Heptabase - Crimp cured?

Posted by Dormouse
Oct 3, 2023 at 07:50 PM

Daly de Gagne wrote:
Hi Dormouse - I am interested in what you wrote about using Mindomo in
>your writing process. I had not really thought much about using a mind
>mapping program in writing although I have used Mindomo for years in
>terms of brainstorming and planning activities. How are you using
>Mindomo? Thanks.
> I was pretty much like you with Mindomo. Had even given up my subscription because I wasn’t using it enough. But when I decided that Heptabase and Scrintal, or even Canvas, weren’t going to cut it for me in the near term, I wondered whether it might be an alternative option for the same need. Instead of a ‘whiteboard’ with notes on it, it has nodes with attached notes (though I’d never used them much before). I remembered the little Hepta mindmap being surprisingly useful. Being usable as a concept mapper, there was no need for all nodes(+notes) to be connected as in a mindmap, which made it more similar to Hepta et al. What sold me into giving it a real try was the discovery that the docx export put the notes into body text with comments as comments. I’d never tested that previously because I’ve done all my writing in txt/md for a very long time. But since discovering that Word had overcome the deficiencies I hated it for and was very practical for long-form writing in a single document (always my preference when practical), I had started writing in Word and so this was now very interesting.

So, I’m not sure how well my system works if you write in single sections/chapters. And I don’t think the Mindomo export options are particularly advantageous for markdown.

But fwiw my basic system is to construct and organise the MSS as an outline or mindmap. I might write body text in a note, I might write comments, I might write a summary (usually this will be in a sub-node). When I think it’s ready, I export it to Word and continue from there. There’s an option for a table of contents at the start of the docx. Any coloured text in the note is exported (highlighted text coming soon). The advantage of Mindomo, for the preparatory work is that I can play out different options away from the outline, draw links, use colour and pictures & etc. - but I can, at the same time, in the same place also write text and note comments. It is, for me, a better system for working through the narrative structure than simply writing in an editor.

I’m not sure it would work at all well if you don’t write in Word, which works well in its outline views, and has a very effective comments system. And even then it’s a question of what suits your writing flow.