Re: New Graphical Outliner--"Personal Memory Manager"

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

Outliners.com Message ID: 5073

Posted by sub
2006-01-17 14:16:44

> The problem is that for this to be really useful, you would need to use this program as your main information receptical, capturing and storing all your information here

Steve,

I think you’ve just highlighted the main issue many of us have encountered when working with information management related software. Most programs try to offer an integrated environment within which one is expected to do more or less everything, i.e. collect information, keep notes, brainstorm, organise ideas and information, edit draft documents etc.

The problem is that very few programs actually offer suitable tools—let alone actually efficient ones- to perform all these tasks. For example, very few programs offer the equivalent of Brainstorm’s MagicPaste i.e. automatic paste of items copied to the clipboard. Drag-n-drop of files, internet links etc is usually only partly supported. Brainstorming is often impeded by inefficient menu structures and the lack of shortcut keys.

Behind much of this lies, I believe, the fact that most developers have a single—or at best, a couple of- original concept(s) around which they build their software. As attractive as the concept may be, in the real world a multitude of good tools works better than a single excellent one; as handy as a Swiss Army knife can prove, few technicians would actually rely on it to provide professional services.

For me it is no surprise that the tools most often discussed here—namely Brainstorm, UltraRecall and Zoot- seem also to be the most versatile in exchanging information with other applications for a multitude of tasks, rather than seeking to do everything themselves. Kinook for example, rather than spend valuable resources in developing a powerful editor for UltraRecall (hence re-discovering the wheel), provide the option to use MS Word internally for any kind of RTF item.

Interestingly, Brainstorm has adopted a similar strategy concentrating on its very core functionality, at the expense of actually appearing to many people oversimplistic, which it is not.

alx

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