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5 Tools For Outlining Ideas For Writers And Artists (MakeUseOf)
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Posted by shatteredmindofbob
May 30, 2013 at 06:39 PM
I’ve tinkered with the latest version of Word and while most of it is an improvement, it seems the outliner hasn’t been touched in ages.
At least, I didn’t notice any real difference from Word 2007.
And yeah, that list kinda makes me sad. It consists of two desktop apps, one of which is not an outliner, despite what most tech sites seem to think and the rest of web apps.
I hate web apps. But sadly, it seems like that’s the only place we’ll ever see any development on outliners that will run on Windows.
Of them, The Outliner of Giants seems to be the most feature-rich and I wanted to like it, but as Steve said, it’s pretty slow and clunky, plus it doesn’t look very good.
Blah.
Posted by MadaboutDana
Jun 3, 2013 at 10:39 AM
Have to say, I’m a little surprised by Dr. Andus/Steve’s dismissal of OneNote as a serious outliner - this does suggest you haven’t played with - or perhaps have forgotten - the powerful outlining features in OneNote, that enable you to (for example) keep multiple outlines on a single page, incorporate tables, embedded links/files etc. etc.
People do tend to forget that OneNote is not just an outliner by virtue of its file/folder/subfolder structure, but also because it can turn any piece of text on any part of a page into an outline. This function has not been emphasized in reviews (Microsoft themselves make very little mention of it), but it’s actually extremely powerful and has not been deprecated (yes, I too have seen reviews that suggest this feature has been dumped, but as a matter of fact, it’s very much alive and well - at least, it is in OneNote 2010. I don’t know about the 2013 version…).
In many respects, OneNote is a vastly more powerful outliner than many “dedicated” tools. The trouble is, like most Microsoft software, it goes about what it does using a higgledy-piggledy, multi-method approach that looks increasingly old-fashioned next to modern apps with their streamlined user interfaces and single-method functions.
But then I have to say that as somebody who’s tried and - alas - failed to get along with The Brain, I find the latter a good deal more confusing!
Posted by Dr Andus
Jun 3, 2013 at 12:35 PM
MadaboutDana wrote:
Have to say, I’m a little surprised by Dr. Andus/Steve’s dismissal of
>OneNote as a serious outliner - this does suggest you haven’t played
>with - or perhaps have forgotten - the powerful outlining features in
>OneNote, that enable you to (for example) keep multiple outlines on a
>single page, incorporate tables, embedded links/files etc. etc.
You’re quite right, I haven’t played all that much with it, to the extent that I’m not even sure what powerful outlining feature you’re referring to. So it’s possible that I’m missing the main point.
I can see that it can be fairly useful in organising material on a single page as an unlimited whiteboard, and using the file structure for further organisation. But when it comes to actually constructing an outline hierarchy within a text note, all I can see is the traditional bulleted list available. Am I missing something?
I was only referring to the inadequacy of the latter for outlining, as opposed to the functionalities of dedicated outliners that allow you to do a lot more with your list.
Posted by MadaboutDana
Jun 3, 2013 at 01:27 PM
Ah, yes, I’ve no idea why they make no mention of this potent feature nowadays. The best way to experiment with it is to type a line on a OneNote page (as you know, you can type anywhere on the page, a la whiteboard). Then press ‘Return’ and then press ‘Tab’ (to indent the following line). Lo and behold, you’ll find that pressing ‘Tab’ was enough to indent the entire paragraph - and if you press ‘Return’ again, the next paragraph will also be indented until you explicitly cancel the indent by pressing ‘Backspace’.
So what? you will inquire. Ah, now if you mouse over the lines you have just typed, you will see a mystic box with a cross in it appear at the start of each line (like a kind of hide-and-seek bullet). If you go to the top of your hierarchy (for that is what you have just created), and double-click the box on the left of the topmost line, all the indented lines/paragraphs below it will vanish away! It is, in fact, an outline.
Useless! you will cry, because they’re hidden! What’s the use of hidden subitems? Aha! No, not so: if you look carefully, you will see the hidden bullet-y thing (box with a cross) has now materialised and isn’t disappearing, even when you move your mouse away. A simple, visual indication that it is not just a line, it is an entire outline! If you unfold the outline again, the bullet-y thing disappears again.
Good, eh? And the best bit is, you can create any depth of outline - all paragraphs automatically treat their subparagraphs as outline subitems. Goodness knows why Microsoft treat this as such an unimportant trick. It’s a really convenient feature, and makes OneNote one of the most powerful outliners around (not least because you can move entire outlines from one page to another, copy and paste them, create multiple outlines side by side, add tables to them (by pressing ‘Tab’ after a piece of text; OneNote’s table function is enormously powerful and very easy to use), embed files in them, and - of course - search through them.
I hope that’s helpful.
Cheers,
Bill
Posted by Dr Andus
Jun 3, 2013 at 02:39 PM
MadaboutDana wrote:
>So what? you will inquire. Ah, now if you mouse over the lines you have
>just typed, you will see a mystic box with a cross in it appear at the
>start of each line (like a kind of hide-and-seek bullet). If you go to
>the top of your hierarchy (for that is what you have just created), and
>double-click the box on the left of the topmost line, all the indented
>lines/paragraphs below it will vanish away! It is, in fact, an outline.
You got me there… I had no idea this feature existed!
OK, I admit - that makes OneNote more of an outliner that I thought it was, and in combination with the whiteboard etc. it’s a neat feature.
But, I think Steve’s original point in the OneNote smack down and my comment was more about whether OneNote is the best outliner out there (if you do a search for outliners in general, there are a number of articles that claim to say so, without even acknowledging that there is a whole world of dedicated outliners).
So I would still say that while OneNote is not bad at all for what it is, if we think of outlining strictly as developing and manipulating a textual list for the purposes of developing a piece of writing, there are more sophisticated solutions out there (just look at the toolbars of Natara Bonsai for all the different folding and zooming options).
I guess what irks me more is that those writers ignore the existence of this category or don’t bother to research it. It’s not so much about having a problem with OneNote itself, the unique strengths of which I can appreciate.