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aziz
PlainTasks
Python2012–2025
aziz / PlainTasks

PlainTasks

An opinionated todo-list plugin for Sublime Text editor (version 2 and 3)

Developer ToolsProductivity
Explore on GitHubRead Hacker News discussions
12Distinct people
15Mentions
0Explicit recommenders
3.3KGitHub stars
REPOSITORY AT A GLANCE

What to know before exploring

What it is

An opinionated todo-list plugin for Sublime Text editor (version 2 and 3)

GitHub

Where it is used

No documented product use was verified in the last source check.

What people are saying

No recommendation phrase was found in the indexed comments.

No classified warning is attached to this page. Read the discussions before treating silence as approval.

Also in these discussions

No other repository is repeatedly linked in the same discussions.

This week on Hacker News

Nov 7–Nov 14 UTC · Direct repository links and separately labeled related project stories. Indexed through 11/14/2026, 3:56:07 PM UTC.

No direct repository links were found in the indexed HN discussions over the past seven days. Older discussions are available below.

Mentions over time

HN mentions by year15 dated mentions

Observed mentions: 2012-09-17 10:26:22 UTC to 2025-01-29 13:01:45 UTC.

0122012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 1 submissions, 1 comments20122013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 2 mentions; 0 submissions, 2 comments20182019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 0 mentions; 0 submissions, 0 comments2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC to 2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC (exclusive): 1 mentions; 0 submissions, 1 comments2025

Counts come from the repository’s dated source evidence. Index cutoff: 2026-11-02 08:16:59 UTC.

View mention counts and date ranges
UTC ranges include their start and exclude their end. Select a period to filter the source evidence.
PeriodStart (UTC)End (exclusive, UTC)MentionsSubmissionsComments
20122012-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC211
20132013-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20142014-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20152015-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20162016-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20172017-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20182018-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC202
20192019-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20202020-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC000
20212021-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20222022-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20232023-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20242024-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101
20252025-01-01 00:00:00 UTC2026-01-01 00:00:00 UTC101

What Hacker News says

15 sources
DarkCrusader2·Jan 29, 2025
I also use sublime for managing todo and IDE for coding as my work repo uses custom tooling for build and autocomplete which only supports Visual Studio. I use PlainTasks [0] which is very similar to your plugin but also has a few keyboard shortcuts to toggle the item state. Using this with a watered down GTD setup has really brought a lot of peace in both my personal and professional life. [0] https://github.com/aziz/PlainTasks
In I still like Sublime Text
DarkCrusader2·Jul 13, 2024
I have been using PlainTasks [0] plugin with Sublime Text for many years now at work to do something similar. It is sort of a mix between GTD [1] and journalling. I create a new file monthly (since that is the "sprint" duration at work) and for each project I am working on, I create a project heading and a list of tasks below each. The plugin doesn't enforce any schema and is just a plain text file so I can iterate on the task list, record thoughts as free form notes anywhere (just below the project heading or below a particular task or just in the file anywhere. If the notes grow too large for a particular project (they don't usually for me), I pull them in a separate file dedicated to that project. I iterate on the task list as things become more clear. For eg. I might start as "Find out how to deploy new certificates on our cluster nod
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es". Once I have done some research or talked to my colleagues, I might mark this a done or delete it and replace it with a list of steps required to deploy the certificates. I also mark things I am going to do today with "@today" every day in the morning. If something planned comes up urgently, it gets it own task with "@critical" tag. The plugin highlights these tags for me. There are some more features but I only use creating and marking tasks as done with the 2 tags. The plugin is also semi-abandoned which is a big +1 for me as I don't have to worry about flow breaking changes or sudden sponsorship messages or constant updates. I don't use sublime for anything else but tracking tasks and notes so it gives me a sort of dedicated workspace for collecting my tasks. Recall is just a plain text search away. I have been using this for many years and has been extremely effective for me. Whenever I feel lost of overwhelmed, I just look this file, find the @today tags and suddenly I am back in my flow. Most of the other tools I have tried (Jira, Asana, Trello, Github/Gitlab issues, Azure DevOps, company internal project management tooling etc.) are too opinionated, not flexible enough, sends unnecessary notifications to me or everyone on the team and are a chore to maintain (busywork). [0] https://github.com/aziz/PlainTasks [1] https://gettingthingsdone.com/what-is-gtd/
In Use a work journal
noptd·Sep 22, 2021
The author makes several great points about why it's beneficial to document your accomplishments. I've been following a similar approach for the last few years using Sublime and the PlainTasks[0] plugin to break apart projects and tasks into individual items and mark them with a timestamp when finished. I'll move the completed tasks into a new quarterly archive section to keep things clean every so often, and those sections end up providing most if not all of the information I need for self-evaluations and manager discussions while entirely amortized over the course of the year. Sure you could do something similar with Jira though I personally find Sublime to be far less overwhelming for the task, though I will usually pair the larger entries with a jira ID so there's a link back to that additional context. 0 - https://github.com/aziz/Pla
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inTasks
In Get your work recognized: write a brag document (2019)
taude·Mar 9, 2017
i used to use org-mode a lot back in the day, but I lost my emacs config, and since then haven't really gone back. I always have a fond memory of organizing my tech life with org-mode, though. It was truly ahead of its time, but I feel there's better tools for the job now, that specialize in doing each of the many things org-mode does, but better. Some alternatives I used off and on for a bit: * NValt * Respose Notes * Evernote * Plain Tasks for Sublime Text https://github.com/aziz/PlainTasks * Workflowy * Other web-based/mobile optimized tools It's still a great tool for managing a single dev's work life, especially if using emacs, but I've found more modern tools, with collaboration built in, pretty formatting for non-techies, etc. a little more flexible. (I also dare to say that I'm on Microsoft OneNote these days, mostly because I wo
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rk in a multi-platform environment.)
In Emacs org-mode examples and cookbook
jrajav·Mar 3, 2013
I currently don't use anything for personal task tracking, since I am a part of a large team and we have project management. However, in college I explored this quite a bit. Here is what I would recommend: * Text-based * If this appeals to you, Taskpaper is a really good format with a lower barrier of entry than org-mode. There is a Taskpaper major mode for Emacs, a plugin for Vim, and even one for Sublime Text 2 (though the author didn't credit Taskpaper or Hog Bay except as "inspiration" at the bottom of the README): https://github.com/aziz/PlainTasks * Simple but GUI * Literally anything that allows you to create individual items, tag them (or add them to multiple named lists - same thing), and then filter by tag or list. Tags are all you need to implement anything from pure ad-hoc task management all the way up to strict GTD. Priorit
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ies are not essential and can actually get in the way; I've always found it much simpler and less of a mind burden to categorize tasks by project ("project" here meaning anything that takes more than one discrete task) and then simply tag the "Next Action" for any given project. You can then filter by "Next Action" and decide for yourself at any given moment what task will be best to do with the resources available to you (time, tools, location, energy). Some examples of solutions that will do this: - A directory of text files with #hashtags in their contents and grep - Notational Velocity / Simplenote - Any todo list app with real tags (not Wunderlist, for instance) - Outlook - Taskpaper or org-mode I actually used Gmail for this for a while. I could expound on that if you're interested. * The Full Monty * OmniFocus, plus the book "Getting Things Done" by David Allen. It's cliche for a reason. It's not a silver bullet (obviously, I hope), but it is an effective system, it works for a lot of people, and you will probably get at least a few takeaways out of reading about it.
In Ask HN: Your favorite to-do list or task manager?

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