allow scheduled to be just a time

[pcause]

It would be useful if the "scheduled" field could be just a time (HH:MM) and that we could sort based on that time. This would allow us to create a simple schedule using something like:

has schedule date
due on today
sort on scheduled

Perhaps the way to support and keep compatibility is to have an option to treat scheduled (or start??) as a time rather than a date.

[aubreyz]

It would be useful if the "scheduled" field could be just a time (HH:MM) and that we could sort based on that time. This would allow us to create a simple schedule using something like:
has schedule date due on today sort on scheduled
Perhaps the way to support and keep compatibility is to have an option to treat scheduled (or start??) as a time rather than a date.

It's an idea. However my experience over 30 years is that todo "apps" that try to think they are calendar/diary apps, tend to do neither very well.

But surely if you wanted that you need the date and a time in the field as well not just a time anyway. The schedule would be both the date and the time, which is the whole point of that field. The due field is not a schedule field so this is muddling the purpose of the different fields.

However I do think the idea of making a day calendar from todo entries is nice.

[aubreyz]

I do think that a starting point for the developers would be to state explicitly in the documentation what the intended purpose of each field is (while making it clear that users are free to adapt to their own purpose). This would facilitate a lot of other things which are being discussed in other issue threads here:

a) So in this thread it might be clear which field might also be associated with a later duration field (in minutes)
b) It would be clearer how an urgency calculation should be optimised (at least for users who stick to the ground "rules") - for example I think urgency should take no account of the scheduled field at all, except perhaps if the date is today and only today.

[pcause]

Understand and don't completely disagree but for my use case this would be helpful. Right now the fields only take a date not a date and time, Perhaps if I use a tag of the form date/time, where time HH:MM and then sort on the tag it would work. so sorty by tag 1 and always have that first tag. i'll try that.

[cja-github]

Ok, but then you have to specify what time you will do a task in the file containing the task. I want to schedule my day in my daily note, not to have to load several files to schedule my day.

[pcause]

just tried it. worked with time/HHMM no colon. when I use a colon it seems to also work but the :MM as it seems a : ends the tag. if you go to the task pane you'll see that #time/09:00 shows as a tag of time/09

but this hack can work for my purpose.

[claremacrae]

That's a great workaround. Thanks for sharing it.

[pcause]

I have made 2 queries to separate events (scheduled tasks) and tasks (unscheduled tasks)

here is the relevant parts to separate the two. For events:

due today
tags include time

and another for tasks

due today
tags do not include time

[pcause]

i have since switched and now put HH;MM-HH:MM at the start of a task description and sort by description. untimed events appear at the end of the list. Only issue is that if you use the tasks dialogue it moves #tasks to the front of the description.

[claremacrae]

Does the global filter actually provide you with any value?

[pcause]

I use the global filer to accomplish this. my tasks can be anywhere and they all appear in my daily note using the tasks queries, sorted by time.

What would be useful would be to add a time field to the tasks object that has start time and end time. then we could sort by in the tasks query. this is my workaround for the lack of those fields.

[claremacrae]

The reason I asked is to find out if you put the global filter on every task, or whether you use the absence of global filter to exclude some tasks from your Tasks searches.

[pcause]

I put it on every task. If I don't the autocomplete doesn't trigger when I am typing the task

[claremacrae]

OK, that's what I wondered.

If you set the global filter on every task, it is serving no value, and only risks missing tasks out by mistake, if the filter is missing.

The global filter is optional. Personally, I have it turned off, as I want every task to be able to be found by Tasks, and I don't want to have to remember to put a tag on every task.

My Task settings look like this:

(It's confusing that a greyed-out #task there might look like it is enabled, it isn't)

[claremacrae]

If the global filter is turned off, the autocomplete triggers on every task.

[pcause]

thanks, will try. thought i had it off at a time and the autocomplete didn't trigger, but might have been when fist released. also though that perhaps performance would be better with it off.