Mmm. I've had a few strange experiences with developers that have coloured my experience of the apps they're working on. Which is to say that I empathise, even if I haven't had that same experience with Heptabase— though I did find their onboarding a little anxiety inducing! They wanted to observe me using the tool when they'd just introduced me to it, which makes sense and sounds fairly reasonable, but I completely spaced in the moment and focused more on "performing" knowledge work than actually figuring out how this new tool might work for me...

Lucas wrote:

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.

Thanks for the recommendation/reminder. I'd tried TheBrain on iPadOS a while back, and didn't quite take to it, but I'll take another look...

Stephen Zeoli wrote:

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.

I’ve just been reminded by my weekly NessLabs newsletter that Anne-Laure Le Cunff has lots of useful tips on brain organising/stimulating apps. In fact, she writes well and generously on a whole variety of brain-related stuff, including the organising of information.

This week’s interview with the founder of Dendron is well worth a read: https://nesslabs.com/dendron-featured-tool

This would probably also interest you, Larry, as part of your search for the perfect brainstorming environment?

Cheers,
Bill

@Cyganet

Cyganet wrote:

If I'm writing a book, I use InfoQube https://www.infoqube.biz/

I am on Ultra Recall, but I am definitely keeping my eye on InfoQube. So far I did not use it for anything, though. Your comment caught my attention. Could you hint at how you use InfoQube for writing a book, pls?

:)
k

I notice that to get "early access" to Heptabase, you now have to subscribe at $6.99/month. I had intended to try it out, but I'm not inclined to sub for early beta (maybe alpha) software. I understand the reasoning of the devs, but I'm not convinced it's sound.

Interesting. For what it's worth, now that I had my onboarding session, I'd like to retract my earlier critical comment about Heptabase. I was highly impressed both by the developer and the software. The only issue is that, for the software to really be useful to me, I would need more flexibility with engaging with individual blocks, rather than just engaging with individual "cards". But the general concept of cards that can appear on multiple boards is interesting and seems to be well executed.

Hi Karel,

I use it to organise my reference materials and research. If you think about Scrivener or any other outliner, all the materials are organised in a long list of nested folders underneath each other. I got fed up scrolling back and forth between the folders when I wanted to look at different items, and the fact that differnent kinds of items are under each other in a long list, getting in each other's way.

In InfoQube, I use grids as the folders, and the interface with tabs and tab groups allows me to separate different kinds of materials from each other. So I have grids called "Interview notes", "Comparative titles", "Feedback", "Concepts to research" etc. and I can easily flip between them, or hide them when I'm not working with them. The metadata in the grid columns is also very useful for organising items.

The other way to use InfoQube is writing an outline inside a grid, and easily moving text around. In that sense it's like Scrivener's 'scrivenings' mode.


karel wrote:

@Cyganet

Cyganet wrote:
>If I'm writing a book, I use InfoQube https://www.infoqube.biz/

I am on Ultra Recall, but I am definitely keeping my eye on InfoQube. So
far I did not use it for anything, though. Your comment caught my
attention. Could you hint at how you use InfoQube for writing a book,
pls?

:)
k