The commands in the module are intended to be used as a simple solution for personal project management or as a more extensive To-Do list. The goal is to put all of your work items at your fingertips in a PowerShell session. At a glance you should be able to see project status and update your tasks.
The core of this module is an object defined in a PowerShell class. Some of the class properties are hidden, meaning you won't see them unless you specify the property name.
Note: ID and OverDue values are calculated at run time.
[int]$ID
[string]$Name
[string]$Description
[datetime]$DueDate
[bool]$Overdue
[String]$Category
[ValidateRange(0,100)][int]$Progress
hidden[bool]$Completed
hidden[datetime]$TaskCreated = (Get-Date)
hidden[datetime]$TaskModified
hidden[guid]$TaskID = (New-Guid)
A MyTask object might look like this:
ID : 8
Name : Lab Setup
Description : DSC Labs
DueDate : 9/1/2020 12:00:00 AM
Overdue : False
Category : Work
Progress : 0
The class methods are invoked by the different functions within this module. The ID property is calculated at run-time when all the tasks are loaded into the PowerShell session. These numbers might change in the same way that job numbers change from session to session. The hidden TaskID property is the unique id for each task.
All task information is stored in an XML file which is created in the user's documents folder. On Linux with PowerShell 7, the $home folder will be used. This path is stored as a global variable myTaskPath and will have a value like: C:\Users\Jeff\Documents\myTasks.xml.
There is also an XML file for archiving completed tasks. This too is in the Documents or $home folder and can be referenced via the myTaskArchivePath variable.
NOTE: Starting with version 2.0.0 of this module the home location is determined
by using [Environment]::GetFolderPath([Environment+SpecialFolder]::MyDocuments)
Use the Get-MyTaskHome command to view your current settings. Use the
Set-MyTaskHome to modify the home variable. All other variables will be set
from that.
As tasks are created, modified, completed and archived, these XML files are
updated. Select-XML is used extensively to make this process as efficient as
possible.
The MyTask object has a provision to tag or label each task with a category. By default the class includes an enumeration with a default set of categories:
- Work
- Personal
- Other
- Customer
Or you can create your own text list of categories which override the default settings. For example, you might want to add a priority category such as High, Medium and Low.
The module is designed to look for a specific text file of category names. Instead of manually creating the text file, it is strongly recommended to use the MyTaskCategory commands.
- Add-MyTaskCategory
- Get-MyTaskCategory
- Remove-MyTaskCategory
The commands should be self-explanatory. It is also recommended to keep your custom category list as short as possible as several commands have a dynamic parameter to expand this list. You should avoid removing any item from a custom category list as long as you have an active task with that category.
Use the New-MyTask command to create a new task. The required parameters are
Name and Category. You can specify a deadline date or a number of days in
which to complete the task. If you don't specify anything the default is 7
days from the current date.
New-MyTask -Name "Rebuild DC02" -Category Work -Days 30
The Get-MyTask command will read all tasks from the task XML file and create
mytask objects. During this process, the OverDue property is calculated based
on comparing the current date to the DueDate. All tasks will be assigned an
ID value. Tasks are sorted by the due date in descending order and completed
tasks are filtered out by default. This means that you might see gaps in the
IDs. Use the -All property to display everything or -Completed to see only
completed tasks.
The module includes a custom format type extension file which includes several custom views. You can try commands like these:
Get-MyTask | Sort-Object Category | Format-Table -view Category
Get-MyTask -days 180 | Sort-Object duedate | Format-Table -view duedate
Get-MyTask | Format-List -view All
The second command is especially useful as it will display all properties, even hidden ones.
Get-MyTask has a default table view with colorized output using ANSI
escape sequences. Overdue tasks will be displayed in Red. Items that are due in
the next 24 hours will be displayed in Orange. Completed tasks will be
displayed in Green.
Use Set-MyTask to modify an existing task. You can update any combination of
these properties:
- Name
- Category
- DueDate
- Description
- Progress
You can specify a task by its name or ID, although it might be easiest to
use Get-MyTask and pipe to Set-MyTask.
Get-MyTask -id 6 | Set-MyTask -Progress 33 -DueDate 8/20/2020 -Passthru
ID Name Description DueDate OverDue Category Progress
-- ---- ----------- ------- ------- -------- --------
6 Rebuild DC02 8/20/2020 False Work 33
When a task if finished, use Complete-MyTask to mark it as complete. This
will set the Progress to 100 and set the hidden Completed property to TRUE.
Get-MyTask -id 6 | Complete-MyTask
The completed task will remain in the task XML file until you archive it or
delete it. You can delete any task from the XML file with Remove-MyTask.
If you will be making changes to your tasks, you might want to backup the
XML task file. Instead of manually copying the file use the Backup-MyTask
command. By default, the command will create a backup copy in your documents
folder using a timestamp filename.
PS C:\> backup-mytaskfile -Passthru
Directory: C:\Users\Jeff\documents
Mode LastWriteTime Length Name
---- ------------- ------ ----
-a---- 7/19/2020 6:19 PM 16461 MyTasks_Backup_20200719.xml
Or you can specify a location and file name.
Finally, if you have completed tasks that you wish to save but not be
imported every time you run Get-MyTask, you can archive them to a
separate XML file. The command is technically called Save-MyTask but you
can use the alias Archive-MyTask.
By default, all completed tasks will be removed from the tasks XML file and
stored in a file called myTasksArchive.xml in the user's documents folder.
You also have the option of archiving specific tasks. This will move the
task to the new file in its current state.
Get-MyTask TaskX | Save-MyTask -Path C:\Work\Other.xml
You can also archive a file when completing it.
Complete-MyTask -Name "setup CEO laptop" -archive
Although this will automatically archive it to the myTasksArchive.xml file.
There is no provision to specify an alternate location like Save-MyTask.
Use the Get-MyTaskArchive to retrieve archived tasks.
If you are running this module on Windows PowerShell with the PSScheduled jobs module you can create a scheduled PowerShell job to send a daily email message showing tasks that are due in the next 3 days or whatever you choose. The default behavior is to send a text message but you can send an HTML message which will add color-coding to highlight overdue and impending tasks.
Use Enable-EmailReminder to set up the scheduled job. The default time is
8:00AM daily but you can pick a different time. The job name is hard coded.
You will need to re-enter your current credentials for the task so that the
task scheduler has access to the network. Run Disable-EmailReminder to remove
the task in case you want to change it. Get-EmailReminder will display the
current state of the task.
This module is not intended as a full-feature project management tool. It is intended to serve as a light-weight reminder or to-do list system. However, feature requests and comments are welcome on the project's GitHub site at https://github.com/jdhitsolutions/MyTasks.
There are no known issues at this time.
- task
- project
- to-do