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I want to change the TODO state of a task automatically on a give date. I would expect something like this:

* FUTU Some task that only becomes actionable of a given date
:PROPERTIES:
:ACTIONABLE: some-function(<timestamp>, TODO)
:END:

This block should automatically change the task to a TODO state once the date is reached. Is there a package that can do this?

Regards,

juanerasmoe
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2 Answers2

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Not a direct answer, but I would generally use scheduling (org-schedule, C-c C-s) combined with an agenda view for this sort of workflow. The default agenda view will not include any tasks scheduled for a future date. On that date the item will start to appear.

This provides a built in way to set the date when you want a task to start showing up in your daily todo list (or GTD review view, etc).

Note that org-mode has different kinds of timestamps with different semantics, see https://emacs.stackexchange.com/a/10506/780. Your task might have a deadline as well as a scheduled time when you want to start thinking about it. (For more detail see Deadlines and Scheduling in the org manual.)

glucas
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  • Thanks for the answers. This is similar to what I'm doing at the moment, but I'm looking for a lees manual solution to change the TODO state – juanerasmoe Apr 29 '20 at 13:55
  • I wrote a function to modify the TODO state and properties of future tasks. It might be useful for your workflow. – juanerasmoe Apr 30 '20 at 20:13
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I ended up writing a small functions for this purpose

(defun j/org-evaluate-if-actionable ()
  "Returns t if the task at point is actionable or nil if it isn't"
  (and (org-entry-get (point) "ACTIONABLE")
       (string< (org-read-date nil nil (org-entry-get (point) "ACTIONABLE"))
                    (org-read-date nil nil "+0"))))

(defun j/org-process-task ()
    "Vefifies if a task is actionable. If it is, set it as actionable"
    (message "PROPIEDAD: %s" (stringp (org-entry-get (point) "ACTIONABLE")))
    (message "Tarea: %s" (org-entry-get (point) "ITEM"))
    (message "Accionable: %s:" (j/org-evaluate-if-actionable))
    (when (j/org-evaluate-if-actionable)
           (org-todo "TODO")
           (org-delete-property "ACTIONABLE")))

(defun j/org-verify-actionable-tasks ()
  "Goes through al agenda files checking if FUTU tasks are actionable"
  ;(interactive)
  (org-map-entries
   '(j/org-process-task)
   "/+FUTU" 'agenda))

;; Ejecutar j/org-verify-actionable-tasks cada vez que se corra la agenda. Lo hace antes de que se calcula le agenda.
(add-hook 'org-agenda-mode-hook #'j/org-actionable)
(defun j/org-actionable ()
  (j/org-verify-actionable-tasks))

This function will find tasks with a FUTU TODO state and an ACTIONABLE property prior to today. Then, it changes the TODO state to TODO and removes the ACTIONABLE property. For example, this task

* FUTU Some task
  :PROPERTIES:
  :ACTIONABLE: [2020-04-29]
  :END:

Will look like this after the date set in actionable ACTIONABLE:

* TODO Some task
juanerasmoe
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  • How are you creating the ACTIONABLE date, or are you doing this manually via `C-c C-x p`? I'm curious why you think this is faster than scheduling your entries to some future date. – jagrg Apr 30 '20 at 21:15
  • @jagrg It isn't faster (in fact, it's a bit slower, but nothing tha can't be fixed with a bit of elisp). I use it because, in my workflow, I need to distinguish between tasks that can be done (with `TODO` state) and tasks that I register but are on hold until a certain date or condition (with `FUTU`state). The function is to automatically change the `FUTU` tasks into `TODO` state once the actionable date comes. It might be overly complicated, but works for me – juanerasmoe Apr 30 '20 at 22:42