Todo.txt

1. Overview

The simplest possible task format: one line per task, with priority, project and context markers readable by any text tool.

Category: Tasks & Finance.

2. Version and scope assessed

Version assessed: Format commit 1d90c086533a2574f6039a756ada760ec672a53e; reference CLI commit a9846a232c86937a218d1be45bc4c7631855ee16.

4. Principle profile

5. Fundamental requirements

6. Evidence and verification

• E1: The official grammar specifies leading priority, optional creation date, completion marker/date, project/context tokens and extensible key:value metadata. Its published examples are retained for independent text inspection. The specification explicitly notes client differences in priority preservation on completion; a due: or rec: token is not by itself proof of shared scheduling behavior across clients. (source), confidence medium
• E2: The official documentation for this entry provides a relevant practicable exit and migration lead, but this desk review did not perform a version-pinned export, restore, migration, offline, or consequential-behavior test sufficient to establish the claim beyond the recorded status. (source), confidence medium
• E3: The official documentation for this entry provides a relevant independent interpretation and recovery lead, but this desk review did not perform a version-pinned export, restore, migration, offline, or consequential-behavior test sufficient to establish the claim beyond the recorded status. (source), confidence medium
• E4: The official documentation for this entry provides a relevant continuing authority and custody over already-created work lead, but this desk review did not perform a version-pinned export, restore, migration, offline, or consequential-behavior test sufficient to establish the claim beyond the recorded status. (source), confidence medium
• E5: The reference CLI completion branch removes a leading priority before prepending the completion marker/date. The archive path appends x-marked lines to done.txt and then deletes them from todo.txt, using sed's .bak mechanism. These are file-changing transformations, not an immutable task history; actual interrupted writes, backups and alternative-client behavior were not run. (source), confidence medium
• sovereignty: A positive Sovereignty finding requires established E1, E2 and E4 in the declared scope. The existing access/exit/custody record for Todo.txt does not establish all three minimums. The prior positive finding is withdrawn; recorded storage and portability strengths remain facts, not a verified failure. (source), confidence medium
• longevity: E3 is not established for Todo.txt's existing essential-record scope. The previous Longevity finding is replaced by Not assessed, not a verified failure or a positive placeholder. (source), confidence medium
• locality: The official documentation for this entry provides a relevant locality lead, but this desk review did not perform a version-pinned export, restore, migration, offline, or consequential-behavior test sufficient to establish the claim beyond the recorded status. (source), confidence medium
• transparency: The positive control observations above do not yet establish whole-scope E5. The methodology requires that minimum before a positive Transparency and Control finding; the previous positive finding is therefore withdrawn to Not assessed, not changed to Does not meet. (source), confidence medium
• E3: The official text grammar describes task markers/tokens, while clients can differ in priority and extension semantics. Reference completion/archive source changes priority and moves lines between files. Complete recurrence, unknown-tag meaning and task-history reconstruction across clients have not been established. (source), confidence medium
• E5: The reference CLI's append/delete and backup-file paths are inspectable, but not immutable history or evidence of interrupted-write safety. Delete/deduplicate/replace authority, line-number drift and effective backup/correction across the declared client workflow remain unverified. (source), confidence medium
• E2: The former E2 Pass does not establish equivalent priority, recurrence and extension-token behavior in an independent task workflow. Keeping readable task lines does not complete the declared cross-client semantic migration. (source), confidence medium

7. Migration and recovery

Native storage format: Single plain-text file, one task per line.

Synchronization or runtime model: Git / Syncthing.

Example export or inspection command (not verified against any particular version or data set): grep '^(A)' todo.txt

8. Architectural strengths

Established strengths and their scope are recorded in the evidence and assessment findings on this page.

9. Architectural limitations

• Plain-text portability does not standardize every extension's behavior.
• Completion/archive change source files and can remove priority; full recovery remains untested.

10. Assessment findings and remaining work

Verification scenario: Move the file to another implementation and verify priorities, completion, and extension tags.

What may invalidate an overconfident claim: Text portability is strong, but conventions for recurrence, dates, and application-specific semantics vary.

Documentation starting point: https://github.com/todotxt/todo.txt

Evidence update: 23 October 2026

• Resolved: The official grammar specifies leading priority, optional creation date, completion marker/date, project/context tokens and extensible key:value metadata. Its published examples are retained for independent text inspection. The specification explicitly notes client differences in priority preservation on completion; a due: or rec: token is not by itself proof of shared scheduling behavior across clients. Source.
• Resolved: The reference CLI completion branch removes a leading priority before prepending the completion marker/date. The archive path appends x-marked lines to done.txt and then deletes them from todo.txt, using sed’s .bak mechanism. These are file-changing transformations, not an immutable task history; actual interrupted writes, backups and alternative-client behavior were not run. Source.
• Open: Three-client edits and unknown-tag/priority comparison, recurrence interpretation, actual archive/delete/deduplicate/replace failures and recovery, line-number shifts and older clients. E5 needs effective archive/delete/replace and failure recovery boundaries, including line-number shifts and backup handling.

Assessment follow-up: These bounded findings are incorporated into the evidence above. Eligibility and principle ratings are deliberately unchanged; their reconciliation and any blank-status fixes are deferred to the next pass. Reproduction details and retained inputs are in evidence/third-pass/batch-7/.

Human-readable criteria: Can a user export complete records, preserve invariants and metadata, restore them independently, and continue the essential workflow without provider permission?

Rating reconciliation: 24 October 2026

E3 and E5 remain Not Verified for the existing declared scope. Longevity and Transparency and Control are Not assessed pending their required minimums. Sovereignty is also Not assessed because the required access/exit/custody minimums are not all established. The prior E2 Pass is withdrawn; its essential-record migration comparison remains incomplete. This is a targeted evidence decision, not a finding that the product fails. Existing E1, E4 and Locality findings were not re-certified.

Remaining: Three-client edits and unknown-tag/priority comparison, recurrence interpretation, actual archive/delete/deduplicate/replace failures and recovery, line-number shifts and older clients. E5 needs effective archive/delete/replace and failure recovery boundaries, including line-number shifts and backup handling.

Next without installing locally: Use synthetic todo/done/config files with recurrence/unknown tags and expected task identities; compare supported independent clients or their recorded results, and inspect exact reference-CLI mutation/backup cases.

The individual decision and provenance are retained in evidence/rating-reconciliation/batch-8/. Overall: Insufficient evidence.

Individually reconciled in rating batch 8 on 24 October 2026. E3/E5 remain Not Verified for explicit missing coverage; dependent unsupported findings corrected. Previously resolved questions are retained, not counted again. E1/E4/Locality were not re-certified by this targeted review. The assessment procedure is described in the methodology.