Create a dynamic task name

[Robin43]

I would like to know how to or if we can set up a recurring task with a dynamic task name.
For eg. Task name: “Weekly updates - Week of Jul 15 to Jul 19”.
When this task gets closed, the recurring new task should open with the name “Week of Jul 22 to Jul 26”.
Or something similar that can identify the week in the task name.
The due date isn’t helpful in this case as some tasks could have follow-up action that causes the due date to be extended.

[Jan-Rienk]

Hi @Robin43 ,

Welcome to the forum!

Using Asana without 3rd parties

This is not possible using just Asana at the moment, mainly because recurring tasks currently don’t trigger rules:

Recurring Tasks to Trigger Rules

EDIT: This was initially a bug report. After it turned out recurring tasks not triggering rules was not considered a bug by Asana this topic became a feature request. Briefly describe (1-2 sentences) the bug you’re experiencing: Reccurring tasks not responding to rules Steps to reproduce: Add sections ToDo and Done in My Tasks (I’m guessing other projects behave the same, but I’ve seen it in My Tasks) Make recurring task in section ToDo Add rule to move completed tasks to section “Done” …

Your vote and voice would be appreciated.

If that were to be solved, you’d still need to be able to increment numbers for each task, or have a rule action that get’s the week numbers.

Using 3rd parties

You might succeed with this in having software like Zapier create weekly tasks and base the name on the creation date.

Or @Phil_Seeman might be able to tell you if you can accomplish this with Flowsana.

[Jan-Rienk]

@Jan-Rienk

If that were to be solved, you’d still need to be able to increment numbers for each task, or have a rule action that get’s the week numbers.

I’ve gone ahead and created feedback for this functionality:

Increment a custom field number rule action

For various applications it would be useful to be able to increment a number custom field as a rule action. Tracking the amount of section or status changes could for instance give insights into efficiency.

[Phil_Seeman]

Hi @Robin43,

@Jan-Rienk

if you can accomplish this with Flowsana.

Yes, you could likely get close to what you want using our Flowsana integration.

Firstly, unlike Asana, Flowsana rules will trigger on new instances of recurring tasks.

Also, we have a Variable Substitution feature that you could take advantage of, which gives you access to the task’s creation date. So you could create a Flowsana rule with an action like:

Now of course, this is predicated on your completing (closing) the task on the first day of the week, in order for {task.CreationDate} to be the date that you 'd want.

[Alana_Lopez1]

Hi @Robin43 I sort of resolved this for my own maintenance board where we have maintenance tasks to run Monthly, Quarterly and Yearly. Just as in your case I wanted dynamic task titles where the newly created reoccurring task reflects the frequency, so they are easily identified as different in other boards/views.

First, I had to set up a rule to trigger my rule, which will happen when the first task is completed and the reoccurring task is created - see Arthur’s solution here, I also used Liohn solution to automate the rule: Enable Recurring Tasks to Trigger Rules - #57 by Arthur_BEGOU

Then I set up my reoccurring tasks with the tags I wanted to reference (these won’t change and will carry over when a new task is generated from the reoccurring task): ‘Monthly’, ‘Quarterly’, ‘Yearly’.

Then I created a rule to use that tag and the start date of the task to generate a phrase to insert into the task title using AI. Now on being “added” to the project, Monthly tasks will insert the Month and Year into the task title, Quarterly tasks will insert the financial quarter, and Yearly tasks will insert the financial year.

NB: It takes about 20 seconds for the AI to update the task title based on my instructions shown in the image below. You do need to set your rule to trigger based on other rules as Arthur says in his solution.

[Jan-Rienk]

Awesome @Alana_Lopez1 !

Some tips:

• The rule seems pretty straightforward, so I’d stay away from the heaviest models, as the more complex models both take more time, and consume more credits. (You can check credit consumption in rule history) Asana Help Center
• Maybe describing the Australian financial year might not require you to use Web search (or maybe it is in the model’s training, I don’t know), further reducing the credit consumption. And you may even be able to utilise the simplest model.
• Describing the “job to be done” (For example: “your purpose is to ___”) and adding syntax/example output helps the rule execute more accurately.

[Alana_Lopez1]

Thanks Jan, it was my first time using it, and I didn’t realise you could change models!!! And I also turned off Search (didn’t mean to turn it on), and the model seems to be functioning fine. Thanks so much for your advice.

[Jan-Rienk]

Sure thing.

Yeah, the model change is a bit of a hidden feature.

Anyway, it’s good to be aware of the credit consumption at your org to prevent running out and the rules stopping from working. So it may be good to check with one of your admins to keep an eye on consumption.

I’m working on an article in English Forum > Forum Leaders tips that dives deeper into the intricacies of credit consumption for different AI studio plans.