(The)BrainDead? (Hopefully not yet)

Posted by 22111
Oct 22, 2020 at 11:24 AM

In broad daylight now

(As said above, at 1 o’clock in the morning, I had been after further info, not after chatting, but since they presented me with their chat window, even though their current page’s url (which they certainly “get”) contained an “old” substring (see above), so I just got the spontaneous idee of some titillating, but then, for JUST coochy-coochy, my time appeared too valuable to me, even after midnight…)

TB Import - Pics

I regularly use html export, by scripts, to extract info, just like I would do with xml export (which I don’t have): > html > csv > Excel > timelines and other charts (once you get the “template”, input of “new” data will be smooth).

(Sidenote: I just trialled “TimelineMaker Pro” (150 bucks plus VAT), both “manually” and with csv import: Big deception, it’s much LESS powerful than the respective functionality in Excel is, so you probably pay the price for this “specialized” tool, then “get” that you can’t even do what you can do within Excel… End of purchase service.)

But I never tried html export for my “regular” stuff (about 10, 15 p.c. of my 1m items contain (little) pics, too).

So I would probably need rtf export > import anyway, or additional scripting, in order to extract the pics, store them as files, create the necessary links… (Wasn’t aware of these additional problems, due to the late hour.)

TB Import - Folders vs. Files

Didn’t grasp the probable “info behind the info”, at 1 o’clock. Most 2/3-pane outliners allow for any item to be parent of other items, AND have “content” (content pane, for text, etc.); NTFS (= Windows file system) does not: It’s either “parent to” (=folder) OR “content” (=file) - leaving alone here the fact that even folders can have ADS in which I suppose you could cramp some “content” indeed.

I said “most outliners” since some do not; I know of (workgroup-ready) MemoMaster (from jbsoftware.de) which makes the same distinction as NTFS does; I suppose this will greatly hamper its sales.

TB works like most other outliners here, and I understand its “text field” (or whatever it’s called) has been greatly improved lately, had trialled it in Java times and commented then how bad it was.

Now, what Marc probably tried to tell me, was, TB html import will import the TITLES of your items, and that’s it. (?) (Of course, I could write a scriptlet that extracted all the titles, for building up just a folder structure, instead of writing a script that differentiates here, together with doubling the “parent” items into folder AND “first” file within that folder.)

It goes without saying that “just title import” of their existant data set would be worthless for almost any possible prospect.

TB - API

I’m also aware of the fact that you cannot expect retrieval (by my script, yes, but then, not by the target tool also) of “third-dimensional” links, of items or sub-structures (“cloning”), upon import, but since I’d easily get those “out”, by scripting, I would then expect the “target application” being “open” to some external script processing (here: for “link item ID x to item ID y as “oncle” or whatever), in order to not to have to do all this manually, after import; it’s obvious such an API would greatly improve any such tool - lately, more and more file managers allow for external macro processing which would NOT have to proceed by the GUI (and which is systematically unreliable, apart from being extremely slow).

TB - Pricing / Number of implementations

Last night, I spoke of “update costs” when in fact, it’s become even worse, I think: You either rent TB (“subscription”), or you pay full price for every “update” = higher-up version you’ll be interested in, so “update” isn’t the correct term here anymore.

If they don’t have the “personpower” to re-implement their “Expanded View”, in 9, 10, 11, and now 12 (re-read Marc on this: its re-introduction does NOT seem to be imminent…), in spite of their pricing, that could imply they don’t sell/rent* too many licenses, after all, so the necessary funds are simply not there (yet)? *=it’s not “rent”, since I think that after “renting”, you will then preserve the tool, with it functionality at the end of the rent period. (Sidenote: Jetbrains (=software for developers, in high demand) tried to do “real rent”, and their users were so appalled by that that they then reverted to a scheme, IF I understand that well (or then, their wording is just incredibly bad), “when your annuel rent ends, without renewal, our tool on your pc will revert to the state it was at the BEGINNING of the year you paid us” - incredible! With TB, it’s the state of affairs at the END of the year, though, and if I’m not greatly mistaken.)

TB - Promises, Promises

So, at the end of the day, it all comes down to the fact that TB, in perspective, is something truly exceptional, whilst currently even having been crippled down from its earlier stages, and in CORE functionality in that - of course, fanpersons could deny that, as they systematically deny anything Apple does against its user base (“it’s not aggression, it’s a feature!” - that’s sometimes highly amusing!), but I invite you again to (re-)read the discussions within the threads linked above, and their unhappiness REFLECTS, I think and suppose, the (relative) lack of funds available to TB staff.

If you don’t look after “real help” with the “overgrown graph complexity”, other, lesser-priced, even free tools are available; if you want a presentation tool, “everyone” already has the one which takes about 90 p.c. of that market (I suppose), so TB, unfortunately, currently doesn’t deliver where it would be without any competition indeed.

I’m aware of the probable fact that a main co-reason for not delivering, for the time being, may be their willingness to not just replicate what had been there in Java times, but to do it even better now… and now they got stuck…

And yes, it’s not just the graphics: A very powerful (and, from the user perspective, easy, fast!) way of filtering out (and “getting into”) the (live) subset would be needed, too - graph tools allowing to quickly get lost within hyperspace abound already, no need to rent TB for that.

(And yes indeed, for years at least, they advertised TB with monster “brains” and for corporate use, and their current db should be much more robust than their Java age one. As for the structure import, it may be possible that Marc was mistaken in his wording - it was 1 o’clock after all, and he was at the end of his shift.)