To settle, to do, waiting, done: which is which?

The decisions screen does not file by arrival date but by what you need to do with each line. That is what throws people at first, and it is also what makes the screen useful: it answers "what do I start with", not "what happened recently".

The five states

To settle. A call is waiting on you. Verbasil spotted an open question and offers to close it. While it sits there, it may well be blocking something else.

To do. The call is made, the action remains. It is no longer a question, it is a task that comes back to you.

Waiting. The action exists but depends on someone else: a customer who owes an answer, a supplier, a partner. Keeping it apart from "to do" saves you from re-reading a line you cannot act on.

Done. Finished. The line leaves the active views and stays available.

Archived. Filed away without being handled: it was not relevant, or it no longer is. Archiving is not deleting, the line and its evidence remain.

What moves a decision between states

You do. Nothing moves on its own: Verbasil proposes the entry into the queue, you decide what follows.

1. On a line to settle, Settle records the call and its rationale.
2. Move to switches between "to do" and "waiting" when responsibility changes hands.
3. Mark done closes the line.
4. Archive takes it out of the active views without handling it.
5. Reopen puts a decision back in play when the context has changed.

The time markers

A line can carry a due date, show up as overdue, or be flagged as dragging for two weeks. These are not extra states but alerts laid over the current one: a decision to settle for a fortnight is still to settle, it has just become expensive.

Didn't work?

• You are looking for a decision and find it in no column. It may still be awaiting validation, so not a decision yet. See Why is my decision missing.
• A line is in the wrong column. It is a proposal, not a verdict: move it.
• Verbasil created several lines from one note. A note can hold several distinct commitments. Keep the ones that are, archive the rest.

FAQ

Why separate "to do" from "waiting"?

Because they are two different mental loads. "To do" asks for time, "waiting" asks for a nudge. Mixing them produces a list nobody dares open.

Does an archived decision still count as evidence?

It stays in the memory and stays available. It simply no longer surfaces in the active views.

Can I turn a decision into an experiment?

Yes. When a call deserves testing rather than settling, the action is on the line.