Re: Contracts in Orgmode

[Markus Heller <hellerm2@gmail.com>]

On 12/24/2009 1:22 AM, David Maus wrote:
> At Tue, 22 Dec 2009 13:49:07 -0800,
> Markus Heller wrote:
>>
>>
>> After some more googling and having a closer look at the org manual, I
>> came up with a solution that might work.  It uses dependencies and
>> org-depend.el.  I've pasted it below, and as usual, I'd appreciate any
>> comments/improvement :)
>>
>> I realize that this is not exactly an elegant solution, but it might
>> work for me.  I'd still like to see a way in orgmode to allow clocking
>> in on certain tasks only during a specific period of time, maybe
>> something like
>>
>> ** Contract for Client A
>>      :PROPERTIES:
>>        :START: 01-01-2010
>>        :EXPIRY: 03-31-2010
>>      :END:
>>
>> Then, when the START date is reached, the task state gets changed to the
>> TODO or STARTED, and once the expiry date is reached, it gets marked
>> DONE, and cannot be clocked in anymore.  I'm not sure if this is a
>> feature that would be of general interest ...  But what do the experts
>> think?
>
> With regards to closing expired items you may take a look at
> org-expiry.el in the contrib directory. It provides a function to
> check for and act upon entries that are past their expiration date.

Thanks.  I'll have a look at it.

> What I am not quite understanding is the wish to be unable to clock in
> a closed item: Isn't clocking in something you do deliberately?

Work should only be done if a valid contract exists (no valid contract, 
no payment, right? :) ).  Right now, my work flow is to bring up an 
agenda view with all STARTED items, and then I'd clock in on the 
Contract.  I'm not aware of how to check if the contract is valid or 
not, so I might be clocking in on an expired contract.

Is there a way to include an expiry flag in the agenda view?  Maybe 
there can be a regexp in the PROPERTIES that checks if the actual date 
is before the expiry date?  If that was the case, then that would let me 
see right away in the agenda view if I'm about to clock in on an expired 
contract.

I hope I'm not too confusing in my description of what I'm trying to 
achieve ...

In any case, merry xmas to all of you!
Markus