[O] Overall organization/setup for org mode: Projects and Tasks

[Alan E. Davis]

I've been using org-mode for a few years.  My agenda is cluttered with tasks that are weeks and even months past due.  I am "this close" to declaring "orgmode bankruptcy" and starting from scratch, except my current setup works so well for other things.   Might still do that, but I want to ask for ideas.  

I stumble consistently over the distinction between projects and tasks.  I think there is not clear distinction, but I need to find a way to organize them so that, at least, agenda displays the day to day TODO tasks separated in a meaningful way from the long term projects that I need to remind myself of (and there are dozens of these).   

PROJECTS: I can define projects as
       - an overall series of tasks related to a single purpose
       - a recurring task (monthly calendars that I need to remind myself to make each month)
       - an actual project I am working on (writing a proposal, or a research project about a coral, or a recipe database, or reconstructing a LaTeX file tree for a publication ten years ago)


TODOS: perhaps tasks could be anything, 
      - bills (marked by tag "bill"
     - phone calls to make

     I am starting to understand how I TODOS can be scattered through all my other files.   However, the greater the number of agenda files, the greater the clutter.   And, as a recent thread called to mind, there are times when the list of agenda files prevents me from searching for tags or todos.  SO where is the happy medium?

Some thoughts:
     -  I tried to write a custom agenda command that defined the agenda files to encompass all *org files in a directory.  This actually set the agenda-files variable to all files for the rest of the session, so I gave that idea up----although I know it's possible to do it.  

     -  Again, the number of agenda files seems to be constraining.  
     -  There seem to be issues between defining the agenda files explicitly, or adding them one at a time.
     -  It would be useful if agenda searches automatically picked up the recent files I had worked on during the session, 

        however, in as streamlined a way as possible.
    

I don't need to be reminded everyday that I have to organize bibliographic references for my next trip to the library, but I have to have a way to keep these organized to jog my memory in planning my time in some loose sense.

I do need to have a list of bills that I can access without having to sort through the list of projects that are 3 months overdue.

Almost every week I have new insights into how to use tags, so perhaps I need to junk alot of the tags I set up long ago.

These thoughts are somewhat disconnected, and I apologize for this.  

And I would be grateful for any comments that would shed light on how to solve these issues.  

Alan Davis