Problem
From time to time I need to create two types of tasks:
- Task that include a number of repetitive action that had to be done. Simple example would be “do 10 pending tasks per week that is in pending category for more than 3 month”. To keep track how far I progressed during the week I can of course mark how many tasks I did. But it’s NOT visually representative.
- Tasks that require date range with clear start and finish. Like “do something from 10.06.18 to 28.06.18”. So there are no easy way to see the progress from start date to finish date.
So the problem is a lack of visually understandable way to represent ranges and progress throughout some activity.
Solution
Introduce simple syntax and functionality for “range” and “progress” visual representation with possible values being numbers or dates.
Syntax examples:
- Number range would look like “<<1, 11, 7” meaning show a range from “1” to “11” with current progress being “7”. Visual representation would look something like
- Date range would look like “<<!(2018-06-14), !(2018-06-28), !(2018-06-23)”. Wich means range from “2018-06-14” to “2018-06-28” with current value being “2018-06-23”. Also importantly allow to omit third param for date range and use current date as a value for it.
Result
In this way person would be able to easily track range and progress. And in case of multiple tasks in one document user will have simple to understand visual indicator that is easy to find. Also it would be really handy on dates since it will allow to track progress of time from start of the task to finish.
Bonuses
- Actually should be very simple to implement since you already have similar “visual indicators” like dates and document links.
- Big benefit is that range mechanics is needed if you intent to implement any kind of Scrum/Kanban representation of your lists in the future.