Thanks for all the incredible email about outliners! I've received hundreds of great stories this week after opening up outliners.com and releasing MORE and ThinkTank thru the web.

***Do you have a story?

Tell us how you use outliners. What's your favorite outliner? Do outliners have a future? If so, how would you like to see them evolve? In the past they were used for business planning, reporting, presentations, education. What will outliners of the future be used for?

***Groundrules

One caveat, we have the power to delete messages on this server. We will delete personal attacks or messages that are complaints about software vendors, especially Symantec, whose generosity made this site possible. We want to have a friendly discussion here, so there's no point posting complaints or attacks. Thanks for listening!

***With that out of the way

Let's make discuss.outliners.com a place worthy of its excellent name! This is a community site, so let's have a great community.

Where and how do I buy Think Tank for my PC, which uses Windows XP Home Edition?
Will it be as simple as the original Think Tank?
And, please, I don't want presentation software.
robertkatz759@aol.com

Where and how do I buy Think Tank for my PC, which uses Windows XP Home Edition?
Will it be as simple as the original Think Tank?
And, please, I don't want presentation software.
robertkatz759@aol.com

Where is the "Edison" file which is mentioned in the "MORE" tutorial?

Your friend,

George Garrigues
Los Angeles

I sincerely hope this doesn't offend anyone (Dave!) or work at crosspurposes to the built-in search engine for UserLand, but I've found that the UserLand engine really doesn't work. I created the following Google link which works just fine. In order to use it, just delete the space in between the quotes and insert your search term. The first time I used it I found what I wanted, as opposed to the UserLand search, which found nothing within the Outliners.com forum.

I've posted this here in the hopes that anyone new to the site will discover this search facility on the first page they come to in the discussion forum and not struggle, as I did, to locate any information of value.

http://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&ie=ISO-8859-1&oe=ISO-8859-1&as_qdr=all&q=%22+%22+site%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.outliners.com&btnG=Google+Search

RC

Hi:

If you like challenges, I have one for you:

As a law student, I am managing information coming from three sources: class notes, briefed (summarized) cases, and outside study aids. These data must be cross-linked and organized in a hierarchical yet flexible way - and summarized in the form of an outline.

I would like to use a Note-taking/Outlining/Document Management/Database software (or a combination thereof) to efficiently manage this process. I've tried to find a solution myslelf but soon was overwhelmed. I have now more questions than answers. Sound familiar?

Here is the challenge:

- I work with the Window XP OS and Wordperfect Office 2002 Pro.

- The class notes are the collection of daily notes taken during each class. They have no pre-set internal organization or fields beyond: date, subject, and class. The content of the note must be searchable. I would like also to be able to link a class note to the outline (hyperlink, attachment, etc).

- All cases are briefed (summarized) following the same pattern or fields: Name, casebook source and page, class, subject, court, date, holding, fact, etc. The fields are identical for each case. The cases should be retrievable by subject, class, or keywords. I would like to be able to link an individual case to the outline (hyperlink, attachment, etc).

- the outline shall be compatible with Wordperfect, allow hyperlink and/or attachment of files for easy retrieval of source document, etc.

- Finally, the class notes, cases and outline shall be opened at the same time in three different panes or windows.

I was thinking to use a two or three pane outliner/PIM. But to date, I could not find one that meets my requirements.

TakeNote! is interesting with its split window function but its database capacity is very weak (only three fields: source, name, category) and it does not allow hyperlink/attachment.

So, one option would be to make the outline with an outliner, and use some sort of database for the cases and Class notes (or a wordprocessor).

I like NoteMap as an outliner. With NoteMap, I can attached files to my outline, hoist the relevent part, marked notes, etc. But then, I must find a way to organize class notes and cases in a format that would allow me to attach individual note / case to the outlines.

Here are my questions:

1- Is there on the market an Outliner / PIM with outline, database, and wordprocessor capability that meets my requirements?

2- If not, which database would allow me to create an hyperlink to an individual note?

Thank you in advance for your help.
Charles Fournier

Does anyone know of a decent free one-pane outliner for Windows? All the ones I've found are two-pane, and most of them aren't free. I'd use ThinkTank, but it's a tad awkward to get files in and out of it. It'd also be nice if the outline could understand tabs as indents. (Oddly enough, I've only found OmniOutliner on the Mac, and BrainForest on my Clie to be able to do that. You'd think it'd be a common feature...)

Thanks.

-- J.P.

As someone who has been using MORE since the late 1980's, I was encouraged by the release of OmniOutliner several years ago. When I spoke to the developers at MacWorld, I became even more enthusiastic, as they all professed a love for MORE. Until now, however, OmniOutliner has not really had the features to make me switch; I've still been using MORE in Classic mode on my OS X-equipped laptop for years. With the release of OmniOuliner v3 (beta), I can finally see the light at the end of the tunnel. I urge all dedicated MORE users to check this new version out, if you haven't done so already. The coming version of OmniOutliner Professional looks even more promising. One interesting note: I remember paying $250 for MORE from MacConnection years ago; even the Pro version of OmniOutliner will be only $70.

As a writer, I have used mostly Maxthink and Grandview to organize myself. The new MS Word or new Maxthink for windows doesn't do anything for me. I suspect that MS including free outliners and grammar correctors in their word processor destroyed the morale of these great thinkers who first invented these important programs. Can you imagine how great these outliners may have progressed without interference from big business?
To answer that last reader on Grandview. What you could do (what I do) is to use grandview files up to the 175,000k limit. Move topics around until you have it the way you want it. Then export it into a tab or space form and import it into MS Word 5.0. Word's outliner is not as good. But By that time, you should already have it organized and can link both GV outlines together in a word processor that will still show the topics should you need to do small changing.

My question is this: On faughnan.com, the sysop mentioned that symantic gave Grandview users - "GV 2.0 users limited resources" to download for Grandview. My problem is that Symantec no longer keeps those resources there. Does anyone know what these programs were? I assume they were plug-ins or converters. Since Symantec had these resources up on their website, I assume they were legal and were only taken down because the sysops may have felt nobody used them anymore.

Does anyone know what these "limited resources for Grandview were?" Or where else they may keep these programs? So I could download them? It would help this die-hard GV user.

THank you, John Btw, this is a great site to devote web space to such an important topic.

Check out http://blue-beach-systems.com/Products/Software/TAO/

It is all of MORE features in an OS X Cocoa application. Only $34. I just bought it. You can paste in all your MORE outlines as outlines, replace the "+" and "-" and you are in business with Rules, Clones, Comments etc. It supports Font Book. and has a Spotlight plugin.

Just found this site after another frustrating session with the MS Word "Outliner." I have often yearned for the old days of simple outliners. Think Tank and PC Outline were my bread and butter for years. When faced with the very difficult task of organizing my random thoughts and scores of references on a topic I don't wnat to have to waste hours fooling around with formatting text, style sheets, etc., etc., etc., etc.

I am hoping that I can find here something that will let me do what I want to do in a much more friendly and logical sequence. Yeah, MS Word outlining will allow you to set up an outline that will simultaneously translate to an attractive document, but the bells and whistles continuously get in the way when what you are trying to do is put disparate thoughts and references together is some kind of logical frame.

The fine points of "prettifying" it all needs, at least for me, to come several steps later in the process.

Now to read some of the posts and see what I can find.

Bill H.