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Becoming obsessed with the idea of a mac
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Posted by David Dunham
Nov 22, 2007 at 05:59 AM
Jonathan Probber wrote:
> I used a bunch of Windows writing and outlining tools, and was
>almost happy that my choices were narrowed after I switched to a Mac,
But not that narrow… Before I released Opal I was looking at a list of about 30 roughly comparable products that were available on the Mac. I think there are now more (especially if you take a more inclusive approach—I didn’t include writing software like Scrivener).
Speaking of Opal, there’s currently a prerelease version that takes advantage of new Leopard (Mac OS X 10.5) features. We should release it before too long.
Posted by Stephen R. Diamond
Nov 22, 2007 at 10:09 PM
Ask a question like that and you’re bound to get encouragement to switch. Microsoft is the monopolist. Nobody has a great interest in its defense. Your sample is also biased, because those who have already made a Mac commitment are the ones in the best position to respond.
Nobody answers that Scrivener is good, but ignores the other side of the equation. Are BrainStorm and Zoot more or less valuable than DevonThink and Scrivener?
There are other matters to be concerned about when embracing the Macintosh. The biggest one, generally unmentioned, concerns the companies’ policies on backward compatibility.
Anyway, before jumping platforms, check out the new MaxThink, the true state of the art pure outliner, guaranteed not remotely available on the Mac.
Matty wrote:
>I’ve been following this forum with great interest for the last six months or so with
>great delight since I share many of the obsessions of the community. I am a historian
>working with a combination of biblioscape, brainstorm, whizfolders, microsoft
>word, and I’ve been playing around with zoot. Lately, however, I have become obsessed
>with two programs for the mac, Devonthink and Scrivener. Does anyone have any
>experience with these? Please tell me that they are not that great and I should stop
>fantasizing about switching platforms when really I should be writing.
Posted by Stephen R. Diamond
Nov 23, 2007 at 12:30 AM
Stephen R. Diamond wrote:
>Nobody answers that Scrivener is good, but ignores the other
>side of the equation. Are BrainStorm and Zoot more or less valuable than DevonThink
>and Scrivener?
should read:
Everyone answers that Scrivener…
Posted by Stephen R. Diamond
Nov 23, 2007 at 04:39 AM
NoteMap hasn’t ceased active development. Recently in fact there was an upgrade, although the changes were substantially cosmetic,bu inclded stronger ties to the litigation products, which includes a column-enabled specialized outliner. Perhaps it would be correct to say that develoment has been paused, even though even that much would be inference. I think it likely and anticipated by CaseSoft, now a division of Lexis/Nexis that plugging the outlner into the legal suite will ultimately stimulate demand for NoteMap.
Anyway, no announcement of cessaton of development and a definite signal of intent to develop the product (but without a known roadmap). All that can definitely be inferred is that the development of NoteMap has been slow. My guess is that it has a rosier future than OmniOutliner.
Chris Thompson wrote:
>Since this is an outliner forum, it’s worth mentioning that OmniOutliner is
>pretty much the best single pane outliner on any platform (especially now that
>NoteMap has ceased active development and doesn’t have columns).
Posted by Cassius
Nov 23, 2007 at 05:36 AM
Stephen R. Diamond wrote:
>NoteMap hasn’t ceased active development. Recently in fact there was an upgrade, although the changes were substantially cosmetic,bu inclded stronger ties to the litigation products, which includes a column-enabled specialized outliner.
I really doubt that NoteMap will have any upgrade. Reasons:
Examining the actual files in the program folder, I found that, with one exception, the most recent date was January, 2007. The exception was the file “license.txt,” no doubt to add the Lexis-Nexis name.
It would be trivially easy to fix the MS WORD export bug, but it hasn’t been done.
I received an email about it months ago with a phone number to call. I called it. It was actually a pitch to sell me the version I already have. The salesman claimed that it would be further upgraded, so I suggested that he post to this Web site asking for features people would want to see in an upgraded version. No such post ever occurred.
-c