Re: Saving column views in agenda

From: mdl@imapmail.org
To: Carsten Dominik <dominik@science.uva.nl>
Cc: emacs-orgmode@gnu.org
Subject: Re: Saving column views in agenda
Date: Mon, 08 Dec 2008 09:51:22 -0600	[thread overview]
Message-ID: <87k5aau0lh.fsf@fastmail.fm> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <06D0017E-5568-42C0-9AA2-4777F558D23E@uva.nl> (Carsten Dominik's message of "Mon\, 8 Dec 2008 10\:40\:04 +0100")

Hi Carsten,

Carsten Dominik <dominik@science.uva.nl> writes:

> Hi Matthew,
>
> this is currently not possible.
>
> You could try to use the mapping API to do something yourself.
>
> What is your use-case?
>
> - Carsten

Thanks for the quick response. I use the agenda to filter column views
via property searches. Let's say I'm keeping track of my spending with
the following outline:

#+COLUMNS: %20ITEM %10TIMESTAMP %20spendtype %10amount{$}

* December Spending
** Week One
*** Grocery Store [2008-12-01 Mon]
    :PROPERTIES:
    :amount: 56.77
    :spendtype: food:
    :END:
*** Athletic club [2008-12-02 Tue]
    :PROPERTIES:
    :amount: 75.00
    :spendtype: health
    :END:
** Week Two 
*** Restaurant [2008-12-08 Mon]
    :PROPERTIES:
    :amount: 30.67
    :spendtype: food
    :END:

With such an outline (obviously much longer and more complex in
reality), I use columns and dynamic blocks to give me a quick overview
(with sums) of spending by week. I also use the agenda to filter these
views by spendtype, so that I can see, for instance, the sum of how
much I spent on food each week/month/year. Currently, I can use column
view in the agenda to generate sums, but I cannot export the column
view for permanent reference or for sharing with others.

I suppose this functionality could be achieved in a few other ways as
well:

1) A dynamic block that captures a column view, but with a parameter
that filters for TAG, property, etc.  

2) A column view combined with a sparse tree that sums the amounts of
only the visible items. Currently, when "summary-type" is specified,
the column view adds all items in the outline hierarchy, regardless of
their visibility. (Of course, if this method were possible, one would
still have to devise a way to export the filtered column view.)

3) A filter for tables that one could apply to the exported column
view. (E.g., show only rows in which "Column 3 = x" and calculate only
the visible items.) 

There is, of course, the likelihood that #1, #2, or #3 already exist
and that I have simply missed something in the manual. Please do let
me know if this is the case. I also realize that I could simply
create subheadings for each spending type (e.g., *** Food) that would
create the desired effect in the column view. But as data becomes more
complex, it would be nice to generate these filtered views
dynamically.

To sum up a long reply: I am curious whether it is possible to create
exportable, dynamically filtered data in column views, in which the
sum created in a "summary-type" column is recalculated when items are
filtered. (I suppose this would count as part of org-mode's
"spreadsheet" functionality.)

Thanks, as always, for such a wonderful program. 

Matt

>
> On Dec 8, 2008, at 6:52 AM, Matthew Lundin wrote:
>
>>
>> I often use dynamic blocks to save/export column views in org-mode
>> files. Does anyone know of a similar way to export/save a column view
>> from the agenda? When I write the agenda to a file, it naturally
>> writes only the text (not the column overlay).
>>
>> Regards,
>> Matt
>>
>>
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