Rainers Blog

It seems that my previous script to make omnifocus tasks out of entourage stopped working, either due to OF 1.7.x or Snow Leopard.

Anyway I have updated the script now and it should work on all versions.

Entourage2Omnifocus

Update 7.1.2010

While this mail rule is currently the latest one, please take a look at the newest posts tagged with “Omnifocus“, to find if there is a newer version.

I have posted a lot about a few of the scripts and tools I use but I wanted to wrap this up in order to give a consolidated overview of the tools and little life hacks that I am using on a daily basis. So maybe some of you find this interesting.

OmniFocus for Mac:

On the Mac, I use OmniFocus which is the tool that fits my needs the most. I have tried Things and it would be my 2nd best in the list but as of now, I prefer OmniFocus for a number of reasons.

I have a number of contexts such as :

• Office
• HomeOffice
• Home
• Errands
• Car
• Phone
• a few others…

In addition I have projects which I group into personal and work related. There are quite a lot of tutorials and infos out there for OmniFocus which is why I dont want to spend too much time on this topic. If you are interested, leave a comment and I might go into more detail in a follow up post.

IMAP inbox + mail rule:

I have a dedicated IMAP inbox which I use to quickly post new tasks to myself. This inbox is hooked up with my modified OmniFocus Mail Rule so every mail I send to my todo account will automatically be added to OmniFocus once I turn on my Mac. I use this feature mainly when my mac is not around or also when I am on my iphone.

OmniFocus for iPhone:

On my iPhone I also use OmniFocus for iPhone sometimes. While I have paid good money for it I am not happy with it (I am actually working on an own iPhone app that will let me do similar things). The reason why I am not very happy with it is that its ridiculously slow. I mean it usually takes 20 secs or more to start the app and around 2 minutes to synchronize which makes it pretty much a deal killer for me. Anyhow if you can live with the delays then IMHO its pretty much still the best GTD app on the iphone so far (at least when considering the good integration with the desktop).

So when I just need to quickly capture a new task then I usually only use the email rule mentioned above. However, when I want to see what I have to do or organize some of the tasks on the go, then I take the time to launch OF on the iPhone.

Entourage script plugin

At work we use Exchange so until Snow Leopard is out I am stuck with Entourage on the Mac (which is the least terrible of the Office:mac apps but that does not say that I am happy with it

Unfortunately Entourage does not support the quick entry feature (since MS does not know how to write Cocoa apps) I have to resort to my modified Entourage script plugin. With this one you can assign a hotkey combination and whenever you hit it, it will add the selected mail to your tasks which is very nice.

So thats about it, I hope this will help whoever is interested in doing GTD on a Mac.

If you are into GTD and are one to be easily distracted, I think this is a really good advice. Since TeaTimer is not free one of the commenters recommended Dejal Time Out (http://www.dejal.com) which I am currently evaluating.

Procrastination hack: ‘(10+2)*5′ | 43 Folders

This script will now also add a link to the mail which will let you open the mail in mail.app directly with one click. If you dont know what this is all about, read the previous post on that topic.

Update:

This post is out of date, please look in the GTD Category for the latest version of the script.

I have stumbled upon a script that will let you turn an entourage message into an OF Action! That was one thing I was desperately looking for.

http://www.sandro.org/omnifocus/index.php#sendentemail

Thanks Sandro!!!

I have recently switched from iGTD to Omnifocus since it has got a really good iPhone app and its integration (with a WebDav Server) is the best IMHO. However, I didnt like their stock mail rule as it would always treated my email footer as a new task (if I forward something or CC myself onto a mail). Furthermore, my email server does not support the +omnifocus address extension.

Therefore, I have changed the builtin mail rule a bit by

A) ignoring the allowed senders (I have an own imap mailbox for my tasks), since they are automatically turned off once you disable the stock email rule. However, you can probably modify the mail rule appropriately.

B) making the whole post a single action so that all of the mails content goes into the notes of the task.

I will modify the script a bit further (once I have time) to also add a link to the original mail (if I manage to get that working). This is one of the drawbacks of OmniFocus at the moment. This was working better in iGTD.

sendtoomnifocus

Update:

Installation Instructions:

Set up a manual mail rule, define your rules when to apply the rule, then fill out the form similar as shown in the screenshot below.

Update

this mail rule is out out date, please take a look at the newest posts tagged with “Omnifocus“, to find the latest version.

I have read the book Getting Things Done. The Art of Stress-Free Productivity by David Allen and I have been trying to get my hands on some of his recommended folders to do all my paperwork. It has been really hard to find them in Europe (at least Germany and Austria). Finally I found comparable Folders on Amazon.

Leitz: Leitz Einstellmap.m.Tabs cham. 2434VE100

These ones are exactly like the normal US manila file folders with easy to label latches. I can really recommend them.

After lots of hackery I finally got a decent semi automated iGTD -> iPhone export working.

It goes like that:

• it changes the default html export format of iGTD, based on the information here. You have to open the package contents of iGTD and replace the old export templates with these files. The template is inspired by the good looking OmniFocus bookmark exporter (OFfline)
• then create a folder which will receive the exported html file
• use this folder action script which is based on the information macosxhints
• put the script into /Library/Scripts/Folder Action Scripts

How to use:

1. go to the context view (projects view does not work yet)

2. select File->Export to file

3. in the export dialog select “HTML table” as a format

4. save it in the folder that you have assigned the folder action to

5. done

In the near future I intend to extend this to also sync with an iphone data bookmark but for now this is already quite nice.

Grab the file here