Handling Single-Day Cancellation in Recurring Tasks Without Breaking the Sequence

[nprime496]

Hello,

I'm seeking assistance with managing recurring tasks in a way that allows for single-day cancellations without disrupting the overall recurrence pattern. Currently, when I cancel a task on a specific day, it halts the entire recurrence sequence from that point onwards.

Situation: There are days when I'm unable to complete a scheduled task and need to skip it. However, I want the task to resume its normal recurrence from the next scheduled date. Essentially, I'm looking to cancel only the current instance of the task, not the entire recurring schedule.

Issue: I've spent considerable time trying to find a solution for this seemingly straightforward problem. If my question is a duplicate, kindly direct me to the existing solution. Otherwise, any guidance on how to "skip" a single occurrence of a recurring task without affecting the rest of the schedule would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you for your help!

[claremacrae]

Hi,

Situation: There are days when I'm unable to complete a scheduled task and need to skip it. However, I want the task to resume its normal recurrence from the next scheduled date. Essentially, I'm looking to cancel only the current instance of the task, not the entire recurring schedule.

Yes, that's not how recurring tasks work. You definitely should not cancel the newest occurrence of a recurring task, unless you are finished with the series.

Issue: I've spent considerable time trying to find a solution for this seemingly straightforward problem.

Summary: I do think that when done is the solution to the problem... It's what it was added for. See below...

Otherwise, any guidance on how to "skip" a single occurrence of a recurring task without affecting the rest of the schedule would be greatly appreciated.

The techniques in Tasks for you to know about, for your situation, are:

1. Add when done to the end of the recurrence rule. With that, if you don't do the task when it was needed, when it is overdue and you do finally complete it, the next task date will be tomorrow (for daily tasks).

   See Repeating a Task Based on the Original Due Date or the Completion Date

   - [ ] sweep the floors 🔁 every week when done ⏳ 2022-02-20
   

2. If you know a task cannot be done today, and you want it out of the way until tomorrow - or whenever you can do it - you can always postpone it, just to get it our of your searches.

3. For bonus points, you can set up custom statuses so that if you cannot complete a task today - using the custom status pattern shown in When DONE is not followed by TODO or IN_PROGRESS

   1. Navigate to its line in the markdown
   2. Complete it anyway
   3. Then click on the just-completed task and mark it as Cancelled.

The linked pages should give you enough information to decide which approach to use.

(I use 1 and 2.)

[nprime496]

Thanks, that's really helpful.

By the way, it's a wonderful job you're doing. Thank you.

[claremacrae]

Gosh. That means a lot to me - thank you very much indeed!