Hello,

In my continuing quest to find the perfect information manager, I am once more delving seriously into ConnectedText. This move was prompted by my general dissatisfaction with the solutions I've come up with in the past to manage my day notes. I was especially intrigued by CT's date topic facility. (In short, this is the ability to give a new topic a "date" name, which causes CT to treat that note differently, including giving it a navigational calendar on which each date is a wiki link.) Since I began this experiment early in January, I've really "connected" with CT (sorry for the pun, but it is appropriate).

I've tried CT several times in the past, but I never got over the mark-up hump. That is, I was never comfortable peppering my text with strange mark-up characters. Why it doesn't bother me so much now, I can't say, other than I've perhaps developed an appreciation for mark-up language, as programs like Scrivener handle Multi-Markdown.

Regardless, I'm finding CT to be fun and inspiring to use. I've been tracking information I always had trouble tending to in the past, mostly through simple prose. And I think that's why I like CT so much: It is so text-based. I find it much more appealing to just write about what's happening in CT than I have in Zoot or OneNote or PersonalBrain, three applications I greatly admire and continue to use for other aspects of information management. But my use of CT is growing, and it is possible that it will surplant one or more of these other applications at some point.

Anyway, I'm hoping to start a thread to gather information about how people use CT. So I'll begin:

For my job I've created four projects (CT speak for a file or database). My primary project is my Day Book, in which I create a topic (CT speak for a note) for each work day. In each of these date topics I use a template with the following sections:

- Needs Attention
- Accomplished
- Contacts
- Notes

You can see a sample screen shot here: http://db.tt/BG03v1Ib

In this same project I've set up topics for key projects. It has surprised me how quickly I've come to find CT useful for this work.

I've set up projects for Agents (these are people who I work with in our field, who have been helpful and have information to share), a general Notebook for miscellaneous information (which I may move into my Day Book project and do away with the separate project), and a Catalog to keep my marketing information about our various products.

I've just begun learning some of the advanced features of CT, and have hardly used them yet. I do like to use categories for marking topics (categories are essentially keywords).

I would welcome reading about how others are using CT.

Thanks.

Steve Z.

Steve,

We seem to be following parallel paths as far as ConnectedText is concerned. I gave it a cursory glance a few times, but the idea of learning a mark-up language struck me as ludicrous, something I thought I'd waved goodbye to with software from the 1980s.

But I gritted my teeth and tried CT properly, and once one learns the (pretty simple) markup, one sees how very useful and powerful CT can be.

I have a 2500 page resource, very heavy in text, graphics, maps and tables, in Word (via Writing Oultiner, to allow export to pdf) and in Personal Brain (to allow export to the web). PB was, however, having major problems with the size of each document (slowing to a complete stop in many cases), and the cross-referencing and internal linking possibilities were not very good. So I moved the whole shabang into CT. It took about 4 months because of the need to mark up and tag everything, but the result (finished yesterday) is rich, allows summaries, cross-referencing and links, customised html, and is a great improvement on the PB output. CT allows me to find missing information, bad links and gaps, so that I wasn't only importing, I was improving. For example, in Personal Brain I had to put postal code formats in each country chapter, then make a new chapter and reproduce that information in summary. In CT I add it (tagged) to each chapter, then with a single command can produce a summary chapter which I know will be updated automatically when I change data in the country chapters. And it had remained fast. I'm curious to hear what my customers say. The whole thing is not for public consumption, I'm afraid, but you can read the blurb/watch the video at http://www.grcdi.nl/book2.htm

So basically I'm producing a wiki - which is what CT is about - but there's a lot more it can do, to be sure.

After 2500 pages I still hadn't reached the point of wanting (metaphorically) to throw CT out of the window, which says something about its flexibility - I did come across issues, but was able to side-step them. CT does have some issues, though. For me:

1) The import from rtf/html needs a great deal of work, because only the most basic of formatting is maintained. It can take hours to format a table in CT.

2) Metadata can only be edited to a limited degree, and as Eduardo (the developer) deftly sidesteps all requests for this, I'm guessing it won't be implemented in the short term.

3) The markup lacks an escape mark to indicate that what follows should be taken as is. Thus, if you want to mark up any text containing double brackets, pipes and so on, such as regular expressions, chances are you'll hit a snag.

4) I discovered on page 2499 that attributes have a limited allowable length :-( It's quite long, but not long enough for what I needed ...

Eduardo has, though, in general, proved to be responsive, so I think I could have a lot more use for CT in the future.

Graham

Thanks for the details, Graham. What an ambitious project. Congratulations on getting it finished... it looks great. It's interesting how different our uses are for the same software.

Steve Z.

I'm also becoming a big fan of ConnectedText. I could probably go on and on about it, but here are a few highlights:

* markup - Markup actually makes more sense to me than things like toolbar buttons. Perhaps it's because I've been working with markup languages for almost 20 years. In any case, once you learn the markup, you can type freely and apply basic formatting without interrupting your typing. Tables can be tricky, but then I only use them sparingly.

* focus - I find the general experience of working with one conceptual topic at a time conducive to focus. While the topic page can "expand" outward via links, and the topic itself can be a concept of varying granularity, information I'm not directly concerned with fades into the background. This experience is the opposite of what I usually have with other approaches like tree-based info managers, where seeing the tree crammed with thousands of items tends to distract and stress me out.

* loose and structured at the same time - I like that I don't really have to make any up-front decisions about my information. I can really just think and write naturally within CT and either apply zero structure (a note that isn't even linked to from anything else) all the way up to very database-like structures with nested categories, properties, attributes, summaries, inline queries, etc. Over time, some areas gain more structure and I organically learn about the structure I need based on what I am trying to do with my info, at which point templates come into play.

* multiple views and organizational approaches - Obviously, linking is a big part of a personal wiki, and that's certainly a primary means for applying order onto information in CT, but I like that there are other ways to organize and view info, with the navigator (mindmap-like), outliner, categories, automatic "meta" pages, etc. Also, I find that the GoTo feature (which is a quick, incremental filter of all topic names) is a great way to rapidly jump around to different topics when I'm working. I do more considered thinking and browsing by following links.

* scripting/plugins/etc. - I haven't had the need to get into scripting CT yet, but as a programmer, I'm happy about the promise of being able to do so. If there is something CT doesn't do with its considerable array of built-in functionality, there is probably a way to achieve it by writing your own helper programs.

So, I find it to be a very natural, writing-based way of working that's flexible enough to grow organically without me having to spend a lot of time trying to wrestle my info into someone else's preconception of how things should be organized. There are some specific tasks that other info managers do much better, but I'm enjoying the overall approach and the general "feel" of using CT.

Also, it's probably worth noting that my usage of CT is mainly for directly entering information into it. I do use it to clip some info from the web, but as Graham notes, the look of imported/clipped material is probably CT's weakest point; if you need or want to maintain the same formatting or layout, you are probably going to be disappointed at the amount of work involved.

I actually prefer the resulting look of most articles/nuggets of info clipped from the web into CT (it automatically creates a table of contents for the article based on headings, for example), but anything other than pages that are mostly text causes a bit of a mess.

So, I'm mainly using CT as a personal, mostly plain text info repository rather than a presentation tool. CT's html export seems pretty good (and I use it to export my entire wiki to a personal site for access from my phone), but I doubt I would want to try to format a large number of imported documents in any significant way with CT.

In case it is of interest to anyone, I've posted a story about CT on my blog, which you can find here:

http://welcometosherwood.wordpress.com/2012/02/19/connectedtext-tinderbox-for-windows/

Steve Z.

Steve,
thanks for the blog post. I've experimented with wikis many moons ago but this is the first time it truly clicked for me how I might be able to use one. I'm starting to think that a wiki like CT might be really good for academic writing because it could help with becoming more disciplined with defining new concepts, as I could just create a new link/page for each new concept as I use it, and then return and develop/define those concepts in more detail later, rather than disrupting the flow. It might also help with managing the overall size of the writing, as I could see all the extra definitions I've created that would need to be fitted into the overall text. Also, sounds like superfluous chunks of text could easily be sunk into the background, without completely losing them. Would you agree?

Dr Andus wrote:

Steve,
thanks for the blog post. I've experimented with wikis many moons ago but this
is the first time it truly clicked for me how I might be able to use one. I'm starting to
think that a wiki like CT might be really good for academic writing because it could
help with becoming more disciplined with defining new concepts, as I could just
create a new link/page for each new concept as I use it, and then return and
develop/define those concepts in more detail later, rather than disrupting the
flow. It might also help with managing the overall size of the writing, as I could see
all the extra definitions I've created that would need to be fitted into the overall
text. Also, sounds like superfluous chunks of text could easily be sunk into the
background, without completely losing them. Would you agree?

I do agree. In case you didn't see it, Glen Coultard (who I contributes to this forum) put together a video showing how he uses CT for academic purposes. You can find it here:

http://www.connectedtext.com/movies.php

Also, Manfred Kuhn, who blogs at Taking Note, has a long article about using CT for research, which you can find here:

http://www.connectedtext.com/manfred.php

Either of these resources can be a little intimidating, because of the advanced CT features they talk about, but they are both interesting. And remember than you don't need to dive into the power features right away. At its most basic, CT is a note card filing system.

Steve Z.

Stephen Zeoli wrote:

I do agree. In case you didn't see it, Glen Coultard (who I contributes to this
forum) put together a video showing how he uses CT for academic purposes. You can find
it here:

http://www.connectedtext.com/movies.php

Also, Manfred Kuhn, who
blogs at Taking Note, has a long article about using CT for research, which you can find
here:

http://www.connectedtext.com/manfred.php

Either of these resources
can be a little intimidating, because of the advanced CT features they talk about, but
they are both interesting. And remember than you don't need to dive into the power
features right away. At its most basic, CT is a note card filing system.

Steve Z.

Thank you, Steve!

I have only just begun exploring CT, so I apologise if this question is too basic. But if you use CT as a writing tool (e.g. to write a book), and then you export it as a bunch of .txt files, does it mean you have to then manually go and remove every single mark-up from the text? That would seem to me like an awful big hassle... Is there any way of avoiding that?

Dr Andus wrote:

I have only just begun exploring CT, so I apologise if this question is too basic. But if
you use CT as a writing tool (e.g. to write a book), and then you export it as a bunch of
.txt files, does it mean you have to then manually go and remove every single mark-up
from the text? That would seem to me like an awful big hassle... Is there any way of
avoiding that?

Some users export the content of a project to HTML files and then import them in Word (or any other writing tool which accepts HTML). You can even export to a single HTML file. Nonetheless, some editing will be required but no markup commands will be present.

Hi Eduardo.

Do you have any plans to add a plugin to export notes to Word DOC/DOCX or OpenOffice ODT files, maybe even adding headline styles to the Word/OpenOffice files? I.e. something comparable to the OpenOffice Export plugin for Dokuwiki (http://www.dokuwiki.org/plugin:odt

Best regards, Franz

Hi Franz

We are testing a new component that can generate RTF files from HTML files. So far it seems to work well.

Do you have any plans to add a plugin to export notes to Word DOC/DOCX or
OpenOffice ODT files, maybe even adding headline styles to the Word/OpenOffice
files? I.e. something comparable to the OpenOffice Export plugin for Dokuwiki
(http://www.dokuwiki.org/plugin:odt

Best regards, Franz

Thanks for the quick response, Mauro.

RTF is not 100% what I need (as RTF does not support stylesheets) but would be a big step forward for me.
Can you already say when this feature will be integrated?

Regards, Franz

Steve, I've long enjoyed Manfred Kuhn's blog. While reviewing it pursuant to your reference to his CT article (which is very good), I came across a delightful post he made about the relationship between reading and writing. If the points in that post were made more often - if indeed they are made at all - in high school classes we would have people who are better readers, writers, and thinkers.

Here's the link: http://takingnotenow.blogspot.com/2012/02/reading-and-writing.html

Manfred begins his post with a very eloquent quote from E. H. Carr's provocative book What Is History?

If I try here to summarize the post I will do a disservice to both E. H. and to Manfred, so instead, I hope readers here will use the above link to read the post.

Daly

Stephen Zeoli wrote:

I do agree. In case you didn't see it, Glen Coultard (who I contributes to this
forum) put together a video showing how he uses CT for academic purposes. You can find
it here:

http://www.connectedtext.com/movies.php

Also, Manfred Kuhn, who
blogs at Taking Note, has a long article about using CT for research, which you can find
here:

http://www.connectedtext.com/manfred.php

Either of these resources
can be a little intimidating, because of the advanced CT features they talk about, but
they are both interesting. And remember than you don't need to dive into the power
features right away. At its most basic, CT is a note card filing system.

Steve Z.

Eduardo, any chance of seeing a collaborative version of ConnectedText in the (not so distant) future? I know I've asked about this in the past, but hope springs eternal.

Steve,
you mentioned in your blog post that "A really great example is that you can select any amount of text in one topic and with a simple command have ConnectedText pack it off to a new topic leaving a wiki link in the original topic." Would you mind telling me what that command is? I'm having trouble finding it in CT.

I believe he means

Edit > Cut to new topic (Ctrl-Alt N)

Yep. That's what I meant... also accessible via right clicking with the text selected.

Mark wrote:

I believe he means

Edit > Cut to new topic (Ctrl-Alt N)

Stephen Zeoli wrote:

Yep. That's what I meant... also accessible via right clicking with the text
selected.

Mark wrote:
>I believe he means
>
>Edit > Cut to new topic (Ctrl-Alt
N)

Mark & Steve,
thank you for that. Cool feature!

I've been playing around with ConnectedText because of the recent mentions here and was about to pay for it because I wanted to use it longer, but couldn't pull the trigger because I was put off by having to pay twice as much for a USB version. A single computer license wouldn't be useful to me. There's something offputting about paying 2x as much for the same software just because I routinely use more than one computer. ConnectedText is also obnoxious with the TRIAL labels it puts on every page before you buy as well. I don't see how that's an inducement to buy. It's just hectoring.

I know that's been said before here, and Eduardo Mauro's entitled to sell his product however he likes, but couldn't resist putting in my two cents.

Mark wrote:

I've been playing around with ConnectedText because of the recent mentions here and
was about to pay for it because I wanted to use it longer, but couldn't pull the trigger
because I was put off by having to pay twice as much for a USB version. A single computer
license wouldn't be useful to me. There's something offputting about paying 2x as
much for the same software just because I routinely use more than one computer.
ConnectedText is also obnoxious with the TRIAL labels it puts on every page before you
buy as well. I don't see how that's an inducement to buy. It's just hectoring.

I know
that's been said before here, and Eduardo Mauro's entitled to sell his product
however he likes, but couldn't resist putting in my two cents.

Hi, Mark,

This isn't an attempt to convince you to spend your money. How much any piece of software is worth is entirely up to the individual user and I respect that. However, I wanted to provide this timely input that was posted today at the ConnectedText forum (and NOT by me):

BEGIN QUOTE:
So many features have been added from 5.0.0.1 through 5.0.0.8 that turned out even better than I had anticipated.

Built-in images can now be provided by the user, not 9 or 99 as I hoped for, but 999, which should suffice the most daring customizing nut (I sure belong to this category)

Goto has received a Global checkbox. Category filters have Union/Intersection options, the whole search process has become much more convenient and user friendly. The NoLetter and Columns options make an Index more compact and better readable ..... and these are just a few of the things that really make a big difference to me and my workflow.

What I really appreciate on top of all this -- that Eduardo is not holding back these features for a major upgrade number (like so many other software vendors) but doesn't hesitate to hand it out to us, free of charge, the minute anything has been implemented.
This is not something to be taken for granted. It deserves mentioning and my topic title is meant to refer to this: Big Thanks.
:END QUOTE

Again, I'm not trying to convince you to spend your money, but when considering value, all factors should be on the table. Among these is how much the product is continually improved, and when upgrade purchases are required. Here's the link to the posting:

http://connectedtext.com/forum/index.php?topic=2379.0

Steve Z.

Thanks Steve. I may as yet succumb ... I even installed MediaWiki on a portable drive in the hope it would save my pocketbook from another CRIMP-attack. MediaWiki has many of the same features as ConnectedText.

Some late answers:

#Alexander Deliyannis
About a collaborative version: we are thinking about it. Perhaps using a cloud service. But we don't have any time frame.

#Franz Grieser
About RTF export. We have already a solution but the library is pretty expensive (really is). So we are looking for other solutions. Right now we are improving the CT's parser in order to enable it transform CT's syntax to others. Perhaps Multi-Markdown, which would enable converting to many other formats.

#Mark
MediaWiki is a superb piece of software but it does not contains many semantic extensions CT has. You can install some of them using the Semantic MediaWiki version. But I think it requires a not small amount of time to configure. And here is where I think CT shines. In less than 2 minutes you have your system up and running. No need to install a server, configure, etc.

I apologize if I sounded as trying to sell my product. I think this is not the purpose of this forum. We would be glad to discuss any aspect of ConnectedText in our forum.

I think I'm coming around on CT.

The markup is still way too intensive for the earlier stages of fast text flow that Cyborganize demands. And the structural possibilities are too defined and open-ended.

But as an end-stage to the Longform Loop, it makes a lot of sense.

I can see also that it has the potential to fulfill a large part of what I wanted UR to be, but found it too slow and limited to be - a fairly intelligent interconnected text database.

Obviously there are a lot of powerful possibilities here. But you need to already know what you want to do, and be sure it's not going to change much, before you do it.

One question. I've been thinking about UR for a contact manager. Would CT do that better? I don't see anyone using it for that, and UR seems like a natural choice. Then again, it might be nice to have everything, including contacts, integrated in the final T1.