I believe that the behavior you are describing is documented in the User Manual section on Next Actions which says “Note: If there are Active Tasks without parent project then only first task for each root task is selected.” The wording is a little stiff but it is completely consistent with the observed behaviour making me believe that it’s all intentional. There’s just one glitch which is this: I believe the statement should have been “Note: If there are Active Tasks without parent project then only first task for each root item is selected.” It’s my opinion that rules like this apply equally to tasks, projects and filters, but the word “task” does not communicate this quite as clearly as “item”.
I recognize that this is a case where MLO’s out-of-the-box function differs from what you would prefer. In the long run, that doesn’t matter, what matters is whether you can use the power of MLO to make a view that does what you want. Usually that’s the case though the jury is still out for your version of next actions by project. As an aside, there are MLO users who try to adhere to GTD orthodoxy. And there are those who do something entirely unrelated to GTD. A lot of us, though, use something personal and idiosyncratic that’s inspired by GTD. So when you find a case where MLO’s default action differs from your understanding of GTD orthodoxy, that does not necessarily justify changing MLO’s action to be more nearly compliant. That’s because there are some users out there who are counting on the existing functionality. I have been stung several times (and the developers I’m sure have been stung even more) by proposing clear improvements in MLO functionality only to face a chorus of angry protests from fans of the prior functionality. So the better question to ask is, how can MLO provide any tools you need but don’t have that will let you build your dream view. From: mylifeorganized@googlegroups.com [mailto:mylifeorganized@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of John Smith Sent: Thursday, December 04, 2014 8:59 PM To: mylifeorganized@googlegroups.com Subject: [MLO] Quirk: "Next Action by Folder" happening in "Next Action by Project" view. Hi [ASIDE: OK I am still smarting... but apologies are accepted where given. From my side I am happy to apologise for my the tone of some of my earlier remarks. OK let's move on.] I have discovered a rather fundamental "weirdness" of the system. [Fwiw, in order to confirm this weirdness I have started again with an empty dataset.] So if you have a collection of tasks in the root directory, to which you have not yet had time to allocated into any Project yet, then if you go to the standard "Next Action by Project" you will see those tasks listed at the top of the page, where it calls them "Projects: (none)". Ah but not so fast, this only works in the root directory. And if those Tasks are moved into a directory of any sort, guess what? They all disappear from this "Next Action by Project" view! WTF? At least most of them disappear. Because it turns out the the first task with the folder does stay visible after all. But only the first in that directory - all the others disappear. So it's almost as if MLO is treating a Folder as if it were a Project. i.e. MLO is 'filtering in' the Next Action within the Folder as if it were finding the Next Action within a Project. Now, if I had ticked the "This is a project" box on the directory then that would make perfect sense. However the "This is a project" box is emphatically not ticked! For reasons of diplomacy I shall resist the urge to call this a "bug", but surely it is pretty unexpected. Background: As we all know, one of the core GTD concepts "Next Action". And so this "Next Action by Project" is likely to be one of the most important screens to anyone trying to implement GTD. I certainly intend to spend a lot of time there. Either way, surely we don't want to see "Next Action by Folder" because the folders are just supposed to be merely containers for subject areas and they do not indicate that something is actually a live Project! I find this to be quite a fundamental problem. I mean if you use folders a lot and you have a lot of one-off type Actions to which you have not yet bothered to put into projects, then whenever you try to work from the "Next Action by Project" view of the world, all your Actions will disappear - All except one per folder! P.S. Now there is a solution to this anomaly which is, similar to what I mentioned in another thread, which is that if you convert your Actions without projects into Projects then they are 'forced' to appear in this "Next Actions by Project" review. But this is definitely a fudge because in GTD theory you need to work tasks very differently if they are an action compared to if they are a project. Surely this "Next Action by Folder" cant be something anyone designed into the system on purpose. And surely it is unwanted, no? Either way, I am curious. Has nobody else discovered this 'quirk' ? 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