Handling many projects/lists
I have about fifty projects, grouped by different areas. Your system looks great, except for the fact that if I add all my projects I'm going to have this huuuuuuuge greeeaaaaaat bigggggg loooooong list of projects down the left-hand side. Am I missing something? Is this what the "Areas of Responsibility" feature will improve? Will it be easy to migrate?
Also, where do I put lists - travel list, shopping list, checklists etc. Add as a project?
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2 Posted by ollie on 14 Dec, 2009 11:46 AM
Here's a screenshot of the items I've added so far. There are many more to come. It's already looking pretty unusable, particularly the inability to focus on specific areas, but also the fact the Trash folder is only accessible with scrolling, and the fact that "lists" are in with projects, which doesn't seem a natural place.
I suspect the solution is grouping of projects, e.g. Work, Personal, Health, Car
3 Posted by ollie on 15 Dec, 2009 02:23 PM
Is anyone from Nirvana out there? I'm keen to adopt the app and move everything across, but want some confidence before I do that that a solution is coming, as at the moment the UI is pretty bad for large numbers of projects
Support Staff 4 Posted by Christiane Magee on 15 Dec, 2009 05:13 PM
Hi Ollie...
We're here! Thanks for poking me offline and for your patience waiting for an answer from us.
Your list IS HUGE.
Areas of Responsibility will definitely help condense this list. Once integrated you will most likely be able to simply open up the project and associate an area of responsibility. When you are in AREA OF RESPONSIBILITY: PERSONAL view you will only see those projects and tasks. So I think the migration will not be troublesome for you.
In the meantime, however, I think using tags will really help you. For example... I have a Project folder called PERSONAL. In there I have tasks tagged with
household,finances, and evenerrands. Tagging tasks this way avoids having Projects for each of these things (i.e. PERSONAL-Household, PERSONAL-Finances, PERSONAL-Errands). You can then go into your PERSONAL folder, click on tagfinancesanddueif you need to quickly review all money related tasks coming up. Again, I use this method for my credit card payments; I create a task the second my MasterCard bill comes in and tag itfinancesand set a due date, and tell the task to show up in TODAY 7 days in advance.If you need to see what errands you need to run, you can click on
errandsand see the whole list. Once we get compound tag filtering launched, you could filter the list even more if you were to tag a taskerrand+groceryif you are only going out to do groceries and not, for example, going to the hardware store (errand+hardware).I think this will greatly reduce the number of projects showing up in your lefthand navi. Does this help? Please let me know.
~Christiane
Christiane Magee closed this discussion on 15 Dec, 2009 05:13 PM.
ollie re-opened this discussion on 15 Dec, 2009 06:06 PM
5 Posted by ollie on 15 Dec, 2009 06:06 PM
That list is only a portion of my current projects. When we add in all personal projects with home, trips, relationships, health, on top of all the work stuff I expect most working people have 50-100 projects running. I work in property (real estate) and so many projects continue for many months with many running at once. For GTD, I think my list is pretty short!
Tagging is helping a little, but not so convenient as I need to go into the projects section before I can filter down to a managable list. I suspect Areas of Responsibility will help a LOT where there are many projects.
Btw, I've used so many task-management tools it's a joke, including nozbe.com, vitalist, todoist, Outlook, Tracks, RTM and many, many others. NONE have come close to implementing GTD, so I hope you guys can succeed where others fail. Nozbe's data structures are about right but the UI is a disaster.
I wouldn't create projects for PERSONAL-Household, PERSONAL-Finances, PERSONAL-Errands, but instead for "Paint bedroom" or "Increase income by x" or whatever. I think a GTD project is a stand-alone series of activities with a clearly stated outcome.
Re lists, I still don't see anywhere to do this. e.g. David Allen suggests some may find it useful to create "When in London" or "When in New York" lists to store ideas and notes on things to do, like favourite restaurants. Where would I put this in Nirvana? They are not projects.
Support Staff 6 Posted by Christiane Magee on 16 Dec, 2009 07:35 PM
Hi Ollie... thanks for clarifying.
Our goal is to try to make Nirvana as GTD as possible - so your feedback is great and your points very valid. Now that we have more users in the system and more power GTD users like yourself pushing Nirvana to the max, we are seeing where improvements need to be made. I think again that Areas of Responsibility and the improved tag filtering will really help you out... so stay tuned as we roll out these features.
RE: lists. we don't have this feature in Nirvana yet, not on the roadmap (just yet). You pointed out in another post that we have some features to implement first, so we'll be focusing on those first and foremost.
That said, I've added a +1 to "Lists Please!" camp.
:)
thanks again
~Christiane
7 Posted by Terminado on 30 Mar, 2010 06:46 AM
+1 for lists!
8 Posted by Proximo on 30 Mar, 2010 05:47 PM
You can create list inside a task right now, but list support is coming.
Just type:
- First item
- Second Item
- Third Item
Now look at your task in Notes view and you will see the check boxes there. They can be picked as you would expect.
Just an FYI
9 Posted by Proximo on 30 Mar, 2010 05:49 PM
Areas of Responsibility will be a huge improvement, but I also wanted to share another idea.
I condense my Active Projects list on the left Navi a lot. Once I do a review and figure out what I will be working on. I don't get in and out of the project from the Active Project list.
I use the Project link on each task to dive in when I need too. Not a solution here, just a tip.
10 Posted by JamesT on 02 Apr, 2010 02:57 AM
As I mentioned in another thread, I too have a huge number of projects, so having areas of focus will be a huge help.
It's important to remember that David says anything with more than 1 action is a project! So a TRUE GTD app, like I understand Nirvana would like to be will need to support an easy way to navigate large lists of projects.
One area that will help is becoming very diligent in my weekly review. If I don't think I'm going to work on a particular project over the next week I'll make sure to list it as inactive. This will help reduce my list some. However, it' only a partial fix as often I really do need to keep pushing a large number of projects along each week.
thx!
James
11 Posted by Proximo on 02 Apr, 2010 01:17 PM
Good points James.
I mark a project inactive for the same reason. It's actionable and must be done, but it will take a back seat to the higher priority projects. If a project goes from "actionable" to "Not sure if this is going to happen", then I move it to Someday list.
I am excited about Areas of Focus and believe this to be a huge benefit for managing GTD for personal and professional needs. In fact, Areas of Focus will allow you as much flexibility as needed.
Improvements in managing projects is always important but I am sure with our feedback and tweaking, this can be accomplished.
12 Posted by Terminado on 02 Apr, 2010 05:18 PM
Prox, I'm not seeing this working. It just shows up with asterisks, not check boxes. I read on the blog that inline lists were now available but I can't see how to create them.
-- "You can create list inside a task right now, but list support is coming.
Just type:
First item
Second Item
Third Item
Now look at your task in Notes view and you will see the check boxes there. They can be picked as you would expect."
13 Posted by Proximo on 02 Apr, 2010 05:35 PM
Terminado,
Sorry about that.
You must type a dash space and then the word
- One
- Two
14 Posted by David M. Ward on 02 Apr, 2010 05:41 PM
It works! Thank you!
15 Posted by c.barber80 on 16 Apr, 2010 07:40 AM
Proximo: thanks for the checklist tip, didn't know that! For something like 'read xxx' would you make it a project and turn chapters into subtasks, or make it a task with chapters as checkboxes?
Also, regarding earlier topics: my understanding is that projects have a specific outcome, whereas things like finance would be an area of responsibility.
And lastly, +1 for lists :P
16 Posted by Proximo on 19 Apr, 2010 07:30 PM
@c.barber80
I am about simplicity. I read at least two books every month and have a monthly Mastermind group with some business associates.
I keep the two books I am reading in my Business Bag and simply make a habit of reading as often as I can. The mornings are great for me or anytime I find myself sitting still.
I do not make it a task because it's a daily habit that I do not need to be reminded about. I do have a weekly chapter goal to reach, but I simply use the small sticky tabs to mark where I need to be by the end of the week to meet that goal.
Again, I use GTD for everything in my life, but I keep things simple as well.
I don't have to make a task for Grocery shopping for example, because it's a weekly habit and my stomach can usually remind me that I have no food in the house. I do use an iPhone app that let's me build a grocery list as I realize things that ran out, but I don't have it as a task in my GTD System.
As for Areas of Responsibility, I think you hit the nail on the head.
17 Posted by Terminado on 19 Apr, 2010 07:58 PM
+1 for simplicity!
(welcome back, Proximo)
18 Posted by Proximo on 19 Apr, 2010 09:05 PM
@Terminado,
Thanks bud. Went on a Road Trip to Kansas City, KS. I only had access to my iPhone so I could not reply to any of the incoming discussions.
I am back and ready to take on the world.
19 Posted by sunni.freyer on 19 Apr, 2010 11:31 PM
Hi -- I tried the dash tip but discovered that it's a hyphen that is used, not a dash. A dash, which separates, is created on the keyboard with two -- A hyphen is created with one -
Hope that helps someone else who gets confused.
20 Posted by c.barber80 on 20 Apr, 2010 10:21 PM
@Proximo Interesting, and a great point. Thanks again
21 Posted by pnooren on 12 May, 2010 09:15 AM
Tagging a project with 'list' and following Proximo's guidelines should ease the people in the "lists now!" camp ;)
22 Posted by Terminado on 13 May, 2010 04:10 AM
I'm one who would like a list feature. I want to be able to quickly access information I need that is related to my tasks but not itself actionable. For example, conference call numbers I need to have close at hand, or web site, lists of people on certain teams, domain names I own or would like to, checklists for repetitive tasks, and on and on.
I could store those in a reference folder, and do, but there are not as easy to access.
A "list" tag would do it but where do those lists then reside? Again, they are not actionable, so they would not go in any of the usual places. Putting them in their own project is possible, but that project, then, is "in the way". I could bury them in an inactive project, but inactive projects aren't displayed on the Navi.
I'd like a link that says "lists" that allows a pop up (or ?) so that I'm never more than two clicks away from the information in my lists.
23 Posted by Proximo on 13 May, 2010 06:41 PM
@Terminado
Adding a List function to Nirvana would only make it better. There are times where you want to create simple and quick list. Not task, Not Projects, Not a list in a note of a task but a simple List.
+1
David McLaughlin closed this discussion on 28 Jan, 2011 12:24 AM.