Some comments regarding (3x5) printing- since you blogged about it (it was going to hit the beta email list otherwise)...

Current choice of column size does not appear to make sense.  There is too much space reserved in various areas around the card (right hand side and bottom).  There is currently no manner to change the viewed columns or size of columns in the print out version.

To give you an idea of the problems- print an 8.5x11 sheet, or larger- fonts shouldn't grow past 12 points, and there's no reason to have so much space- think space-saving.

Choosing scaling function in page setup does not appear to seriously influence the column widths, often one scales in order to increase the amount on a single line, not just get more lines on the page.  [Try longer names for tasks and you'll see what I mean.]

No option for separate context lists on separate 3x5 cards.

You might consider having XML and CSS sheets for printing- the engine is there in the program… you could setup advanced printing preferences via CSS sheets, and share them with friends, etc.  [just an idea]

Also, for space-savings, perhaps having a vertical text spanning the contexts on the left hand side (rotated 90 degrees to the rest of the page), and then highlight the list by way of a color-bar at the left edge.  This would enable very quick flipping through 3x5 cards and determination of the context without need for a large line and spaces wasted in the print out.  (See hipster PDA color-coding of card-edge with Sharpie markers for an example.)

Yes, currently you can print to 3x5, but there's not much control over the view, column width, data density etc.  I'm hoping it gets better before the release…

But, I'm very thankful it's there at least rudimentarily.  I was beginning to wonder if you were waiting for everything else to be done before playing with printing!

[Also spacing options in row spacing and column spacing in the normal program would be wonderful.  A style selection similar to omnioutliner (for same-level of tasks in folders) would be helpful for altering some of this, perhaps- but perhaps not perfectly appropriate…]

Hey Brian,

I felt bad about putting all that on the blog, honestly, and so please feel free to remove it if you like.  It may just be my own tasks that don't really show up very well on the 3x5 card… but the data-density is kinda poor, so it makes using 3x5's not very easy… and I was surprised to see full-page print-outs not working also.  Would love to have more printing support if possible.  But, to be honest, I don't know how many people print this stuff out… it's the old Hi-Fi/Lo-Fi debate/question.  :)  Having any printing at all, I'm grateful for!!

Omnifocus is awesome!  Keep up the excellent work!  It's no wonder you guys got so many pre-purchasers so quickly.  Hat's off to you guys.

-Allen

A11en said: “Yes, currently you can print to 3×5, but there’s not much control over the view, column width, data density etc.”

You can control which columns to print and how wide they should be by setting them up the way you want in your view first.  Once you've done this, you can save that layout in a Perspective (along with your page layout settings), giving you one-click printing of 3x5 cards (if you follow the tip from Brian's earlier post).

testing testing 123

zimzim, we'd like to support the iPhone with a native application, but we won't be able to make any plans until Apple releases the SDK next month.

We did do some work on a web app, but setting it up proved to be more challenging than a lot of folks wanted to deal with, so we stopped work on that front. Some of our users have picked that work up and are continuing it, though; check our forums for more info.