"committed next actions"
"needing next actions"
"deadlines"
"relationship"

If you enter and win the contest, I reserve the right to make this your "custom macro" prize, and if you don't enter, to have this new feature disappear again :-).

As I mention above, I changed the code so there are no upper limits on projects, actions, overdues, etc, so I'll put down your "upper limits" as the 65% level.

Your score will get pretty tiny but there is always a small improvement for any dent you make in the piles. There can be offsetting effects though. For example if you knock off a bunch of young tasks, the "feasibility" score will improve, but your "freshness" score may go south.

3-10 projects sounds pretty conservative, but perhaps it is realistic. I tend to have just a few "next actions" on any given project, but lots of projects on the radar. It would take a lot of discipline to admit to myself I wasn't realistically going to touch them in a given week. It would be interesting to modify the "mark task complete" macro to always track the parent project as a call out to see how many projects actually get advanced in a typical week. A metric on actions/project might be interesting as well.

This macro is superb. I really find it very useful not only to check whether your dashboards are getting out of control unknowingly but also to motivate yourself when thinks are moving in the right direction.

Re the reader survey I think 70 is actually about right for a week, as it means 10/day on average in a week. After that we may convert some more from "someday" to "committed" in the weekly review.

2.5 times that figure would probably be a good upper limit.

As for projects, I think the number should be between 3 and 10 for 70 actions. I also think the number should be somewhat a percentage of the actions, so for the 175 limit I mentioned before the maximum number of projects should be 25.

JM

I hadn't anticipated your dashboard customizations as the script is designed to work on the default dashboard. The current version searches for each branch of the default daily action dashboard and copies them to individual hidden maps to add things up without needing to do much filtering/traversing. This approach would only find one each of your "next action" branches.

I'll look into making some edits to try to capture multiple branches of the same type onto the temporary maps. I actually have my "AO" world captured as "R:AO" rather than my name and then split it off as a single "next actions" branch on the dashboard with Owner:AO. Cloning all the branches is an interesting idea.

The tag just needs to be:

{send; run:macro:'AO/ao_next_action_analysis.mmbas'}

Or just paste the packed text from the wiki into the GyroQ dialog box and it will be installed:

http://wiki.activityowner.com/index.php?title=Naa_packed

Of course you need to download the mmbas file and put in "My Maps\AO" as well.

I have a request. How do I assign the macro to the 'naa' tag? (I know I should know this and it's a GyroActivator question, but you're my hero after that batch processing tip you gave me/us on Sunday.)