myBase Desktop v6 released

Posted by Cassius
Sep 15, 2011 at 08:44 PM

Glen,

I’m now retired, so my comments are from someone who now uses PIMs mainly to save personally useful information (e.g., info on good plumbers) and items of personal interest.

In DOS days, I used GrandView for everything. When it became difficult to use, I switched to TreePad, but Henk discontinued developing it for some time while developing an enterprise version. I later started using the Business version, but found it a bit slow, so I switched to a very user-friendly product, Jot Plus, which was rtf-based and one could paste in images from the clipboard. I have a lot of information stored in Jot Plus so hesitate to give it up, but development of it has essentially ceased.

I occasionally use Inspiration, which is a bit quirky and has some limitations, but also has advantages. It has never lost data or committed other “crimes,” unlike NoteMap of which I had high, but then dashed, hopes.

I looked at UltraRecall when it first appeared. As I believe you feel, it seemed overly complex/“computer geeky.” I offered to revise the user manual to replace the technical, computerese & database jargon with more user-friendly language. The developers were not interested.

I have only looked at myBase 6 for a very short time. One problem with version 5 was that it had no Boolean search options (e.g., “x” and “y” , “x” or “y”). It seems that the developers have decided to remedy this by introducing “regular expression” search, which I believe is overkill and will turn off a lot of potential users (like Ultra Recall does).

I also looked at MyInfo, but found its import of Web pages inferior to myBase, Surfulater and WebResearch.

While still working, I found a very worthwhile use for Personal Brain, which could have been improved with a simple addition. The developer wasn’t interested, although I think that it may have since added my suggestion. The idea was to use Personal Brain to map a large organization with all the connections between the organization’s parts. Each part could then place itself at the “center” of the organization’s universe and see how it linked to other parts. (This would also be useful for management, which usually has little, if any accurate knowledge of what is really going on.)

I have Surfulater, but so far, it just doesn’t “feel right.”

As I explore MyBase 6, I’ll post more comments in this thread.

If you have any insights with respect to comparing myBase and WebResearch, they would be appreciated.

-cassius

============================
Glen Coulthard wrote:
>I’d love to hear your feedback Cassius. As many others here, I’ve purchased almost all
>of these types of products in the past (looking for that “perfect”
>outlining/notetaking application.) Here is what I’ve found:
> >- UltraRecall:
>difficult to realize/access the power without a deep dive; never really could get it
>to fit my workflow—too many options, templates, etc. that just seemed like it was
>trying to do too much through a “programmer’s” interface (remember that this is my
>perception of the product, rather than an objective review)
> >- MyNotesKeeper:
>inexpensive, easy-to-use, and one of the nicest and cleanest outliners/notetakers
>with good handling of images and file attachments; however, developer is
>unresponsive and updates are far and few between. Difficult decision to use as a
>“trusted system” given questionable development.
> >- MyInfo: great use of columns
>in the tree/navigation pane, but only basic image handling and only one file
>attachment allowed per new node; for my purposes
>(academic/professor-researcher), I regularly attach 3 or 4 file versions to a
>single node, so MyInfo never worked for me as the tree became too cluttered with
>multiple “child” attachments displayed.
> >- myBase: nice file management and
>attachment capabilities, and allows for multiple windows to be open at a single time
>(which I like); also, the best “web capture” capabilities I’ve come across aside from
>Surfulater and Macropool’s WebResearch products. In fact, the web capture and other
>plugins for importing/exporting to HTML and Word are the key reasons I first
>evaluated myBase. I also find the whole Javascript API plugin development platform
>very intriguing—what can’t you do with that type of openness and a few smart
>developers?
> >- ConnectedText: not fair to mention here, as it is not a 2- or 3-pane
>outliner/notetaker, but this is my GoTo application for writing and referencing
>content; but mentioned because any application has to transfer information back and
>forth nicely between/with CT (and PersonalBrain)
> >So, currently, I am using
>ConnectedText as my personal wiki, WebResearch for my web clipping and link storage,
>PersonalBrain for processing and organizing local and web content, and
>MyNotesKeeper (MNK) for drafting and laying out articles (because of its image and
>file attachment capabilities.) Currently, I am evaluating both myBase and Amode as
>alternatives to MNK - both seem quite powerful and extensible.
> >Well, that’s it in a
>nutshell.
>Glen
> >
> >