Re: Journaling software with a timeline...

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Note: This message is from the outliners.com archive kindly provided by Dave Winer.

Outliners.com Message ID: 3088

Posted by sub
2005-04-04 15:11:55

My main objective in buying information management and creativity tools is their complementarity; I have little use for several tools of the same genre, such as tree-based two-pane outliners.

CRIMP syndrome aside, I admit that it takes me quite a while to come up with a final verdict on whether a tool actually complements my way of working or not; it took three installs before I finally purchased Brainstorm. On the other hand, I purchased UltraRecall rather hastily but, for the moment, find the developers’ attitude more impressive than the actual product (UR is, by the way, again available at the $49 introductory pricing till May 1st).

Storyview is one of those “different” products, like Brainstorm and Zoot that are hard to get infatuated with, but have plenty of essence under the wrapping. The ability to alternatively present a text outline vertically or horizontally opens up new conceptual pathways; however, I have yet to find a way to integrate it in my actual work. This will happen—or not- over a longer period of time. Thankfully, the demo version has few features disabled and—apparently- no end date.

The developers have provided some substantial sample files, such as the scripts for a feature film and a TV series; these go a good way towards showing the program’s strengths, which are:

- Outline/Timeline editable views; one may build a project by breaking down tasks and then directly present it as a timeline or vice/versa.

- Varying zoom timeline, regardless of visible levels; i.e. you can see the high-level categories while getting a good idea of the underlying complexity.

- Complementing the actual textual information, there’s some useful metadata ability, such as a “character” pane that shows who is involved where; very useful for managing collaborators.

All in all, as Derek had suggested, a very interesting approach to script writing that can be adapted to project planning and management. Its one significant flaw: 4 is the maximum number of available levels. Even Word can handle 9.

alx

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