Complete and Await Reply

celebrate progress; trust but verify

Download version 2.1 Updated November 24, 2018 with a setting (off by default) to remove all existing tags from an item before adding your Waiting For context.

(Still using an older version of OmniFocus? You really should upgrade, but in the meantime you can still download version 1.3 of this script for OmniFocus for Mac 2.22.)

This script marks the selected action as complete and creates a new action, like the selected one but prefixed with “Reply on:” and tagged with your Waiting For tag. I use this for email tasks and other actions, like ordering stuff online, where I expect a reply.

Here’s how to install the script:

  1. In OmniFocus, choose Help → Open Scripts Folder.
  2. Drag the Complete and Await Reply file into the scripts folder.
  3. Control-click the toolbar and choose Customize Toolbar to add the script to the toolbar in OmniFocus.

Replacing Tags

By default, the script will just add your Waiting For tag to the set of existing tags on your action. If you’d rather replace the existing tags, use Script Editor on your Mac to edit this bit of code, changing the false to true:

(*
    If true, then all existing tags are removed from the new
    "waiting-for" action, so that only the "waiting-for" tag
    remains. If false, then the "waiting-for" tag is added
    but all other tags are left unchanged.
*)
property removeExistingTags : false

Setting Due Dates

If you’d like to put due dates on your follow-up action, use Script Editor on your Mac to edit the number in this bit of code:

(*
    The number of days from base date that the newly created
    “waiting-for” action will be due. Set to a negative
    number to put no due date on the new action.
*)
property daysUntilDue : -1

By default the base date is relative to the due date of the original task. You can change the following property to false to make the base date relative to the time that you run the script:

(*
    If daysUntilDue is not negative, then this controls
    whether the date of the newly created “waiting-for”
    action is set relative to the original task’s due date
    or relative to today’s date.
*)
property useTaskDateAsBaseDate : true

Setting Defer Dates

If you’d like to put defer dates on your follow-up action, use Script Editor on your Mac to edit the number in this bit of code:

(*
    The number of days from now until the newly created
    "waiting-for" action will be available. Set to a
    negative number to put no defer date on the new action.
*)
property deferForDays : -1