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Comment by neilv | Hacker News Reader

If someone isn't quite ready for org-mode, but wants to try a lightweight todo list (and more) with some powerful features, there's the todo.txt format, which works with a variety of tools. (Or you might use org-mode for work projects, but todo.txt for personal.)

http://todotxt.org/

There are many programs that support todo.txt, including multiple Emacs modes.

For one of the Emacs modes, I have a few tweaks to the format and Emacs that let me use it as a lightweight todo list, calendar, and day planner.

https://github.com/avillafiorita/todotxt-mode

https://www.neilvandyke.org/todotxt/

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I use just plain text file opened in plain text editor with following conventions:

  # Topic
  [ ] A task. @tag #ticket
    [ ] A subtask.
      [ ] A sub-sub-task.
  [+] Completed task.
  [-] Failed task.
  [.] Partially completed task. WIP.
  [!] Urgent task.
  [^] High priority task.

Easy to store. Easy to share. Easy to edit at any device with plain text editor.

The only feature I miss is grouping of sub-tasks. For example, I may want to group all subtasks from all projects(topics), which I need to do at place X (e.g. at parents home), so I will prepare for them. I cannot select them all without using of SQL engine or grep like tool. If editor can highlight a search term, it helps, but for long lists it easy to miss.

keep going, you are 90% there to having a Markdown todo list like me! just use a dash and a space before the brackets and use "x" to indicate they are done. If you render the markdown in a browser you can use a mouse to click the checkboxes. Check out a markdown cheat sheet for more details.

Granted, you won't be able to use your special characters in the brackets..

IMHO, a preprocessor can be used to convert from square-brackets format into markdown format, e.g. to highlight urgent and high priority entries with different colors. Sometimes, I need to share my TODO list with a manager. However, even in it plain form, it works well. IMHO, same can be done with todo.txt and org-mode files.

Can you share more about how you generate HTML from your markdown, and how you share result, please?

I wrote a (mostly unbiased) article comparing todo.txt and Org mode a while ago.

https://medium.com/@mgkennard/a-comparison-of-two-plain-text...

Using an outliner without shortcuts that operate on outline nodes is rather akin to hitting a nail with a microscope. An outliner is fantastic when it can add and reorder nodes quickly and smoothly, so putting your thoughts in it is almost effortless. Marking an outline by hand is a dubious pastime, and by extension comparing Org to plain-text organization is questionable: the benefit will be simply overlooked and misunderstood.

Taskpaper is another text based task management system that works just about anywhere.

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