From c37f36510af61bb4e769e40bc59b54b775af8161 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Paul Beckingham Date: Wed, 27 Jan 2010 23:58:18 -0500 Subject: [PATCH] Documentation Update - Added a couple of good questions to the task-faq man page. One is a discussion of the ID number resequencing, which really should have been addressed in this way years ago. --- doc/man/task-faq.5 | 31 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 31 insertions(+) diff --git a/doc/man/task-faq.5 b/doc/man/task-faq.5 index 6d55dae97..cbdbc8f5b 100644 --- a/doc/man/task-faq.5 +++ b/doc/man/task-faq.5 @@ -43,6 +43,13 @@ file too. .TP .B Q: Can I share my tasks between different machines? +Yes, you can. Most people have success with a DropBox - a free and secure file +synching tool. Simply configure task to store it's data in a dropbox folder, by +modifying the: + + data.location=... + +configuration variable. Check out DropBox at http://www.dropbox.com. .TP .B Q: The undo.data file gets very large - do I need it? @@ -107,6 +114,30 @@ substitutions: The pattern on the left will now be a caseless search term. +.TP +.B Q: Why do the task ID numbers change? +Task does this to always show you the smallest numbers it can. The idea is that +if your tasks are numbered 1 - 33, for example, those are easy to type in. If +instead task kept a rolling sequence number, after a while your tasks might be +numbered 481 - 513, which makes it more likely to enter one incorrectly, because +there are more digits. + +When you run a report (such as "list"), task assigns the numbers before it +displays them. Those numbers are good until the next report. For example, you +can do this: + + $ task list + $ task do 12 + $ task add Pay the rent + $ task delete 31 + +Those id numbers are good until the next report is run. This is because task +performs a garbage-collect operation on the pending tasks file when a report is +run. This keeps the pending tasks file small, and therefore keeps task fast. +The completed data file is the one that grows unbounded with use, but that one +isn't accessed as much, so it doesn't matter as much. So in all, the ID number +resequencing is about efficiency. + .SH "CREDITS & COPYRIGHTS" task was written by P. Beckingham . .br