Using the Next, Waiting, and Someday folders destroys a task's start time | Help Center | Doit.im

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Using the Next, Waiting, and Someday folders destroys a task's start time

PRO

morsedl 08/10/2014 22:31

Platform:All

Hi!

I wrote this with the Next folder in mind, but my comments apply to not only the Next folder, but also the Waiting and Someday folders.

I very much like the Next folder, as I can put tasks there to temporarily get them out of the Today folder so that my Today folder can help me focus my attention on just my most pressing 7 +/- 2 tasks (the Doit.Now feature helps with this as well).

However, if I move a task to the Next folder, it's start time becomes "Next". Then, when I move it back to the Today folder, its start time changes to today (and if I move it to the Schedule folder from the Next folder, Doit.im asks for the date, rather than remember what the assigned start date was before the task was moved into the Next folder).

This effectively means that using the Next folder = information destruction (i.e., a "Bad Thing"). So, I stopped using it long ago for this reason, as I need to know when I entered a task into Doit.im (and I need that date to NOT change, EVER).

In a highly-exploratory, constantly-changing task environment such as mine where new incoming tasks are constantly arriving and many are not acted on because more action paths are proposed than are ever acted upon, knowing the "age" or "staleness" of a task is critical information in assessing if the task is to be kept, completed, or deleted. But using the Next folder destroys this information, which I consider to be be a bug.

So, I'd be most grateful if someone could look into this and see if there's a way tasks placed into the Next and Waiting and Someday folders can "remember" their original start date when the same task is later moved again out of the one of those folders and into some other folder (e.g., to the Today or Scheduled or Waiting folder). In other words, this "remembering" of the original task start date should persist, and ONLY change when the user explicitly changes the start date (even if it is not visible in these "dateless" folders like Next, Waiting, and Someday).

Principle: Don't destroy user's information unless the user explicitly requests it or unless the user has been clearly warned beforehand that a given action might result in information loss.

Thanks!
Doug

wendy_only post on 08/11/2014 02:54#1

PRO

@morsedl
Hi,

Thank you for your feedback.

When you move the task to Next,the start time of the task will be changed to Next. We will not change the start time of the task from Today to Next automatically. When you move the task,we think that you want to change it. All tasks are processed by yourself.

Now we do not offer the feature to record the history of the task options. If you want to remember the time or other information, you'd better add a comment to the task.

Shall you need any help or have additional questions, please do not hesitate to contact me back.

Thank you for your support!

Best regards,
Doit.im Team
morsedl post on 08/11/2014 22:50#2

PRO

Hi Wendy!

OK, thanks. If you can, please add this as a feature request then. IMO, moving tasks to different folders shouldn't change their underlying start date and time, even if they go into folders that "mask" that start date and time (i.e., Next, Someday, and Waiting). Manually having to add information to the comments and then re-enter start times should that task move out of one of these three folders is certainly a workaround, but not a very usable one: It means I have to only manually spend time doing so, it also means I have to remember WHICH tasks need this done and which do not.

Thus, without a feature enhancement such that tasks remember their creation date/time and their start date/time (even when masked) and such that they restore this start date/time when they move out of a "dateless" folder (i.e., Next, Someday, and Waiting) into another folder that does (i.e., all the others), the Next, Someday, and Waiting folders are beyond useless to me, in that they actually cause information loss. So, I cannot and will not use these until this design flaw is corrected in the Doit.im system.

Thanks!
Doug
Folke post on 08/12/2014 08:27#3

PRO

@wendy_only

I agree completely with @morsedl

I think the start time (creation date etc) is an essential and objective piece of information. It provides me with some of the information I need to decide whether it is time for me to do something about this task, to make it happen.

One solution, which I have suggested before, is that you keep this date in the "scheduled date" field for all tasks except scheduled tasks, i.e the scheduled date is always a start date - either a historic or a future one. As @morsedl points out, this start date should not be affected by me moving the task in and out of Today. Moving it to Today is just to keep it handy, not to change anything about it. (This is also a discussion we have had many times.)

Besides, the "box" (Next, Waiting, Someday) should not be regarded as a "start time". The difference between Next and Waiting has nothing to do with time. It is a matter only of whether it is I personally or someone else who will do the task, but there is no difference in urgency or importance. The person responsible (me or someone else) could well decide to get it done even today. The same goes for Someday/Maybe. The key difference is that Someday tasks are "maybe" (not committed yet), but as far as timing is concerned even Next and Waiting are "some day" in the sense that no "appointment" (day or date/time) has been made for its execution.