The Omni Show

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Dave Messent, OmniFocus product manager, and Tim Ekl, OmniFocus engineer, join the show for a special episode to talk about OmniFocus 3 (for Mac and iOS) and tags. In the new OmniFocus, tags replace contexts. Tags can do everything contexts can do, and more — you can apply multiple tags to tasks and projects, where with contexts you could apply just one. Dave and Tim go into detail on how this all works, and they discuss some of the organization and workflows that tags enable. You can find Dave @dmessent on Twitter, and you can find Tim on Twitter @timothyekl and on the web For more about tags, you read the Omni Roadmap 2018 — particularly the second half, which concentrates on OmniFocus — and listen to a previous episode of the show where Ken Case talks about the roadmap. Also see the OmniFocus 3 development blog, which is just starting up (at this writing) and will have more details as we post more.

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Dave Lonning — world-traveler, world-builder — joins the show to talk about writing documentation for Omni apps — and about how the tools and formats have changed over the years. He also talks about moving, after college, to Japan — where he taught English and later worked on video game localization. He was there in 2011 when a devastating earthquake and tsunami hit. Dave’s hobbies include role-playing games — running and creating — and painting miniatures. And, most importantly, he’s a cat person who’s learned to love the office canids. You can find Dave @zroundbls on Twitter. Some other people, places, and things mentioned: Apple Help format Apple Help Viewer OmniOutliner Python WebView EPUB iBooks PDF MultiMarkdown OmniGraffle OmniFocus OmniPlan OmniGraphSketcher The bus to work Documentation at support.omnigroup.com Apple-II-compatible Laser 128 Performa 405 Silo Macalaster College Japan The Last Samurai All your base are belong to us PCs 2011 Japanese Earthquake William Van Hecke Seattle Interbay Caffe Appassionato Role-playing games (RPGs) Dungeons & Dragons (D&D) Pathfinder Painting miniatures Cat Made-up languages The Rocketeer

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Ainsley Bourque Olson — knitter, cat person, OmniPlan planner — joins the show to talk about being the product manager of a project management app. And about how to go from Apple retail to world domination. And about how to get by in Norwegian Ballard. You can find Ainsley @ainslaw on Twitter and on Instagram. Some other people, places, and things mentioned: Canada Product Management WWDC Apple Ken Case Project Management OmniGraffle OmniFocus Getting Things Done (GTD) Gantt Chart Waterfall management Network diagram Project Levelling Las Vegas Monte Carlo simulation Microsoft Project Windows UW Continuing Education Program Omni internal tools OmniPresence OmniDiskSweeper WebDAV Nova Scotia University of Washington Bondi blue iMac Family tree diagram Political Science Apple Store University Village Pages Numbers Aaron Cherof Pneumonia King of Norway Syttende Mai Parade in Ballard Knitting Ballard’s Brewery District Stoup Cats Derek Motonaga Linus and Lucy

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Orion Protonentis — swashbuckler, bug-hunter, pastry-enjoyer — joins the show to talk about testing Omni apps. And about his life on the stage with swords. After studying acting and stage combat in Hawaii, Tennessee, and Las Vegas, and after tending bar and running nightclubs, Orion — whose first computers were Commodore 64, TRS-80, and Apple II — answered the call to come do support at The Omni Group. He later made his way to the test department, where he’s been finding bugs — so you don’t have to. You can find Orion @orionp on Twitter and on Micro.blog. Some other people, places, and things mentioned: Orion Ares Invisible Hair X-Men OmniGraffle OmniFocus Apple Watch OmniOutliner Valentine‘s Day OmniPlan Ken’s Roadmap Blog Post OmniWeb, OmniDiskSweeper Liz Marley Brian Covey Ken Case Portland University of Oregon Trash-80 Conan the Barbarian Living Videotext ThinkTank MORE Sophocles Shakespeare Scimitar Star Wars The Princess Bride Sword Fight Society of American Fight Directors Fight Choreography The Globe Theater Julius Caesar The Scottish Play Twelfth Night Seattle Opera The Nightmare Before Christmas

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Ken Case, CEO and one of the founders of The Omni Group, talks about what we accomplished in 2017 and what we plan to do in 2018. It’s a big year, especially for OmniFocus 3 for Mac and iOS. You can read all about it: see Omni Roadmap 2018 on our blog. And go back in time, if you like, to the 2017 roadmap. And 2016 and 2015. You can find Ken @kcase on Twitter. You can also find @omnigroup on Twitter and on Micro.blog.

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Liz Marley, unlike your host, is not afraid of math — and she brings that fearlessness to work every day on OmniGraffle, which is chock-full of math-y goodness. After getting a computer science degree from Harvey Mudd, then joining The Omni Group in 2005 and working as a tester, OmniBugZapper PM, tester, OmniFocus PM, and tester, two years ago she walked down the hall and switched to engineering. She also volunteers for App Camp for Girls, does innovative technical talks (using Swift playgrounds), and keeps up on her knitting. You can find Liz @emarley on Twitter. Some other people, places, and things mentioned: Africa by Toto Ken Case Brian Young Micro.blog Apple Radar Swift Objective-C Swift and Objective-C Interoperability Kristina Sontag Pancakes Bacon Fritz Klug OmniPlan Delta Drawing Logo Windows Microsoft SQL Server Craig’s List OmniOutliner OmniWeb Best Buy Costco Hula hoops Jumpropes App Store Grey Osten Laura Savino CocoaConf Seattle Xcoders Affine Transforms Swift by Northwest OmniFocus Curt Clifton

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Mark got hooked on video and special effects at the age of five when he saw a TV show about the effects behind The Empire Strikes Back. After creating videos for vast government bureaucracies and The History Channel, Mark moved to Seattle to come work at Omni — which, from his point of view, is a video production company that happens to create some companion software to go along with the movies. Mark also hosts The Optical podcast, which you should listen to. And — most critically — Mark is this show’s intrepid producer. You can find Mark @bobtiki on Twitter. You may, if you meet him in person, call him Bob. It’s fine. Some other people, places, and things mentioned: The Great British Baking Show Omni customer story video (an example video, shot at Camp 1 Vineyard) Omni Slack channel Computer Science BASIC Unix VAX OmniPlan OmniPlan videos James Bond villains Final Cut Pro Adobe Premiere Adobe After Effects Adobe Audition 4K Resolution Canon C Series Camera Tweening Special effects SPFX: The Empire Strikes Back Le Voyage Dans la Lun (A Trip to the Moon) by Georges Méliès Darth Vader Luke Skywalker Mark Hamill National Institutes of Health Scrooged Bill Murray Media 100 Avid PowerMac 9600 Gaithersburg, MD Boston Final Cut Server History Channel Ancient Aliens That one guy with the hair Digging for the Truth North Carolina Roanoke Colony MacGyver Richard Dean Anderson NSCoderNight DC Jose Vazquez Seattle Cinefex magazine Douglas Trumbull Harrison Ellenshaw Howie Weed Star Trek: The Motion Picture Tiki Kilauea Cove Tikibar.tv Rum DisneyLand Florida Fort Lauderdale Florida Keys Tampa Bay Critiki Raspberry Pi Adafruit Trader Sam’s Enchanted Tiki Bar

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Andrea studied fine art at Michigan State and human-computer interaction at the University of Michigan. One day, while working at the school library, it was discovered that she could make websites — which launched her career as a UX designer, and since 2012 she’s been designing apps at Omni. Andrea, it must be told, is firmly against stealing money from puppies — or maybe she’s against treating puppies as a particularly cuddly form of currency and then stealing them. Nobody knows which. Don’t do either! You can find Andrea @amcvittie on Twitter. And you can find her work in every single Omni app. Some other people, places, and things mentioned: User Experience (UX) User Experience and Ethics Mike Monteiro OmniFocus Sync Encryption Tim Ekl OmniGraffle Apple Pencil OmniFocus Tags Vesper Curt Clifton Jim Correia darkpatterns.org Seattle Art Museum Omni Slack Group Rosemary Orchard Omni Support Listener question from Twitter Michigan State Library Adobe Photoshop Shadows from the Walls of Death University of Michigan School of Information Oliver, who’s a good dog

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Brian Covey studied computer science at The Evergreen State College — which your host also attended, but back before computers were a thing. After some normal young-person-bouncing-around a little, Brian came to shore at Omni in 2001, where he became the leader, dear and fearless, of Omni’s Support Humans. You can find Brian @hidvorak on Twitter. (You can contact Omni support at support.omnigroup.com.) You can also find a video of Brian doing the worm in an Omni commercial from 2006. Absolutely not to be missed! Some other people, places, and things mentioned: The Music of Aaron Cherof (Aaron works at Omni and does the music for this show) Elevate Support conference Ken Case Chuck Toporek OmniWeb British Columbia Ninjas Droids Curt Clifton Pair programming OmniPlan Babylon 5 Seattle NetZero Mac OS X Boomerangs Nirvana K Dorm Experience Music Project (now MoPOP) Dave Grohl Nomeansno Skinner Box Mythical Man Month Spokane Antonín Dvořák Dvorak keyboard Repetitive Strain Injury (RSI)

Full transcript and show notes at theomnishow.omnigroup.com Curt Clifton came to Omni while on sabbatical from his computer science professorship at Rose-Hulman — and never went back. He’s spent much of his six years at Omni on the OmniFocus team, where he clicks checkboxes for a living. Curt’s a fan of the local association football team. He also likes woodworking and distance-running, though he has yet to explore the synergistic possibilities of doing both at the same time. You can find Curt @curtclifton on Twitter and at curtclifton.net. Some other people, places, and things mentioned: iOS 11 drag and drop OmniFocus 3: tags Files app World Wide Developer’s Conference (WWDC) (aka Dub Dub) Lake Union iOS 7 The notch AppleScript OmniOutliner Ethan Schoonover Kinkless GTD Getting Things Done, by David Allen Indiana Omni Forums Ken Case Tim Wood The Amish Vanilla Ice Crocodile Dundee Pennsylvania Dutch Country Good ’N Plenty Restaurant Amana Colonies Tim Ekl Jim Correia Pomona College Harvey Mudd College Reid Callan Tom Bunch Cubs Major League Soccer Cup Boston Marathon Marathon Support Humans