due dates or not. Why would I NOT want to see all of the time slots that are full PLUS all of the tasks that are due on that same date, in the same interface?? That’s how I know what my “tomorrow looks like”.
-
Reminders have been confused with list-makers. Lists, if they are task lists, can have due dates on the individual list members. Do the groceries on my grocery list have due dates? Does the list of stuff that I plan to donate to charity have a due date? Not usually, though such lists might be CONNECTED to either calendar events or items on a task list with due dates.
-
There are not enough ways to connect things together. I should be able to add an event to the calendar (“mom’s birthday party”), from that calendar event, generate a reminder to buy a birthday present, and connect it to a list of things that mom said that she would like to have.
-
a notification is a mechanism by which a reminder would be delivered. But those concepts have have been confused as well.
-
The evidence of all of this confusion is clearly in the fact that there is a proliferation of alternative third-party applications that put back together what Apple has rent asunder.
1 Like
I personally would not want Apple te create a reminder for each calendar entry I have with a notification, they are separate things to me. If I need to buy a present for someone that would be a task, and in GTD terms it would very easily be a project. Being present on a birthday party (calendar item) and buying a present (task) are separate things.
If you would want to create a reminder from a calendar event, just drag the calendar event to the Reminders app and it will create a Reminder with a link back to the calendar event. If you need more flexibility or automation you could use Shortcuts for that.
A reminder is not a notification per se. I can have a list of things I need to remember without being actively notified of these items. I might just look at the list each day and pick something to do. A notification is a way to let me know that I need to leave home at a certain time for an appointment (fixed date/ time). I could also have reminders (tasks) with notifications, but I seldom use those.
The confusion is mainly caused by not having clear what a reminder/ task / todo is and what an appointment is. GTD is a method that creates a clear distinction between those, which is not always easy!
Also the name “Reminders” for an app makes it a bit unclear
1 Like
This!!! Once I grokked the difference betwenn needs to be (or must be) vs want to be it became far more obvious how to separate claendar vs tasks
1 Like
What about having a view setting in Calendar (or reminders) that had a combined calendar and reminders in a single view. I get to achieve this kind of thing in the OmniFocus Forecast perspective. I enjoy being able to see my whole day of appointments mixed in with my next actions–without the two apps actually being conjoined. Thus, still different apps for those of us that prefer that, but with some tweaks that allow people to customize how they use the two apps together?
1 Like
I also have calendars visible in Omnifocus, but it only shows calendar items and tasks that do have a Due date, or deferred items which I need to do something with today. Most of the time these are not really “next actions”. These can be things like:
- take out the trash (due, because it needs to be done sometime today)
- decide to buy ticket for concert (deferred)
These are things when put on my calendar and the day gets really busy will be easily forgotten by me, so I like to be able to check these off when I have time, they’re not time specific, only day specific.
Workflows are very personal and having multiple ways to view tasks and calendars adds flexibility. It depends on you personal workflow how much value combining calendar and tasks will give you.
Hi OogieM, if I was juggling a professional portfolio I wouldn’t be using Apple calendar either. In fact I don’t use it for work, which I manage with my work calendar and keep separate from my personal calendar for sanity’s sake.
In my opinion, basic Apple calendar should start with functionality for personal use and it fails in that regard by not allowing the choice for those of us who would like to see their reminders in their calendar to do so.
My point is that it could be turned off for those who don’t wish to see them there by toggling them on and off, as one does with any particular shared calendar anyway.
Webwalrus, I might not schedule a hard and fast blocked out time to “bake cake” because with everything I juggle the time has to be flexible. Your time is not really your own when there are several other family members whose days and events are all dynamic and changeable and impact my day in real time, so I can’t just block out inflexible time slots for most things and instead have to make in-the-moment judgements about what can and can’t be done and when to best slot them in, when to flick them to if they are lower priority, so it sits better for me as a reminder to do the task sometime that day, but in the context of any fixed events that may also be there.
So I prefer to see an overall picture of the day with the things I’ve scheduled to do, some of which might be approximate timeslots. And often the majority of items might go out the window altogether, but it is easier for me to reschedule them if I can see the existing events and tasks on the day I’m considering flicking them to.
And because I have ADHD I need to be reminded of things by an alarm in my pocket, which I can look at and respond to while I’m on the go, and see the reminder at a glance in the context of the rest of the tasks I have scheduled for that day, including “events” that I also need reminding about at various times in advance of the event. I also set up reminders the night prior to an important event or if I have a particularly early event the following day, so I don’t oversleep, or if I need to remind a family member of an event on the day prior so they can prepare something for the next day. And it is helpful to see that reminder in the context of the calendar in which the “event” is shown as well.
The zero or 5 minute meetings are my way of getting that particular reminder to show up on my calendar in scrollable list form under the month view on my phone, while also not overlapping, if there are several reminders and events scheduled for the same hour in the day view for when I might look at it on the laptop.
The bottom line is we all have different requirements of our reminders and calendars and to preclude the viewing of reminders in the context of the calendar was incomprehensible to me, having come from the Nokia platform on which it worked seamlessly, and is unfair for those of us who want that functionality q(and there must be more than a few of us, given this thread has been found by over 2k views) simply to relieve those of you who don’t want it of the effort required to uncheck a box and turn it off.
I wouldn’t have any problem with such a checkbox as long as the reminders that were showing up were actually scheduled in some way, as opposed to an amorphous, unscheduled “buy bread” task.
In the meantime, you might benefit from looking at some of the other calendaring apps on the App Store. BusyCal and Fantastical both seem to do something like what you want, and would probably serve your needs well.
1 Like
Actually no. When I frequently have to reschedule a reminder for a different day, it is LESS likely to get lost because it is so easy to just change the date it is set up for, and easy to see the existing things on the day I’m considering changing it to. And I know I’m getting an alert on the new day so I can stop thinking about it until then. This is only possible in Apple world because I’m using calendar events as my reminders so I can see them in context with the rest of the day. But it would be nicer to have the reminders tagged as “reminders” and also viewable as a separate list sometimes, which is why I’d prefer to have two apps, but the existing Apple reminders app is useless for my purposes if it doesn’t show up in my calendar.
My reminders are time dependent and I want an alarm in my pocket to remind me to attend to the reminder. I used to use a paper diary and I would frequently forget to look at it, or I would look at it in the morning, but when 4pm rolled around I would forget something I was supposed to do at 4pm.
Examples of my reminders: (they almost all need reminder alerts in my pocket and most need it at particular times)
“Make an appointment to get new referral from GP for annual specialist appointment next week” (this would be put in my calendar a year prior, along with the appointment event a week later, and I would have the alarm go off at lunchtime when I’m likely to have time to attend to it. If I don’t it’s very quick to open the reminder and change the date, and less likely to get totally forgotten if I can see the existing tasks on the date I’m considering shifting it to, and will come with an alert on the new day so I won’t totally miss it.)
“Remind child one to take x item to school today” ( set up a week prior and accompanied by an alert which will remind me early before they need to leave for school when I might not yet have had time to leisurely peruse my separate reminders list for the day)
“Dog 3 monthly tick medication due today” ( with an alert at dinner time, when the dog gets fed but when I am likely to forget otherwise)
“Phone mother’s home care provider to change her service date for transport to dentist” (this can’t be done straight away so I have set myself a reminder for the following day but needs an alarm to remind me at a time when I am likely to have time to make the phonecall and again, is easy to quickly change the time to a later time if necessary but I will forget to do it if it requires me remembering to look at a separate reminders list)
“Possible afternoon off to babysit x child if y parent unable to do it” (would most likely set up as an all day event because it doesn’t need a reminder alert but does need to be there to remind me to keep that day free and not to add unnecessary events or reminders for that day just in case. But I don’t want it scheduled for a particular time because I don’t know the exact time yet.
“Remember to buy x on the way home from work” (again I want an alarm, and I want it to go off at 5pm, and I will forget it if it relies on me remembering to look for it in the reminders list, but I also want to see it in the context that I’ve got a Physio appointment after work that day which affects where and when I can get item x)
“Remember to pack shorts and runners in my tote bag to take to work for Physio appointment tomorrow” ( I set this reminder up at the same time I made the appointment at the Physio and put a separate Physio event in my calendar and I want it to go off at 9pm the night prior to the Physio event when I’m getting my stuff ready for the next day and I’ll forget it if it doesn’t have an alert)
“Buy present for XY” (will set this one up as an annual reminder for a couple of weeks prior to the birthday event and it it is easy to change the date if that day becomes clogged with other priorities, but again, I need an alert or I will forget it.)
But if the reminders app can be toggled on and off as viewable in the calendar (as we can already do with various subscribed shared calendars which we may or may not want to see all the time) we would all be happy. As it is, only those who don’t want to see reminders in the context of their calendar can be happy.