Search and open OmniFocus Projects enhanced with Alfred support
One of the things I always come across when using OmniFocus is the need to quickly find and open/focus a particular project. While OmniFocus has its own search capabilities and of course allows you to navigate to and focus a specific project. However, this typically doesn’t cut it for me since it involves multiple steps and, depending of the perspective setting you are currently in, may not provide the intended result.
AppleScript to the rescue
Thankfully there is a great AppleScript based solution to this problem: The original script by Rob Trew can be launched via Launchbar by passing the search string on or from the OmniFocus toolbar asking you for the search string.
Adding in Alfred support
The script itself is basically perfect, like everything that Rob does, but I was missing support for Alfred and so I added it. You can now invoke the script from Alfred as an AppleScript extension (Powerpack required), using for example the keyword ‘ofind’ and add the search string in Alfred itself. If more than one project contains the search string you are presented with a dialog to select the project you have been looking for and a new OmniFocus window will be opened with the desired project in focus. Should you decide to build your own Alfred extension from the script and not use the one below, please note that you need to remove the ‘on run’ block to make it work with Alfred.
Download the script of Alfred extension
You can download the script as an AppleScript file for use with Launchbar, in the OmniFocus toolbar or with script launchers such as FastScripts. If you like to build your own Alfred extensions you can start from this file as well. For the more lazy I have also have the ready made Alfred extension available for download.
Find all of my OmniFocus posts in my ‘Essentials’ collection. If you like to master OmniFocus, I really recommend the excellent ‘Learn OmniFocus’ learning platform as well as the pragmatic ‘Working with OmniFocus’ video tutorials.
