I want to curate, a list of all ThinkingTools, softwares, which helps in thinking..

Please, help me draw line between,
Knowledge Management, Information Storing Apps, VS ThinkigTools ..

I want to, list..Softwares, like, Tinderbox, ThinkComposer..etc
mindmapping, inter-relating text, multiple layers..etc

Please Help Me..
post url of software, which comes at Tip of Your Tongue Or I say; Tip of Your Finger

Please, anyone?

Hi Newbee,

I'm going to interpret "thinking tools" as those that help you develop new ideas, rather than store information that is collected from an outside source, which would be "knowledge management".

For me, it often starts with mindmapping using Freeplane https://www.freeplane.org/wiki/index.php/Home
For concept mapping, I like to use CmapTools https://cmap.ihmc.us/ or VUE https://vue.tufts.edu/
If I'm drawing diagrams to clarify my thinking, I use PlantUML https://plantuml.com/
If I'm just jotting ideas down in an outliner, any one will do. I quite like Dynalist https://dynalist.io/
If I'm making a presentation, I use MS Powerpoint to make the outline and order of slides before filling them in
If I'm writing individual pieces of text, I like a clean environment like Typora https://typora.io/
If I'm writing a book, I use InfoQube https://www.infoqube.biz/

For storing information in a wiki format with connections I use ConnectedText https://www.connectedtext.com/ but I don't use it to create new ideas. You CAN use it that way by using its outliner feature which is equivalent to using Dynalist from my list above

Hope this gives you some ideas for your list.

I tend start with outlines most of the time. Typically, I jot down my thoughts/braindump as lines in an outline and then start organizing by moving them around.
sometimes I start with a mindmap (FreeMind), sometimes a flow diagram (freehand on a whiteboard, or Dia/Visio), but the outline is usually the primary tool for me.

Bump, Please

Newbee wrote:

I want to curate, a list of all ThinkingTools, softwares

Have you tried working from a base list and then visiting AlternativeTo-style websites?

Frankly, all these bumps makes it seem a bit like asking people to do homework for you.

How about providing a list of what you've come up with already?

Agreed. Why not read through discussions on this forum for ideas?

We cover a spectacular range of tools, and also discuss various use cases and processes.

satis wrote:

Newbee wrote:
> I want to curate, a list of all ThinkingTools, softwares

Have you tried working from a base list and then visiting
AlternativeTo-style websites?

Frankly, all these bumps makes it seem a bit like asking people to do
homework for you.

How about providing a list of what you've come up with already?

How about first you post what you already know, and then ask for help with what you don't know. I doubt anyone here will want to help unless you show that you've put some effort into the project yourself (and have some baseline knowledge, which I'm not sure that you do).

Hi Newbee,

I am also interested in a list of ThinkingTools (software, which helps with the many aspects of the thinking process) and also PKM (Personal Knowledge Management), Information Storing Apps and lots of other aspects of available software.

I'm also not sure where to draw the line between the various types of software that are available to help us live better, more interesting lives, using computers.

You said: "I want to curate, a list". That's interesting. Can you share how you envision this list being used and what form it might take, to be the most useful to the most people? Are you trying to sell it to others as a way to attract some kind of business customers? Is it a part of a homework assignment, as suggested by others on this forum, or part of a doctorial (or other higher education effort) research project? Do you intend to make it freely available to the general public? If so, what would that look like?

I'm asking, because it seems like others are interested in where you are coming from, so they can know how much effort it is worth, for them, to contribute to your desired outcome. I'm also asking, because I'm trying to FIND the list you are wanting to CURATE. I'm not even convinced that I have a good idea what such a list would best look like.

If you have done any research in this forum, you have probably already found that I asked a similar type of question a little while ago. If so, you should have already found a bunch of very helpful replies which were provided by users to me. I'm not sure they have answered your question specifically, but they pointed me to many, many interesting projects/software tools that might be of some interest to you as well.

In my quest, for a better understanding, of the landscape, I encountered: https://www.theproductivists.club/ which is another (much smaller, I think) forum that has interesting people and discussions on these kinds of topics. If you have not already found it, or the associated "the productivists" Discord community discussion server, I would recommend you join there and introduce yourself.

One other place, that I have found to be quite interesting, is: https://forum.zettelkasten.de/ Might not be as interesting to you, but I think it's worth a look.

If you know of other such places, I'd love to hear about them. I'm still searching for a better way to find and share for information about the above kinds of topics.

Sorry, that's all I have on the "Tip of my Finger", for now, except "Google is Your Friend".

David Garner

What do you mean by "bump"?

Daly

Daly de Gagne wrote:

What do you mean by "bump"?

(Some) people do this in online forums to get their topic/post back to the top of the topic list.

The idea of a curated list of note and organizing tools is a pretty cool idea.

I'm stuck in a rut, myself. Devonthink works pretty well. I like the way I can create links to notes that can be synced across machines, for instance.

This is a nice idea in concept, but I think it is nearly impossible to do without driving yourself crazy. I know. I have tried. There are so many variables, so many different pieces of information to track. These products are constantly changing. And a lot of the curated information is subjective (for example, in what category would you put TheBrain or Airtable?)

Seriously, it is like trying to build a giant sand castle with the tide constantly streaming in and out.

As the sign says at the entrace to the haunted forest of Oz: "I'd turn back if I were you."

Steve

This might be of use? https://github.com/brettkromkamp/awesome-knowledge-management
Lots of thinking about knowledge management, but the apps/tools list should offer a solid starting point.

As others have acknowledged, this sounds like quite the undertaking. It'd be interesting to see even the beginnings of a taxonomy of thinking tools. Three categories for thinking tools are (for my own purposes) are:
- linear thinking (note-taking in an app like Drafts)
- structured visual thinking (hierarchical mind-mapping tools like iThoughts, and non-hierarchical knowledge graphs like Kinopio)
- loose/freehand visual thinking (sketch/drawing apps like Concepts)

Even this isn't particularly cast-iron; plenty of tools sit on the borders and cross the divides...

Thanks, Franz. It's the first time I have seen it used that way.

Daly

Franz Grieser wrote:

Daly de Gagne wrote:
>What do you mean by "bump"?

(Some) people do this in online forums to get their topic/post back to
the top of the topic list.

!!!! ... oh my ..... another fun rabbit hole to explore!!!! :- )

jsamlarose wrote:

This might be of use?
https://github.com/brettkromkamp/awesome-knowledge-management
Lots of thinking about knowledge management, but the apps/tools list
should offer a solid starting point.

As others have acknowledged, this sounds like quite the undertaking.
It'd be interesting to see even the beginnings of a taxonomy of thinking
tools. Three categories for thinking tools are (for my own purposes)
are:
- linear thinking (note-taking in an app like Drafts)
- structured visual thinking (hierarchical mind-mapping tools like
iThoughts, and non-hierarchical knowledge graphs like Kinopio)
- loose/freehand visual thinking (sketch/drawing apps like Concepts)

Even this isn't particularly cast-iron; plenty of tools sit on the
borders and cross the divides...

Ha! Yes— that one’s particularly fun (and far-reaching…) ;)

bartb wrote:

!!!! ... oh my ..... another fun rabbit hole to explore!!!! :- )

jsamlarose wrote:
This might be of use?
>https://github.com/brettkromkamp/awesome-knowledge-management
>Lots of thinking about knowledge management, but the apps/tools list
>should offer a solid starting point.
>
>As others have acknowledged, this sounds like quite the undertaking.
>It'd be interesting to see even the beginnings of a taxonomy of
thinking
>tools. Three categories for thinking tools are (for my own purposes)
>are:
>- linear thinking (note-taking in an app like Drafts)
>- structured visual thinking (hierarchical mind-mapping tools like
>iThoughts, and non-hierarchical knowledge graphs like Kinopio)
>- loose/freehand visual thinking (sketch/drawing apps like Concepts)
>
>Even this isn't particularly cast-iron; plenty of tools sit on the
>borders and cross the divides...

Thinking further: I wonder if the (very) rough categorisation I put forward resonates with anyone else, or if anyone might offer alternative views? I know there are some pretty obvious and messy points of intersection, which makes me wonder whether this is more of a Venn diagram than a sliding scale…

I guess outliners would sit somewhere in the linear, hierarchical category, though Dynalist would skew towards the structured visual category, since it does offer a mind-map view. And Roam (and its many competitors and clones) would be just another flavour of structured visual thinking?

Muse (https://museapp.com/ feels like it deserves a mention in any conversation about thinking tools…

jsamlarose wrote:

This might be of use?
https://github.com/brettkromkamp/awesome-knowledge-management
Lots of thinking about knowledge management, but the apps/tools list
should offer a solid starting point.

As others have acknowledged, this sounds like quite the undertaking.
It'd be interesting to see even the beginnings of a taxonomy of thinking
tools. Three categories for thinking tools are (for my own purposes)
are:
- linear thinking (note-taking in an app like Drafts)
- structured visual thinking (hierarchical mind-mapping tools like
iThoughts, and non-hierarchical knowledge graphs like Kinopio)
- loose/freehand visual thinking (sketch/drawing apps like Concepts)

Even this isn't particularly cast-iron; plenty of tools sit on the
borders and cross the divides...

Muse is a very interesting app with apparently a lot of thought and design put into it (looking over their blog.) A Muse Mac app is planned for next year, and I will look at that closely. There is also a very interesting app in development called Heptabase (heptabase.com) that offers similar spatial organization of information but with more emphasis on text.

I much prefer 'spatial organization' of information in the initial creation and planning stages of a project or idea. Pencil and paper work great for me there, of course digital apps offer much more functionality but only if the interface is frictionless (which is where many apps fail for me.)

The best digital version for me has been Scapple, which is as bare bones as it is easy to use. The only additional feature I wish it had was notes, so that I could jot down additional information about an item without cluttering up the page. I have found Mindnode also to have a very frictionless UI, and it offers not only text notes but both iOS and Mac apps. There are a lot of great mind map apps out there, but most stick to the single central node with branches model which is not really how I do it.

Finally, while I love these sorts of spatial/visual apps they don't seem very practical as an all-in-on solution. But OPML is a great way for transferring info into an outliner/PIM.


jsamlarose wrote:

Thinking further: I wonder if the (very) rough categorisation I put
forward resonates with anyone else, or if anyone might offer alternative
views? I know there are some pretty obvious and messy points of
intersection, which makes me wonder whether this is more of a Venn
diagram than a sliding scale…

I guess outliners would sit somewhere in the linear, hierarchical
category, though Dynalist would skew towards the structured visual
category, since it does offer a mind-map view. And Roam (and its many
competitors and clones) would be just another flavour of structured
visual thinking?

Muse (https://museapp.com/ feels like it deserves a mention in any
conversation about thinking tools…

jsamlarose wrote:
This might be of use?
>https://github.com/brettkromkamp/awesome-knowledge-management
>Lots of thinking about knowledge management, but the apps/tools list
>should offer a solid starting point.
>
>As others have acknowledged, this sounds like quite the undertaking.
>It'd be interesting to see even the beginnings of a taxonomy of
thinking
>tools. Three categories for thinking tools are (for my own purposes)
>are:
>- linear thinking (note-taking in an app like Drafts)
>- structured visual thinking (hierarchical mind-mapping tools like
>iThoughts, and non-hierarchical knowledge graphs like Kinopio)
>- loose/freehand visual thinking (sketch/drawing apps like Concepts)
>
>Even this isn't particularly cast-iron; plenty of tools sit on the
>borders and cross the divides...

steveylang wrote:

I much prefer 'spatial organization' of information in the initial
creation and planning stages of a project or idea. Pencil and paper work
great for me there, of course digital apps offer much more functionality
but only if the interface is frictionless (which is where many apps fail
for me.)

The best digital version for me has been Scapple

I agree that when it comes to speed of capturing and developing ideas, analysing problems etc., nothing beats pen and paper (I like to go for A3 size, but have used a large scroll of wrapping paper as well for really large-scale planning).

The challenge with spatial organisation digitally is that spatial software (such as Onenote) works better for analysing and mapping a single issue, rather than for organising a large database and visualising aspects of that database. Roam's visual graph becomes pretty useless fairly soon as well.

The only workable solution I've come across so far has been the semantic zoom of Plectica (though it's still not a panacea, as explained below).

Plectica has remained my go-to solution for visually analysing and modelling smaller scale problems (taking over from VUE, which was my previous tool for this), as it's fairly quick to create nodes and connect them.

The ease of embedding nodes within nodes is also very helpful (as eventually everything is part of something else, one way or another, so it's always helpful to be able to easily embed one node in another).

The semantic zoom then helps maintain the big picture, while easily allowing one to zoom in and work on a detail.

But even with Plectica there comes a point where you'd want to separate issues into different maps once it grows too big, as I'm not sure how it would accommodate a single giant database in a single map.

Perhaps someone one day will combine Plectica's implementation of the semantic zoom with supporting a Roam type database, so that one can build specific visualisations without having to create a new file or database every time.

I was kind of able to do such analyses with ConnectedText's Navigator feature, but it has its own limitations (and is sadly no longer developed).

If you're on a mac Tinderbox has some great visual mapping features and can create quite complex large maps. You can put a map inside a map and link to other maps in the same document.

Dr Andus wrote:

The challenge with spatial organisation digitally is that spatial
software (such as Onenote) works better for analysing and mapping a
single issue, rather than for organising a large database and
visualising aspects of that database. Roam's visual graph becomes pretty
useless fairly soon as well.

I think you nailed it on the head there- working on a specific idea vs. than the organizing/classifying/archiving of your work or gathered information.

I love having everything I've done ready for recall on my computer or nowadays smartphone, but also nothing beats the appeal of a freshly sharpened pencil and blank page for thinking through an idea. I don't have to keep trying to combine the 2 worlds into a single experience/process/application.

I've been picking away at candidates for tools that facilitate spatial knowledge management / thinking for a little while now. Currently curious to see how Heptabase (https://heptabase.com/ nee Project Meta) and Gems (https://gemsnotes.app/ will evolve. Gems has my attention straight out of the box— not quite as well developed as Heptabase, but it's accessible through mobile browsers, which is an essential requirement for my workflow. I like the way Gems places an emphasis on building a graph of notes, rather than wiki-linking your notes into a graph— fees like it could be a useful complement for the note-taking/making app I'm already using. Also, I see one of the upcoming features is node grouping— essentially sub-folders for graphs, which will hopefully prevent graphs with lots of nodes on different subjects from becoming unwieldy...

Yes, I've personally been keeping an eye on Heptabase. I definitely look forward to trying it out! Last I checked, the only way to try it was to set up an onboarding call, and the next opening was months away. I went ahead and scheduled one. I then got in touch directly with the developer and asked if I could try the software sooner. He said that might be possible, and then asked if I use Zotero. I said yes. And then he said I can't try the software yet because the Zotero feature hasn't been added. It was like a trick question. The exchange left me feeling like the developer is rather pretentious (or at least has an odd way of communicating), but no matter, I look forward to trying out the software eventually.

If Gems interests you, I suggest you take a look at TheBrain, which appears to me to be a lot more feature-rich. The one thing that TheBrain lacks that Gems appears to have is a graphical window that is as malleable. But it makes up for that with a very flexible hierarchical scheme. Plus you can add a lot of meta data to your notes (called Thoughts in TheBrain). The note area of TheBrain has improved immensely in the new version. A nice feature, for example, is that you can import a screen shot right into the note.

TheBrain has native apps for Mac and Windows, as well as an iOS version (which I don't use, so can't comment on). It is a bit expensive, but not that bad given the cost of apps like Roam and what Gems is going to cost.

I am not saying TheBrain would be a better choice than Gems, but I think if you haven't looked at it in a while, it is worth another try.

Steve Z.