Tasker

Tasker is licensed under CC BY 4.0. To view a copy of this license, visit https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/

Overview

• command-line, Windows & Mac
• just needs to be somewhere on the system path
• in the same folder as the executable are the tasks.txt and done.txt
• possible future option to have a redirect so that the 2 files could be in dropbox, onedrive etc tasker.cfg etc
• tasks.txt is the list of active and sleeping tasks
• done.txt is just a list of tasks that have been marked as done, with a timestamp of when they were done
• always creates a backup of tasks.txt and done.txt at the start of the day (the first time it's used in a given day), in the format yyyy-mm-dd.tasks.txt and yyyy-mm-dd.done.txt
• and then after that a simple .bak is maintained for both, which is the previous version of the file throughout the day
• eg;

  tasks.txt              <- current tasks (and sleeping tasks)
  done.txt               <- done tasks
  tasks.txt.bak          <- previous version of tasks
  done.txt.bak           <- previous version of done
  2024-01-03.tasks.txt   <- tasks at end of 3-jan-2024  
  2024-01-03.done.txt    <- done at end of 3-jan-2024  

tasker + taskname+tasknotes

• add taskname with optional notes (both strings can be " escaped)
• console returns the task id
• priority implied by number of + (so + is default, ++ is higher, +++ highest)
• delimiter between name and notes is + (shell-safe on macOS/Linux). A legacy ; delimiter is still accepted for backward compatibility.
• eg tasker + "My First Task+This is a note"
• sample output;

  1 'My First Task' added  

additional options for tasker + command;

• -rd daily recurrence generated when task is done
• -rw weekly (etc)
• -rm monthly
• -ra annual
• -rn n is number of days (so r1=rd, r7=rw etc)
• -s start off as a sleeping task

tasker list

• shows all outstanding tasks in order of priority and then id
• eg tasker list
• sample output;

  Active tasks;
  1 My first task  
    This is a note  
  2 Another task  
  3 A Recurring Task         (daily)  
  4 Another task  
    Which has a note

• supports -sleep option to show sleeping tasks
• eg tasker list -s
• sample output;

  Sleeping tasks;
  2 Another task  

• supports -done option to show done tasks
• eg tasker list -done
• sample output;

  Completed tasks;
  2024-05-01 2 Another task  

tasker - id (or taskname)

• mark a task as done (adds to done list with timestamp of when done)
• eg tasker - "Myfirst task"
• eg tasker - 2
• sample output;

  2 'Another task' completed  

tasker rem id (or taskname)

• just remove a task (don't move to done list)
• will prompt y/n
• eg tasker rem 2
• sample output;

  Remove task 2 'Another task'? (Y/N) Y  
  2 'Another task' removed  

tasker renum

• will prompt y/n
• renumber all the ids of the outstanding list,
• then print it out (as per list)
• eg tasker renum
• sample output;

  Renumber tasks? (Y/N) Y  
  1 My first task  
    This is a note  
  2 Another task  
  3 A Recurring Task         (daily)  
  4 Another task  
    Which has a note

tasker sleep id (or taskname)

• suppress this task for the time being
• eg tasker sleep 2
• sample output;

  2 'Another task' sleeping

tasker wake id (or taskname)

• reactivate this task
• eg tasker wake 2
• sample output;

  2 'Another task' active

tasker clean

• deletes backup files/objects after a Y/N safety prompt
• eg tasker clean
• sample output;

  Clean - all backups will be deleted? (Y/N) Y
  15 backup files deleted

What gets deleted

• Filesystem backend

  • Within-day backups: tasks.txt.bak, done.txt.bak
  • Daily dated backups: yyyy-MM-dd_tasks.txt, yyyy-MM-dd_done.txt in the tasks folder

• Firebase backend

  • Within-day backups: <prefix>/tasks.csv.bak, <prefix>/done.csv.bak
  • Daily dated backups: <prefix>/yyyy-MM-dd_tasks.txt, <prefix>/yyyy-MM-dd_done.txt

Notes:

• Deletions are best-effort; missing files/objects are skipped silently.
• Dated backups currently use the previous day’s date (mirrors legacy behavior).

tasker init

• initialise storage by creating empty CSV files if missing
• safe to run multiple times; if files already exist, it does nothing
• eg tasker init
• sample output;

  Initialised storage (created empty tasks/done files as needed)

• behavior without init: you can run commands like tasker list before running init; the tool no longer crashes if tasks.txt or done.txt are missing. It will treat missing files as empty and show “No active tasks” or “No completed tasks”.

tasker -h

• help
• also -help, --help and /? are supported

tasker clear

• remove tasks after a Y/N safety prompt
• options:
  • -done: clear only completed tasks
  • no option: clear all active/sleeping tasks
• examples:

  tasker clear -done
  Clear all completed tasks? (Y/N) Y
  All completed tasks removed

  tasker clear
  Clear all tasks? (Y/N) Y
  All tasks removed

Behavior:

• Works with both backends via the storage abstraction
• After clearing, the store saves an empty CSV (with headers) to the file/object

Configuration (tasker.cfg)

Tasker reads a tasker.cfg JSON file from the app's base directory (next to the executable). It controls output style and the storage backend.

Common options

{
  "UseColor": true,
  "Verbose": true,
  "Backend": "file"   
}

File backend (local filesystem)

• Backend: file
• Paths can be absolute or relative. Relative paths resolve from the current working directory when Tasker runs.
• If omitted, defaults are tasks.txt and done.txt in the current working directory.

{
  "Backend": "file",
  "File": {
    "TasksPath": "./tasks.txt",
    "DonePath": "./done.txt"
  },
  "UseColor": true,
  "Verbose": true
}

Notes:

• The legacy top-level TasksPath/DonePath (if present) are still honored as a fallback when File.TasksPath/File.DonePath are not provided.
• Backups: a daily-dated copy is created once per day, and a within-day .bak is maintained when saving. If the source file does not exist yet, backups are skipped.

Firebase backend (Google Cloud Storage)

• Backend: firebase
• Requires a service account JSON with permissions to read/write objects in your bucket.
• Credential path supports ~ (home) and environment variables (e.g. $HOME), and can be relative (resolved against the current working directory).
• BucketUrl must be a gs:// URL for your bucket (e.g. gs://your-project-id.appspot.com).
• Pick object keys for the two CSV files.

{
  "Backend": "firebase",
  "Firebase": {
    "BucketUrl": "gs://your-project-id.appspot.com",
    "TasksObject": "tasker/tasks.csv",
    "DoneObject": "tasker/done.csv",
    "CredentialsPath": "~/Documents/tasker-credentials.json"
  },
  "UseColor": true,
  "Verbose": true
}

Credentials:

• Download a service account key JSON from Google Cloud Console (IAM & Admin → Service Accounts → Keys).
• Keep real credentials out of git. An example file is provided as firebase.service-account.example.json.
• Alternatively, set the GOOGLE_APPLICATION_CREDENTIALS environment variable to the JSON path and omit CredentialsPath.

Behavior & safety:

• If objects are missing, Tasker treats them as empty and will create CSV content on first save (e.g., after tasker init or tasker + ...).
• BucketUrl is not a secret and can be committed. Do not commit the service account JSON.