Sort by dependency

[ferife]

⚠️ Please check that this feature request hasn't been suggested before.

• I searched previous Ideas in Discussions didn't find any similar feature requests.
• I searched previous Issues didn't find any similar feature requests.
• I am only requesting a single feature. Multiple changes should be split into individual requests, with links between them.
• I believe my requested feature will be generally applicable to other users, not just me: it is not uniquely tied to my personal workflow.

🔖 Feature description

A sorting option that puts task dependencies at the top and their task dependents below them. Hopefully it puts tasks that are directly dependent on each other together.

✔️ Solution

a

❓ Alternatives

No response

📝 Additional Context

No response

[claremacrae]

Hi @ferife, thanks for the suggestion.

For clarity, please supply:

1. some example tasks, as markdown text, with dependencies in
2. and then show the sorted output you want to see, once they are sorted in the order you wish.

You seem to be thinking about direct and indirect dependencies - so be sure to include examples of those, and how you wish them to be sorted.

By supplying examples to be used in testing the implementation, you will be helping somebody do the work, and ensuring that what is programmed matches the behaviour you are requesting.

Thank you in advance.

[claremacrae]

Closed as no reply.

[ferife]

Hi @claremacrae I apologize for taking so long to reply.

Here are some examples pulled straight from my vault

• Prog2 Programming Assignment 7 ⛔ i7fjn5 🔼 📅 2024-04-05
• Prog2 Programming Assignment 8 ⛔ 4yqy8d 🔼 📅 2024-04-05
• Prog2 Programming Assignment 9 ⛔ 6yyjks 🔼 📅 2024-04-15
• Prog2 Programming Assignment 10 ⛔ ibkw2j 🔼 📅 2024-04-22
• Prog2 Quiz 7 ⛔ i7fjn5 🔼 📅 2024-03-29
• Prog2 Quiz 8 ⛔ 4yqy8d 🔼 📅 2024-04-08
• Prog2 Quiz 9 ⛔ 6yyjks 🔼 📅 2024-04-15
• Prog2 Quiz 10 ⛔ ibkw2j 🔼 📅 2024-04-22
• Prog2 Textbook Reading 7 🆔 i7fjn5 📅 2024-04-05
• Prog2 Textbook Reading 8 🆔 4yqy8d 📅 2024-04-05
• Prog2 Textbook Reading 9 🆔 6yyjks 📅 2024-04-12
• Prog2 Textbook Reading 10 🆔 ibkw2j 📅 2024-04-19
• ExampleTask13 📅 2024-03-30

presuming that they are being sorted by dependency, then by date, the result I'm hoping for is

• Prog2 Textbook Reading 7 🆔 i7fjn5 📅 2024-04-05
• Prog2 Quiz 7 ⛔ i7fjn5 🔼 📅 2024-03-29
• ExampleTask13 📅 2024-03-30
• Prog2 Programming Assignment 7 ⛔ i7fjn5 🔼 📅 2024-04-05
• Prog2 Textbook Reading 8 🆔 4yqy8d 📅 2024-04-05
• Prog2 Programming Assignment 8 ⛔ 4yqy8d 🔼 📅 2024-04-05
• Prog2 Quiz 8 ⛔ 4yqy8d 🔼 📅 2024-04-08
• Prog2 Textbook Reading 9 🆔 6yyjks 📅 2024-04-12
• Prog2 Programming Assignment 9 ⛔ 6yyjks 🔼 📅 2024-04-15
• Prog2 Quiz 9 ⛔ 6yyjks 🔼 📅 2024-04-15
• Prog2 Textbook Reading 10 🆔 ibkw2j 📅 2024-04-19
• Prog2 Programming Assignment 10 ⛔ ibkw2j 🔼 📅 2024-04-22
• Prog2 Quiz 10 ⛔ ibkw2j 🔼 📅 2024-04-22

[ferife]

As you can see, especially with the first two tasks in the result, the dependency takes precedence over the date, so textbook reading 7 is displayed before quiz 7 and before ExampleTask13 even though it is due later because quiz 7 cannot be done until textbook reading 7 is done

[claremacrae]

Brilliant - that really helps clarify things a lot.

It will get tricky when a task depends on multiple other tasks, or if there are cyclic dependencies, but I can see the basic principle.

[ferife]

Great. I edited my example to clarify that if a dependency is due after tasks unrelated to the dependent which is due before those tasks, the dependency should appear before all of those too. That's what ExampleTask13 is about

[claremacrae]

That isn't how the Tasks sorting works sadly.

• It first sorts all the tasks by criterion 1 - dependency.
• Then it sorts all the tasks that had equal priority according to criterion 1, using the criterion 2 sort order - due date.

So as far as I can see, sorting by dependency would have to do something like put all the tasks without a dependency after all the tasks with a dependency.

It might require some kind of grouping to get the behaviour you want.

(And whilst you would like the second criterion to be due date, someone else may choose start date, or priority... so it's not obvious how to write special-case code to combine together sort criteria in the way you show in your example)

[ferife]

That isn't how the Tasks sorting works sadly.

* It first sorts all the tasks by criterion 1 - dependency.

* Then it sorts all the tasks that had equal priority according to criterion 1, using the criterion 2 sort order - due date.

So as far as I can see, sorting by dependency would have to do something like put all the tasks without a dependency after all the tasks with a dependency.

It might require some kind of grouping to get the behaviour you want.

(And whilst you would like the second criterion to be due date, someone else may choose start date, or priority... so it's not obvious how to write special-case code to combine together sort criteria in the way you show in your example)

Fair enough. In that case, maybe the query example I gave could be the result of sorting by dependency and grouping by due date.

It seems to me that if the primary sorting criterion is dependency, the user should specify the other secondary criteria using group by instead of sort by.

Though if that's how that's going to work users would probably want a way to hide the group headings, but that seems like a separate discussion from this.

[ferife]

Brilliant - that really helps clarify things a lot.

It will get tricky when a task depends on multiple other tasks, or if there are cyclic dependencies, but I can see the basic principle.

Regarding cyclic dependencies, the best I can come up with would be to throw up an error message if one is detected to avoid infinite recursion problems. Perhaps there is a better solution, but I wouldn't really know since I've yet to need cyclic dependencies in my vault