OmniFocus

Today through Saturday: Merlin's Advanced OmniFocus Demo (MacWorld Booth #760)

Merlin — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 13:46:12 -0500

I'll have a more proper Monthly Pimp on-deck here soon, but -- time being of the essence here -- I wanted to make sure and extend an invitation for something I'll be doing in town today.

If you're one of my nerdy band of brothers who's in San Francisco this week for MacWorld, please do come visit me between 1:30 and 2:30 (today, Friday, and Saturday), at the giant, glistening, Oz-like Omni Group booth (#760).

As below (via), I'll be blowing minds and curling shorties with some of the most advanced-level, post-doc OmniFocus fu that I know. And, as is my wont, I'll also be sharing some of the deeper mojo that explains why OF was built the way it was (read: why it's so [ugh.] 'complicated'), and how you can choose to leverage that functionality in building a personalized and friction-free workflow. And, yeah, while I'll certainly be touching on the connections with GTD, the big focus will be on thinking about how to support that phrase Ethan and I came up with so many years ago:

Always focus on shortening the path from cognition to completion.

Love that. Pretty much sums up my take on the whole productivity game in one sentence.

Me? I'll be easy enough to recognize today -- I'm the one with the throwing stars in my gi and the sandalfoot pantyhose¹ on his head.

from the Omni Group's post:

Merlin Mann: Advanced Secrets of the Omnifocus Ninja

Thursday through Saturday afternoons from 1:30-2:30pm, Merlin Mann (43 Folders, MacBreak Weekly, You Look Nice Today) will stealthily rappel into the Omni Group’s booth (#760) to demonstrate the arcane and deadly methods of the OmniFocus Ninja. Long thought by many to be an elaborate myth or hoax, these ancient productivity moves unlock the hidden power of Omni’s award-winning task management app.

Working the bookmarklet
Friction-free task management right from your iPhone
Tricking-out your Perspectives
Slice and dice your work into perfect-sized cubes
Novel uses for on-hold projects
Out of sight means out-of-mind — until you need it
Location, Location, Location!
Using the power of location-awareness in your contexts
BONUS: Five more tiny OmniFocus tricks almost nobody knows about
(seeeeeekr1t!)

Hope to see you there!

Come. Love. Booth. Okay?

And, yes, I the Titular Ninja also really hope to see you and your neckbeard in ole 760 today.

Because, seriously? Don't be that guy who hangs back and doesn't come up and say "hi" like a person. You must introduce yourself and high-five or shake hands or take a picture of us frenching or whatever. I don't want to see a bunch of toots about how you almost came up. Don't be that Lizard Brain guy, right? Exactly.²

Noooooo....I'm not actually wearing sandalfoot pantyhose on my heard. Everybody knows real ninjas wear taupe Sheer Energy® Control Top L'eggs®. ↩
Well. Frankly, we don't have to french. That's just what we in the industry call "a value add." If you want, you can just learn to become insanely productive, then go drink with Gruber, Moltz, Seoulbrother, and the rest of the Dream Team. (That's what I'll be doing, anyhow) ↩

”Today through Saturday: Merlin's Advanced OmniFocus Demo (MacWorld Booth #760)” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on February 11, 2010. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

OmniFocus for iPhone: Location-Aware Contexts and More

Merlin — Tue, 10 Jun 2008 13:54:42 -0400

The Omni Group - OmniFocus for iPhone and iPod touch

[Disclosure: I'm a consultant on the OmniFocus project. You can blame me for having requested any of the features you don't like.]

Oh, man. It's so nice to lift the veil on this one. It's been like I knew you guys were getting the big Lego Millennium Falcon for Christmas, but I couldn't tell you until Santa had gone back up the chimney (in his black mock turtleneck and jeans). Anyway.

Merry Christmas, Mac productivity nerds: iPhone synching for OmniFocus is coming. And it is gorgeous, usable, and location-aware. More here on OmniGroup's blog.

From the OmniGroup site:

Using your location, OmniFocus can create a custom list of actions to complete nearby. Buying groceries? OmniFocus can show you the closest grocery store and create an instant shopping list.

Capture tasks anywhere, anytime with OmniFocus: you can enter text, take a picture, or even make a quick voice recording.

Yum. Screengrabs and more -- including a reminder that you should totally visit me at the WWDC OmniFocus meetup tonight -- after the iJump.

FWIW, I'm going to let OmniFocus answer any questions people have (blog post comments, forum) about details of their apps and plans and what have yous. I just wanted to take the opportunity to fist bump the OmniNerds on their fine hard work. They're pathologically dedicated to taking care of their customers, and you can see that in this app. It's crazy-smart and a lot of fun to use.

So! Yes. Tonight. Come to the OmniFocus meetup at the W and fistbump me:

The Omni Mouth » OmniFocus meetup in S.F. on 6/10/08

What: OmniFocus meetup When: Tuesday, June 10th 2008, 6:30 - 8:00 pm Where: W Hotel (map), San Francisco • 3rd Floor, Workroom 2

Please RSVP. Max capacity for the room is 150, so make sure you arrive on time to snag a good seat.

Also, completely off topic, there's a rumor that there might be a totally informal, last-minute You Look Nice Today meetup in SF tonight featuring @scottsimpson and me (@lonelysandwich is at a Fannypack Convention in Prague). Stay tuned to @ylnt for details as they emerge.

[Again, with the Disclosure: I'm a consultant on the OmniFocus project. You can blame me for having requested any of the features you don't like.]

”OmniFocus for iPhone: Location-Aware Contexts and More” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on June 10, 2008. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Clippings intelligently convert "stuff" into OmniFocus tasks

Merlin — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 12:13:29 -0400

[Disclosure: I'm a volunteer contributor on the development of the OmniFocus app]

You could be forgiven for being exhausted by my harangues about the importance of putting actions into their own special place outside of email, web sites, or other action-bearing media ("Email is just a series of tubes," Senator Ted Stevens, might one day say).

In fact, liberating actions from the email in which they arrived and putting them into a system that you trust is arguably the most important tenet of Inbox Zero. But it's also advice that leaves a lot of people scratching their heads: "OK, big shot, so where do I put this new task, and how exactly is it supposed to get there?"

Well, I'm happy to say that recent sneaky peaks of OmniFocus now have a pretty neat way to help with this problem. It's called "Clippings," and if you're familiar with the similar feature in OmniOutliner, you can imagine how it might work in the context of a task-tracking app and the complementary apps whose contents you want to direct to it.

Alongside the recently-added Perspectives, this is a feature that is making me very happy right now.

Once lightly configured, via the OF Preferences, Clippings allow you to select text and images from inside most OS X applications and send it to the OF QuickEntry box, where it gets munged into an inbox task automagically.

My favorite way to use this right now is inside Mail.app and alongside Scott Morrison's wonderful MailTags plugin.

Let's say I get a message from my client, Thorstenson Finlandson, containing some bit of work that he wants me to do.

See how I selected some of the text? Now I select "[Mail] > Services > OmniFocus: Send to Inbox" (n.b.: you can also define a system-wide key command for this in OF Preferences). And, waa-lah, the selection gets sent to my OF QuickEntry box.

Note that the message Subject is the default name of the task, the selection is added as a "Note," and (this is huge) the sender's email address is added as a link, as well as an URL that points me back to the original message (thanks for that one, MailTags!).

Since Thorstenson thoughtfully used an awesome subject line, I'll need only a bit of light editing and the addition of a few task details to turn this into a real thing.

I hit "Save" and I'm good to go. Back in OmniFocus, I'm ready to get to work:

All that note stuff I added is safely shunted away in its currently-hidden field, but I can bring it up any time by selecting the task row and hitting "CMD-[apostrophe]" or by clicking the "Expand Note" icon on the far right.

Happily, this works right out of the box in many other popular OS X apps (I'll go out on a limb and guess that it works in most Cocoa apps that play nice with OS X Services; feel free to correct me). But this already feels like a really healthy, Quicksilver-like habit to me. I love a) that it's super-fast, and b) that I keep that wonderful link back to the item the task came from. Disco.

Could I do things like this inside a Single Heavyweight Application? Yes, probably. But, personally, that's not my gig. I love Mail.app for email, Safari for web browsing, NetNewsWire for feed reading, and so on. I've chosen a series of super-sharp paring knives over one monstrous Swiss Army Knife, because, frankly, that's just how Daddy rolls.

I love how Clippings capitalizes on standard OS X technologies to lightly glue things together for me, regardless of my app preference. Personally, I don't need a massive robot to try and do a bunch of thinking for me; I just need a few very simple tools that shorten my path from cognition to completion.

Anyhow, as you can see, I'm a little giddy about this and wanted to share it with you guys. If you're in on the sneaky peak, be sure to give Clippings a spin (along with the hugely useful Perspectives). If I may say, my OmniGroup friends are doing a swell job on what feels to me like a very solid and non-fiddly app.

Rumor

A little bird tells me that a certain fast-talking new OmniGroup employee with hip glasses and a buzz cut may soon have a new OmniFocus screencast for you. Watch this space later this week for details.

[Again with the disclosure: I'm a volunteer contributor on the development of the OmniFocus app]

”Clippings intelligently convert "stuff" into OmniFocus tasks” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on October 15, 2007. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Merlin & the OmniNerds coming to Tekserve in NYC

Merlin — Thu, 13 Sep 2007 11:07:17 -0400

Very cool announcement to share -- Ken Case, Ethan Schoonover, and I will be doing an after-hours demo of OmniFocus on September 27th at Tekserve in Manhattan:

Not only will you get a sneak peek at the forthcoming OmniFocus software, but Merlin Mann from 43folders.com, a popular site about personal productivity, will be here to lead a discussion on personal organization and life management.

Pete the Tekserve Guy says seats are filling up fast, so be sure to register for free now if you're planning to attend.

This should be really fun -- and we'll all be hanging out after the presentation to talk, hang, and meet you. I'm pumped. It's my first trip to Manhattan since 1989 (and, no, I won't have a tragic mustache and a Meat Puppets shirt this time. Sorry.).

Here's the directions and more info...

[via: OmniMouth]

”Merlin & the OmniNerds coming to Tekserve in NYC” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on September 13, 2007. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

OmniFocus in SF, WWDC

Merlin — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 05:30:01 -0400

The Omni Mouth » OmniFocus demo at the San Francisco Apple Store

My peeps at OmniGroup mentioned this, so I'll slide it in as well. I'll be appearing with my OmniBrethren at the Stockton Street Apple store on Thursday June 21st to demo OmniFocus. Huzzah:

[Merlin will] be talking about productivity tips in general and discussing how OmniFocus fits in his workflow, so it should be more fun and interesting than your basic software demo. You should definitely come by and say howdy.

Be there.

Second, I heartily second Linda's suggestion that you email (omnifocus-wwdc at omnigroup dot com) if you're interested in doing an informal OF meet-up at WWDC.

If you don't come, Ken and I will have to sit there and stare at each other and maybe talk about D&D. Please, don't make us talk about D&D.

Update 2007-06-11 09:32:34 - OmniFocus at WWDC is scheduled. According to a recent Message of the Day in the OmniFocus beta:

We'd like to invite anyone attending WWDC to join Ethan Schoonover, Merlin Mann, and the OmniFocus development team for an informal gathering on Wednesday evening. We'll be meeting from 6:15pm-7:15pm in the ~~"Commonwealth Room"~~ "Olympic Room" on the 2nd floor at the Westin Hotel, one block from Moscone. (Please note the change in venue!)

This should be a lot of fun. If we can wangle A/V equipment. we'll do a demo of the latest version or OF, plus we'll be available to answer any questions about OmniFocus and just generally hang out.

Nota bene: I believe that this is for WWDC pass holders only. So I apologize in advance if there's an iPortcullis in place, and really encourage you to come to the event at the Apple Store next week if you're around.

Update 2007-06-12 23:24:49: Note room change above. We're now in the larger "Olympic Room."

”OmniFocus in SF, WWDC” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on June 06, 2007. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Getting ready for OmniFocus

Merlin — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 10:38:00 -0400

(Disclosure: I am a contributor to the OmniFocus project)

According to OmniGroup, about 2,500 people are now participating in the "sneaky peak" beta of OmniFocus, and new folks will continue to be added as capacity for support allows. But even if you're not yet using the app and are just waiting to get your hands on a finished version, it's not too early to start thinking about making a smooth transition from wherever you are now.

Moving your world of action into a new application is like moving into a new house (and can be almost as stressful). This is your chance to throw away crap, rethink how you've been doing things, and just give yourself a fresh start. So before you ever fire up OmniFocus for that first time, do yourself a favor and get sorted out with your current system first. Believe me, you're much more likely to handle this well before the temptation of having the app in your hands sends you diving into using it full-time.

In short, I recommend you start by conducting a thorough review that's focused on bringing all your tasks and projects up to date and in line with reality.

delete or archive all the crufty tasks and projects that you've finished or that you never really intend to do
carefully review all remaining items to ensure that each is still timely, well-defined, and worthy of your attention
tweak next actions to reflect true physical tasks that you really plan to complete (related to all three of these: Does this “next action” belong someplace else?)
look over all your contexts and consider deleting or combining any items that are more taxonomically satisfying than functionally useful (related: Simplify your contexts)
if you're using an electronic system, including Kinkless, definitely make and retain multiple recent backups just to be safe

But, whether you're moving from Kinkless, paper, or what have you, when you're finished with this preparation, you should have a completely up-to-date and actionable dashboard of your near-term activities.

Remember, it's garbage in, garbage out with this stuff, so be sure you're starting out with as little crap as possible. And, honestly? If you feel your current system has way more trash than treasure, you might (carefully) consider starting over from scratch once OmniFocus arrives. Whatever works for you.

In my opinion, OmniFocus works because it helps enforce several habits that have been shown to help people succeed with making a personal productivity system that works and that sticks. Still, it's not a magic wand. Like any tool, it's only as useful as the hand that wields it.

In my next post on OmniFocus, I'll go over what I consider to be some best practices that come out of my own experience using OmniFocus for a couple months now, including how to avoid fiddling, how to not get wrapped up in taxonomy, and, how to stay focused on action.

”Getting ready for OmniFocus” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on June 04, 2007. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Kinkless.com and "The Kinkless Desktop"

Merlin — Thu, 31 May 2007 08:37:52 -0400

Kinkless | Productive Creativity

My pal, Ethan, is a photographer who's probably best known in the Mac-o-sphere as the author of "Kinkless GTD," the AppleScript for OmniOutliner Pro that caused a sensation last year among Mac productivity nerds and helped lead to the development of the OmniFocus task management app (disclosure: it's a project to which Ethan and I both currently contribute).

Well, if you haven't visited Ethan's Kinkless.com site in a while, you'd do well to pop by for a fresh look, because you're in for a treat.

In addition to doing a re-architecture and redesign that's one of the most eye-catching I've seen on a Drupal site, Ethan has begun writing some very useful tutorials (in addition to the screencasts for which he's becoming well-known).

For example, he's recently completed his "Five Steps to a Kinkless Desktop" series, focusing on how to "clean up, prettify and streamline the usage of your desktop." He starts with "The No-Mercy Cleanup":

So we have an undifferentiated mass of stuff on the desktop. This is the point at which a lot of organization self-help tells you to sort through it file by file. I am not going to tell you this. Why? Because I am lazy and realistic. You are just not going to clean up your desktop right now. Why? It’s overwhelming. So we’ll use a trick I call the “No Mercy Cleanup”

If your Mac and your brain need a dose of strong medicine, don't miss this.

I'm really enjoying seeing Ethan contribute his thoughts on productivity -- I've learned from working with him over the past few months that he's very thoughtful and deliberative about this stuff. Despite being a taxonomical animal, he's always focused on sharing first-person changes that will bring real, non-fiddly benefits to the lives of creative types. Looking forward to seeing where he takes this.

”Kinkless.com and "The Kinkless Desktop"” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on May 31, 2007. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

TUAW's notes from the OmniFocus meetup

Merlin — Tue, 09 Jan 2007 06:11:49 -0500

OmniFocus Sneak Preview - The Unofficial Apple Weblog (TUAW)

Dan Lurie at TUAW has detailed notes on the OmniFocus Meetup yesterday at the Apple Store.

OmniFocus, unlike its predecessor KinklessGTD will feature an instant data propagation across the app, thus doing away with the need for a "sync button," and ensuring your data is always where you expect it to be.

OmniFocus will have a simpler and more streamlined interface than OmniOutliner, on which KGTD was built.

Users will be able to view multiple or individual projects and contexts in either a single window or multiple separate windows.

OmniFocus will support existing KGTD QuickSilver inbox-entry actions.

OmniFocus will also feature a standalone proprietary quick-entry method via keystroke, similar to Yojimbo.

Future versions will support user definable smart folders.

The first version of OmniFocus will not require 10.5 Leopard, but all following versions will due to the use of Leopard only technologies.

Like KGTD, OmniFocus will support syncing with portable devices through iCal.

OmniFocus will be fully applescriptable.

Future versions will support integration with OmniPlan.

Future versions will support universal action creation from other applications (such as turning an email message or iCal to-do into an action).

Future versions will support attaching or tying of files to actions and projects.

OmniGroup is planning to release OmniFocus within the next few months.

It was great to hear Ken lay out OmniGroup's plans and progress on the Kinkless replacement. Thanks much to everyone who showed up yesterday.

”TUAW's notes from the OmniFocus meetup” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on January 09, 2007. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

OmniFocus meetup, Monday @ the Apple Store

Merlin — Thu, 04 Jan 2007 10:04:53 -0500

The Omni Mouth » OmniFocus get-together during Macworld week

Upcoming.org: OmniFocus Meetup at Apple Store (Monday, January 8, 2007)

As most Kinkless nerds already know, OmniGroup is developing a full-on Cocoa implementation of Ethan's script that they've dubbed OmniFocus. Since the OmniGroup folks will be in town for MacWorld, they've kindly offered to host a meetup at the Apple Store on Monday afternoon. For better or worse, your Author will be the emcee.

I don't think there will be any Steve-like reveals, booth bunny antics, or techno-music-fueled demos of the app, but this will be a great chance to hear what OG's been cooking up -- they're most especially interested to hear your questions, comments, and any kind of input. They seem serious about making this app work for current Kinkless fans.

The meetup is in the theater upstairs and runs from 4:30-5:30. There's a good amount of seating available, but you might want to get there on the early side if you want to guarantee yourself a comfy spot.

[Disclosure: I'm an [unpaid] and only marginally useful advisor on OmniFocus]

”OmniFocus meetup, Monday @ the Apple Store” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on January 04, 2007. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"

Ethan on Kinkless and OmniFocus

Merlin — Wed, 27 Sep 2006 08:02:23 -0400

Hold breath. Exhale. Focus. | Kinkless

I don't have much to add to Ethan's (typically entertaining and gracious) post about OmniFocus -- an under-development OmniGroup app that will bring Kinkless' functionality to a stable and powerful Cocoa application. But, first off: Yay! The Kinkless is dead! Long live the Kinkless!

Ethan writes:

OmniGroup has been very supportive of kGTD from the beginning, clearly making code tweaks and additions to support this nutty venture. At some point it became clear that the next logical step would be to consider Cocoafying the whole shebang. Having the chance to take everything I’d been thinking and working on with kGTD and see it turned into something bigger and better and brighter is like making a doodle on a piece of paper, handing it to da Vinci and seeing it turned into a full color oil painting. Even better: it’s like Da Vinci letting you sit around and gab at them while they do this and ask for “a bit more cobalt-blue in the sky” and “a few more peasants in that bit on the left”.

While OF is under development, I won't have much to say publicly about it -- I'm superstitious about buying a crib until the baby gets its first smack on the ass -- but I know the OmniMouth will keep you posted on updates, including when you can expect to see a beta, what the feature set for the first cut is likely to include, and so on.

What I will say is that both Ethan and OmniGroup are wonderful to collaborate with. I'm confident that this will be an app that pulls together the functionality, stability, and polish you associate with OG's terrific apps.

[Non-disclosure disclosure: Not sure it matters, but if you're curious, this is not a paying gig for me. Mostly I just stand around like a fat man at a construction site, drinking coffee and shouting pointless suggestions. Ethan and OmniGroup listen patiently, sometimes complying with my random requests, and that's all the pay I could ever hope for.]

”Ethan on Kinkless and OmniFocus” was written by Merlin Mann for 43Folders.com and was originally posted on September 27, 2006. Except as noted, it's ©2010 Merlin Mann and licensed for reuse under CC BY-NC-ND 3.0. "Why a footer?"