Projects List (pro mode only)

Use the Projects List to view a list of your current Projects and optionally modify their properties.

Window Frame of View

The top frame of the Projects List shows the number of projects, the current time of day (including ticking seconds), the current date, and an asterisk if schedule changes have not yet been saved. "FILTERS ON" appears to the right of these other elements if the Filters window is open, as a reminder that you are only seeing those projects which qualify to pass through the Filters.

Projects List

Each row of the list shows one project, sorted alphabetically by project name. Here is the information which appears for each item (from left to right):

To the left of each project name is a color square indicating the custom color you assign to that project.

If a dollar sign appears preceding the Project Name, it has been tagged for inclusion in tagged project statistics.

If you make the first character of a Project Name an exclamation mark (by pressing Alt+F3), then the project is a "life project", qualifying its items for special prioritization if you check the Balance Life Projects checkbox in Other Settings (read about this powerful advanced feature). Being a life project also qualifies done items of such projects to be counted in the Weekly Time Spent On Life Projects statistic (on the Statistics submenu of the Reports menu).

All undone projects on the list will appear in the pull-down menus in Project fields elsewhere in TimeTo (such as the Item Properties window), so that you can assign items to projects. A rectangle of color will also appear in various schedule views next to items assigned to the project (and clicking on that rectangle is a quick alternative way to change the Project setting of an item).

If the project has a Note, the Note icon appears on the extreme right of the row, and if you click the icon you can view or edit the Note. (The Note for a project is NOT shared with items set to that project: the project's note is only visible from the Projects List.) You can type whatever you like in the Note. Note contains history of done items for the project: In order to make it easy to see a history of what has been completed on a project, each time an item of that project is Done, the Project's Note gains a row showing the date and time that this item was marked Done, as well as its title. (If the project did not yet have a Note, one is created the first time you complete an item of that project.)

Adding a new project: To add a project to the list while viewing the Projects List, choose New Project (from the Insert menu, click the Insert key, or double-click on any row on the Projects List that doesn't yet have a project listed). You are then prompted to give the project a Title, and optionally a Color (if you don't specify a color, the color remains white). You can also use the Underscore command (F3) to Underscore the project's name, or the Life Project command to designate (or undesignate) the project as a Life Project.

Productivity Tip: You may wish to force frequently used projects to the top of the projects list. You can do so by prefixing its name with a symbol which sorts high alphabetically, such as a tilde "“~" or exclamation mark. For example, if you want the top project in the project list to be “ferret-legging”, create a project named “~ferret-legging”. Better yet, choose a symbol that you don't have to press Shift to get to, such as an equals sign (why? see the next tip!).

Productivity Tip: Some users name their most popular projects starting with different letters or numerals: this lets the them select from the Projects pulldown menu in Item Properties by simply pressing that key on the keyboard.

Renaming a project: To modify a project, double-click it on the list, or press Enter. If you rename a project or change its color, all items assigned to the project are automatically adjusted to the new name and/or color.

Duplicating and automatically numbering new projects: Choose the Duplicate Selected Item command (from the Insert menu, or press the " key) to create a new project based upon the properties of the highlighted one. If the project you are duplicating has a number in its title, TimeTo™ will increment the number by 1 in the duplicate (so, for instance, if the existing project is called "project 23" or "002file", the new project would be called "project 24" or "003file").

Marking a project as Done: Just as with items, you can mark a project Done (or undone) using the Done command or by pressing the Spacebar. Just like done items, done projects have a strikethrough through its title (though not a reversed background). This is valuable to do, as Done projects will not clutter up the list of choices available when assigning a project to an item.

Deleting a project: To delete a project, press the Delete key with the project highlighted on the Projects List. If you follow through, all items that have their Project field set to the deleted project automatically are reassigned to Project "none" (the items are not deleted).

Searching the projects list: If you choose the Find command (from the Navigate menu) while viewing the Projects List, the command will search Projects (rather than items) for whatever you search for.

Filtering views by project: Filtering by project is one of the filters available in the Filters command: if you wish to only view items assigned to a certain project in any, you can do so by choose Filters the checking Project and selecting which project to limit the view to show.

Printing a list of projects: To print a list of all projects, choose Print Projects List (from the Print submenu of the File menu).

Viewing a tree of all your projects: To view a collapsible tree of all your projects, choose the Projects Tree (from the View menu).

Tagging a project to be included in tagged project statistics: To tag a project to be included in the tagged projects statistics (from the Statistics submenu of the Reports menu), choose the Tag/Untag Project command (from the Statistics submenu of the Reports menu) or press F4. Tagging the project will cause a dollar sign ("$") to appear in front of its name on the list of projects, and it will now be included in the calculations for these statistics that some people use to help keep track of their time use by project (the "$" does not appear in pulldown menus of projects, only on the Projects List).

Reports and projects: Projects are central to these reports:

Statistics and projects: Projects are central to these statistics (available from the Statistics submenu of the Reports menu):

Log files and projects: The Project will also appear in monthly log files (if you have enabled the Monthly Log Files Of Done Items setting in Other Settings), which can then be useful for such purposes as providing reporting as to how much time you have spent on a project, or for importing such information into other software.

Strategies for handling subtasks

If you would like to track many subtasks to a task, there are at least two ways to achieve this in TimeTo.

Approach 1: One task per item, each item associated with one Project.
First, create a New Project on the Projects List.
Then create as many items as you wish, with that Project specified in the Project field of the Properties for each item.
To create many such items quickly, you can:
        1. Use the Duplicate command to clone the first item, and then adjust the Title (and any other properties you wish to change) to suit the next item, or
        2. Temporarily or permanently change your New Item Preferences to designate that new items will have a certain Project as the default.

Approach 2: Many tasks associate with one item.
Consider having one item represent the personal project (i.e. don't use TimeTo's Project concept), and instead show the subtasks as either
        1. list a series of actions (subtasks) within the Title of the one item, potentially separating them on new lines (by using Ctrl+Enter). This has the advantage that only the next action appears on lists of items, thus helping you focus on the next action only, or
        2. list your subtasks within the Note attached to the one item that names the project. This has the advantage of allowing up to 65,000 characters of description, as well as better editing and printing capabilities. (Advanced thought: Consider also that you can share a note amongst many instances of one recurring item, so that for instance you could anchor working on such a project as a recurring event).

Keep in mind that, whichever approach you take, you can Filter your views by keyword and/or Project so that you can easily limit your views, printouts and exports to just the items having to do with your personal project.