dan7000 wrote:

but to me it seems like Gingko does force a hierarchical organization.

Yes, you're right. I was saying it doesn't enforce a strict mind-mapping hierarchy (where you must have and—can only have—one top level or central node), as one can have an unlimited number of 'nodes' (or cards) in level 1 (leftmost column) in Gingko.

Basically
one card in the leftmost column can be associated with multiple cards in
the middle column, but each card in the middle column can have one and
only one parent in the left column.

Yes, that's true. But there are good reasons for that. That way it's possible for the export function to assign the position of each card to a hierarchical heading structure, creating e.g. MS Word (or HTML) headings in the process.

That's what makes it impossible for me to use for writing.
For early thought gathering and snippet
organization, it's too hard for me to stick to such a strict heirarchy.
As an example, in fiction writing, how does one know at the very
beginning of the process that a particular scene will be in Act I or Act
III? Gingko makes you decide that before you even put pen to paper.

Indeed, Gingko is better suited for the type of writing that follows certain structural conventions, such academic, legal or business writing, where you know what the implicit hierarchy is from the start.

For that kind of writing, Gingko can work both as a front-end outliner (developing the initial ideas, while slotting them into place), and for the end process of writing up an outline in such a hierarchical way.

>Because of that I feel like I might

as well use an MS Word outline.

I could still see Gingko being useful (and possibly more useful than Word outline) for the writing up of a fiction manuscript, e.g. once you've worked out the outline and the content, but you're facing the constraint of having to conform to a certain word count.

At that stage Gingko would be good for moving scenes easily around, or cutting out sections and moving them provisionally or permanently to the right, and then use Gingko's export tool to only export the content of the first few columns (the clean manuscript without the removed fragments in let's say column 4).

Dr Andus wrote:

dan7000 wrote:

>Basically
>one card in the leftmost column can be associated with multiple cards
in
>the middle column, but each card in the middle column can have one and
>only one parent in the left column.

Yes, that's true. But there are good reasons for that. That way it's
possible for the export function to assign the position of each card to
a hierarchical heading structure, creating e.g. MS Word (or HTML)
headings in the process.

What I would love to see with this card metaphor (since it's kind of like an outline, but kind of not) is for child cards to be able to have multiple parents. I understand that wouldn't work so well for exporting with a hierarchical structure. Maybe each card has a single parent, but could also be linked to other cards as well? (any card- parents, siblings, etc.) Or provide for labels or hashtags, with special "index" cards for each label, that would highlight all related cards.

Basically, I feel the card metaphor is very promising, but Gingko's implementation is a bit restrictive or underdeveloped.

My mistake- tags are already available (and clickable). Very interesting- I will play around more.

I really like Workflowy, not sure if there's room for both in my life. Not that I wouldn't get value out of Gingko, but would just add another silo...

steveylang wrote:

I really like Workflowy, not sure if there's room for both in my life.
Not that I wouldn't get value out of Gingko, but would just add another
silo...

My use cases are quite different for the two.

I use WorkFlowy mainly as a task and project manager, workload planner, list maker, note-taker, and tracker of workflows, while I use Gingko for special outlining and writing tasks, especially where word count constraints are in place, or where an overall structure needs to be developed, and then followed. I tick cards off as done, while I write up the final version in WriteMonkey.

I find a Gingko 'tree' (one file, as it were) ideally sized for the standard 10,000-word book chapter or journal article.

Gingko is also good for developing content for presentations (one card equals one PowerPoint slide).

Bumping up an old thread =>

Anyone still using Gingko these day? Any interesting use cases?

kjxymzy wrote:

Bumping up an old thread =>

Anyone still using Gingko these day? Any interesting use cases?

Here are some use cases:

http://community.gingkoapp.com/t/use-cases-care-to-share/17

I have two main uses for it:

1) for structured brainstorming and outlining of new pieces of writing from scratch. The final writing-up eventually happens in WriteMonkey, but I use the Gingko outline as a reference, ticking them off as I write up each card.

2) for reminders: for things I want to be reminded of on a daily basis, such as a list of todos or books I want to read - by setting Chrome to open those Gingko trees automatically when I launch the browser.

Gingko is particularly good for isolating topics or thoughts or todos by using one topic etc. per card, so it's like a set of virtual index cards that are easy to move around or browse.

I tend to use Gingko for relatively small projects (10k word pieces), as once you have too many cards in a tree, things can become confusing or overwhelming after a while (just like any other outliner).

Thx for the response.

The 10k words is a good metric I will definitely keep in mind.

My use case is for coding notes. I have a bunch of notes in Bear that I'm migrating because there is no easy way to organize them hierarchically in Bear (summary notes w/ links got clumsy). Only thing I miss so far is the syntax highlighting.

Also am going to try doing my next writing project in Gingko. I often do a lot of writing in iThoughtsX(Ive stuck with it because it killed my writers block), but Gingko seems like a much better fit for actual writing projects and how I write.

Dr Andus wrote:

kjxymzy wrote:
Bumping up an old thread =>
>
>Anyone still using Gingko these day? Any interesting use cases?

Here are some use cases:

http://community.gingkoapp.com/t/use-cases-care-to-share/17

I have two main uses for it:

1) for structured brainstorming and outlining of new pieces of writing
from scratch. The final writing-up eventually happens in WriteMonkey,
but I use the Gingko outline as a reference, ticking them off as I write
up each card.

2) for reminders: for things I want to be reminded of on a daily basis,
such as a list of todos or books I want to read - by setting Chrome to
open those Gingko trees automatically when I launch the browser.

Gingko is particularly good for isolating topics or thoughts or todos by
using one topic etc. per card, so it's like a set of virtual index cards
that are easy to move around or browse.

I tend to use Gingko for relatively small projects (10k word pieces), as
once you have too many cards in a tree, things can become confusing or
overwhelming after a while (just like any other outliner).

One trick to extend the usability of Gingko is to use it together with a text expander app (I use PhraseExpander but there are a couple of free ones) to make it easier to insert HTML code e.g. for highlighting text in yellow or to insert icon images hosted on Dropbox such as green ticks for completed cards, red X to mark excluded cards, or a yellow warning sign (!) for work-in-progress cards or to mark them as "attention needed".

You can also use CSS to change font size, remove touch screen controls (that appear automatically on small format laptops), or change the look and feel of cards and trees, etc. etc. There are a number of CSS scripts people have shared on the Gingko forum:

http://community.gingkoapp.com/search?q=css

I fiddled around with the free Gingko several years ago, but it didn't seem to fill a need for me. With the apparent demise of Tree and the recently resurrected thread here, I decided to give it another look. It absolutely fills a need for me now, namely, scheduling tasks in several different projects. Reminds me slightly of Ulysses and Bear, but I like the workflow of Gingko better.

I'm glad I bumped this thread.

Over the past week or so, Gingko has been working quite well for me. I think the major draw of Gingko has been the ability to sort/organize of cards/thoughts in a more visual and precise manner. At this time, Gingko has mostly replaced my other favorite note/writing app, Bear, as a writing tool and has relegated it mostly to a finished writing depository for works/notes I've written in Gingko/other apps.

Besides the praise, I have two wishes for Gingko:
- a live markdown editor* similar to Bear, which, IMO is best in class (versus the current editor that requires a user to exit editing before seeing the results)
- search with matches being highlighted and explorable within context (versus the current method of isolating cards that match the search query, and hiding those that do not, which removes context and obstructs the big picture view of a tree)

I am already greatly satisfied w/ Gingko and hope Adriano continues his brilliant work long into the future.

* by live markdown editor, I mean it shows the results of markup cleanly/beautifully w/o hiding the markup like a rich-text editor would

Jeffery Smith wrote:

I fiddled around with the free Gingko several years ago, but it didn't
seem to fill a need for me. With the apparent demise of Tree and the
recently resurrected thread here, I decided to give it another look. It
absolutely fills a need for me now, namely, scheduling tasks in several
different projects. Reminds me slightly of Ulysses and Bear, but I like
the workflow of Gingko better.

Although I haven't used the app much I paid to download and support the desktop version. It makes me more comfortable to be able to keep my files on my own machine, so I'm more likely to delve into Gingko now. For a v0.8x app it is surprisingly stable and fast. I like it, but I just wish that the nice template choices on the web were in the desktop app too.

Is there an actual Gingko app for the Mac? So far, I've using the Internet only to interact with Gingko. I cannot find anything on the app store or on the Gingkoapp site that looks like a downloadable app.

Go to https://gingko.io/

Thanks much!

Franz Grieser wrote:

Go to https://gingko.io/

Yes - I see someone else already posted the link. The trial period is 30 days of actual use, as opposed to 30 calendar days, so you could theoretically spend months playing with it. But I'd recommend buying it if you like it, especially since the payment page offers a user-selectable sliding scale so that it doesn't have to cost the recommended $45 - it could cost as little as $15 for a license, which is a huge bargain for what it (potentially) offers.

The Mac app is pretty barebones and could really use settings for text font/size/color/background color (and a night mode would be nice), checkboxes to implement macOS spellcheck and/or correct while typing, smart substitutions (eg quotes, dashes), etc. And again, getting those templates on the desktop app would be sweet. Less important additions that would be nice to see might include auto-backups, password locks, doc stats in footer, some printing control, etc

But as far as its working like the web app, it's pretty solid.

It's okay, but without a search function, fairly limited in usefulness. Shame! Gingko is an amazing concept.

Fellow CRIMPers:

Gingko update from many years later. It WAS and is an amazing concept. Horizontal outliners are handy for some kinds of things, and Gingko when I first saw it was simple, clear, and quick. Brilliant in design, well-integrated with the emerging markdown format.

I just took a look at the latest iteration I could find.

A work of art is not necessarily a business success. Enter " gingko " in the search bar for the whole history. I posted here because this topic had the most visits. It's a pretty fascinating discussion on the aims of outlinersoftware and the sustainability of its core components.

I give Gingko as an idea and execution a big thumbs up.

I still want a document view, a toggle or plug-in, that looks and works like Gingko. It had precise and powerful editing power too. The developer seems to have moved to Obsidian. For me, Dynalist still hits the frictionless outliner ideal. That's one use case. I'm happy enough.

But I do wonder: Does the concept live on? Where?

jaslar wrote:

Fellow CRIMPers:

The developer seems to have moved to Obsidian.

That would be rich, considering that Adriano is still charging $117/yr for the GingkoWriter service. But are you sure? I looked and he has no public project or contribution associated with Obsidian. How did you hear he moved to Obsidian?

Does the concept live on? Where?

The small tender branch of horizontal writing/outlining apps pretty much withered with the withdrawal of Tree outliner and the moribund status of Gingko.

Earlier this year I stumbled across some text-based writing app that similar to Gingko but it was a very raw v0.2 alpha that one person was working on slowly, and it didn't seem stable enough to pay attention to. I think I saw a Github link for it posted by the dev on a productivity subreddit.

I’m not sure the developer has moved to Obsidian, but someone has certainly replicated the Gingko concept in Obsidian – very well, in fact. The plugin concerned is called Lineage, and works precisely like Gingko. The write-up says that it was “inspired by Gingko Writer”, so presumably it isn’t the original developer (his/her GitHub name is ycnmhd).

I use it quite a lot! I’ve also experimented with it as an alternative task management approach. For some people, it might be the ideal solution.

It also works on mobile.

jaslar wrote:

Fellow CRIMPers:

Gingko update from many years later. It WAS and is an amazing concept.
Horizontal outliners are handy for some kinds of things, and Gingko when
I first saw it was simple, clear, and quick. Brilliant in design,
well-integrated with the emerging markdown format.

I just took a look at the latest iteration I could find.

A work of art is not necessarily a business success. Enter " gingko " in
the search bar for the whole history. I posted here because this topic
had the most visits. It's a pretty fascinating discussion on the aims of
outlinersoftware and the sustainability of its core components.

I give Gingko as an idea and execution a big thumbs up.

I still want a document view, a toggle or plug-in, that looks and works
like Gingko. It had precise and powerful editing power too. The
developer seems to have moved to Obsidian. For me, Dynalist still hits
the frictionless outliner ideal. That's one use case. I'm happy enough.

But I do wonder: Does the concept live on? Where?

As far as I can tell, Gingko Writer is still alive and well, at least to judge by the website:

https://gingkowriter.com

I don't know that it has been updated recently, although the pricing has. They had had a "pay what you want" option, which no longer seems to be the case.

Steve

jaslar wrote:

Fellow CRIMPers:

Gingko update from many years later. It WAS and is an amazing concept.
Horizontal outliners are handy for some kinds of things, and Gingko when
I first saw it was simple, clear, and quick. Brilliant in design,
well-integrated with the emerging markdown format.

I just took a look at the latest iteration I could find.

A work of art is not necessarily a business success. Enter " gingko " in
the search bar for the whole history. I posted here because this topic
had the most visits. It's a pretty fascinating discussion on the aims of
outlinersoftware and the sustainability of its core components.

I give Gingko as an idea and execution a big thumbs up.

I still want a document view, a toggle or plug-in, that looks and works
like Gingko. It had precise and powerful editing power too. The
developer seems to have moved to Obsidian. For me, Dynalist still hits
the frictionless outliner ideal. That's one use case. I'm happy enough.

But I do wonder: Does the concept live on? Where?

I agree - Dynalist is a great outliner, and its developers need to focus on restoring it to life.

Stephen Zeoli wrote:

I don't know that it has been updated recently, although the pricing
has. They had had a "pay what you want" option, which no longer seems to
be the case.

GingkoWriter always had a pay component, with a minimum of $2/month when it was introduced, later revised to a $5/month minimum. That went away and I belive the current pricing structure has been unchanged for a few years.

jaslar wrote:

Does the concept live on? Where?

I completely forgot about a free Mac app (with one-time $4.99 unlock) I wrote about here last November called 'Outliner: Scroll'

https://www.outlinersoftware.com/topics/viewt/11139/0/scroll-a-treegingko-like-outliner-for-maciosipados

https://apps.apple.com/us/app/outliner-scroll/id1597619594

It was pretty limited and bad when I wrote about it, and it's only had one update since then. Looking at the app's version history on Apple's site apparently the uncomfortably small fixed text entry box has not changed.