Getting started
Tapestry is a task management tool that helps you focus on what you can do now. Once you link tasks as dependencies, Tapestry will show you the tasks that are relevant to you right now.
For example, if you have a task to Achieve enlightenment that depends on Eat a sandwich, Tapestry will show you the Eat a sandwich task first, and only show you the Achieve enlightenment task once you’ve completed the sandwich.
How to use Tapestry
The easiest way to use Tapestry is to start on the Home page. This page shows your highest-priority tasks.1
If you can’t complete any of these tasks, your first move should not be to go to another page to browse tasks (such as Now, which shows all of the tasks that are unblocked). Instead, you should tell Tapestry exactly why you can’t complete that task:
| Why | What to do |
|---|---|
| “I need to do something else first.” | Add the dependency to the task that’s blocking you |
| “I don’t have enough time.” | Break your tasks down so that each task can be completed in a single sitting |
| “This task isn’t relevant or possible yet.” | You can’t send your mom a birthday card until her birthday! Add a Snooze to the task to make it reappear when it’s relevant. |
Breaking down tasks
Tapestry works best when you break down tasks into small, atomic pieces. For example, rather than the task,
you might break it down into smaller tasks like,
By breaking down tasks into smaller pieces, you can unblock more of the list, and make progress faster — even when the project as a whole is blocked. If you have collaborators, one of you can Buy paint while another Clears the room, and unblock tasks together.
Building a task tree
The best way to write a task is to start from the goal:
Tapestry will show you this task right away. But you can’t do this task! Why not? There’s a dependency: Paint the living room. Add the minimum viable dependency to your list and then look at the tasks Tapestry is presenting to you now; can you complete them now? If not, add the minimum viable dependencies for those tasks, and so on.
By working from your goals back to their immediate dependencies, you can be sure that you’re never working on tasks unless they bring you closer to your endgame.
Using Snooze and Due dates
There are two types of dates you can add to Tapestry tasks: Snooze dates and Due dates. Adding a Snooze date to a task will make it disappear from your list until the date you’ve set. Adding a Due date heightens the priority of the task, and all prerequisites that must be completed before it.
When entering a date in Tapestry, you can type in a date
(e.g., January 3, 2027 or 2027-04-04), or use plain English to say what you mean
(e.g., tomorrow, next week, monday at 8am, etc.).
Try it out:
Try "tomorrow", "next week", or "monday at 8am".
It can be tempting to use Snooze dates to push tasks off into the future, but be careful: If you find yourself snoozing a task more than once, it’s probably a sign that the task is too big or too vague. Think about why you’re repeatedly snoozing this task: If it’s intimidating to begin, break it down into smaller tasks.
Footnotes
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How does Tapestry know what’s high priority? A task is high priority if it is blocking other tasks, or if it has a due date. Tapestry blends the network-based priority of blocking tasks with the time-based priority of due dates. ↩