Current software:

- Mindomo for outlining and brainstorming. This is one change from last year, and it's working out very well.

- The other new tool since last year: Producteev for task management. After many years of Outlook with the Taskliner plugin, I became too bothered by the unavailability of my tasks on platforms other than Windows. Producteev seemed to be the best of the online task managers, and it has android, windows, and ios native apps. It's easy to email tasks in from Outlook or elsewhere, and they have easy email subject-line options for setting due dates, tags, and folders right from the email. I don't get the dynamic task scheduling that I used to like with Taskline, but am not missing it too much. I miss not having durations, so I'm using the priority level for that: 1 star is one hour, etc. Short tasks have no stars. I find it's easy to filter my tasks and see only the starred items to get a big picture of how overloaded I am over the next couple of days.

- Evernote for collecting information and taking notes. I later link many notes into Mindomo

- Outlook for work email and for calendaring. Gmail for personal email. Moved contacts over to gmail for the most part, rather than outlook. Again, I like having them on many devices and gmail seems more permanent and flexible.

- Word for documents. I can do an outline in Mindomo and then export to Word.

I'm still using an old version of *GSNotes* (Golden Section Notes http://www.tgslabs.com/en/gsnotes/index.php )...used it for years. But, I'm seriously thinking about a switch to RightNote. It's been awhile since GSNotes has been updated but there's no bugs or anything and still does what I need. I like some of the RightNote export options better and it's obviously still being developed.

I also use *CintaNotes* for to-dos and *NoteFrog PRO* for my main text dump. I absolutley LOVE the NoteFrog instant-database-as-html feature (don't really know what to call it - it's fairly unique in operation) here's what a sample instant html looks like: http://notewindow.com/frog/x/demostack.html

I also use *'Drafts'* a lot on my iPad. I use the "append to DropBox" function which is worth the small cost of the program in itself.

Finally, all of the above is used to eventually find a place in whatever I'm working on in *Scrivener*.

Good thread!

""""Posted by Dr Andus
Sep 22, 2012 at 11:19 AM


Further on the Fall 2012 Outliner/PIM roll call, here is the top 10 list of software links that visitors (mostly from Outliner Software) clicked on the most on my blog:

1. ConnectedText – personal wiki
2. Mindsystems Amode V2 – project management
.........
.........
.........
""""""


Thanks for the lead to Amode, Doc. The videos indicate that it is remarkably well thunk-out. I shall do a trial as soon as time permits.

razorboy wrote:

Thanks for the lead to
Amode, Doc. The videos indicate that it is remarkably well thunk-out. I shall do a
trial as soon as time permits.

Read some more about Dr Andus' impression of Amode here: http://www.outlinersoftware.com/topics/viewt/3945/30

Alexander Deliyannis wrote:

razorboy wrote:
>Thanks for the lead to
>Amode, Doc. The videos indicate that it is
remarkably well thunk-out. I shall do a
>trial as soon as time permits.

Read some
more about Dr Andus' impression of Amode here:
http://www.outlinersoftware.com/topics/viewt/3945/30

I'm still very happy with Amode, although I only use it for project management. Having set up my project many months ago (which was fun with Amode), now I only use it to monitor my project progress and to "complete" my tasks (I do it daily and the app is open in the background). It's satisfying to watch the progress bar in the bottom left corner of the Gantt chart telling me I'm 45% done of my 9 months, 505 hours 55 min long project.

There is only one niggle, but a minor one. If you close the application and reopen it, you have to manually readjust the width of the task list pane in the Gantt window to show all the text of the tasks. But I can live with that.

I'm still
very happy with Amode, although I only use it for project management. Having set up my
project many months ago (which was fun with Amode), now I only use it to monitor my
project progress and to "complete" my tasks (I do it daily and the app is open in the
background). It's satisfying to watch the progress bar in the bottom left corner of
the Gantt chart telling me I'm 45% done of my 9 months, 505 hours 55 min long
project.

Hmmm... The Amode site describes the thing as suitable for: ~~Lists, Tasks, Mini Databases, Grouping Random Information~~

That makes it sound like a sort of PIM/Note organizer. Of course, the videos focus on the project management angle.

razorboy wrote:

Hmmm... The Amode site describes the thing as suitable for:
~~Lists, Tasks, Mini Databases, Grouping Random Information~~

That makes it
sound like a sort of PIM/Note organizer. Of course, the videos focus on the project
management angle.

Personally I don't have a need for those other uses, but it can certainly be used as a MyInfo type PIM or even as a concept mapper.

I think there might be a couple of videos on Youtube for those other uses as well: http://www.youtube.com/user/mindsystemsvideo

But I think the best video to watch is the Amode Learning Module that you can download with the trial. It gives a good overview of its possible uses.

Dr Andus wrote:

But I think the best video to
watch is the Amode Learning Module that you can download with the trial. It gives a good
overview of its possible uses.

Here is the link to the learning module:
https://portal.mindsystems.com.au/downloads/10/Amode-Documentation

Dr Andus wrote:

razorboy wrote:

>Hmmm... The Amode site describes the thing as suitable for:

>~~Lists, Tasks, Mini Databases, Grouping Random Information~~
>
>That makes it

>sound like a sort of PIM/Note organizer. Of course, the videos focus on the project

>management angle.

Personally I don't have a need for those other uses, but it can
certainly be used as a MyInfo type PIM or even as a concept mapper.

I think there might
be a couple of videos on Youtube for those other uses as well:
http://www.youtube.com/user/mindsystemsvideo

But I think the best video to
watch is the Amode Learning Module that you can download with the trial. It gives a good
overview of its possible uses.

I went through the training module, and I don't see how Amode would be used
as a general info or data collector, since the thing seems a big project manager with -
predictably - everything relating up to or down from, projects. Mind you, I haven't
had time to do the trial yet.

razorboy wrote:

I went through the training module, and I
don't see how Amode would be used
as a general info or data collector, since the thing
seems a big project manager with -
predictably - everything relating up to or down
from, projects. Mind you, I haven't
had time to do the trial yet.

Having worked with the actual product, I agree. As briefly discussed in the related thread, Mindsystems probably described Amode as a general information solution aiming for a broader market --and possibly, I would add, to not disturb their existing line of profit as resellers/trainers of other programs that are used in project management. But you can't have your cake and eat it too, at least not at the same time. With this marketing approach they probably shot themselves on the foot, because the product itself is very capable.

razorboy wrote:

I went through the training module, and I
don't see how Amode would be used
as a general info or data collector, since the thing
seems a big project manager with -
predictably - everything relating up to or down
from, projects. Mind you, I haven't
had time to do the trial yet.

I agree with Alexander that Mindsystems missed a marketing opportunity by not promoting Amode as primarily a project management software, which is its key strength.

However, at its heart it is structured as many other PIMs, so the PIM functionality is there. Its a 2-pane outliner where each item not only has a rich text note (like MyInfo or UR) but also an associated concept map, alarms, attachments and some rather sophisticated way of making internal links (called "Relationships"). Plus the PM features of the Calendar and the Gantt.

Moreover, you can keep many databases (Amode files) open at the same time in tabs, and view them side-by-side in a single view in the Briefcase (project stacks). This latter feature I haven't seen anywhere else.

The reason I don't use Amode as a PIM is because I have other apps for those features that individually do a better job (CT for notes database, MLO for task management, VUE for concept mapping, Bonsai for outlining etc.). My other concern was about how it would deal with mountains of data, as even Mindsystems warn against putting too much data into a single file in order not to corrupt it, which is not ideal if you want a PIM.

Re the "Relationships" feature, you can have more complex relationships between items than even in a wiki. In Amode you can have 2-Way, Neutral, Outward, Inward, Finish-Start, Finish-Finish, Start-Start, and Start-Finish relationships, so you can construct some very idiosyncratic models (but this is most useful for project management).

""""""".......................even Mindsystems warn against putting too much data into a single file in order not to corrupt it, which is not ideal if you want a PIM.""""""""

One would think that they would programme a kind of limiter to stop one entering a crash-worthy amount of data, as in: "STOP! IF YOU ENTER MORE DATA IN THIS FILE, I WILL CRASH." Or something to that effect.

InfoSelect, used to be a little unstable if it had to do heavy lifting, but that was a much older version I had.