Average Reviews:
(More customer reviews)I've been using and relying on Omnifocus for the Mac for about a year. I agree with other reviews here and elsewhere that the conceptual framework of the product is very strong in its support of GTD. This is especially true if you have a lot of tasks, or a lot of irons in the fire, or simply a good imagination.
However, the usability of the product has consistently fallen short of my expectations and needs for the entire time. Just as I systematize an approach (use this view, do this on this schedule) for managing tasks, I find some annoying and confusing roadblock. They are everywhere. They don't prevent me from managing my tasks and they don't lose any data, but they constantly divert me from work into work-arounds.
For example, let's look at entering new tasks. I use the Quick Entry window, which I really appreciate for dumping new tasks from anywhere on my Mac when I think of them. If you don't enter a project and context, the item goes into your Inbox, as it should. So from time to time one cleans up the Inbox. If you have a simple project structure with no outline groups, you can just do this in the Inbox window using pulldowns. But if you use outline groups (and they are very useful), you have to open another window to show the projects so you can pinpoint the project's outline group you want to use.
The Inbox menu item is only available when there is a window open. So if you don't have any windows open you can't see the Inbox. There is a built-in Inbox perspective that you cannot delete but you can reformat. But it is not involved in any way when you click on the Inbox menu item.
The Inbox folder icon in the project folder list conveniently shows the number of items remaining, just as the No Context item shows them because they usually have no context. But clicking on the No Context folder doesn't show all the items having no context (and causing the number to appear) because the typical context filter you use during work doesn't show the offenders. In fact, no matter how you fool with the filters, it's hard to find the offenders for the No Context view.
To summarize, you may think I'm just complaining about some features I would have if I were king. Quite the contrary... just dropping items into the Inbox and clearing the Inbox out is not nearly as seamless as you would expect. And the same is true for numerous other routine tasks. In using the product it seems to me as if a lot of great ideas were collected into the program without spending enough effort integrating them to be sure they were usable day-to-day by real people.
I continue to use the product because there is no real alternative on the Mac to-date. However I remain frustrated because Omnifocus diverts so much of my attention away from the tasks I need to do. Maybe it's just because I have such high hopes based on how it looks and seems to operate. Before you commit yourself to purchasing and using it I suggest you take a serious look at what you expect to do with it all day, and decide if maybe another one of the alternative would work better. I think its power has exceeded the elegance of its user interface.
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