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Outlining software recommendations?
Paul Keith:
Credit goes to mwang: https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=17606.0
Software link: http://treesheets.com/
superboyac:
Have you looked into mind-mapping software? That might do what you want, although it is a bit of a different paradigm.
-Renegade (January 22, 2011, 07:54 PM)
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Yeah, I use mindmaps for other things. I can't do it for this case, because I need to be able to import and export large blocks of information. So i need to be able to bring in and take out stuff from the outliner into Excel and text files, and so forth. Mindmaps can't do that because of the way they display the information. That's why I need exactly what Excel does (interface-wise), but with the ability to move rows in and out of parents, which Excel can't do.
superboyac:
Credit goes to mwang: https://www.donationcoder.com/forum/index.php?topic=17606.0
Software link: http://treesheets.com/
-Paul Keith (January 22, 2011, 08:09 PM)
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Paul! And mwang! That might actually be the solution!! Oh man, I have to say, even if I don't end up using this for what I described here, that program is pretty freaking awesome. I think it's going to be a winner. Thanks Paul, that might be a lifesaver for me.
What I LOVE about it is that it works just like my brain works when I'm trying to solve any kind of problem. I seriously think in grids and outlines. I can break anything I do in my life into a grid and outline. So this program allows me to do that quite easily. The interface is superb. I actually was thinking of this EXACT thing a while back when thinking about the best way to do a mock website.
If this program adds some formula support so it can do automated functions could be added to the cells, it would rock. InfoQube does this, and that's why its so powerful. If Infoqube or Treesheets can combine each other's strengths, I truly think it would revolutionize personal information management for the future.
tomos:
Treesheets looks very nice.
I guess what would be important would be ease of import/export (in case the formula support is slow to get implemented and you get itchy feet)
If Infoqube or Treesheets can combine each other's strengths, I truly think it would revolutionize personal information management for the future.
-superboyac (January 22, 2011, 08:30 PM)
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You gotta start making a list for Pierre (to implement in IQ) :)
Re your first post (above) - I find it a doddle to move items around the hierarchy in IQ
Select item(s) and Alt+Arrowkeys is all you need.
I've never worked with manual sorting in IQ, so I cant help much there - I know Armando does all the time (but that doesnt necessarily mean it's easy :-)
There is a method of making a manual sort permanent (via a number field) but again I'm not sure about it - maybe Armando will comment about it...
EDIT/ minor
superboyac:
Treesheets looks very nice.
I guess what would be important would be ease of import/export (in case the formula support is slow to get implemented and you get itchy feet)
If Infoqube or Treesheets can combine each other's strengths, I truly think it would revolutionize personal information management for the future.
-superboyac (January 22, 2011, 08:30 PM)
--- End quote ---
You gotta start making a list for Pierre (to implement in IQ) :)
Re your first post (above) - I find it a doddle to move items around the hierarchy in IQ
Select item(s) and Alt+Arrowkeys is all you need.
I've never worked with manual sorting in IQ, so I cant help much there - I know Armando does all the time (but that doesnt necessarily mean it's easy :-)
There is a method of making a manual sort permanent (via a number field) but again I'm not sure about it - maybe Armando will comment about it...
-tomos (January 23, 2011, 01:30 PM)
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Yes, I do really want to make a list for Pierre, but I just don't have the time. I keep in touch with Armando all the time, he's amazing. He really uses IQ heavily and understands pretty much everything about it.
Please read this before continuing:
Pierre, Armando, etc. The stuff I wrote below is just a rant. Please ignore it, it is not really constructive at all. I don't intend it to be anything negative about the program. On the contrary, I desperately want the program to be very successful. I apologize for this.
tomos, I'm not sure how heavily you use IQ, but once you really use it heavily, things get difficult. Yes, it's easy to move items around. But once you start having hundreds of items in a grid, each with several levels and very particular sorts, along with linking several items in various places (like shortcuts for an exe), bad things can happen real quick. items start disappearing for no apparent reason, but they are still there in a sense, you just don't know what happened. Then, if you drag/drop items here and there, into and out of parents, the screen view jumps around a lot, you lose your spot, and you don't know what happens. So you spend a minute reorienting yourself in this huge list of items. Copying and pasting items can get very hairy. It's hard to understand how the items get pasted or inserted in. Do they go under the place you've selected to past in? Are they children, are they parents? Again, after pasting, the screen does a couple of funky jumps, and you have to reorient yourself again. Then, if you've selected several items that are not grouped together and you paste it somewhere, I've seen where nothing gets pasted. Then you go back and try to see what happened, and you might find some items have changed or disappeared. You can't undo because there's no real undo feature. You start getting real nervous about what's happening to your data. What are links? What are original items? If you accidentally click somewhere, and the sorting or the view changes drastically, you can't just undo it.
Then, there are the item properties which help you keep track of everything, but those can get confusing. I'll look at an item to see where it is linked, i.e. how many "parents" does it have. Sometimes it will say zero, but you can see that it's under some item, so you're like, what the heck? So you click on refresh, which sometimes fixes it, sometimes not. That's another thing, the refresh, if you make certain changes to your items, you don't see the changes immediately, so you want to refresh. But by not seeing things change immediately, you can't tell what happened. So all of this just makes you more nervous about relying on the program for very large and important information management. You can very easily lose track of what is going on. I literally have spent at least 5x more time trying to figure out what is happening in IQ than I do actually using it to do productive work.
Then there's printing issues. So often, I prepare a very nice grid with awesome information, and I need to show it to someone. So I need to be able to print a pdf, or just print whatever view I'm currently looking at. Well, no matter how you do it, you'll never be able to get something printed that looks anywhere near as nice as whatever you're looking at on the screen. If you just print it, it will be very very ugly, and not something you want to show anyone. So then you'll use the html export dialog, which is ridiculously complicated and not intuitive, and even if you finally understand it, it takes forever before you can turn it into something presentable. Usually, I have to export a selection to Excel, massage it in there, and then print it. But I can't EVER just print something quickly and go to a meeting or something.
So that's my InfoQube experience. I know it sounds bad, but I love the program. I wouldn't go through all of this if i didn't think it was something very special. But it's not in very good shape now, it's not reliable, in my opinion. Pierre keeps adding very nice features, and it is feature packed. And I respect whatever strategy he has, and I also respect the fact that it doesn't bring in a lot of money so he has to make sure he does other things to make a living. i get that. but strictly from the program's standpoint, if i were him, I'd stop adding any more features to the program (calendar, gantt charts, etc.) and spend a year or so doing NOTHING but interface issues. I mean a complete overhaul. I'm telling you, if the UI was done right, the popularity of this program would be off the charts. The mistake a lot of developers make is thinking that adding tons of features will make a program more attractive. But making a program easy to use, fun to use, will be much more valuable than any more features that can be added. The day that I stop being nervous about relying on IQ for my information management is when IQ will start becoming much more popular. I'm 99% sure.
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