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Why aren't tasks showing in today when they are supposed to have started?

floweringtree says:
I usually have tasks that need to be done this week or this month whenever I happen to have time, but I keep forgetting them if they don't show on the today list, leading to a lot of stress.

However, it also isn't much help if they show as due today when they really aren't.

I tried putting in a start date that is before today, but they still vanish from the today list as soon as their due date is set correctly.

So, for example, "Fill in X form, start date 12th Y, finish date 30th Y", only shows on 30th Y, rather than showing in every day's list from the 12th, which is what I need it to do.

This seems so illogical (if a task started yesterday, why on earth does it not show in today's list?) that I wondered if I had missed or muddled a setting somewhere?

Or, if the programme really is set up like that, can anyone point me to a hack?!

:-)
Posted at 6:21am on October 19, 2022
andrewski (Remember The Milk) says:
Hi floweringtree,
What we'd suggest is to create a Smart List that you use to see the tasks you want based on the start date.

You can create a Smart List that is basically like the Today view but incorporating start dates with the following search:

due:today OR dueBefore:today OR start:today OR startBefore:today

I hope this helps for your needs but keep me posted on what you find! 💙
Posted 1 year ago
floweringtree says:
Thanks :-)

I have tried that sort of thing, but because I have the sort of mind (very dyslexic) which just gets hopelessly muddled between lists if there is the slightest ambiguity, I haven't been able to make it work. If I do that sort of thing, I simply can't find the right list or I end up on the wrong one without noticing, and it is worse.

I would need to be able to remove or rename the Today list and put the smart list at the top of the sidebar, and if that can be done, I haven't managed to work out how to do it?

I tried making the "All tasks" lists fold up, but it doesn't help because it unfolds again whenever the page is refreshed.

It would be really useful to have a bit more flexibility in the defaults!
Posted 1 year ago
(closed account) says:
floweringtree - I agree that more flexibility is needed in the sidebar. However, you can keep the All Tasks list folded up.

Whenever you go to a list that is in the All Tasks list (Inbox, Today, Tomorrow, etc.), it will unfold that All Tasks list. If your starting list in the settings is set to one of those lists, then it'll unfold whenever you open RTM.

You might try creating a Smart List to whatever it is you need and then set that list as the list that RTM goes to when you open RTM. Here's how:

Go to the Settings gear at the top-right (assuming the web app). Then go to:
- Account Settings
- General
- - Set Start View to Specific Smart List
- - Set your preferred Smart List in the next dropdown

I hope that helps.
Posted 1 year ago
andrewski (Remember The Milk) says:
Hi floweringtree,
I understand that, and I have an idea that I hope helps for you:

You can create that Smart List, then add it to favorites, and it will show up at the top in the Favorites section.

Then, you can collapse the All Tasks/Inbox section, and change the order of Favorites, and hopefully the presence/prominence would help!

You can set this Smart List as your start view, which may help the All Tasks section not expand again too.

Keep me posted on what you find! 💙
Posted 1 year ago
andrewski (Remember The Milk) says:
Whoops, geojono, I opened this tab earlier and just returned to it, and in the meantime you posted a lot of the same details! Thanks for covering that. 💙
Posted 1 year ago
floweringtree says:
Thanks :-) I'll experiment and see...
Posted 1 year ago
mystwillow says:
I feel like this question comes up a lot (there is another more recent thread on the first page right now asking about this same thing). Would the RTM team consider adding a toggle option to include tasks available to start today to the built-in Today list? I understand the smart list as a workaround, but the Today list is such a convenient feature and having tasks available to start today included in it seems to be a very intuitive expectation for many users (hence the many threads asking why they aren't showing up there).
Posted 1 year ago
andrewski (Remember The Milk) says:
Hi mystwillow,
Yes, we appreciate your feedback and take it to heart when people bring up questions like this. Thank you! 💙
Posted 1 year ago
floweringtree says:
I'm having trouble making it work due to the odd behaviour of start dates on repeating tasks. Many of the tasks I need this functionality for repeat.

I would imagine this would be a problem with or without the hack (i.e. if tasks did turn up on the preset today list after starting) and it is particularly puzzling because I cannot work out what the app is actually doing.

So, I have task X that starts towards the beginning of this month and is due on the last Friday (25th), and is set to repeat every last Friday. When it is completed, it comes up as next due on Tuesday 13th December, which isn't the last Friday according to my reckoning, and the newly generated task has a start date of "never"!

However, another task I have been looking at, task Y, which is due the last Saturday, generates an at least sensible new start date every time it repeats (I think it is the Wednesday of the fourth week previously, which algorithm should work often enough not to matter if I have to correct the odd one manually).

I would like everything to do what task Y does, but I cannot see any obvious difference between the set-up or instructions in task X and Y.

Can anyone tell me what the rule behind the generation or otherwise of start dates on repeating tasks is?

:-)
Posted 1 year ago
This topic has now been closed automatically due to a lack of responses in the past 90 days.