Olen writes:

> Level 2 is very useful - and cannot, unlike Level 1, be reached by S-TAB.

Actually, it can. S-TAB takes a numeric prefix key. The doc string says:

"When ARG is a numeric prefix, show contents of this level."

So, you can directly open or close the outline to _any_ desired level "N" with C-N S-TAB. I find that feature to be incredibly handy. It encourages me to nest my outlines as deeply as I wish.

Here's a little navigation utility I wrote to take advantage of S-TAB's ability. Sometimes I'll want to collapse the outline to the level at point in order, say, to clean things up by closing all lower levels. However, it's not always obvious to me what level I'm on. And without knowing what level I'm on, I can't hit the right numeric prefix for S-TAB. The following utility does it all automagically by passing the result of org-outline-level() to S-TAB. C-S-TAB is a logical binding for this function.

(defun open-org-outline-to-current-level ()
  "Opens or closes the Orgmode outline to the level at point."
   (interactive)
   (org-shifttab (org-outline-level))
   (message "The current outline level is %s." (org-outline-level)))

Regards,

Tom Davey

On Thu, Aug 8, 2013 at 9:02 AM, Oleh <ohwoeowho@gmail.com> wrote:

On Thu, Aug 8, 2013 at 9:01 AM, Carsten Dominik
<carsten.dominik@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> On 23.7.2013, at 15:48, Oleh <ohwoeowho@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Hi all,
>>
>> I've recently started using `org-use-speed-commands', and I like it a lot,
>> except I had to make one tweak:
>>
>>    (setq org-use-speed-commands t)
>>    (setq org-speed-commands-user
>>          '(("1" . (org-shifttab 1))
>>            ("2" . (org-shifttab 2))
>>            ("3" . (org-shifttab 3))))
>>
>> The corresponding values of `org-speed-commands-default' aren't that useful
>> for GTD:
>>
>>    ("1" org-priority 65)
>>    ("2" org-priority 66)
>>    ("3" org-priority 67)
>
> That depends on wether you work with priorities.  I find S-TAB easy enough, so I do not
> really see the need for speed commands here.

Maybe I should elaborate my point of view on the usability.
Priorities don't normally need "buttons" to jump between states,
a "knob" is enough: only increase/decrease priority, not jump to priority 1,
jump to priority 2 etc.

Outlines, on the other hand, can benefit from the ability to jump between
the levels of expansion.

Level 1 is very useful - it minimizes everything, showing the
structure of the file. S-TAB is useful and simple, but you have to
repeat several times,
checking each time if it has brought you to the level that you wanted to be on.

Level 2 is very useful - and cannot, unlike Level 1, be reached by S-TAB.
For my gtd.org, it shows the tasks and appointments, without expanding
them, as well as the project names, but not what they contain.
This gives a nice overview of my projects.

Level 3 is very useful - and cannot be reached by S-TAB.
It shows me the separate TODOs for my projects, without revealing my
notes on them, just the headings.
I even bound the rest of the digits to levels and it is useful sometimes.

In my opinion, these shortcuts make org-mode a better outlining tool,
and should be given priority before the priority shortcuts.

Slightly off-topic, these type of shortcuts is why I use Ubuntu Unity (I think
I managed to turn off the spying). It's got a feature that Super+1-9
switches between applications in the sidebar slots 1-9. Sure, it's
possible to do with Alt-TAB, and that's what most other desktops do,
but Super+1-9 is superior, since you don't have to wait for feedback,
you instantly get what you want.

regards,
Oleh

--
--
Tom Davey
tom@tomdavey.com
New York NY USA