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Suprised no-one has asked about this before, but would it be possible to sort by time estimate ?
Would be nice to look at my carefully crafted smart list of tasks and be able to scan the quick and slow tasks quickly, without running the cursor over each task.
Equally, can the time estimate be shown on the task (like tags optionally can be) ?
Posted at 6:19pm on November 19, 2007
This sat here for a while without generating any interest. But the way I use RTM I would find this quite useful too.
I have set up smart lists called 15, 30, 60 that give me things that are 15 or less, 30 or less, 60 or less. So based on available time I can choose tasks wisely, but rather than setting up more smart lists with ranges it would be nice to have them sorted in those lists so if I have an hour available, I can look at one list and chose to knock out 5 or 6 little tasks, or get done one big task.
Posted at 3:47pm on February 13, 2008
says:A nice search keyword would be sortBy: where you could add for example timeEstimate, priority, dueDate, tag (difficult as a task can have many tags), etc.
Would make the smart lists even smarter!
Posted at 6:16pm on February 13, 2008
says:Implementing sort as part of SmartList has a lot of potential. I would hope that when power-sorting finally appears in RTM (when, not if, he says hopefully), that it will support specifying multiple criteria for the sorting [sort by due date, then priority, then by time estimate (ascending)] for example.
Posted at 7:59pm on February 21, 2008
says:+1 to sort by time estimate on all lists.
This seems like a useful, standard feature and reasonable request. It's a little unlikely to expect the average user to create a smart list just to be able to sort by estimate.
I'd also request that there be an option to display time estimate directly on a task w/o having to mouse over the task.
Posted at 6:40pm on November 3, 2008
Another vote for sorting by time estimate. And a total. That way I can see if my tasks for a given day are exceeding the number of hours in the day!
This is actually important, as then I know that I need to start moving tasks around.
Posted at 8:55pm on December 18, 2008
says:i agree sorting by time estimate would be a nice feature.
+1
Posted at 4:44pm on January 12, 2009
says:For all sorts of links to years' of great sorting suggestions and ideas, see this thread:
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/6289/
Posted at 5:20pm on January 12, 2009
says:+1 would love to see the time estimate in the task list.
It's satisfying to see the sum of all the time estimates against each list and (sometimes!) get it to slowly decrease. The only problem is you have to remember to assign a time estimate to every task, and it's hard work to check if there are any tasks without associated times, as you have to hover over every single one.
Posted at 5:59pm on January 30, 2009
says:Susan,
I have a smart list ("fix") with this query:
isTagged:false OR (NOT timeEstimate:"> 0")
It shows any tasks which have no tag or no time estimate. You can easily expand it to show tasks with no location or due date if those are also important to you.
Posted at 1:11pm on January 31, 2009
says:Thanks, that gets round things. Now I've got a smart list has search criteria:
list:Work AND NOT timeEstimate:"> 0"
Posted at 4:46pm on February 2, 2009
this doesnt necessarily sort them, but from here I add tags to the results
due:today (timeEstimate:"> 0") AND (timeEstimate:"< 10min")
due:today AND (timeEstimate:"> 10min") AND (timeEstimate:"< 20min")
due:today (timeEstimate:"> 25min") AND (timeEstimate:"< 45min")
due:today (timeEstimate:"> 45min") AND (timeEstimate:"< 1hr")
due:today (timeEstimate:"> 1hr") AND (timeEstimate:"< 2hr")
due:today (timeEstimate:"> 2hr") AND (timeEstimate:"< 3hr")
due:today (timeEstimate:"> 3hr") AND (timeEstimate:"< 4hr")
due:today (timeEstimate:"> 4hr") AND (timeEstimate:"< 5hr")
Since when I am at work it may vary if I have 5 minutes, 10, 30, 45 minutes free to do something, or things may change I use this to make it work as a makeshift smart list
Posted at 11:01pm on February 13, 2009
I concur. But I think it would be immensely useful to take it a little further and have RTM provide "optimized" suggestions for how to spend a user-specified block of time. For example, if I tell RTM I've got 30 minutes, it should give me a 2 or 3 options for how to use that time (e.g., 10 minute tasks or 1 30 minute task) based on criteria like: priority, elapsed time since todo entered and possibly number of times postponed.
Posted at 5:18am on February 18, 2009
I'd dig this feature!!
Posted at 11:24am on February 25, 2009
Thanks for the suggestion! I'll check and see if it's on the list already - if not, I will add it now.
Posted at 3:28am on February 26, 2009
says:I would love to have the time estimate shown in the list and be able to sort by time. Not having the time estimate is one of the reasons I'm still looking for for different task management options.
Posted at 5:23am on March 14, 2009
I'm looking at this again - 1 year into my GTD implementation and I notice a lot of my tasks are getting buried because I don't have any graphical way of displaying or sorting on the time estimates.
Estimated time seems still very much a second (or perhaps even third) class citizen in RTM - is anything planned to promote it forward ? Even something as simple as when I select multiple tasks, it shows me the total time estimates of them (helping me plan which tasks I am going to focus on that day / hour / evening).
I see various hot topics on swimlanes, time taken and other reporting metrics, but these all seem unlikely to happen with time estimate as it is.
Posted at 6:54pm on March 16, 2009
says:One more vote to get sorting by time and sum of total time going!
Posted at 11:45pm on April 28, 2009
says:Sorting, as it exists, was not originally part of RTM. It was added on 8/1/07, and those three sort options (priority, date, alphabetical) are much better than nothing, but...
These boards are littered with threads by people suggesting different sorting schemes. A very non-comprehensive list follows, including several that ask for just what you desire...
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/279/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/552/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/783/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/1448/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/1547/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/1891/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/1910/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/2243/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/2514/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/2854/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/2856/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/2879/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/3145/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/3158/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/3206/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/3233/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/3742/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/3835/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/3989/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/help/4043/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/4472/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/5062/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/6289/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/6368/
http://www.rememberthemilk.com/forums/ideas/7226/
So when you hear cranky ol' timers lament that the UI of the RTM site has lain dormant while other things have been attended to - GMail, iPhone, &c. - this is exactly the sort of thing we're talking about. I really hope some basic things, like per-list, multi-variate, customizable sorting, are addressed before Bob turns his attention to Outlook syncing, for example.
* The idea that smartlists have access to an operator that would specify sorting is one of the many great ideas found in the threads above. I think that would help make RTM's best feature even better.
Posted at 5:25pm on April 29, 2009
says:sortBy would be a great addition to smart lists
Posted at 12:19am on May 7, 2009
says:Another vote for sorting by time estimate and displaying it next to the task.
Posted at 4:48pm on May 10, 2009
Oddly enough, when I put "sort by time estimate" in the search field, I got no results. I only found this thread by looking for sort.
Another vote for wanting to more easily sort by time estimate!
Posted at 2:23pm on September 29, 2009
says:+1 for displaying time estimates next to tasks and for sorting by time estimates
Posted at 6:54pm on October 20, 2009
