my simple GTD setup

my simple GTD setup

[David O'Toole]

I read through some of the available articles by people who use org
for GTD and decided to try it myself.

Two days ago I put together a very simple setup. 
Screenshot at http://dto.freeshell.org/notebook/images/menu-shot.png
Elisp snippets at bottom of message.

Details: 

 - I use the TODO keywords as a "task status". 
   These are TODO, MAYBE, WAITING, NEXT, DONE.
   "NEXT" is specially fontified so that it stands out.
   I find it convenient to use org-mouse to change keywords.

 - I use tags for contexts. I don't worry about not having a precise
   definition of what a context is; it could be a place, a tool, a
   person, a project, or whatever.

 - I put almost everything in One Big Org File. This is the biggest
   change from my old style. I used to have one org file per project,
   with the "webpage" stuff in the top half, and the TODO items jammed
   all at the end of the file in a huge mess. 

   Now I am using foo.org as the webpage and notes file, whereas the
   workflow structure and scheduling for "foo" go into the foo section
   of my main file "dto.org". I think this separation will help each
   file be cleaner, and bring together all my workflows into one
   hierarchically organized clickable buffer. 

 - I am having trouble with searching for all the "NEXT" keyword
   items, which is all I really need to complete my setup. I can see
   the list of NEXT actions, but not what project they come from or
   what tags they have. So it can be tricky to understand what the
   task means out of context. Should I use a tag to represent each
   project, or properties, or what?

There is so much other stuff like tables, properties, etc that I'm not
sure what to do with yet, but I'm sure I'll find something :-)

> (setq org-hide-leading-stars t)

> (setq org-todo-keywords '((sequence "TODO" "MAYBE" "WAITING" "NEXT" "DONE")))

> (setq org-tag-alist '(("STUDIO" . ?s)
> 		      ("COMPUTER" . ?c)
> 		      ("MAIL" . ?m)
> 		      ("HOME" . ?h)
> 		      ("PROJECT" . ?p)
> 		      ("READING" . ?r)
> 		      ("DVD" . ?r)))

> (setf org-special-ctrl-a/e t)

> (setf org-todo-keyword-faces '(("NEXT" . (:foreground "yellow" :background "red" :bold t :weight bold))))


-- 
David O'Toole 
dto@gnu.org
http://dto.freeshell.org/notebook/

Re: my simple GTD setup

[Dan Griswold]

David O'Toole <dto@gnu.org> writes:

> Screenshot at http://dto.freeshell.org/notebook/images/menu-shot.png

I get a 404 error.

Dan


-- 
--------------
Dan Griswold
Rochester, NY
--------------

Re: my simple GTD setup

[David O'Toole]

"Dmitri Minaev" <minaev@gmail.com> writes:

> Hello,
>
> The requested URL /notebook/images/menu-shot.png was not found on this server.

Oops! The correct URL is http://dto.freeshell.org/images/menu-shot.png

> Thanks for the ideas! Could you also share a sample fragment of an
> .org file, please?

   
* Emacs						:COMPUTER:
** eon						:PROJECT:
*** NEXT Implement modules
*** TODO Serialization
*** TODO Code suspend>> macro
*** TODO Code run>> macro
*** TODO Simple object browser
*** TODO RELEASE 1.1				:MILESTONE:
*** TODO Common Lisp compatibility 
*** TODO Interactive minibuffer message sender
*** TODO Object mouse menus
*** TODO Eon menubar
*** TODO Write brief developer's guide
*** TODO Add edebug declarations for the macros
** pixel art 					:PROJECT:
*** TODO Menu support
*** TODO Save and load

** rlx						:PROJECT:
** Void Mission
** cl-guide					:PROJECT:
** peano					:PROJECT:
** Configuration
*** TODO Tweak menu-bar colors
*** TODO Set up keyboard commands for menubar
** TODO Implement GTD system
*** TODO [#C] Set up versor keys
*** TODO Configure org-stuck-projects 
*** NEXT Fix tag search
*** TODO Move tasks from other pages
*** TODO fix color theme

* Books
** TODO Read "Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus"
*** NEXT Chapter 5
*** TODO Chapter 6
*** TODO Chapter 7
*** TODO Review entire book
* Music						:STUDIO:

** TODO Back up the Pod				:STUDIO:
** TODO Try out Common Music

** TODO Omnipotent Space Band 1.0 		:PROJECT:
*** NEXT Obtain ZoomH4
*** TODO Conduct field recording session	:FIELD:
*** TODO Reorganize file:osb1.org
   DEADLINE: <2007-10-22 Mon>
*** TODO Prepare statement of work for Dominic
* Fun

** TODO Play crawl


-- 
David O'Toole 
dto@gnu.org
http://dto.freeshell.org/notebook/

Re: my simple GTD setup

[Bastien]

David O'Toole <dto@gnu.org> writes:

>  - I am having trouble with searching for all the "NEXT" keyword
>    items, which is all I really need to complete my setup. I can see
>    the list of NEXT actions, but not what project they come from or
>    what tags they have. 

Do you use a custom agenda view for this?  

with `org-agenda-remove-tags' set to nil, and with the project being the
category in which the headline is, you should have all the desired info.

Global list of TODO items of type: NEXT
Available with `N r': (0)ALL (1)TODO (2)NEXT (3)DONE
  compas:     NEXT [#A] Mettre en place ...
  compas:     NEXT [#A] Ecrire Nicolas ....   :Write:
  compas:     NEXT [#A] Mettre en forme ...   :Write:

You can also refine this display by adding a new entry to
`org-agenda-custom-commands':

(setq org-agenda-custom-commands
       (("N" todo "NEXT"
         ((org-agenda-sorting-strategy '(priority-down))
          (org-agenda-prefix-format "  %-12c: ")))))

See `org-agenda-prefix-format' docstring for details.

-- 
Bastien

Re: my simple GTD setup

[Bernt Hansen]

Bastien <bzg@altern.org> writes:

> David O'Toole <dto@gnu.org> writes:
>
>>  - I am having trouble with searching for all the "NEXT" keyword
>>    items, which is all I really need to complete my setup. I can see
>>    the list of NEXT actions, but not what project they come from or
>>    what tags they have. 

You can try a TAGS search like the following

Headlines with TAGS match: /NEXT|PROJECT

That seems to work well for me.  I recently (2 days ago?) switched back
to trying to use GTD and I mark projects with the PROJECT TODO keyword
and the result shows all PROJECT and NEXT matches for me with tags.

HTH,

Bernt