I have used Asana for some time now, and one recurrent problem is with the subtasks.
The goal is to set up regular dailies, that are NOT separate tasks, but subtask of a DAILY-task, hence creating better overview of other explicit tasks.
When doing so, and generating a recurrent task from it, each time all subtasks are recreated as a new instance of the main task, which makes sense following basic logic, but is inherently counterproductive as I can see it.
This leads to the problem, that no recurrent task can ever have subtasks.
The second problem is, that there is no clear way to ever find a subtask - I was not yet able to find search terms that would work like > âis:subtask AND assignee:none AND duedate: noneâ.
I also couldnât find a full display of ALL incomplete tasks in the project incl. subtasks.
Is there a way to either block main task completion- before all subtasks are completed (ideally incl. a little info comment), auto-complete subtasks when the main project is marked complete, or at least to find a full list of project tasks (explicitly incl. assignee:none)?
I am thankful for any suggestions, else this can be seen as a feature-request.
Thank you 
- What youâve tried so far
- Whatâs not working or confusing
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Too many questions my brain froze 
Can we discuss based on an example? Can you share the name of a real task, real subtasks, and one issue you have?
Well nothing special here.
Hereâs a Task + Subtasks set up as a daily
When I complete the main task (Which I should not be able to do, when subtasks are not completed)
A new task is generated, as it should
And now thereâs 2 such subtasks (6 total subtask for 1,2,3 in total for just one reoccurence of the daily):
Those subtasks cannot be found without explicit knowledge about their exact name.
So now thereâs A LOT of subtasks which I cannot find, but which also arenât displayed in the global overview. Assign each to a person and project, might help, but the fact , that subtasks do not inherit parent-task-projects by default is a bug in itself.
I have searched the forum and the first people who were highlighting this exact topic started doing so in 2017!!! Canât argue, that Asana wasnât able to solve this in close to a decadeâŚ.
I donât understand the issue, but maybe thatâs because we donât use Asana the same way.
Each daily task has a list of things to do, subtasks. So every single day you get new subtasks, which is good and expected I guess.
You mentioned:
- âI should not be able to complete a task if there are still subtasks openedâ: I disagree, this is a old heated debate, and I have tons of cases where I do want to be able to, and I donât want to have âthe optionâ to choose the behavior
- âI canât find the subtasksâ: I believe thatâs the main issue. Either those subtasks are assigned to people and/or multi-homed into specific projects, so you can"easily" find them. Or you decided to only assign yourself on the main task and completed it without checking the subtasks: thatâs your decision. â maybe thatâs your main issue right there? forgetting to checkk subtasks when completing a main task?
I would sometimes assign myself on the main task and the subtasks, and then put in place the right dependencies to make sure I do everything is the right order.
Well, I will not argue preferences, I am not the only one who supports this opinion, seems like thereâs still no relevant solution to this.
It is true that there has been much discussion about this in the past. And, in terms of the relationship between tasks and subtasks, what @Philipp_Keyzman have written is exactly what is happening in reality.
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What would be the ideal solution for you?
Subtaks are being worked on, so now is a good time to share
I quote
1a) âIs there a way to either block main task completion - before all subtasks are completed (ideally incl. a little info comment),
1b) auto-complete subtasks when the main project is marked complete,
1c) or at least to find a full list of project tasks (explicitly incl. assignee:none)?â
- âAssign each to a person and project, might help, but the fact , that subtasks do not inherit parent-task-projects by default is a bug in itself.â
(â> because, theyâre then easily lost in the void, of Asana)
This problem is described based on a reoccuring task, because they WOULD be helpful IF autocomplete/block parent-task-completion was ON for them, otherwise they self-replicate and basically spam the project, in the background, while being invisible.
But if we take a single project-task, which is actually relevant as it is, without repeating:
Itâs subtasks carry even more relevance, than those of the repeating one, since they are intended to be completed as they are as part of the parent-task. I might, but I also might not want to assign all 5 sub-tasks to the person.
If the person then decides to complete the parent-tasks, the sub-tasks are basically gone forever, and this might cause trouble for others down the road.
Prohibiting parent-task completion guarantees, that you have spend enough time checking the subtasks, and theyâre actually finished, or at least have become irrelevant and can be marked finished and commented if necessary.
If you defined a parent-task and you can finish it BEFORE finishing the sub-tasks, this is a very strong indicator , that the structure of this task is plain out wrong.
So yes, if thereâs any possibility people who donât use Asana in the same way you do, might get to use it their way too, that would be cool (, because it seems thereâs many like this)
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Because Asana rarely comes here and comments, I was just trying to be helpful by helping define what people expect more precisely. Also trying to manage expectations, after years of reading the forum and knowing what Asan usually does and doesnât do.
The main issue is that a large number of users actually do not want those changes you described. And Asana is not known to offer the âoptionâ to choose between two behaviours.
Also some of those behaviours can be somehow created with rules, dependencies, script actions⌠It isnât easy to setup and doesnât scale, I agree, but in some cases I am sure Asana considers that if someone wants a specific behaviour that isnât the current one (considered to be the expected behaviour) then they can use the API and scripts to create whatever behaviour they want.
A good example of that is that you can complete a blocked task even if the blocking task isnât completed. 50% of the people are ok with it, 50% are not with it
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I do appreciate your effort 100%
That said:
Breaking this down to basic principles: Asana is a glorified to-do list.
And there is not âright wayâ to write one, as long as it works for the persons environment.
My list is mine, and as long as we do not collaborate on it, itâs fine.
When we do, we communicate rules of using it, one of which might be what I explained before.
How others use theirs is none of my concern per se (even though Iâm sure thereâs a lot to learn there too).
Asana not being known for anything is kind of besides the point, features come over time - The main question is: Do people want it (and they apparently do ) and if itâs 50/50, itâs a design choice to not implement a setting, which could be as simple as a toggle to shut it on/off in the project owners settings, or per project basis.
The second thing is that if a person needs to do something fancy to do the same (like applying scripting) , he can also use another software, which already has what he needs, or code his own to-do-list-app entirely (if heâs apt enough to code, or even use an AI like repl.it).
My point is if tech doesnât do what people need, esp. based on indiv. preference of others, they will just move to something better - therefore this argument is kind of invalid.
Generally Iâm not sure why this might be such a big deal anyway, Adding a functional check to the class task should imho not be a big deal .
Something like this might solve it + the settingâs toggle which on/offâs this functions execution.
def complete_task:
if TASK has subclass.status != complete
return False
(Itâs obviously never as easy, but I canât imagine this being SO hard either)
