Re: logging the timings of task A + task B both at once?

[Christoph LANGE <math.semantic.web@gmail.com>]

Nicolas Goaziou on 2016-04-06 10:54:
> Sharon Kimble <boudiccas@skimble.plus.com> writes:
>> Being that we can have multiple cursors, is it possible to have 2
>> separate, distinct, tasks being clocked both at the same time?
> [...]
>
> There can only be one active clock at any given time. Although
> I understand the need for some special features, I don't think it is
> worth re-implementing "org-clock.el" to allow multiple ones.
>
> You may probably redefine "Task A" and "Task B" so they do not overlap
> and require being clocked at the same time.

I have a similar use case, which is related to booking working hours on
multiple projects and/or multiple employers.  I have many tasks which
cannot clearly be associated to a single project or employer, such as
"installing security updates on my computer".  Here, it would be
convenient to be able to define, by a special property, that, say, .7 of
the time logged on one task should be attributed to one
project/employer, and .3 to the other one.

Such that a query for

#+BEGIN: clocktable :tags "EmployerA"

over

* Security updates :EmployerA:EmployerB:
  :PROPERTIES:
  :LOGFACTOR-EmployerA: .7
  :LOGFACTOR-EmployerB: .3
  :END:
  :LOGBOOK:
  CLOCK: [2016-04-24 Sun 11:09]--[2016-04-24 Sun 12:09] =>  1:00
  :END:

would result in a value of "0:42".

I am currently using two workarounds for this:

1. Explicitly defining two separate tasks.  Having logged some time on
one of the tasks, I manually split the CLOCK: intervals and move the
"other" part of the split to the other task.  Thanks to my function
org-clock-split-current-interval
(https://github.com/clange/emacs/blob/master/.emacs.d/init/org.el#L68)
the latter is not as painful as one might think.

2. Not tagging tasks with :EmployerA: or :EmployerB: but with a common
super-tag, e.g. :Work:.  Then, in the spreadsheets I'm generating from
my clock tables (see
https://github.com/clange/org-mode/blob/master/clocktable-spreadsheet/working-hours.org
for the general approach; those spreadsheets that generate
project-/employer-specific timesheets I have not yet made public), I do
something like "determine all time logged on :Work: but neither on
:EmployerA: nor on :EmployerB:.  Add .7 of that time to the time that's
explicitly logged on :EmployerA:, and .3 of that time to the time that's
explicitly logged on :EmployerB:."

Cheers,

Christoph

-- 
Dr. Christoph Lange, Enterprise Information Systems Department
Applied Computer Science @ University of Bonn; Fraunhofer IAIS
http://langec.wordpress.com/about, Skype duke4701

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