Greets gang --

I've spent several hours now surfing and trialing products, but I've come up empty so far. I'd appreciate the collective wisdom of you all. My desires are actually very basic.

1) Easy placement and rearrangement of text elements -- like ecco, or tkoutline

2) Text 'folding' of arbitrary branches, based on outline depth -- again, like ecco (MS word has "outline view" but this is awkward to say the least)

3) Here is the kicker, that puts me into the word processor realm: Ability to automatically generate footnotes from pasted citations. If this doesn't make sense, the functionality is in MS Word -- I can copy text from a book in my Libronix software (an electronic library software), and the footnotes are automatically generated and captured when I paste into MSWord. (I'm not a programmer, so I don't know the guts of how this happens -- any education here might be helpful too)

4) Doesn't cost a bundle

One perspective: I'm after an Ecco-like thing that accommodates footnoting
Another perspective: I'm after an word processor that provides a useable, stable, outlining mode and accommodates automatic footnoting.

Bottom line is that I'd like a tool that lets me easily organize a document, but also automatically accommodates citations / footnotes.

Ideas?
--Will

I have not used it in MANY years, but you might wish to try a demo of the Write module of Ability Office ver 4 at http://www.ability.com/ .

-c

The options for outliners that support footnotes directly are pretty limited, even without the auto-footnoting on paste that you describe (which I suspect you won't find outside of Word).

If you have access to a Mac, take a look at Scrivener:
http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.html
It's one of the few outliners that supports both footnotes and marginalia directly. It also has a variety of other tools to support writers (e.g. you can view your outline as a corkboard for instance and rearrange index cards on the corkboard, it supports custom fields and columns for keeping track of section/chapter development, etc.). Unfortunately it's a two pane outliner. I'm not aware of any current single pane outliners that support footnotes directly. Take a look at Scrivener though, it's a good tool.

-- Chris

I had been posting about this in one of the long threads. It's exactly what I've been looking for as well. Sadly, Tkoutline is probably the closest thing. I found a copy of the old DOS textmode PC-Outline on the internet. It made me sad... because it is exactly what I'm looking for, but it doesn't have any useful export/import filters.

I just updated to the latest version of ListPro (primarily because it is the only application that has a desktop Windows and Windows Mobile smartphone counterparts) and it has decent outlining capabilities... I'm going to dig around a bit in it to see how well it works.

Keep the feedback coming gang

Cassius -- thanks for the tip -- I'm downloading and trying Ability Write as I type... not looking optimistic from the feature descriptions, but it's worth a look =\.
Chris -- Scrivener does look good, though the negatives are the 2-pane layout (for writing, I'm definitely a single-pane guy), and that I don't have Mac access
Sracer -- I finally found a copy (like a needle in a haystack!) of pc-outline so I could read the documentation, but it doesn't look like it handles citations / footnotes -- this true? Listpro doesn't look like a match for single-pane writing...

For a brief moment, I almost entertained trying to have tkoutline generate the xml tags for footnoting, etc, etc. But what am I thinking? I'm a hack programmer at best, and I need a *tool*, not another *project* right now!

Wow. I didn't think that a "Single pane outliner with folding and footnotes" would be such a vacant niche! Woe is me. Seriously, keep the ideas coming gang.

--Will

Update --
I just had a look at Ability Write 4. It appears impressively executed, but No Go as far as outlining. No mention of outlining in the user manual, no MSWord-esque "outline view". Sigh.

--Will

It's a crying shame that PageFour does not offer outlining capabilities. While outlining gets mentioned in its promotional material, it offers the barest of bullet and number list functionality.

PageFour with a NoteMap type outlining capability would be a killer program for writing purposes.

Jack

Jack Crawford wrote:

It's a crying shame that PageFour does not offer outlining capabilities. While
outlining gets mentioned in its promotional material, it offers the barest of bullet
and number list functionality.

PageFour with a NoteMap type outlining capability
would be a killer program for writing purposes.

I'll second and third that!

There's a lot I like about PageFour, but I gave up on it precisely because of its less-than-impressive outlining capability.

Bob

This is exactly what I have been looking for as well, but I have become convinced that MS Word is really the only game in town for outlining with footnotes. It is far from perfect, but, once you get the hang of it works ok. One of the keys to using the outlining mode effectively is formatting your document using styles, something that I only learned about recently. Like everyone else, I am awaiting something better,

Matt

williaq wrote:

Keep the feedback coming gang

Sracer -- I finally found a copy (like a needle in a
haystack!) of pc-outline so I could read the documentation, but it doesn't look like
it handles citations / footnotes -- this true? Listpro doesn't look like a match for
single-pane writing...

On the surface, ListPro doesn't appear to support that. However it DOES have TKOutline-like capabilities within a particular "list". ListPro uses an outline/tree like structure (the lefthand panel) to organize various lists. But you can configure an individual "list" to operate as an outline.

Here's a screenshot I took of what I'm talking about: http://www.divshare.com/download/2045627-e01

In this example, "Sample Outline" is a "list". The panel on the lower right is where text for the outline entry will appear. In that sense, it is a 2-pane outliner.

The reason why I'm giving ListPro another shot (I've used it off and on over the years) is because it is the only tool with desktop PC and smartphone components (simply sync or transfer data between the two), and since I like TKOutline, the ability to have similar functions embedded in a personal data organizer is helpful. (I currently use KeyNote as my data organizer).

For a brief moment, I almost entertained trying to have
tkoutline generate the xml tags for footnoting, etc, etc. But what am I thinking? I'm a
hack programmer at best, and I need a *tool*, not another *project* right now!

I'm a developer by profession... and I've used TCL (and TK, Expect) in my travels. If I can manage to get TCL to run on my WindowsMobile 6 smartphone, then I plan to work on tkoutline to include some additional functionality.

Wow. I
didn't think that a "Single pane outliner with folding and footnotes" would be such a
vacant niche! Woe is me. Seriously, keep the ideas coming gang.

I've done a few exhaustive searches over the months, and a single pane outliner for Windows with modest outlining capabilities simply doesn't exist. I keep hoping that I overlooked one.

I’ve done a few exhaustive searches over the months, and a single pane outliner for Windows with modest outlining capabilities simply doesn’t exist. I keep hoping that I overlooked one

Have you tried SQLNotes (code name) It is in beta right now, so you can download a free copy. It has both single pane and dual pane outlining. It takes the Ecco Pro concepts and brings it further. Check-out all the features on www.sqlnotes.net.

It's been two decades since I used it, but has anyone lookd at Word Perfect?

-c

Will, if you have some programming skills, any outliner that supports character styles and some form of flexible export could probably be customized to your needs. I know it's Mac-only, but just as an example, OmniOutliner lets you apply character styles (so you could define a "footnote" style) and its export function allows you to define an XSLT to transform the output however you like. Since the character styles are marked in the XML, it's pretty trivial to write an XSLT that takes the regions tagged "footnote" and does whatever you want with them. There's even an example LaTeX exporter that does this in the OO SDK, so you wouldn't be reinventing the wheel.

-- Chris

williaq wrote:

Keep the feedback coming gang

For a brief moment, I almost entertained trying to have
tkoutline generate the xml tags for footnoting, etc, etc. But what am I thinking? I'm a
hack programmer at best, and I need a *tool*, not another *project* right now!

Wow. I
didn't think that a "Single pane outliner with folding and footnotes" would be such a
vacant niche! Woe is me. Seriously, keep the ideas coming gang.

--Will

I just remembered. My favorite integrated app (AppleWorks/ClarisWorks for Windows) supports outlines! Outlines in the word processing module capable of folding/hiding/collapsing and manipulating outline entries. Although I purchased it (and updates) back in the day, it is now abandonware and is available for free downloading. (just do a google search)

It has rich import/export filters capable of importing/exporting Word files. More stuff to play with. ;-)

Have you tried ndxcards? It formats footnotes as part of its bibliographic capacity. (I haven't used this functionality, but it would seem it supports only bibliographic footnotes. Perhaps you need a broader footnoting ability.) It has an outliner that does most of what you want. One-pane, in its own way.

williaq wrote:

Greets gang --

I've spent several hours now surfing and trialing products, but I've
come up empty so far. I'd appreciate the collective wisdom of you all. My desires are
actually very basic.

1) Easy placement and rearrangement of text elements -- like
ecco, or tkoutline

2) Text 'folding' of arbitrary branches, based on outline depth
-- again, like ecco (MS word has "outline view" but this is awkward to say the
least)

3) Here is the kicker, that puts me into the word processor realm: Ability to
automatically generate footnotes from pasted citations. If this doesn't make
sense, the functionality is in MS Word -- I can copy text from a book in my Libronix
software (an electronic library software), and the footnotes are automatically
generated and captured when I paste into MSWord. (I'm not a programmer, so I don't know
the guts of how this happens -- any education here might be helpful too)

4) Doesn't
cost a bundle

One perspective: I'm after an Ecco-like thing that accommodates
footnoting
Another perspective: I'm after an word processor that provides a
useable, stable, outlining mode and accommodates automatic footnoting.

Bottom
line is that I'd like a tool that lets me easily organize a document, but also
automatically accommodates citations / footnotes.

Ideas?
--Will

More excellent feedback folks -- here is what I've learned, for our general edification (I'm seeing that there is a whole, community of us clamoring for something like this -- wow -- hope I can contribute to our collective knowledge here). I've jotted notes below for the gang, and individuals:

All --
Of the things that I have looked into thus far, Lotus Smartsuite WordPro (9.7 is what I have, I thin) looks somewhat promising. One of the features it has is a custom view where one can have the outline view in one pane, and a synchronized "draft" view in the other (actually, there is a third pane as well, showing a microsopic multi-page view of the document). This is handy for watching the document develop as I work in the outline view. The standard Alt-arrow combination is what moves nodes around. Overall, the outlining seems okay -- It is a bit quirky, however, though I'm fuzzy on specifics (so many software programs at once).

And also -- due diligence -- I came full circle and looked more closely at MS Word. After recording some macros to move nodes up, down, promote, demote, and assigning them to the traditional Alt-Arrow combinations, I might give this another try. Still hard on the eyes, and not as clean as Ecco, or tkoutline. Also, as my doc gets bigger, we'll see how things slow down. For the short term, to minimize disruption (I have to actually get some stuff done, whatever tool I end up with, after all) I might give this (Word--reprised) a shot for my next project.

Sracer --

thanks for the heads up on Listpro (will bear in mind);
I tried to find ClarisWorks to give it a try -- couldn't find one -- any leads?;
If you manage any expansions of TKoutline, please count me in as very interested!

PPL --

I had a look at SQL notes a bit ago -- probably pilot-error, but I had a bit of trouble driving, trying generate outlines for my purposes -- looks like a powerful program for sure; will probably look at that again, when my needs are for a more comprehensive PIM

Cassius --

I did look into wordperfect -- all I had was an old copy of 2000 -- it had outlining features, but I found it awkward and limited and quirky; again, this all might be pilot-related, I'm also trying to consider how intuitive or painful I find the interface given my (unfortunate, perhaps =]) MSWord background

Chris --

I may toy with tkoutline to see if I can cause the output to include footnotes a-la-microsoft -- there is a learning curve for me here though, as I'm more of a traditional c-programmer type, mostly for quick tools for work in days past, and I'm new to xml, and xslt (as far as xslt goes -- embarrased -- don't even know what that means! (yet));

Steve --

I just sent a note to the ndx cards developer to inquire re. footnotes. Will probably try the demo for myself if I can find time.

Keep thots coming as they occur.
--Will

williaq wrote:

Sracer --
> thanks for the heads up on Listpro (will bear in mind);
> I
tried to find ClarisWorks to give it a try -- couldn't find one -- any leads?;

I was hesitant to post a link, but considering that I found numerous references to it on Digg, I figured one more reference isn't going to slam their servers.
http://download.nides.bc.ca/Software/Windows/OLD%20programs/

Willaq said that maybe Word isn't so bad after all. Well, when I was forced to abandon GrandView as a composition/writing tool, I did migrate to Word...at least most of the time. (I created a special toolbar icon to make adding footnotes easy.)

One CAUTION, which I believe I've posted before. It is VERY important to create a large document in several separate Word files. At the end, they can all be pasted into one long Word file, but DO NOT delete the originals, at least for a while.

Why? Here's a real-life example: Several people were writing separate parts of a document, which the editor then pasted into a single Word file, deleting the originals. Unfortunately, at least one of the pieces had some corruption. This corruption infected the entire document and could not be eliminated. The editor ended up retyping the entire document from scratch!

Another real-world Word problem: Emailing a Word file as an attachment can result in formatting changes in the most unexpected places, requiring a re-proofing of .the entire document. I always zip my Word files before emailing them. It SEEMS to help.

-c

More evaluative thoughts for us all:

Clearly, some good software out there, each having has it's own "take" on things:

ndxcards: looks like a good program; The interface was somewhat 'modal' and would take some getting used to; I believe (from my brief demo) that to capture references, sources have to be inputted via a card and appropriately linked
claris works: outlining is visually *very clean* -- very nice, but hotkeys are unavailble for some of the common node-placement operations (move up, down, expand, collapse -- at least i couldn't find them, and I don't think they are customizable) ; also, cutting and pasting from my libronix doesn't automatically generate foonotes (this was possible with lotus smartsuite)
Looks like the bottom line for me (sigh, gasp) is that I'll be working with MS Word for for now and working in "outline" view: Some factors that have led me to this point:
1) Can automatically capture citations / references and generate footnotes even as I paste citations into my outline
2) I can get around the clunky interface using VB scripts, and assigning to them to hotkeys (for instance, expand/collapse, moving nodes up/down/demote/promote)
3) I can then seamlessly move into the "word processing" mode (that is, final formatting, and prepping for print).

On the downside: visually, I personally find the outline view sort of hard on the eyes (would be nice to have an extra half-line of spacing between nodes, for instance)

I will keep looking. And if anyone stumbles on the ideal, or other candidates, throw in so we can all check things out, and learn =].

--Will

On the downside: visually, I personally find the outline view sort of hard on the eyes (would be nice to have an extra half-line of spacing between >nodes, for instance).

Word 2007 causes a little less eyestrain in outline mode than Word 2003 (which I'm guessing you're using). Not from any increased capability (such as the ability to insert space between nodes), but from more salient expand/collapse icons which help guide your line of sight. Probably not enough a reason to buy it, at least for me.

One suggestion for this problem: you might want to try running the outline mode with a 1.25 or so zoom factor.

Have you tried Literary Machine?

Plaintext, tagging, Outline modes.

Have been playing with it for a few months to handle my documentation, procedures and creation of a disaster recovery manual (SysAdmin by day what can I say).

Also WordPerfect X3 is the editor of choice.

http://www.literarymachine.com also has a Yahoo group