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UltraRecal vs. MyInfo
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Posted by Stephen R. Diamond
Mar 14, 2007 at 09:29 AM
These tree-based information managers seem to be getting the best comments. Does anyone care to summarize their relative strengths and weaknesses?
Posted by Tom S.
Mar 14, 2007 at 11:58 AM
Stephen R. Diamond wrote:
>These tree-based information managers seem to be getting the best comments. Does
>anyone care to summarize their relative strengths and weaknesses?
I don’t know if I can sumarize them all but I can tell you what bothers me the most about them. Tree-based PIMS tend to categorize information by making them subitems of another item which would be, say, the name of a real category. Other possibilities might be contact names, places, dates, pretty much anything you would use to separate and group data.
This brings you to the first issue: in far too many cases, you can only put the item in one spot. So which one will use choose as the “root” category where you information is filed and where you will look for it? This is only a minor issue because many of the better designed PIMS actually allow the data to reside in multiple places in the tree.
That brings you to the second and IMO the more niggling problem. If you’ve got the data in all of these places in the tree, the tree gets really big. In the end, at least in my case, the whole thing gets very bulky and very unwieldy as you find yourself filing away items in many different places, most often manually, in this huge structure which becomes more and more difficult to manipulate. It’s a vicious cycle: Adding more data in more places leads to making everything more difficult and clumsy. Inother words, you’re basically making the system harder and harder to deal with as you add more and more data, filing it in more and more ways.
I don’t know what the answer to how to organize data is. I’ve been reading a book called, “Dreaming in Code” by Scott Rosenberg. I think pretty much everyone who subscribes to this forum would probably enjoy it. It basically outlines the history of the “Chandler” project which was an effort by a group of veteran software developers to make PIM software that would do it all better. As many of you probably know, this is a project which has foundered for all kinds of reasons. But even if it hadn’t, I really wonder how far it would have gone toward solving the problems that have probably brought most of us to this forum in the first place.
Tom S.
Posted by Stephen Zeoli
Mar 14, 2007 at 01:13 PM
Stephen,
I don’t use UltraRecall, though I did purchase a license (CRIMP at work). I do use MyInfo regularly and like it a lot. Here are the features of MI that appeal to me:
1. You can keep multiple databases open and tab accessible—this facilitates breaking your information into smaller chunks, thus keeping the tree-structures from getting too unwieldy.
2. The cross-database search capability means you are not penalized for breaking your information into different databases.
3. MyInfo holds almost anything you want to put there. Drag a PDF file (or Word file) in and it stores a copy right in the program. No need to find a folder to store it in. This is helpful to me because I receive many printing quotes via e-mail, and it is so convenient to just plunk the file down into MyInfo and know it is going to be available.
4. You can assign keywords to each MyInfo item.
5. You can clone items and have them under different headings.
6. Data is indexed for fast searches.
7. You can create most any type of customized columns to hold additional data.
8. I like its clean interface (which is why I use it instead of UR), although this does come with a bit of a price, as the display is somewhat inflexible.
This all said, I am switching to OneNote, because of its greater flexibility and power.
Steve Z.
Posted by Kenneth Rhee
Mar 14, 2007 at 01:58 PM
Stephen R. Diamond wrote:
>These tree-based information managers seem to be getting the best comments. Does
>anyone care to summarize their relative strengths and weaknesses?
I’m little busy today, but here is a quick summary of two.
MyInfo is a good application that offers metadata capability and tabbed interface. However, it’s somewhat rigid in its application and somewhat limited in features.
UR on the other hand, offers similar features with MyInfo and a lot more. More flexibility in both visual interface and features. MyInfo seems to offer a cleaner interface up front, but UR’s interface can be changed to suit one’s need. UR takes a longer to discover all its features since there are so many, but it’s worth the efforts.
I’ll add more to this when I have more time later.
Ken
Posted by Bob Mackreth
Mar 14, 2007 at 02:07 PM
Stephen Zeoli wrote:
>I don’t use UltraRecall, though I did purchase a license (CRIMP at work). I
>do use MyInfo regularly and like it a lot. Here are the features of MI that appeal to
>me:
—- snip—
>This all said, I am switching
>to OneNote, because of its greater flexibility and power.
Wow! You’ve just listed most of the features that I like best about MyInfo.
Would it be too much to ask for you to provide a similarly thorough explanation of what has caused you to decide Onenote is more useful? I’d be very appreciative… on my first few experiments, I found Onenote to be a bit mystifying.
(One more example of how it’s “chacun a son gout” when it comes to PIMs, I guess.)