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An in-depth TheBrain app-praisal !
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Posted by Stephen Zeoli
Jul 6, 2014 at 06:56 PM
No worries, Doc. You said it better than I did anyway!
Dr Andus wrote:
Stephen Zeoli wrote:
>>That’s where the comparison with mind mappers leads to underestimating
>>TheBrain, because I would agree it isn’t ideal for plotting out a
>speech
>>or a paper. Where the mind map usually represents one particular
>project
>>and the pieces that make it up, TheBrain doesn’t work that way
>
>Oh, sorry Steve, I didn’t see your post before I posted mine. I was
>making a very similar point.
Posted by Hugh
Jul 10, 2014 at 06:16 PM
I’m hesitating over TheBrain somewhat less than I was.
What has struck a chord with me is Steve’s description of it as a “primary project dashboard”. In other words, it sounds as if it could perform the function of project “front page(s)”, with the heavier lifting (to mix metaphors) performed by, say, DevonThink or the Mac Finder itself, effectively behind the scenes. I do need some such tool, in order to enable me to (mixing metaphors again) distinguish the wood from the trees.
Posted by Stephen Zeoli
Jul 10, 2014 at 07:01 PM
Hugh wrote:
I’m hesitating over TheBrain somewhat less than I was.
>
>What has struck a chord with me is Steve’s description of it as a
>“primary project dashboard”. In other words, it sounds as if it could
>perform the function of project “front page(s)”, with the heavier
>lifting (to mix metaphors) performed by, say, DevonThink or the Mac
>Finder itself, effectively behind the scenes. I do need some such tool,
>in order to enable me to (mixing metaphors again) distinguish the wood
>from the trees.
I am finding TheBrain very good for this type of work, as I mentioned. I do want to point out a few limitations, so as to not mis-lead you:
1. It has a nice calendar system that syncs to Google Calendar (I don’t do this, so can’t vouched for how that works), but it does not sync directly with the native Mac Calendar app.
2. The iOS app works well, but does not include the calendar.
3. If you are going to be syncing TheBrain between two or more Macs, note that you will not be able to keep links between external documents in sync. That is, if you’re linking to a specific document in DevonThink on Mac A, that link will not work in Mac B (and I am pretty certain that is the case, even if your DevonThink database is sync’d between the two computers, though I am not sure of that). One thing I haven’t tried (maybe someone else can answer) is what happens if you have the external link leading to a file or document in Dropbox, which is sync’d across computers—my guess is it won’t work, but don’t know for sure.
On the other hand, you can embed almost any type of file within TheBrain and that will sync across computers just fine. Of course, you’ve got to have the proper app on both computers to open and edit the embedded files on each.
TheBrain works for me, because I have one brain for my day job, which I use most of the time on my Windows PC, so I don’t care if the links to OneNote files don’t work on my MacBook.
Anyway, I’m in no way trying to discourage you, Hugh. I just want to make sure I don’t OVER sell TheBrain for dashboard work.
Steve Z.
Posted by Hugh
Jul 10, 2014 at 09:19 PM
Understood. Thanks for the advice, Steve.
Hugh
Posted by donleone
Jul 10, 2014 at 09:27 PM
here is an excellent “thoughts” provoking argument in favor again of TheBrain:
We are all very familiar with our “Tree” way of thinking & organizing
(after all it’s been around for at least the last 20 years,
and surely everyone on here has used it extensively
at one time or another in their outlining career)
But now imagine that you could
AT ANY TIME with just a SINGLE CLICK,
TURN AROUND your entire Tree
up-side down & criss-cross wise,
from any chosen sub-item that you wanted,
and see then your whole tree and its relations
now from THAT sub-items perspective?
Wouldn’t that be powerful ?
If your tree outliner could offer that,
would you not want that ability too?
And all that with just 1 single click,
without re-arranging or changing,
any of the actual order of your database
THAT to me is the big power of TheBrain.
So that you are not forced kept into a fixed top-down hierarchy
that once you establish stays pretty much forever like that.
But you can at any time chose to “tree-shape-shift” the entire thing :-)
and re-examine all of your data from simply a whole other perspective.
And now a 2nd point, as an addition to the review:
after having played now with TheBrain for some time,
i must say, that out of the 4 views possible in Version 8,
i ONLY find the so called “Outline View” (which again i initially dismissed)
to be actually after all the most user-friendly and most efficient of all,
since
a.) the Outline View almost completely avoids any lines overlapping subjects
as all the other views, as soon as they get many cross-connections in-between them,
truly start to become self-confusing, especially when the “expanded all” is enabled.
But the Outline View does NOT become confusing, because it always blends in only
the current level linkages only (just test it once and you’ll see what i mean).
b.) and furthermore the “Outline View” because, it alone is able to show the MAXIMUM DEPTH
automatically and natively (which “depth” in the Outline View is going “left to right” ways,
instead of top to down as in the “Normal View”, and with the BIG benefit again
that in the Outline View you can have an infinite left to right VISIBLE-retained depth,
whereas the “Normal View” all items that go beyond the 4 levels of depth,
become invisible and faded out, for the sake of “focusing”, but i find the infinite visibility
on the contrary to help me MORE focus as the whole thread is somehow “retained” in your mind,
instead of being always 4 level hoistingly cut off.
and “unlimited” of course in the sense, as far sideways as your screen space goes,
but also with the left & right arrow’s holding you can super speedily “fly through” all the open side-levels,
should there be very many that are open simultaneously.
Lastly, in that “Outline View”, the auto-hoisting is by necessity more an “auto-centering”,
and on purpose not hoisting, so that you CAN see more depth beyond just the 4 levels,
and thus indeed seems to me, a nice golden mean “view” between the traditional Tree outliners
and the more confucius views of theBrain, apart from its Outline View.
greetings
donleone