Recurring Task 'every day' gets stuck at the end of a month [the day before Australian clocks switch to daylight savings]

[Quejinok]

Expected Behavior

On completion of a recurring daily task task should be marked as completed and a new task created for the next day. Recurrence term used is "every day"

Obsidian installed on Apple Mac Mini (M1 chip) running latest version of Monterey

Current behaviour

Task is completed (and ticked); however, for the first task of a new month (eg. 1st October) the new task is created for the same day as the completed task. Repeated attempts at completing task results in more completed tasks for the current day plus a new incomplete task for the current day.

Steps to reproduce

1. Create a task that uses the term "every day" in the recurrent task field.
2. Continue completing the task until the 1st day of a new month - complete this task.
3. Check completed and incomplete tasks for this entry - there should be at least on completed task for the 1st of the month plus one incomplete for the same day.

Which Operating Systems are you using?

• Android
• iPhone/iPad
• Linux
• macOS
• Windows

Obsidian Version

0.15.9

Tasks Plugin Version

1.15.0

Checks

• I have tried it with all other plugins disabled and the error still occurs

Possible solution

Change daily task to seven weekly tasks that recur on every Sunday, every Monday, etc

Note weekly, monthly and other tasks do not seem to be impacted.

[claremacrae]

Thank you for the bug report.

I tried to reproduce it with my understanding of the information supplied, and it worked for me.

- [ ] do stuff 🔁 every day 📅 2023-10-04
- [x] do stuff 🔁 every day 📅 2023-10-03 ✅ 2022-10-01
- [x] do stuff 🔁 every day 📅 2023-10-02 ✅ 2022-10-01
- [x] do stuff 🔁 every day 📅 2023-10-01 ✅ 2022-10-01
- [x] do stuff 🔁 every day 📅 2023-09-30 ✅ 2022-10-01
- [x] do stuff 🔁 every day 📅 2023-09-29 ✅ 2022-10-01
- [x] do stuff 🔁 every day 📅 2023-09-28 ✅ 2022-10-01
- [x] do stuff 🔁 every day 📅 2023-09-27 ✅ 2022-10-01

I thought there was a report similar to this some time ago that couldn't be reproduced, but I can't find it after much searching.

However, if we have enough information, we can try and write a unit test in the source code to reproduce it, so please could you provide as much information as you think of about the situation.

• Please test it again, and see if you can yourself reproduce the problem still
• Paste in an example line, that does reproduce the problem (please change the description, though, for privacy)
• What day and roughly what time did the problem occur
• What timezone are you in?
• Had you just updated the Tasks plugin and not restarted
• Had you used this task before 2022-09-30 - did it recur then?

[Quejinok]

Hi Clare, Thanks for the quick feedback. I can answer some questions right now; however, the real test will be to allow a dummy daily task to click over at the end of October and I will take screenshots at that time. Not sure if your testing involved changing the system date to simulate an end of month. As this is my main system I do not want to muck around changing these setting as they date change can trigger other events that would be a problem for me. Answers to some questions follow. Date & Time of Problem Timezone is Australian Eastern Standard Time (AEST) Problem occurred around 7 - 8am on 1 Oct 22. Actions Taken Post identification of issue. 1. Closed and re-opened Obsidian several times - no change to behaviour 2. Rebooted complete system - no change to behaviour 3. Checked all plugins for any out of date - no changes required 4. Updated MacOS - minor upgrade required to latest version of macOS Monterey - no change to behaviour 5. Checked on a Synced Mac Laptop - behaviour the same there 6. Completed a non-recurring Task - all OK 7. Completed a non-daily recurring Task - all OK 8. Determined a temporary workaround to establish daily task as a weekly task (set up for each day of week) - tested - all ok 9. Reported issue. Use of Task Daily tasks have been running since mid September with no issues. As they had been working with no issue that is what triggered me to associate the issue with a month end - worked on 30 Sep and before (in September) but failed on 1 Oct 22. I have only started using Obsidian and Plug-ins in September. Tasks are presented using Dataview in my Daily Journal. Underlying task notes exist for maintenance. Future testing I will run up a dummy daily task and keep a log (starting from 20 Oct) then see what happens on 1 November and report back. Best Regards, Steve

[claremacrae]

Wow, thank you @Quejinok for a really helpful reply, and for setting up the test ready for next month.

Based on your description, I do wonder whether it's a time-of-day issue rather than a month one. In case it is a time-of-day issue, you might be able to try reproducing it an other days before then, at different times.

We don't currently have any automated tests that exercise the code in different time zones and different times of day, only on different dates. It might be worth figuring out how to do that - and also for when the clocks change.

I can't promise when I will have time to do that, though. If I haven't been able to do it by the start of next month, your experiments will be really helpful.

[claremacrae]

I will run up a dummy daily task and keep a log (starting from 20 Oct) then see what happens on 1 November and report back.

HI @Quejinok gentle ping, in the hope that you might have time to keep any eye on this... Thanks in advance!

[Quejinok]

In hand - been running ok up to today - tomorrow is the test.

[Quejinok]

Hi Clare, In Oz it is now 3 Nov 22. I have taken screenshots of the dummy daily task before an after during the last day of October and up to today. The end result is that nothing seems to be untoward - everything is working as expected. I have now come to the opinion that various upgrades to my system - right from the OS to applications to plug-ins have basically resolved the issue. Unfortunately this does not allow me to pin down why the issue happened at the end of September. All other tasks (I have nearly 300 in the system - spread over several years) are working normally, also. I will now stop testing the Tasks feature. Thank you for your patience in this matter. I apologise for not being able to help further and thank you for your time. Best regards

[claremacrae]

Hi @Quejinok,

Ah well, thank you very much indeed for trying to reproduce the problem.

[claremacrae]

As this hasn't been seen again, I'm going to close it for now, as no action is currently required.

[claremacrae]

There has been another report of this, so I've updated the title of this one with what has been learned.

• Completing a daily recurring task creates task set to same day [the day before Australian clocks switch to daylight savings] #2309