Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[Tory S. Anderson]

I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm 
loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out there 
for using it collaboratively (where others are not using emacs), 
rather than just for personal task management (where it excels)? 
It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my co-workers 
are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker. PivotalTracker 
looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage 
orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has worked 
for you? 

Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[John Kitchin]

unless those services have some kind of API, and you have the desire to
implement it in emacs, you might be out of luck.

I am trying to figure out a way to do collaborative work via email,
where I am the project coordinator. The idea is to use my email.el code
to send headlines to people I need information or action from, and then
to have them reply to the email. Then, I would have some easy way to get
information out of the reply back to the heading (e.g. TODO state
change, info etc...). Probably I would embed some org-id link in the email,
and "train" the users not to delete it. This is only a half-baked idea
so far.

It would integrate org-contacts, mu4e, and org-mode in my setup.

depending in your role in the project, you might get something like that
to work too.

Tory S. Anderson writes:

> I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm
> loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out there
> for using it collaboratively (where others are not using emacs),
> rather than just for personal task management (where it excels)?
> It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my co-workers
> are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker. PivotalTracker
> looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage
> orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has worked
> for you?

--
Professor John Kitchin
Doherty Hall A207F
Department of Chemical Engineering
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
412-268-7803
@johnkitchin
http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu

Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[Ken Mankoff]

This thread should merge with recent ongoing thread titled "[O] Help testing orgmode connection to interactive web environment"

  -k. 

Please excuse brevity. Sent from pocket computer with tiny non-haptic feedback keyboard. 

> On Aug 21, 2015, at 11:33, Tory S. Anderson <torys.anderson@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out there for using it collaboratively (where others are not using emacs), rather than just for personal task management (where it excels)? It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my co-workers are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker. PivotalTracker looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has worked for you? 

Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[Bill Burdick]

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Heh, well I did add a todo item to the project when I saw this thread, but
Leisure doesn't yet handle agenda items.  This is the type of feedback I'm
looking for though.

I'm also wondering if there are any orgmode hackers out there with some
JS/HTML skillz who might like to help out with modding the project for
things like this.  We do have an orgmode parser that can pick out things
like tags and properties, etc.


-- Bill

On Sun, Aug 23, 2015 at 3:03 PM Ken Mankoff <mankoff@gmail.com> wrote:

> This thread should merge with recent ongoing thread titled "[O] Help
> testing orgmode connection to interactive web environment"
>
>   -k.
>
> Please excuse brevity. Sent from pocket computer with tiny non-haptic
> feedback keyboard.
>
> > On Aug 21, 2015, at 11:33, Tory S. Anderson <torys.anderson@gmail.com>
> wrote:
> >
> > I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm loathe to
> leave it. But what solutions have been found out there for using it
> collaboratively (where others are not using emacs), rather than just for
> personal task management (where it excels)? It has some integration with
> Trello, I know; some of my co-workers are advocating BaseCamp (...) and
> PivotalTracker. PivotalTracker looks pretty good, but I would rather find a
> way to leverage orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has
> worked for you?
>
>

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Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[Eric Abrahamsen]

John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:

> unless those services have some kind of API, and you have the desire to
> implement it in emacs, you might be out of luck.
>
> I am trying to figure out a way to do collaborative work via email,
> where I am the project coordinator. The idea is to use my email.el code
> to send headlines to people I need information or action from, and then
> to have them reply to the email. Then, I would have some easy way to get
> information out of the reply back to the heading (e.g. TODO state
> change, info etc...). Probably I would embed some org-id link in the email,
> and "train" the users not to delete it. This is only a half-baked idea
> so far.
>
> It would integrate org-contacts, mu4e, and org-mode in my setup.

Sounds exactly like Gnorb! Except org-contacts instead of BBDB, and mu4e
instead of Gnus :(

> depending in your role in the project, you might get something like that
> to work too.
>
> Tory S. Anderson writes:
>
>> I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm
>> loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out there
>> for using it collaboratively (where others are not using emacs),
>> rather than just for personal task management (where it excels)?
>> It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my co-workers
>> are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker. PivotalTracker
>> looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage
>> orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has worked
>> for you?
>
> --
> Professor John Kitchin
> Doherty Hall A207F
> Department of Chemical Engineering
> Carnegie Mellon University
> Pittsburgh, PA 15213
> 412-268-7803
> @johnkitchin
> http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu

Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[John Kitchin]

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Haha! I have been interested in gnorb a long time but I don't use bbdb or
gnus😉.

On Sunday, August23, 2015, Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net> wrote:

> John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu <javascript:;>> writes:
>
> > unless those services have some kind of API, and you have the desire to
> > implement it in emacs, you might be out of luck.
> >
> > I am trying to figure out a way to do collaborative work via email,
> > where I am the project coordinator. The idea is to use my email.el code
> > to send headlines to people I need information or action from, and then
> > to have them reply to the email. Then, I would have some easy way to get
> > information out of the reply back to the heading (e.g. TODO state
> > change, info etc...). Probably I would embed some org-id link in the
> email,
> > and "train" the users not to delete it. This is only a half-baked idea
> > so far.
> >
> > It would integrate org-contacts, mu4e, and org-mode in my setup.
>
> Sounds exactly like Gnorb! Except org-contacts instead of BBDB, and mu4e
> instead of Gnus :(
>
> > depending in your role in the project, you might get something like that
> > to work too.
> >
> > Tory S. Anderson writes:
> >
> >> I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm
> >> loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out there
> >> for using it collaboratively (where others are not using emacs),
> >> rather than just for personal task management (where it excels)?
> >> It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my co-workers
> >> are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker. PivotalTracker
> >> looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage
> >> orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has worked
> >> for you?
> >
> > --
> > Professor John Kitchin
> > Doherty Hall A207F
> > Department of Chemical Engineering
> > Carnegie Mellon University
> > Pittsburgh, PA 15213
> > 412-268-7803
> > @johnkitchin
> > http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu
>
>
>

-- 
John

-----------------------------------
Professor John Kitchin
Doherty Hall A207F
Department of Chemical Engineering
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
412-268-7803
@johnkitchin
http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu

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Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[Peter Salazar]

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So what would it take to make Gnorb work with org-contacts and mu4e? I know
Gnorb works with Gnus, but in my opinion, Gnorb's ability
to automatically "catch" and identify incoming emails isn't as useful as
its other features.

In other words, if using Gnorb with mu4e required the user to manually flag
an incoming email through a function like "add-message-to-gnorb," Gnorb
would still retain 99% of its usefulness. The most useful functionality, as
John Kitchin noted, would be to capture information from a mu4e email
reply, and process it and incorporate it back into an org-mode file.


On Sun, Aug 23, 2015 at 12:39 PM, Eric Abrahamsen <eric@ericabrahamsen.net>
wrote:

> John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>
> > unless those services have some kind of API, and you have the desire to
> > implement it in emacs, you might be out of luck.
> >
> > I am trying to figure out a way to do collaborative work via email,
> > where I am the project coordinator. The idea is to use my email.el code
> > to send headlines to people I need information or action from, and then
> > to have them reply to the email. Then, I would have some easy way to get
> > information out of the reply back to the heading (e.g. TODO state
> > change, info etc...). Probably I would embed some org-id link in the
> email,
> > and "train" the users not to delete it. This is only a half-baked idea
> > so far.
> >
> > It would integrate org-contacts, mu4e, and org-mode in my setup.
>
> Sounds exactly like Gnorb! Except org-contacts instead of BBDB, and mu4e
> instead of Gnus :(
>
> > depending in your role in the project, you might get something like that
> > to work too.
> >
> > Tory S. Anderson writes:
> >
> >> I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm
> >> loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out there
> >> for using it collaboratively (where others are not using emacs),
> >> rather than just for personal task management (where it excels)?
> >> It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my co-workers
> >> are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker. PivotalTracker
> >> looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage
> >> orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has worked
> >> for you?
> >
> > --
> > Professor John Kitchin
> > Doherty Hall A207F
> > Department of Chemical Engineering
> > Carnegie Mellon University
> > Pittsburgh, PA 15213
> > 412-268-7803
> > @johnkitchin
> > http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu
>
>
>

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Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[Eric Abrahamsen]

Peter Salazar <cycleofsong@gmail.com> writes:

> So what would it take to make Gnorb work with org-contacts and mu4e? I
> know Gnorb works with Gnus, but in my opinion, Gnorb's ability to
> automatically "catch" and identify incoming emails isn't as useful as
> its other features. 
>
> In other words, if using Gnorb with mu4e required the user to manually
> flag an incoming email through a function like "add-message-to-gnorb,"
> Gnorb would still retain 99% of its usefulness. The most useful
> functionality, as John Kitchin noted, would be to capture information
> from a mu4e email reply, and process it and incorporate it back into
> an org-mode file.

Let's see... the org-contacts vs BBDB issue isn't a big deal, since
Gnorb doesn't actually do all that much with contacts right now. I'd be
happy to add tweaks to it to make it more org-contacts friendly.

Email tracking is a bigger issue. Gnorb uses the Gnus registry to track
correspondences between messages and headlines, and obviously none of
that would work with mu4e.

Earlier versions did tracking by storing message ids as a property on a
headline. I suppose I could go back to doing that in a mu4e-specific
library.

To me, the most useful thing about message tracking isn't the
identification and hinting of incoming emails. The two most useful
things (I think) are:

1. Taking a message and saying "this message should trigger a state
   change on that Org heading there"
2. Seeing all messages associated with a heading in their own virtual
   "mailbox"

Number one shouldn't be too difficult to implement for mu4e, as it would
mostly rely on Org's own mu4e support. Number two would be nearly
impossible, or at least impractical given my lack of familiarity with
mu4e.

Another thing I find hugely useful is automatically transferring files
attached to incoming messages to Org headings (via org-attach).
Presumably mu4e has a way of getting at the attachments on a message, so
in theory this wouldn't be that hard, either.

Anyway, those are some thoughts on the issue. If you all had some
particular feature where you'd like mu4e support, let me know and I can
take a stab at it.

Eric

> On Sun, Aug 23, 2015 at 12:39 PM, Eric Abrahamsen
> <eric@ericabrahamsen.net> wrote:
>
>
>     John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>
>     > unless those services have some kind of API, and you have the
>     desire to
>     > implement it in emacs, you might be out of luck.
>     >
>     > I am trying to figure out a way to do collaborative work via
>     email,
>     > where I am the project coordinator. The idea is to use my
>     email.el code
>     > to send headlines to people I need information or action from,
>     and then
>     > to have them reply to the email. Then, I would have some easy
>     way to get
>     > information out of the reply back to the heading (e.g. TODO
>     state
>     > change, info etc...). Probably I would embed some org-id link in
>     the email,
>     > and "train" the users not to delete it. This is only a
>     half-baked idea
>     > so far.
>     >
>     > It would integrate org-contacts, mu4e, and org-mode in my setup.
>
>     Sounds exactly like Gnorb! Except org-contacts instead of BBDB,
>     and mu4e
>     instead of Gnus :(
>
>     > depending in your role in the project, you might get something
>     like that
>     > to work too.
>     >
>     > Tory S. Anderson writes:
>     >
>     >> I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm
>     >> loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out
>     there
>     >> for using it collaboratively (where others are not using
>     emacs),
>     >> rather than just for personal task management (where it
>     excels)?
>     >> It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my
>     co-workers
>     >> are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker.
>     PivotalTracker
>     >> looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage
>     >> orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has
>     worked
>     >> for you?
>     >
>     > --
>     > Professor John Kitchin
>     > Doherty Hall A207F
>     > Department of Chemical Engineering
>     > Carnegie Mellon University
>     > Pittsburgh, PA 15213
>     > 412-268-7803
>     > @johnkitchin
>     > http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu

Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[John Kitchin]

>
> Let's see... the org-contacts vs BBDB issue isn't a big deal, since
> Gnorb doesn't actually do all that much with contacts right now. I'd be
> happy to add tweaks to it to make it more org-contacts friendly.
>
> Email tracking is a bigger issue. Gnorb uses the Gnus registry to track
> correspondences between messages and headlines, and obviously none of
> that would work with mu4e.
>
> Earlier versions did tracking by storing message ids as a property on a
> headline. I suppose I could go back to doing that in a mu4e-specific
> library.

Message id tracking is likely the way to do it in mu4e. mu4e links seem
to store this for links.

[[mu4e:msgid:BN3PR0301MB0851DB3E4C53993DAA1E8A98B2610@BN3PR0301MB0851.namprd03.prod.outlook.com]]

>
> To me, the most useful thing about message tracking isn't the
> identification and hinting of incoming emails. The two most useful
> things (I think) are:
>
> 1. Taking a message and saying "this message should trigger a state
>    change on that Org heading there"
> 2. Seeing all messages associated with a heading in their own virtual
>    "mailbox"
>
> Number one shouldn't be too difficult to implement for mu4e, as it would
> mostly rely on Org's own mu4e support. Number two would be nearly
> impossible, or at least impractical given my lack of familiarity with
> mu4e.

I am still learning many things about emails. mu4e has pretty powerful
search capability via the underlying Xapian database.

>
> Another thing I find hugely useful is automatically transferring files
> attached to incoming messages to Org headings (via org-attach).
> Presumably mu4e has a way of getting at the attachments on a message, so
> in theory this wouldn't be that hard, either.

This sounds pretty interesting. I have never gotten that into
attachments, but this might change my mind. There are functions in mu4e
to view and save attachments, so this might not be hard.

I am pretty interested in pursuing this, but am pretty busy for a while
so progress on my end will be slow ;(
>
> Anyway, those are some thoughts on the issue. If you all had some
> particular feature where you'd like mu4e support, let me know and I can
> take a stab at it.
>
> Eric
>
>> On Sun, Aug 23, 2015 at 12:39 PM, Eric Abrahamsen
>> <eric@ericabrahamsen.net> wrote:
>>
>>
>>     John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>>
>>     > unless those services have some kind of API, and you have the
>>     desire to
>>     > implement it in emacs, you might be out of luck.
>>     >
>>     > I am trying to figure out a way to do collaborative work via
>>     email,
>>     > where I am the project coordinator. The idea is to use my
>>     email.el code
>>     > to send headlines to people I need information or action from,
>>     and then
>>     > to have them reply to the email. Then, I would have some easy
>>     way to get
>>     > information out of the reply back to the heading (e.g. TODO
>>     state
>>     > change, info etc...). Probably I would embed some org-id link in
>>     the email,
>>     > and "train" the users not to delete it. This is only a
>>     half-baked idea
>>     > so far.
>>     >
>>     > It would integrate org-contacts, mu4e, and org-mode in my setup.
>>
>>     Sounds exactly like Gnorb! Except org-contacts instead of BBDB,
>>     and mu4e
>>     instead of Gnus :(
>>
>>     > depending in your role in the project, you might get something
>>     like that
>>     > to work too.
>>     >
>>     > Tory S. Anderson writes:
>>     >
>>     >> I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm
>>     >> loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out
>>     there
>>     >> for using it collaboratively (where others are not using
>>     emacs),
>>     >> rather than just for personal task management (where it
>>     excels)?
>>     >> It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my
>>     co-workers
>>     >> are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker.
>>     PivotalTracker
>>     >> looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage
>>     >> orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has
>>     worked
>>     >> for you?
>>     >
>>     > --
>>     > Professor John Kitchin
>>     > Doherty Hall A207F
>>     > Department of Chemical Engineering
>>     > Carnegie Mellon University
>>     > Pittsburgh, PA 15213
>>     > 412-268-7803
>>     > @johnkitchin
>>     > http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu

--
Professor John Kitchin
Doherty Hall A207F
Department of Chemical Engineering
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
412-268-7803
@johnkitchin
http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu

Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[Eric Abrahamsen]

John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:

>>
>> Let's see... the org-contacts vs BBDB issue isn't a big deal, since
>> Gnorb doesn't actually do all that much with contacts right now. I'd be
>> happy to add tweaks to it to make it more org-contacts friendly.
>>
>> Email tracking is a bigger issue. Gnorb uses the Gnus registry to track
>> correspondences between messages and headlines, and obviously none of
>> that would work with mu4e.
>>
>> Earlier versions did tracking by storing message ids as a property on a
>> headline. I suppose I could go back to doing that in a mu4e-specific
>> library.
>
> Message id tracking is likely the way to do it in mu4e. mu4e links seem
> to store this for links.
>
> [[mu4e:msgid:BN3PR0301MB0851DB3E4C53993DAA1E8A98B2610@BN3PR0301MB0851.namprd03.prod.outlook.com]]

Yup, I think most of the MUA links end up looking something like that.
Message IDs are the one constant across MUAs and (most) mail sources, so
everything in Gnorb is keyed to that.

>>
>> To me, the most useful thing about message tracking isn't the
>> identification and hinting of incoming emails. The two most useful
>> things (I think) are:
>>
>> 1. Taking a message and saying "this message should trigger a state
>>    change on that Org heading there"
>> 2. Seeing all messages associated with a heading in their own virtual
>>    "mailbox"
>>
>> Number one shouldn't be too difficult to implement for mu4e, as it would
>> mostly rely on Org's own mu4e support. Number two would be nearly
>> impossible, or at least impractical given my lack of familiarity with
>> mu4e.
>
> I am still learning many things about emails. mu4e has pretty powerful
> search capability via the underlying Xapian database.

Well, on second thought, maybe it wouldn't need to be that hard, then.
The Org heading would have its list of msg-ids, and if mu4e search has
an easy way of saying "search for all messages whose IDs are in this
list", then that it would be quite easy. Much easier than in Gnus, I
have to say! If that search works across mail accounts and folders, then
Gnorb wouldn't even have to care about messages being moved between
folders, which is one of the main uses of the registry.

>>
>> Another thing I find hugely useful is automatically transferring files
>> attached to incoming messages to Org headings (via org-attach).
>> Presumably mu4e has a way of getting at the attachments on a message, so
>> in theory this wouldn't be that hard, either.
>
> This sounds pretty interesting. I have never gotten that into
> attachments, but this might change my mind. There are functions in mu4e
> to view and save attachments, so this might not be hard.

Much of my work involves throwing attachments around (or rather,
receiving attachments and sending back plain text whenever possible),
so this is pretty crucial for me. While org-attach is very sound, I
found its surface-layer interface a bit cumbersome, and this makes it a
lot easier to use.

> I am pretty interested in pursuing this, but am pretty busy for a while
> so progress on my end will be slow ;(

Mine as well, ha!

BTW, mu4e still uses message mode for composition and sending, right?

>> Anyway, those are some thoughts on the issue. If you all had some
>> particular feature where you'd like mu4e support, let me know and I can
>> take a stab at it.
>>
>> Eric
>>
>>> On Sun, Aug 23, 2015 at 12:39 PM, Eric Abrahamsen
>>> <eric@ericabrahamsen.net> wrote:
>>>
>>>
>>>     John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>>>
>>>     > unless those services have some kind of API, and you have the
>>>     desire to
>>>     > implement it in emacs, you might be out of luck.
>>>     >
>>>     > I am trying to figure out a way to do collaborative work via
>>>     email,
>>>     > where I am the project coordinator. The idea is to use my
>>>     email.el code
>>>     > to send headlines to people I need information or action from,
>>>     and then
>>>     > to have them reply to the email. Then, I would have some easy
>>>     way to get
>>>     > information out of the reply back to the heading (e.g. TODO
>>>     state
>>>     > change, info etc...). Probably I would embed some org-id link in
>>>     the email,
>>>     > and "train" the users not to delete it. This is only a
>>>     half-baked idea
>>>     > so far.
>>>     >
>>>     > It would integrate org-contacts, mu4e, and org-mode in my setup.
>>>
>>>     Sounds exactly like Gnorb! Except org-contacts instead of BBDB,
>>>     and mu4e
>>>     instead of Gnus :(
>>>
>>>     > depending in your role in the project, you might get something
>>>     like that
>>>     > to work too.
>>>     >
>>>     > Tory S. Anderson writes:
>>>     >
>>>     >> I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm
>>>     >> loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out
>>>     there
>>>     >> for using it collaboratively (where others are not using
>>>     emacs),
>>>     >> rather than just for personal task management (where it
>>>     excels)?
>>>     >> It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my
>>>     co-workers
>>>     >> are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker.
>>>     PivotalTracker
>>>     >> looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage
>>>     >> orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has
>>>     worked
>>>     >> for you?
>>>     >
>>>     > --
>>>     > Professor John Kitchin
>>>     > Doherty Hall A207F
>>>     > Department of Chemical Engineering
>>>     > Carnegie Mellon University
>>>     > Pittsburgh, PA 15213
>>>     > 412-268-7803
>>>     > @johnkitchin
>>>     > http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu
>
> --
> Professor John Kitchin
> Doherty Hall A207F
> Department of Chemical Engineering
> Carnegie Mellon University
> Pittsburgh, PA 15213
> 412-268-7803
> @johnkitchin
> http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu

Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[John Kitchin]

Eric Abrahamsen writes:

> The following message is a courtesy copy of an article
> that has been posted to gmane.emacs.orgmode as well.
>
> John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>
>>>
>>> Let's see... the org-contacts vs BBDB issue isn't a big deal, since
>>> Gnorb doesn't actually do all that much with contacts right now. I'd be
>>> happy to add tweaks to it to make it more org-contacts friendly.
>>>
>>> Email tracking is a bigger issue. Gnorb uses the Gnus registry to track
>>> correspondences between messages and headlines, and obviously none of
>>> that would work with mu4e.
>>>
>>> Earlier versions did tracking by storing message ids as a property on a
>>> headline. I suppose I could go back to doing that in a mu4e-specific
>>> library.
>>
>> Message id tracking is likely the way to do it in mu4e. mu4e links seem
>> to store this for links.
>>
>> [[mu4e:msgid:BN3PR0301MB0851DB3E4C53993DAA1E8A98B2610@BN3PR0301MB0851.namprd03.prod.outlook.com]]
>
> Yup, I think most of the MUA links end up looking something like that.
> Message IDs are the one constant across MUAs and (most) mail sources, so
> everything in Gnorb is keyed to that.

It is pretty easy to get these from a message. I use this variable in a
send callback function:

(setq *email-message-id*
        (concat
         "mu4e:msgid:"
         ;; borrowed from https://github.com/girzel/gnorb/blob/master/gnorb-utils.el#L137
         (replace-regexp-in-string
          "\\(\\`<\\|>\\'\\)" "" (mail-fetch-field "Message-ID"))))

and then later use
(org-set-property "Message-ID" *email-message-id*)

and I get a clickable link in the property that will go back to the
message (after mu indexes again for freshly sent emails).
>
>>>
>>> To me, the most useful thing about message tracking isn't the
>>> identification and hinting of incoming emails. The two most useful
>>> things (I think) are:
>>>
>>> 1. Taking a message and saying "this message should trigger a state
>>>    change on that Org heading there"
>>> 2. Seeing all messages associated with a heading in their own virtual
>>>    "mailbox"
>>>
>>> Number one shouldn't be too difficult to implement for mu4e, as it would
>>> mostly rely on Org's own mu4e support. Number two would be nearly
>>> impossible, or at least impractical given my lack of familiarity with
>>> mu4e.
>>
>> I am still learning many things about emails. mu4e has pretty powerful
>> search capability via the underlying Xapian database.
>
> Well, on second thought, maybe it wouldn't need to be that hard, then.
> The Org heading would have its list of msg-ids, and if mu4e search has
> an easy way of saying "search for all messages whose IDs are in this
> list", then that it would be quite easy. Much easier than in Gnus, I
> have to say! If that search works across mail accounts and folders, then
> Gnorb wouldn't even have to care about messages being moved between
> folders, which is one of the main uses of the registry.
This seems to do what you describe. When I run it, I get an mu4e buffer
with those two messages in it. Basically you just create a mu query.

#+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp
(let ((ids '("871teq3c9p.fsf@ericabrahamsen.net"
             "201508260407.t7Q479lS026871@relay.andrew.cmu.edu") ))
  (mu4e-headers-search
   (mapconcat
    (lambda (id)
      (concat "msgid:" id))
    ids
    " or ")))
#+END_SRC

>
>>>
>>> Another thing I find hugely useful is automatically transferring files
>>> attached to incoming messages to Org headings (via org-attach).
>>> Presumably mu4e has a way of getting at the attachments on a message, so
>>> in theory this wouldn't be that hard, either.
>>
>> This sounds pretty interesting. I have never gotten that into
>> attachments, but this might change my mind. There are functions in mu4e
>> to view and save attachments, so this might not be hard.
>
> Much of my work involves throwing attachments around (or rather,
> receiving attachments and sending back plain text whenever possible),
> so this is pretty crucial for me. While org-attach is very sound, I
> found its surface-layer interface a bit cumbersome, and this makes it a
> lot easier to use.

Me too ;) I just have not progressed to org-attach yet. I usually have
to edit the attachments. How easy is it to reattach them to send back?

>
>> I am pretty interested in pursuing this, but am pretty busy for a while
>> so progress on my end will be slow ;(
>
> Mine as well, ha!
>
> BTW, mu4e still uses message mode for composition and sending, right?

yes.

>
>>> Anyway, those are some thoughts on the issue. If you all had some
>>> particular feature where you'd like mu4e support, let me know and I can
>>> take a stab at it.
>>>
>>> Eric
>>>
>>>> On Sun, Aug 23, 2015 at 12:39 PM, Eric Abrahamsen
>>>> <eric@ericabrahamsen.net> wrote:
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>     John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>>>>
>>>>     > unless those services have some kind of API, and you have the
>>>>     desire to
>>>>     > implement it in emacs, you might be out of luck.
>>>>     >
>>>>     > I am trying to figure out a way to do collaborative work via
>>>>     email,
>>>>     > where I am the project coordinator. The idea is to use my
>>>>     email.el code
>>>>     > to send headlines to people I need information or action from,
>>>>     and then
>>>>     > to have them reply to the email. Then, I would have some easy
>>>>     way to get
>>>>     > information out of the reply back to the heading (e.g. TODO
>>>>     state
>>>>     > change, info etc...). Probably I would embed some org-id link in
>>>>     the email,
>>>>     > and "train" the users not to delete it. This is only a
>>>>     half-baked idea
>>>>     > so far.
>>>>     >
>>>>     > It would integrate org-contacts, mu4e, and org-mode in my setup.
>>>>
>>>>     Sounds exactly like Gnorb! Except org-contacts instead of BBDB,
>>>>     and mu4e
>>>>     instead of Gnus :(
>>>>
>>>>     > depending in your role in the project, you might get something
>>>>     like that
>>>>     > to work too.
>>>>     >
>>>>     > Tory S. Anderson writes:
>>>>     >
>>>>     >> I've relied on Orgmode heavily for over half a decade, and I'm
>>>>     >> loathe to leave it. But what solutions have been found out
>>>>     there
>>>>     >> for using it collaboratively (where others are not using
>>>>     emacs),
>>>>     >> rather than just for personal task management (where it
>>>>     excels)?
>>>>     >> It has some integration with Trello, I know; some of my
>>>>     co-workers
>>>>     >> are advocating BaseCamp (...) and PivotalTracker.
>>>>     PivotalTracker
>>>>     >> looks pretty good, but I would rather find a way to leverage
>>>>     >> orgmode in a way that facilitates collaboration. What has
>>>>     worked
>>>>     >> for you?
>>>>     >
>>>>     > --
>>>>     > Professor John Kitchin
>>>>     > Doherty Hall A207F
>>>>     > Department of Chemical Engineering
>>>>     > Carnegie Mellon University
>>>>     > Pittsburgh, PA 15213
>>>>     > 412-268-7803
>>>>     > @johnkitchin
>>>>     > http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu
>>
>> --
>> Professor John Kitchin
>> Doherty Hall A207F
>> Department of Chemical Engineering
>> Carnegie Mellon University
>> Pittsburgh, PA 15213
>> 412-268-7803
>> @johnkitchin
>> http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu

--
Professor John Kitchin
Doherty Hall A207F
Department of Chemical Engineering
Carnegie Mellon University
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
412-268-7803
@johnkitchin
http://kitchingroup.cheme.cmu.edu

Re: Collaborative Team Project Management with Orgmode?

[Eric Abrahamsen]

John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:

> Eric Abrahamsen writes:
>
>> The following message is a courtesy copy of an article
>> that has been posted to gmane.emacs.orgmode as well.
>>
>> John Kitchin <jkitchin@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>>
>>>>
>>>> Let's see... the org-contacts vs BBDB issue isn't a big deal, since
>>>> Gnorb doesn't actually do all that much with contacts right now. I'd be
>>>> happy to add tweaks to it to make it more org-contacts friendly.
>>>>
>>>> Email tracking is a bigger issue. Gnorb uses the Gnus registry to track
>>>> correspondences between messages and headlines, and obviously none of
>>>> that would work with mu4e.
>>>>
>>>> Earlier versions did tracking by storing message ids as a property on a
>>>> headline. I suppose I could go back to doing that in a mu4e-specific
>>>> library.
>>>
>>> Message id tracking is likely the way to do it in mu4e. mu4e links seem
>>> to store this for links.
>>>
>>> [[mu4e:msgid:BN3PR0301MB0851DB3E4C53993DAA1E8A98B2610@BN3PR0301MB0851.namprd03.prod.outlook.com]]
>>
>> Yup, I think most of the MUA links end up looking something like that.
>> Message IDs are the one constant across MUAs and (most) mail sources, so
>> everything in Gnorb is keyed to that.
>
> It is pretty easy to get these from a message. I use this variable in a
> send callback function:
>
> (setq *email-message-id*
>         (concat
>          "mu4e:msgid:"
>          ;; borrowed from https://github.com/girzel/gnorb/blob/master/gnorb-utils.el#L137
>          (replace-regexp-in-string
>           "\\(\\`<\\|>\\'\\)" "" (mail-fetch-field "Message-ID"))))
>
> and then later use
> (org-set-property "Message-ID" *email-message-id*)
>
> and I get a clickable link in the property that will go back to the
> message (after mu indexes again for freshly sent emails).

[...]

> This seems to do what you describe. When I run it, I get an mu4e buffer
> with those two messages in it. Basically you just create a mu query.
>
> #+BEGIN_SRC emacs-lisp
> (let ((ids '("871teq3c9p.fsf@ericabrahamsen.net"
>              "201508260407.t7Q479lS026871@relay.andrew.cmu.edu") ))
>   (mu4e-headers-search
>    (mapconcat
>     (lambda (id)
>       (concat "msgid:" id))
>     ids
>     " or ")))
> #+END_SRC

All this looks very encouraging!

>>>> Another thing I find hugely useful is automatically transferring files
>>>> attached to incoming messages to Org headings (via org-attach).
>>>> Presumably mu4e has a way of getting at the attachments on a message, so
>>>> in theory this wouldn't be that hard, either.
>>>
>>> This sounds pretty interesting. I have never gotten that into
>>> attachments, but this might change my mind. There are functions in mu4e
>>> to view and save attachments, so this might not be hard.
>>
>> Much of my work involves throwing attachments around (or rather,
>> receiving attachments and sending back plain text whenever possible),
>> so this is pretty crucial for me. While org-attach is very sound, I
>> found its surface-layer interface a bit cumbersome, and this makes it a
>> lot easier to use.
>
> Me too ;) I just have not progressed to org-attach yet. I usually have
> to edit the attachments. How easy is it to reattach them to send back?

When you use `gnorb-org-handle-mail' on a heading, that composes a new
reply to most recently-associated message (or does something else,
depending), and runs `map-y-or-n-p' over the org-attach files, offering
to attach them to the outgoing message.

This works pretty well for me. The only org-attach commands I'm really
missing now would be `org-attach-copy-attachment' (to somewhere else on
my filesystem), and `org-attach-refile-attachment' (to move an
attachment to a different heading).

Anyway, all looks promising! Now to find the time...

Eric