Drag tasks onto tasks to merge into subtasks
complete
Alex Cunningham
complete
The ability to merge tasks is now publicly released! Simply hold your
alt
or option
key, pick up a task, and drop it onto another. Check out this post for more information and a quick video demo:
https://sunsama.canny.io/changelog/merge-tasks
Rebecca Keller
This is yet another feature that ignores mobile usage [I use the web-app btw, because mobile app, while its improved, lacks too much] -- How can I hold down keys when I have no keyboard?
It's not the only mobile issue. Eg. Add task to calendar used to work good. But now if I want to AVOID splitting a task into multiple blocks I must hold-down a key I don't have.
At least this latest doesn't remove functionality.
I am disappointed in the trajectory of Sunsama and long-term am on my way out. Mobile should be a priority
Alex Cunningham
Rebecca Keller: Hi Rebecca, we're working on adding the merge feature to the mobile app.
If you use the mobile app, it's very easy to timebox a task to the calendar at any time of your choosing without splitting. If you're having issues with this, can you chat with us in support about this?
Alex Cunningham
complete
The ability to merge tasks is now publicly released! Simply hold your
alt
or option
key, pick up a task, and drop it onto another. Check out this post for more information and a quick video demo:
Rebecca C
Alex Cunningham From what I can see this doesn't work if you're trying to merge a task into a repeating task - is that right? (I was hoping this would work like Akiflow's "time slots", where you can have a repeating slot on the calendar and drag any task in - recurring or otherwise)
Alex Cunningham
Rebecca C Hey Rebecca, no you should be able to merge a task into a recurring task! Can you send us a message in support chat so we can see what the issue is?
Patrick Scheuerer
This is already great, thank you for implementing this! One very common use case I have is dragging tasks onto meeting that I've imported from the calendar. Here's a common scenario, I receive a few messages on Slack and turn them into tasks in Sunsama. If I don't get around to answer them asynchronously during the day, I'd like to add them to our teams daily checkin meeting for triage for the next day.
Do you plan to implement adding tasks to a time-based task (meeting) as well? This would be fantastic!
Bruno Bernardino
Hi Patrick Scheuerer, thank you for sharing your use case! For now we don't plan on supporting merging into/from calendar events since that involves a lot more UI/UX considerations, but if there's enough interest, we'll certainly consider it.
Mark Adams
This is awesome! Loving it. Thank you!!
Veerle Persy
Super helpful. I gained so much clarity in my day.
One suggestion for improvement:
You can merge tasks into calendar items as well, but they don't show up when you open the calendar item and hence they cannot be removed again or altered. That would make a useful edition imo: eg to drag the tasks to be discussed during a team meeting into the calendar item by way of creating a meeting agenda.
Bruno Bernardino
Veerle Persy: Thanks for mentioning this! That is actually a bug, as we don't want to allow merging tasks into events for now (it's a whole Pandora's box and why we don't allow merging events into other tasks as well, yet).
Notes in the events are the way to go for now, they're powerful and you can create checkboxes in them for a similar effect.
George Napier
Hi. I really like this idea. A couple of thoughts...
When you drag to merge tasks, can the resulting merged task list both tasks (the dragged and the target) as subtasks of a "larger" task? In other words, a "meta task" is created that has both tasks listed as subtasks. It can have some temporary name (like "New Meta Task").
Also, can the new meta task reflect the combined length of the two tasks (or at least have that as an option)? Especially when I have two tasks on my timeline and one is directly after the other.
Or is this all possible and I just missed the key combos (again)? :)
Thoughts?
Ashutosh Priyadarshy
George Napier: Yup, this is one of the biggest product/ux questions we're grappling with right now internally. We've had a few other notes to do this and we'll see if there's a better experience we can build around this or not in an upcoming update to this feature.
There's still a lot more we're planning to add before we announce and finalize this feature so really appreciate you mentioning this!
P
Petr Víteček
A first impression thought - move the subtask out to create a standalone task. Other than that, it does exactly what I'd expect - which is great! Love you guys!
PS: If you could get rid of the Alt key, it would be great!
Ashutosh Priyadarshy
Petr Víteček: You can move the subtask out! Go into the task page, click the double rectangle icon on the subtask's row to eject it.
I wish we could get rid of the alt key but for various technical reasons, this saves us several weeks of building this feature and also ensure you don't take this semi-destructive merge action by accident.
Vincent Le Pes III
Ashutosh Priyadarshy yes I think I would find it more frustrating to accidentally merge a task when I'm quickly reordering tasks every day. I get the keyboard shortcut is a necessary evil, unless there was something like a delay where you had to hold it over the task a few seconds and then the merge icon would appear to let me know. Just spitballing here, overall I am very pleased to have this feature now and especially with it supporting integrations!
Saul Annett
Brilliant, great work - thank you! Can I ask if, once you have dragged a task into a subtask, there is any way to delete or remove the subtask? I've managed to drag a task into another but I made a mistake and can't find a way to disconnect them again
Jack Mitchell
Saul AnnettJust click the "convert to task" button to the left of the actual time listing -- you get a separate task with the original integration.
Bruno Bernardino
Saul Annett: What Jack Mitchell said will work. If you detect the mistake within its first few seconds, you should also be able to CMD/CTRL + Z and undo the merge.
Ryan Watts
Yes!, rockstart team thank you
Bruno Bernardino
We have just released the public beta for our first version of merging tasks (supporting the use case of merging tasks into another task as a subtask, including from integrations). You can enable it at https://app.sunsama.com/settings#betaMergeTasks and use the Alt/Option key when dragging a task.
In general terms, what should work:
- Merge a task in from an integration, keeping that integration information and automations in the new subtask
- Merge a task into another task
- Using keyboard shortcuts in subtasks while hovering them with the task open
What doesn’t work:
- If you merge a task in with timeboxed information, that won’t get saved
- You can’t set a separate start date on a subtask
- You can't merge a completed task
- You can't merge an event
- The mobile app still doesn't show the subtask integration information
Here's a demo:
Please let us know if you find any issues or have any suggestions!
Roni Laukkarinen
Bruno Bernardino Nice! Thank you so much.
Pieter Beukes
Bruno Bernardino this is awesome! Thanks guys!
Matthieu Ortalda
Bruno Bernardino Works like a charm, thank you!
Ben Farber
Bruno Bernardino this is amazing!!! Such a huge upgrade, and love the UI choices (alt key + merge logo + blue shading).
One small piece of feedback would be that it would be nice for the alt key to work after the dragging has already begun, but that a mere nice-to-have; I can definitely get used to holding alt before I start dragging!
Thanks again to you and the team for making this long-awaited feature a reality :)
Pierre Colson
Bruno Bernardino Thanks a lot!
Jack Mitchell
Bruno Bernardino This is something I have been waiting eagerly for. Thank you!! One suggestion: I see the button to pull up the item in the original integration. It would be really nice if you could also pull up the sunsama task details page as well, rather than having to open a new window.
Jacob Lund
Bruno Bernardino You guys are amazing - just dragged a few tasks into a larger "morning admin section" and it felt so satisfactory! :D
James Leow
Bruno Bernardino Overall, this is working exactly how I'd want it to! One visual "bug": When I drag a task into the another it flies down the screen before being added to the new task. Very minor--and slightly confusing the first time I dragged a task. But overall, THANK YOU for this.
Ashutosh Priyadarshy
James Leow: This is something we thought we'd fixed and it's possible it still exists. Next time this happens can you please send a message in the in-app support bubble or to support@sunsama.com saying it just happened so we can check our logs to see what happened?
If you can get this to happen often a screen recording would be golden to help us fix this.
Ashutosh Priyadarshy
Jacob Lund: Yesss! Glad it's helping, that's exactly what I use it for too :)
Ashutosh Priyadarshy
Jack Mitchell: Do you want to open up the original task the subtask came from?
Ashutosh Priyadarshy
Ben Farber: Thanks, Ben. I think we'll probably skip that as it would likely require us to do a full rebuild of the drag and drop library we use all through Sunsama.
I agree, it's not ideal. In a perfect world, there'd be no modifier key at all and you could just drag on to a task directly but doing that would have extended the build time on this by many, many weeks so it's a tradeoff we're fine with. Since merging a subtask in can be a semi-destructive action (perhaps it's more of a deep modification of the task) we felt opting into that with a modifier key is also a nice touch, so it's hard to do it on accident.
Sculley, Jennifer
Bruno Bernardino THIS IS AMAZING. I'm seriously looking forward to this week so that I can feel the benefits of this feature. Thank you!
Jack Mitchell
Ashutosh Priyadarshyexactly. Since I can access many of the elements of the Trello card, including checklists, directly in Sunsama. I would rather be able to open the original task from the sub task list than to open the Trello card. If I need to open the Trello card I can do that from the Sunsama task.
Vicky Hughes
Bruno Bernardino Love it!!!!!!
Bruno Bernardino
Ben Farber: Thanks for the kind words! Unfortunately we're limited by what the tooling allows here (for now, it might change in the future) and it's not possible to change the behavior of the drag _after_ you start dragging the element.
Ben Farber
Bruno Bernardino No worries at all! Not a big deal whatsoever :)
James Leow
Ashutosh Priyadarshy Just sent an email with a screen capture!
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