Tag Archives: Things

Things to Merlin – Transfer selected todos to Merlin on another mac

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We have posted information for transferring activities from Merlin to Things and todos from Things to Merlin. Mentioned approaches require both applications (Merlin and Things) to be installed on the same mac.

But… how to proceed if you want to transfer your data to another Mac where you may have installed Merlin, or when wanting to forward to a PM using Merlin? By a similar approach.

Just use another AppleScript we specifically wrote, which reads the selected todos from Things and writes in a Merlin XML file, which you can open in Merlin by drag&drop. For an easy file transfer, the script creates an email message and attaches the Merlin file.  Cool, isn’t?

Installation:

  • Just download the applescript
  • Expand the zip archive
  • Install the contained AppleScripts into the ‘Things Scripts’ directory
    /Users/[your user name]/Library/Containers/com.culturedcode.things/Data/Library/Application Support/Cultured Code/Things Scripts/
  • Restart your Things

Preparation:

    Work in Things. Create todos in Things and name them. Add on those todos, if required, due dates, tags, notes and may click the todos to define that they are completed

Workflow:

  1. Start your Things and view your todos
  2. Select the todos to be transferred
  3. Call the script “Things > Mail > Merlin” from the scripts menu of Things
  4. Enter the email address of the recipient in the mail message which is automatically created in Mail.app and contains a Merlin-XML file
  5. Send the mail message.
  6. As the recipient of this mail… Drag the XML file as displayed in the email message onto the activities area of an opened Merlin project.

Result:

    The todos will be inserted as activities in the Merlin project.

Merlin 2.7.9: Connecting to Things, better collaboration to MS Project

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Merlin, the most successful project management software for the Mac, collaborates now even better with other applications. New workflows are introduced in the latest version 2.7.9 enabling it to connect to the popular personal task management mac software Things (by Cultured Code). Further enhancements are also implemented for the collaboration with the market leading project management software for Windows MS Project. And last but not least, several improvements under the hood ensure Merlin’s typical high software stability and robustness.

This is a  dream come true for Merlin and Things users: Merlin and Things can finally work together. With just a few clicks you can now export Merlin activities as todos to Things or import todos from Things as activities into Merlin. The two market-leading applications for project management and personal task management on Mac are finally not only complementary on paper but also in practice. An easy and self-explanatory data exchange workflow, implemented in AppleScript, makes this possible.

We use Things from Culture Code regularly for personal task management in our company. It was only logical to add the capability to connect Things to Merlin and of course just a question of time until we would be able to provide such a solution to our customers. We are very happy, that this is now the case. It will be a great help for many Merlin users, as they won’t need to transfer activities and todos anymore between the two applications by hand.

Frank Blome, ProjectWizards – CEO.

Things to Merlin – Transfer selected todos to Merlin

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This is a  dream come true for Merlin and Things users: Merlin and Things can finally work together.

With just a few clicks you can now export Merlin activities as todos to Things or import todos from Things as activities into Merlin. The two market-leading applications for project management and personal task management on Mac are finally not only complementary on paper but also in practice. An easy and self-explanatory data exchange workflow, implemented in AppleScript, makes this possible.

This article describes the installation procedure of the scripts and the workflows we specifically defined in the latest Merlin 2.7.9 update for the following 2 use cases:

Prepare your Todos in Things and install the scripts

1. Use case „Transfer tasks to Merlin on the same Mac“

2. Use case „Transfer tasks to Merlin on another Mac“

Preparation

Work in Things. Create todos in Things and name them. Add on those todos, if required, due dates, tags, notes and may click the todos to define that they are completed

Installation

  • Download

    • the scripts

  • Expand the zip archive
  • Copy contained AppleScript Application Packages into the ‘Things Scripts’ directory
    /Users/[your user name]/Library/Containers/com.culturedcode.things/Data/Library/Application Support/Cultured Code/Things Scripts/

 

  • Restart your Things


Continue reading →

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.