OmniFocus 3 enhances the Forecast view. Forecast let’s you see what’s due today, what’s due soon, as well as what you may have deferred until today. It also shows your calendar alongside your tasks.
As a result, many OmniFocus users use the Forecast as their “Today” list. An issue in OmniFocus 2 was that users would have to reset dates for tasks that they did not complete. For example, if you had something deferred until today, but did not complete it, it wouldn’t show up in the Today view when you looked at it later in the week. You would need to go to the inspector and make adjustments for each task. This became tedious.
Now, however, we have the option of a “pinned” tag in the professional version of OmniFocus 3. This single chosen tag may be pinned to the Forecast view. All tasks that are in that tag will now simply stick around in your Forecast view. You won’t have to make any date adjustments or even assign false defer or due dates.
To set up the new pinned tag in OmniFocus 3:
- Go to the Forecast view and select the eye icon at the top:
- In the Inspector, select the Tag section:
- Then choose the tag you would like to have pinned. Here I’ve chosen a “Today” tag.
You now have a list of tasks that can sit in your Forecast view without leaving as the days pass, at least not until they are complete:
Another neat use that I learned from Rosemary Orchard on the OmniFocus Slack channel is that the pinned tag can be different for different devices. Therefore, instead of using a @Today tag, you could have @iPad1, @iPad2, and @iPhone and pin them all to those separate devices. In that way, you’d have a custom today list for your individual devices.
Having said all of this, I’d be remiss not to say that there is caution to consider. A today list is best considered as one to clear. If it is not cleared regularly, it loses its strength as a part of your reliable and trusted system of work. Therefore, while the use I’ve shown is for a “today” function, another potential use could be as a Considered function. (See also post on considered tasks.)
I just discovered that the forecast tag doesn’t sync between devices, and while at first I thought this was a problem, now I see it as a great thing. I can set the tag for my phone to @errands before going out and set the tag for @work in the office and @home at home. Then the forecast view shows me what I need on each device. Also, can change that setting whenever it seems good, for example, if I have a bunch of time on my hands on the train and want to make calls.
It is a nice feature that we can have different devices devoted to different lists.