Making Lists

In Getting Started you learned to make lists of projects, tasks, and notes. This section doesn't add any new parts, it just shows ways to make and organize your lists faster.

Items

In TaskPaper each line makes a new item.

1. Use Return to create a new item.
2. TaskPaper will auto-format and indent your lists. Press Option-Return to avoid auto-formatting.
3. Use Item > New to create new project, task, or note items.

Organize with Lists

TaskPaper uses lists of lists (outlines) to organize items.

1. Use Tab to indent selected items into a sub-list.
2. Use Shift-Tab to un-indent selected items out of a sub-list.
3. Drag and drop item using the dot handle that shows on the item's left.
4. Use Item > Group Items to group items under a new item.
5. Use Item > Duplicate Items (Shift-Command-D) to duplicate items.
6. Use Item > Format to change the type of existing items.
7. Use Item > Move (Control-Command-Arrows) to move items in your lists.
8. Use Item > Move to Project… (Command-\) to move items to a project.
9. Use Item > Delete Items (Shift-Control-K) to delete items.

When using Item > Move to Project… you can move to a new project by typing the new project name into the "Move to Project" palette and pressing Enter.

Organize More with Tags

Tags provide another way to organize (and later search for) items.

1. Use Item > Tag With… (Command-T) to apply existing tags.
2. Use Item > Tag With… then Shift-UP/Down arrows to apply multiple tags.
3. Use Item > Tag With… then type new tag name and press Enter to create new tags.
4. Or just type the @ symbol in the editor followed by a tagname to create a tag.

Tags are great if you need them, but they are not always necessary. You can make great use of TaskPaper without using tags at all. It all depends on how much structure you want.

Use @done Tags to Create Todo Lists

TaskPaper has some simple conventions for working with "todo" style lists.

1. If you have something "todo" add it to your list as a task.
2. When you complete a task cross it out by applying the @done tag (Command-D). Items tagged with @done are visually crossed out. This is because of a style rule in the default stylesheet. You can setup similar styling rules in your own stylesheets.
3. Use Tag > Archive @done Items to move all @done items and the items they contain to the "Archive:" project (Command-Shift-A). If this "Archive" project doesn't already exist in your outline TaskPaper creates it for you.