Tasks are the atomic unit of work in TandemLoop—the things you actually get done. They can sit in the Inbox, live directly in a project or milestone, or belong to an area as standalone tasks.
All Fields at a Glance
| Field | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Title | What exactly needs to be done (required) |
| Status | Active, Waiting, On Hold, Completed, Dropped, or Someday. In addition, there are For Review and Question—only the AI agent sets these, when it hands a task back to you (see Back from Agent) |
| Assigned To | Human = you do the task; AI = an AI agent takes it on |
| Delegation | Only when assigned to AI. Do = the AI does the task itself, Draft = the AI prepares it (you decide), Ask = the AI asks before it acts |
| Due Date | The date by which the task must be finished—optionally with a time (Time switch in the calendar). With a time, the task counts as overdue only from that time on, and lists, the agenda, and the calendar sort by it within the day |
| Reminder | A point in time at which TandemLoop reminds you with a notification—independent of the dates. Quick choices: In 1 Hour, This Evening, Tomorrow Morning, or Custom Time…. Completed and dropped tasks don’t send reminders |
| Do Date | The date on which you plan to start working on the task |
| Repeat | The rule by which the task recurs (see below) |
| Tags | Assign tags from your tag library |
| Attributes | Custom fields such as “Client” or “Budget,” if you’ve created any (Settings › Attributes) |
| Conversation | The task’s log: time-stamped entries that you and the AI agent write—notes, questions, results. To add a new entry, use Add Entry at the bottom |
Two more fields live in the task file and take effect in views but
don’t appear in the Inspector: Waiting For (free text,
who or what you’re waiting for—entered in the form when creating a task
as soon as the status is Waiting) and the defer
date (defer_date): Until that day, the task counts
as unavailable. An AI agent can set both.
Delegation works only with assignment AI. As soon as you set a task to AI, TandemLoop automatically chooses Do as the delegation mode. With assignment Human, the field is hidden.
Creating a Task
New tasks are created directly in the middle column—without a detour through a form. An input line appears exactly where the task will end up:
Middle column › + New Task (at the end of the list) → type a title → ↩︎
- ↩︎ creates the task and immediately opens the next empty line—so you can capture several tasks in a row.
- ↩︎ in an empty line or ⎋ ends the input. If you click elsewhere, a title you’ve already typed is kept.
- You set other fields (due date, tags, notes, and so on) afterward in the Inspector or with the context menu.
The same input line also opens from:
| Starting point | Where does the task end up? |
|---|---|
| + in the header of a milestone | in the milestone |
| Toolbar + Task, the T key, or ⌃⌘N | next to the selection (in the milestone of the selected task or in the project) |
| Right-click a milestone or project › New Task | in the milestone or project |
| Empty list › New Task | in the current list |
In views (board, table, calendar, and so on), there’s no fixed list a line would fit into—there, a form opens in the Inspector. On iPhone, create tasks with + at the top right.
Quick Entry remains the fastest way when you’re somewhere else: the task lands in the Inbox.
Toolbar › Quick Entry (tray icon) (or ⌃⌥Space) → enter a title → confirm
Editing
Click a task to open it in the Inspector on the right—that’s where you reach all fields.
Renaming works directly in the row everywhere: double-click the title, press ↩︎ with the task selected (as in the Finder), or right-click › Rename. ↩︎ or a click elsewhere confirms, ⎋ cancels; an empty title is discarded.
The Context Menu
Right-clicking a task (iPad/iPhone: touch and hold) shows the same menu in the same order everywhere—list, project card, view, board, table, calendar, Multi-View and dashboard columns:
| Group | Items |
|---|---|
| Handback | only for a handback from the AI agent: Accept, Request Changes… or Reply…, Take Over, Drop Task |
| Open | Go to Location (jumps from a view to the project; for Inbox tasks, Show in Inbox) |
| Edit | Rename, Open Spec…/Add Spec… |
| State | Mark as Completed, for recurring tasks Skip This Occurrence and Stop Repeating, Status ▸, Due Date ▸ (Today, Tomorrow, Next Week, No Due Date), Tags ▸ |
| Arrange | Move To…, Duplicate |
| Copy | Copy Link (as a [[tsk_…\|Title]] wiki
link), Copy App Link (tandemloop://open/…,
see System Integration), Copy
ID, Show in Finder (macOS) |
| Delete | Delete—with confirmation |
On the Mac, you find the same commands in the menu bar under Item (with keyboard shortcuts) and in the ⋯ menu at the top of the Inspector. You can reverse changes made through the menu with Undo in the notice at the bottom—or with ⌘ + Z (Edit › Undo), even after the notice has disappeared.
Several tasks at once: In the table layout, you select rows with the checkboxes on the left. A bar above the table then applies to all selected tasks: Mark Completed, Mark Active, assignment, Set Delegation, due date +1 Day / +7 Days, Tags + / Tags −.
Duplicate (⌘D) creates a copy with all fields, tags, notes, and the spec in the same project or milestone—as an open task named “… copy,” whose title you can overwrite right away.
Specs for AI Agents
A spec (short for specification) describes exactly what needs to be done: goal, requirements, and acceptance criteria. This lets you prepare tasks calmly and then hand them off to an AI agent. The spec is at the start of the task file, so agents read it directly from the data folder.
In every task list, an icon on the right of the row shows how far along the spec is:
| Icon | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Document with plus, faded | AI task without a spec—one click creates it |
| Document with lines | Spec in Draft |
| Green document | Ready for AI Agent |
Writing a Spec
Open the spec with the icon in the row, with the Spec card at the top of the Inspector, or with the context menu (Open Spec…/Add Spec…). It opens as a separate page in place of the list and details.
- The task’s title is at the top—you can change it right here. Below it, after the divider, the spec begins.
- A new spec starts empty. If you’d rather start with an outline, store it under Settings › AI Agents › Spec (there’s also an example outline you can insert). Sections you leave empty are removed when saving.
- You write Markdown. Headings, lists, checkboxes, and code blocks are formatted as you type; the control characters stay faintly visible.
- ↩︎ continues lists, ⇥ and
⇧⇥ indent and outdent list items. Clicking
[ ]checks off an item. - Edit or Reading View (⇧⌘E) switches between writing and a calm reading view. Saving happens automatically.
- In the column on the right, you change status, assignment, delegation, do date, due date, reminder, tags, and custom attributes directly, without leaving the spec. Below that are the outline—a click jumps to the heading—including checked-off acceptance criteria, and the History, which opens in its own window.
Going Through Several Tasks
Review Specs in the list’s toolbar opens the first AI task whose spec is missing or still a draft—and then pages only through these tasks. The button appears as soon as the list contains such tasks.
With ⌥⌘↓ and ⌥⌘↑, you move to the next or previous task of the list you came from. Ready & Next (⌘↩︎) marks the spec as ready and moves straight on. Back, ⌘[, or ⎋ (twice in writing mode) takes you back to the list. On iPhone, the spec opens as its own sheet: Done closes it, paging and Ready are in the bar at the bottom.
Hand Off—Copy Prompt (⇧⌘C) puts a short work order with the task’s ID and file path on the clipboard, which you paste into your AI tool; the agent then reads the spec itself from the data folder. You can also copy the spec or just the file path. This doesn’t change the task’s status.
Custom templates—Under Settings › AI Agents
› Spec, you define the outline of new specs and the handoff
text. Both are stored in the data folder as
_config/spec-template.md and
_config/spec-handoff.md and therefore apply on all devices.
In the handoff text, you can use {{id}},
{{title}}, {{context}}, {{path}},
and {{absolute_path}} as placeholders.
Views for an overview—In views, the fields Spec (Draft/Ready for AI Agent) and Has Spec are available for filtering, for example for a “Ready for Agents” view.
Recurring Tasks
A task can repeat according to a rule. In the Inspector, you set it up under Repeat: daily, on weekdays, weekly on one or more days of the week, monthly (on a day, on the last day, or, for example, on the last Friday), or yearly—each also as “every n …”. Optionally, the repetition ends on a date or after a number of occurrences. Recurring tasks show a repeat icon in every list; in views, you filter for them with Recurring.
| Type | Next occurrence |
|---|---|
| On Schedule | At a fixed rhythm, no matter when you complete it (for example, every Monday) |
| After Completion | Counted from the day you complete it (for example, 2 weeks later) |
When you complete the task, it’s kept as completed, and TandemLoop creates exactly one new task in the same place—with title, spec, tags, attributes, and assignment, but without the log entries. The due date determines the timing, or the do date if there’s no due date; all dates shift together, and the time and reminder move along (“every Monday 9:00 AM” becomes next Monday 9:00 AM). Missed occurrences aren’t made up: the new task is placed on the next occurrence after today. This also applies when an AI agent completes the task in the file—if the app isn’t running, the follow-up task is created at the next launch.
In the context menu, you also find Skip This Occurrence (the next task is created immediately) and Stop Repeating (the task stays, no further one follows). When you drop a recurring task, TandemLoop asks whether you mean only this occurrence or the entire series.
Checked off by mistake? With ⌘Z or by reopening the completed task, the follow-up task that was just created disappears again.
Moving and Sorting
Drag tasks within a project or milestone to change their order. You can also drag a task to another project, a milestone, or another area. Details are in the chapter Reorganizing with Drag and Drop.
Completing and Deleting
Check off the task with the circle in front of the title, press ⌘K, or set the status to Completed or Dropped—TandemLoop then sets the completion date automatically. On iPad and iPhone, a swipe to the right also completes the task. By default, checked-off tasks stay visible but are shown struck through and dimmed; Completing & Archiving explains more.
To delete, use the task’s context menu (Delete) or press ⌫ or ⌘⌫ while the task is selected. TandemLoop asks first. On iPad and iPhone, you can also swipe a task to the left and tap Delete.
Deleting can’t be reversed with Undo. On the Mac, the deleted files go to the Finder’s Trash and can be restored from there; on iPad and iPhone, deleting is permanent. For finished tasks, use the status Completed instead.