GTD and GTD+ functionality
I am very new to Nirvana, but I like what I see. I can understand that a lot of thought has been going into the design to make it appear so simple - so clean and so fast and so useful.
Although I am a bit of a free thinker as far as GTD is concerned, I agree with those who maintain that the initial impression of Nirvana should be kept very pure, such that anybody who has read the GTD book (or other GTD material) can get started immediately without any elements of confusion. It is vital to have a common core understanding of what it is all about. Yet at the same time, I think it would be a pity not to take advantage of the fact that Nirvana actually does run on a computer (not in manila folders) and can be made customizeable in many ways. As an example, I think Nirvana has handled the "Later" list in an excellent way. "Later" is not GTD, so it is initially hidden, but it could be useful to many, so it has been made "enableable" under Account Settings. I think a great many creative and useful features could be handled in this way. Here are a few suggestions:
1) An "All States" view (last in the States section, just below Someday)
Instead of having to click into each "State bucket" (Next, Someday etc) separately it sometimes would be very handy to be able to see it all in one long list and just scroll up and down. Especially in conjunction with a selected Area of Focus this would be a powerful way of viewing your entire "pipeline" of tasks for that Area. It would also be useful for discovering things that have been overlooked.
There could be an option, analogous to the other State lists, to view the All States list either "unified" or "sorted by state" or "sorted by project".
2) A "Standalone" "project" (first or last in the Projects section)
It would be handy to be able to gather and isolate all the odd bits and pieces - the standalone actions - and be able to know that this is all there is; nothing has been overlooked . The simplest way to implement this probably would be to have "Standalone" appear as one of the Projects.
This list could be "sorted by state" by default, just like regular projects.
2 Posted by Elurven on 16 Oct, 2011 05:56 PM
I have to say that I like the idea of a "standalone" project. That would make it easy to review it just like any other project, not just in the Next list as standalone actions. For a weekly review at least, it makes a lot of sense to me.
3 Posted by Proximo on 17 Oct, 2011 12:33 AM
I like all your ideas. Except that the Later list is useful.... lol. Just kidding.
I honestly think that your ideas would be great options. I can see myself using some of them.
Any ideas on a Weekly Review mode? Something that would make weekly reviews easier without having to jump from list to list or Area to Area. hmmmmm
4 Posted by Folke on 17 Oct, 2011 07:42 AM
Elurven & Proximo: I am glad you like the idea.
Proximo, regarding weekly reviews:
I also like to review things:) Often I do it briefly and superficially, and sometimes much more carefully and with a longer time horizon. For this reason I like to be able to have different views with varying "depth" (on the State scale, i.e. the Focus-to-Someday scale) and varying "width" (in terms of number of Areas of Focus), in different combinations.
So another couple of suggestions, in addition to 1 and 2 above, would be:
3) Grouping of Areas
I currently have four work related Areas and three private Areas (and I think I need to have this many, not just "work" and "private", because when I do deeper reviews I want to see the whole pipeline in each Area, and then "work" is too wide and I get swamped). But it would be very useful in the slighly more frequent reviews, such as the weekly ones, to be able to look at, say, all my work related areas at the same time (but then be able to limit the depth of the list instead).
4) An "All States except .... " list (except Someday, except Scheduled, except both)
The Someday state has a lot of things in it (at least in my case; much more than all the other states combined). The All States list (suggestion 1 in my first post above) would be very useful particularly for the deepest, and least frequent, reviews of each of my seven Areas individually. But for semi-frequent reviews, such as weekly ones or even more frequent ones, I would prefer to trade off a bit of depth (skip the Someday category, and the Scheduled category) for a bit more "width" (more Areas at the same time)
Similarly, the Scheduled tasks are something that tends to clutter my overview and take up unnecessary list space, especially in the deeper, longer-term reviews. I kind of know the scheduled tasks more or less by heart, and the amount of time and energy they take - they are just a kind of scheduled "reminders", really, whose main purpose it is to just pop up at the right time, but I do not need to see them for longer-term planning. It would be neat if they could also be excluded.
If I had all the above features 1-4 available, I think I would use it roughly as follows:
a) Focus / All Areas (many times a day, my default), alternating with
b) Focus / Group of Areas (especially on days with a long list of small tasks)
c) All States except Someday and Scheduled / Group of Areas mainly (several times a week)
d) Individual projects and the Standalone project (at least once a week or as needed)
e) All States except Scheduled / Individual Areas (a few times month)
5 Posted by Folke on 19 Oct, 2011 07:04 AM
I just discovered (I am still in the discovery and evaulation phase here :) that suggestion 2 above is already implemented in an indirect way:
If in the Tag Cloud you select Show All you get exactly what I suggested - a list of All States, and this seems to work well even in conjunction with the selection of an Area (which acts as an global pre-filter, just like it should).
Is this intentional and something I can depend on still being there even in the more immediate and foreseeable future releases?
(I still would prefer it to be implemented "properly", for the benefit and convenience of all users, as an "enableable" useful feature in Settings, just like Later, and then have it appear right below Someday, but still ....)
Support Staff 6 Posted by David McLaughlin on 20 Oct, 2011 04:04 PM
@Folke - yes it's intentional (Tag Cloud)
Most of the items mentioned here are on the suggestion list in one form or another
One I'm particularly waiting for is to have a more granular AND-OR-NOT criteria select and filter method, ad hoc as well as smarlist.
Thanks for you time and suggestions.
David
7 Posted by Proximo on 21 Oct, 2011 07:13 PM
@Folke,
Again, great ideas and I can relate with having different roles in any one area. I currently separate these with tags but your suggestion would be a great way to handle it.
8 Posted by Folke on 17 Nov, 2011 09:00 AM
@Proximo: Yes, tags work fine, too, for roles - but it would seem to be more "by-the-book" to use the Area field, if the implementation/functionality is well made.
@David:
Glad to hear that most of these things are on the list, and even some improved filtering and smart lists. May I just double-check:
Is the "Standalone project" also "on the list", in other words having, under Projects, a group called "Standalone tasks" (or "Single tasks or something like that)? This is a very important thing, I believe. It makes me feel a bit "blinded" not to be able to look at those.
Support Staff 9 Posted by David McLaughlin on 17 Nov, 2011 06:17 PM
The "Standalone project" is on the list of suggestions to review; no decision as to whether it will be implemented, or in what form, has been made.
dbm