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Areas and People

Use Areas for ongoing responsibilities and People for delegated or person-centered work. Both can be created where you assign them, and both can be managed later in Settings.

Areas

Areas group related projects and standalone tasks under a stable responsibility, such as Work, Home, Health, Research, or a client name.

Use an Area when you want to answer: "What work belongs to this part of my life or work?"

Create an Area While Assigning It

You do not have to leave the task flow to create an Area.

  1. Open Quick Add, Quick Capture, or the task editor.
  2. Open the Area field.
  3. Type the Area name.
  4. If it does not already exist, choose Create.
  5. The new Area is selected for the task.

On desktop, the same create-as-you-type behavior appears in Area pickers. On mobile, the Area picker in Quick Capture and task edit lets you search first, then create the Area if there is no exact match.

Create or Edit Areas in Settings

Use Settings when you want to manage saved Areas directly.

  1. Open Settings.
  2. Open Manage.
  3. Expand Areas.
  4. Add a new Area, rename one, change its color, or delete an Area you no longer use.

Deleting an Area keeps its tasks and projects. Mindwtr moves them to unassigned instead of deleting the work.

People

People are reusable assignee names for delegated tasks, Waiting For items, and person-centered searches. They can also hold notes and reference links, such as an email address, contact page, or Obsidian link.

Use People when you want to answer: "Who owns this, who am I waiting on, or who should I discuss this with?"

Create a Person While Assigning One

  1. Open a task.
  2. Find Assigned to or Assignee / Person.
  3. Type the person's name.
  4. If the name is not already saved, choose New Person.
  5. The person is saved and assigned to the task.

Typing a name without creating the saved Person still works as a task assignee. Choosing New Person makes the name reusable in future suggestions and Settings.

Create or Edit People in Settings

  1. Open Settings.
  2. Open Manage.
  3. Expand People.
  4. Add a person, rename one, add notes, add a reference link, or delete a person you no longer use.

Deleting a Person keeps the tasks. Mindwtr clears that saved person record instead of deleting the work.

FieldUse it forWhere to create
AreaResponsibility buckets for projects and tasksArea picker, Settings -> Manage -> Areas
PersonDelegated assignee or waiting-for ownerAssigned to field, Settings -> Manage -> People
ContextWhere, with what tool, or with whom you can do the taskType @context in Quick Add or task edit
TagTopic, energy, mode, or grouping labelType #tag in Quick Add or task edit

See Also

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Getting Things Done and GTD are registered trademarks of the David Allen Company. Mindwtr is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by the David Allen Company.