Re: Notemap 2.0--a Correction

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

Outliners.com Message ID: 5260

Posted by 100341.2151
2006-02-15 14:12:20

Stephen -

> Using the program generally leaves users with a favorable experience, even if it’s hard to justify. One can be impressed with the small details without actually noticing them.

Yes, NoteMap IS much more fun than Inspiration, I’m afraid. The interface is just that much more elegant. The icons, fonts, etc. give an impression of a very well-crafted program, as do the excellent selection of toolbars, the fullscreen option (F11), MS-Word-friendly formatting, ability to fold Notes, and the Comments - if only they didn’t have the merging bug. At the same time, I don’t like the way that the Note-Select function (F2, or click on label) is implemented. I would prefer that its operation were confined to the dragging and dropping of Notes, and did not allow other potentially dangerous actions like their deletion.

Inspiration OTOH gives the somewhat unfavourable first impression of amateurishness. Compared to NoteMap it is also rather limited in terms of features (leaving aside its mindmapping module, of course). Some of these initial impressions are caused by the poor choice of fonts, both for the outline itself and within the menus. Changing the outlining fonts to match NoteMap’s makes a lot of difference, as does designing one’s own outlining template in place of the default one. Inspiration shares NoteMap’s risky implementation of Note-Selection for drag-and-drop purposes. But I find Inspiration better thought out* in terms of how its basic outlining features, such as merging Notes, work.

[* meaning MLGV - more like Grandview :-)]

In summary, I would prefer to work with NoteMap were it not for what I see as some irritating design flaws. Inspiration, OTOH, has some of the basics right, but is still too limited, and feels clunkier. The result is that I am driven back to Grandview, which has all the outlining features I need, except for multiple undoes, and fewer glitches.

This is all, needless to say, very subjective, based on limited work in both Inspiration and NoteMap, and long familiarity with Grandview. I am quite ceretain that the last “qualification” creates its own interference with, and resistance to, the learning of outlining programs that work in a different way.

Derek

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