Using Context to make a Cool Grocery List on OmniFocus

The last time I came here and talk about OmniFocus, I was talking about Contexts, about the Context View. By now you should have a set con basic contexts, and even others more complex and even interesting. Please share with us those, you may be giving us ideas.

When I did the GTD Seminar, (I was lucky enough to be able to attend) I sit next to a lady that I have never met before. She wasn’t a beginner, she had her Palm, her lists, and seem to me to be in the top of her game. We begin talking about contexts, and we came to errands. I should remind you, that in the old days, Palm allow you only to have 15 contexts, so you need it to be really careful how you use them.

She was telling me all about until we got to her @Errands context and then she just bluntly said, this one is a mess and I am never ever able to accomplish anything. I ask her why, and she explain to me that she had there all the errands, from groceries to stuff to do, and it was impossible to see it, so she was missing stuff all the time, and she gets mad and frustrated. I ask to see the list, and I give her a little idea, (that I was using in my lists at the time to create more contexts). Why don’t you begin the task, with the main area,  GROCERIES, TARGET, HOME_DEPOT, that way, they will sort automatically and get all together. She begin doing that, using instead zGROCERIES, so they move to the bottom. Her face change a soon as she finished, her system or more specifically her @Errands Context was functional again.

The reality is that we all have more things to do, than the time we have to do them, that’s a fact of life, in part for the agreements that we do ourselves, and the ones that came to us and we can’t choose not to do, and the ones that simply are part of life, your list are going to be in constant chaos if you don’t work them, and learn to control them, Context is the way I KNOW to control them, the way it work for me. I am sure they are others, Weekly review help me too, but to get CONTROL AND PERSPECTIVE, I need to handle my contexts.That’s the reason I have been an advocate of have the context you need, even the temporarily ones, because is using those that I can establish  control on my own chaos.

Today I am going to show you a cool trick on OmniFocus. This trick I learn from my good friend Mark Denu, and it’s one that I have use so much. I keep in OmniFocus my grocery list, and for a long time, every week when I plan the menu for next week, I write down everything again. The system wasn’t bad, but wasn’t automated. Talking to Marc he told me how he did, and I tough he was brilliant, I got the same experience that lady did, when she begin writing zGROCERIES before her list.

Let me begin showing you the contexts (categories) of my list of things to buy:

This is the list of things to buy, everything, from food, to candy, to medicine. Notice that the list has 3 levels, Level 1 “THINGS WE NEED TO BUY”, level 2 “GROCERIES & MEDICINE” and level three the actual category of stuff.

To this moment, the problem seems on how you make them show in the proper list. Be careful, here comes the geeky stuff. 

At the Project Perspective or view you are going to create the different levels, as show in the image above. After that, you are going to begin  to create each item as follows: Let’s imagine that you need Formula for the Baby. Well under Baby Stuff, you create a project called Formula. Under it, you create a Task called Formula and another one called also Formula. 

Notice that the first Formula is on the Context of BABY STUFF, or really THINGS_WE_NEED_TO_BUY>GROCERIES>BABY_STUFF. The second one you put it in your context for Groceries. 

Then let’s see the detail:

If you don’t know how to access the panel, select the project or action and click the Inspector Button: 

 

It’s important to notice that the project need to be Sequential, (set that in Type) that means, only one action showing at the time. Where the project is contain is irrelevant, and then set the context. 

Next Important thing is to mark the project ‘Complete when when completing the last item’ since that way the project will regenerate again, after is mark of.

Finally you want to set an initial Start Date, so when the project regenerate doesn’t show, and you will at the end set them to start again X days after completion. In this case 1 day.

This way, you can go to the specific context of things you need and just mark instead of create the whole groceries list again.

Of course this work well too, if you use it for anything that need to be repeated, like for example change the Air Filters in the Summer, or bring the trash to the curb on Monday morning.

Next week, we will work more into OmniFocus, for now, be productive and enjoy your weekend!

 

**Update: My Friend Mark remind me that I should have write his name Mark and not Marc... Shame on me! 

Comments

[AE Thanh]

That's an interesting setup. I can see how the multiple levels make this work. The only problem is that I use Omnifocus on the iPhone too, which does not support project perspectives. I actually look on my iPhone as I'm going through the checklist, so I have to use context perspectives.

I have a perspective for groceries. This is my level of context:
HIGH LEVEL: Errands
MEDIUM: Cities (since I travel a lot and stay in different places all the time) and Groceries.

Then I have a perspectives which is solely based on the Groceries context. On my iPhone I just look at this perspective and check off each item.

Like yours, all the things I need to buy are grouped in an action group and I check the box of "mark complete when completing last item" and it starts again every 1 day after completion.

So our setups are almost the same day, actually :)

[Augusto Pinaud]

Dear AE Thanh, thanks for your comment.

I never tough about doing it that way, but that will work to. From the project perspective, I have just one project for all home groceries, and if they are part of another project just land in the correct context.

I will love to see screen shots of yours, and see how that can improve mine.

Thanks again for the comment.

[Henrik]

THIS IS AN AWESOME TRICK! I make tons of these list-creating-lists, both at work and home. Simple ones that works like this Vacation Pack List >> Length (Weekend, 1 week, 2 weeks) >> Who is coming (me, spouse, son, daughter) >> Type (sailboat, skiing, summer house). And it generates a basic pack list with context @home@packing that the family (mostly me) uses when packing.

I also make more complex ones that automatically populates actions on to different lists for recurring events.

And yes, I spend an unproportional amount of time making these lists and tweaking them. Probably more time than they save. I try to use my “System cleanup time” which is one hour every month and one day every year for this kind of things but sometime it’s just too much fun to see what I can come up with.

Micromanaging is my favorite procrastination ;)

[Augusto Pinaud]

Thanks for the comment Henrick, sadly we are almost all guilty of playing with the system as a procrastination technique...

at least I am