Merlin Applescript – Transfer selected activities to Things

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Do you use Merlin for project management and Things for GTD? That’s great, we also do the same and transfer activities from our Merlin projects to Things as todos. Are you wondering how we do it? Well, Things has no import or file open features, so we cannot export a file to import in Thing, but Merlin and Things support applescript, so this is how we connect the two applications; by applescript. And here is how it works. Installation

  • Just download an applescript we wrote
  • Expand the zip archive
  • Start Merlin in case it is not already running
  • Call File > Send To > Open Scripts Folder
  • Copy the contained applescript into the “SendToMenu” folder (it’s path is ~/Library/Application Support/Merlin/SendToMenu)

  • For Mavericks, Mountain Lion and Lion users: If your ‘Security & Privacy’ system preference is not set to allow applications downloaded from ‘Anywhere’,
    • please select temporarily ‘Mac App Store and identified developers’.
    • Right-click the applescript application from within Merlin’s Scripts folder
    • Choose “Open” from the context menu
    • And  click in the next dialogue again on “Open” button
    • This will start Merlin and the script may or may-not work
  • Restart your Merlin to complete installation.

Workflow

  1. Open your Merlin project and select the activities you want to transfer.
  2. Call the script as shown under File > Send To >

Result

    See your tasks inserted in Things into a new Things project.

UPDATE September 5, 2013: Updated and added tip for Mountain Lion and Lion users (GateKeeper) March 27, 2012: Updated and simplified installation procedure.

23 thoughts on “Merlin Applescript – Transfer selected activities to Things”

  2. It doesn’t work for me.
    I can ues the menu but nothing appears in Things. No project, no activity. What an I doing wrong?
    Thanks for yor inputs.

  3. Hi Robert, please repeat download and installation of the script. I did some changes and added some error reporting. Had you selected any activities in your project priorly to calling the script?

    Best regards, Vicky

  4. It’s the same file. No change in behavior. Maybe you can upload the script again and make sure it is a new one.
    And yes, I had selected one or more activities and tried it with Things running or not.
    This would really be a cool “thing” i like to use. Thanks.

  5. Ok Robert, so you already have the latest version of the script. I would suggest you make sure you are also using the latest version of Merlin and Things.

    Are you sure you have extracted the zip and put the applescript file in the SendToMenu folder and not the zipped archive itself?

    The script works for other users and other projects… so if this is not the case for you, you may send a copy of your project to Merlin’s support and describe which activities won’t get transferred to Things.

    Best regards, Vicky

  6. Pingback: Things to Merlin – Transfer selected todos to Merlin » MacPM

  7. Works for me. Seems true that if I name my Merlin project the same name as my Things project, it “Sends To” from Merlin to the proper Things project. All synchronized now. Nice work!

  8. cool Quevin 🙂 great to read this

    hi Robert, please repeat the download. We did some changes and saved the script as an applescript application which hopefully solves the problem you had on your mac using it directly out of the SendTo menu.

  9. How is the due date defined ? It is set, but not according to any date that is relevant for the project (I do have my own date settings)

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  13. Yes, we see… how can you change the date format in Things to yyyymmdd?

    We see in our Things Jan 11, 2012 for today.

    We have added a dialogue to ask for the date to be used as due date. Planned start, or planned end.

  14. It is the date setting that is coming from the system wide preferences -> it causes “short date as string” to be formatted as yyyymmdd.

  16. You would need to edit the script.

    If you don’t want a tag at all, you can change the following line:
    set s to “#” & TheTag & ” ” & TheTitle & ” [” & TheMerlinProj & “] > ” & TheDueDateString

    to…
    set s to “#” & TheTitle & ” [” & TheMerlinProj & “] > ” & TheDueDateString

    If you need another tag, you need to change the line where the tag gets set. This is here:
    — create tags in Things
    try
    get (tag whose name is TheTag)
    on error
    set NewTag to make new tag with properties {name:TheTag}
    end try
    Whereby “TheTag” is a property by the value “Merlin”

  17. I am a things user and just introduced to merlin. Trying trial version to establish connection between merlin and things but the i can’t find the library path or the downloads are not zipped. they are two scptd files that script doesn’t open.

    not sure what to do.

  18. I don’t understand, Sorry. This blog post gives a link to a zip file called “Things.applescript.zip”
    It also explains that you need to expand it. You get an applescript application called “Selection to Things”.
    Now you need to place this under the following path:
    ~/Library/Application Support/Merlin/SendToMenu
    And restart Merlin.

    Which script are you referring?

    This script here is ment to work with Merlin to transfer tasks from Merlin to Things.

    Are you having problems using the other script? The one for Things transferring to Merlin?

    Best regards, Vicky

  19. I’m not having success transferring Merlin activities to Things. I downloaded Applescript version dated April 27, 2011. I have a MacBook Air with OS X 10.9.1, Merlin 2.9.2, and Things 2.2.5

    Any help appreciated,
    Tom

  20. Hmm, the script is as you say from 2011 and tested with that Things version. I’ll check it on Mavericks and with the latest Things version and let you know as soon as I have more information on this.

    Best regards, Vicky

  21. Hi, I’ve just tested it on Mavericks with Merlin 2.9.2 and the latest Things 2.2.5
    It works just fine.

    The script is provided as a zip archive and ever since Lion zip archives are blocked by the Gate Keeper unless they are signed by a developer certificate. We don’t sign AppleScript samples, so to use it, you need
    1. to allow your system to run (in the ‘Security & Privacy’ system preference)all applications downloaded from ‘Anywhere’.
    2. Start the script
    3. and change afterwards the security setting as you like.

    Best regards, Vicky

  22. I can’t find any means of getting to-do’s from Things to Merlin (the other direction works).
    Where is the “Apple Script” menu in Things?
    NB I only have the Things demo version right now.

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