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ConnectedText now is an Outliner with Footnote Function
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Posted by Manfred
Oct 2, 2007 at 02:15 PM
The new Beta of ConnectedText has introduced two new functions:
1. an outliner that is quite capable and can import and export opml files
2. A new footnote function that does automatic footnotes (which, if I am informed correctly, will in the next version allow the export of automatic footnotes).
This new version seems to provide some of the essential functionality that people asked for in the thread on Outliners with Word Processing capability.
As some of you may know, I have talked about ConnectedText and Wiki functionality before in this forum, praising this program. While I would not want to call myself an “evangelist” for this program, I definitely think it is among the very best for managing research and early drafts. And I am amazed at how the program is developing.
Because I do not want to make the move to Vista, I have bought a MacBook and fooled around with all kinds of Mac Outliners. Let me assurer you that they are WAY ahead of anything that can be found in Windows. In fact, it is ConnectedText that keeps me staying with Windows (and now I have one more reason).
In any case, I think this product is something that some of you “crimpers” might want to take a look at.
Manfred
P.S. I would like to thank those who participated in the discussion of Word Processing and Footnotes. I am now using AppleWorks 5.0 as my Word Processor of Choice (not 6.0, which has some nasty incompatilities with Windows). The main difference to the Microsoft Works word processor (who is also not as bloated as Word) is that it does Outlines and Endnotes as well as footnotes.
Posted by Thomas
Oct 2, 2007 at 04:18 PM
The beta is not publically available, but I received a link in a short time after asking for it through contact form (without being a registered user).
Posted by Chris Thompson
Oct 2, 2007 at 04:56 PM
Looks interesting. Thanks for the heads-up!
Manfred wrote:
> 1. an outliner that
>is quite capable and can import and export opml files
Is the new outliner a single pane outliner or a dual pane outliner? Can you collapse/expand parts of the outline?
How would you compare ConnectedText to VoodooPad (apart from the graphical view which VP doesn’t have)?
>Because I do not want to make the move to Vista, I
>have bought a MacBook and fooled around with all kinds of Mac Outliners. Let me assurer
>you that they are WAY ahead of anything that can be found in Windows. In fact, it is
>ConnectedText that keeps me staying with Windows (and now I have one more
>reason).
I agree with you. There is much more active development in this area on the Mac platform, and some of the software tools are more mature. (BTW, be sure to check out TAO if you haven’t; it doesn’t get a lot of press but is probably the most powerful true outliner since MORE.) The nice thing is with Intel Macs is you still have access to all the Windows software too, and with modern VMs, they’re integrated with the system and behave just like Mac apps. I no longer worry about platform issues; I just run the best software for my needs, Mac, Windows, or Unix.
>P.S. I would like to thank those who
>participated in the discussion of Word Processing and Footnotes. I am now using
>AppleWorks 5.0 as my Word Processor of Choice (not 6.0, which has some nasty
>incompatilities with Windows). The main difference to the Microsoft Works word
>processor (who is also not as bloated as Word) is that it does Outlines and Endnotes as
>well as footnotes.
If you’re using AppleWorks, you may want to look at the most recent version of Pages. They changed the keybindings to make outlining natural; whenever you’re in a list, tab indents the whole thing, option-tab un-indents, and when you grab on the bullet, the cursor changes to an outline-rearranging triangle. Unfortunately it still doesn’t have a dedicated outline view or collapse/expand, but compatibility with Word is now truly excellent.
—Chris
Posted by sracer
Oct 2, 2007 at 05:17 PM
For those interested in an open source personal wiki, there’s “Wikidpad”.
http://www.jhorman.org/wikidPad/
Posted by Manfred
Oct 2, 2007 at 05:25 PM
Hello Chris,
I am using AppleWorks in Windows (for now). I don’t think Pages works Windows. Eventually I will probably use a Word Processor that works on the Mac only, and run Parallels or Fusion to run Windows from the Mac (mainly to have access to ConnectedText and Above & Beyond, which I prefer over TimeTo).
The outliner is a separate VIew in ConnectedText that looks and works like a single-pane outliner. Collapse and expand are available. You just double-click on the entry line. You can do pretty much everything that you can do in TkOutliner. The outliner files are saved as separate files in ConnectedText
One of things hat makes it most interesting is the way it interacts with the rest of ConnectedText, as you can drag and drop topic names into the outliner and jump from these outliner items to the corresponding topics. When you use it in this way, it behaves like a two-pane outliner. So, you have the best of both worlds.
I actually bought Voodoopad and imported all 5000 entries I have in ConnectedText into it (using Devonthink as a way station to transform them from html to rtf and rtfd. Worked like a charm; even the wiki links work.
What I like about Voodoopad is the graphical interface and that it behaves very much like ConnectedText. One of the things I don’t like—and this is an important thing to me—is the anemic search function of Voodoopad. It does not allow regular or full text searches, and this alone would be enough to stay with ConnectedText. But outlining and especially the footnote capability that in the future will allow export of automatic footnotes to rtf is also important.
Another thing I like about ConnectedText after this experience is how easily it allows one to export one’s stuff. (And what I don’t like about Windows is how difficult it is to move rtf from one application to the next. The Mac is WAY ahead on that as well.)
Manfred