I have been a big fan of Scapple for a long time. I sometimes try people to use it. But, I was having a hard time explaining why the maps in Scapple are different from the maps in Obsidian and other hyperlink graphs. . https://oasis-lab.gitbook.io/roamresearch-discourse-graph-extension/fundamentals/what-is-a-discourse-graph

They call them discourse graphs.

- They are not links between two notes.
- They are links between concepts: the relation of the concept is mapped by using different arrows/text to show the direction of logical argumentation.

Idea X supports Idea Y
Idea Z is tangentially related with idea X:
Idea A has this implication B,
and that implication leads to the rejection of idea X
- add some facts--lead to the rejection of hypothesis Z

etc,

Convoluted argumentation, labyrinth of logical flows can be mapped with them. These kinds of graphs are different from hyperlink graphs; and are really practically useful.

Dellu, what you describe seems similar to concept maps, or am I misunderstanding. Thanks.

Daly

Dellu wrote:

I have been a big fan of Scapple for a long time. I sometimes try people
to use it. But, I was having a hard time explaining why the maps in
Scapple are different from the maps in Obsidian and other hyperlink
graphs. .
https://oasis-lab.gitbook.io/roamresearch-discourse-graph-extension/fundamentals/what-is-a-discourse-graph

They call them discourse graphs.

- They are not links between two notes.
- They are links between concepts: the relation of the concept is mapped
by using different arrows/text to show the direction of logical
argumentation.

Idea X supports Idea Y
Idea Z is tangentially related with idea X:
Idea A has this implication B,
and that implication leads to the rejection of idea X
- add some facts--lead to the rejection of hypothesis Z

etc,

Convoluted argumentation, labyrinth of logical flows can be mapped with
them. These kinds of graphs are different from hyperlink graphs; and are
really practically useful.

yes, that is concept map. LIke the one we have in Miro: https://miro.com/concept-map/

Quite interestingly, the developers in Obsidian are working on to develop sth similar to Miro or Scapple. I was disgruntled by those hyperlink fancy maps which seem to do nothing for the end user.

Having a concept map, or discourse map in Obsidian would be really cool.

Yes, the Discourse Graph tool for Roam is interesting as a type of concept mapping tool. I was delighted to notice recently that the developer put out a survey implying he plans to continue developing it. For concept mapping I currently use a variety of tools:

- InfoQube ("Surface" view)
- linkfacts.link
- stemic.app
- Flying Logic
- CmapTools (a bit outdated but still unparalleled in certain regards)

My ideal is to be able to outline ideas moving back and forth between an editable outliner mode and an editable concept-map mode. (Mind maps, which limit items to one parent, are too limiting for me.) Most tools which offer both types of views offer editing in only one of them. InfoQube is the only tool I've found that current allows editing in both modes in a usable way, although linkfacts.link does have a quasi-outliner mode, and TheBrain does something vaguely similar as well.

I am hopeful that the Roam Discourse Graph tool could be enhanced to allow easy editing in both regular Roam outline mode and in the special map mode.

(From what I gather, the coming Obsidian tool will be more like Heptabase, Scrintal, and Tinderbox, which offer a canvas for mapping relations between notes, but not for drilling down into greater granularity within notes. It's a bit like the difference between two-pane and one-pane outlining, the former being for a more macro-level of outlining, the latter being conducive to micro-level outlining.)

I forgot to mention: Argdown is worth mentioning in this context. The argdown plugin for Obsidian, for example, allows for outlining arguments and viewing them as a map.

Very interesting - can you provide a link where the developers discuss this? Is this your understanding of the "Canvas plugin" that the Obsidian developers mention on their roadmap?

https://trello.com/c/8Eo9WYly

Dellu wrote:

Quite interestingly, the developers in Obsidian are working on to
develop sth similar to Miro or Scapple.

Yes, it is the canvas plugin. It started in the forum: an then moved to Trello.
https://forum.obsidian.md/t/super-fr-visual-spatial-note-taking-whiteboard-mind-map-concept-map/32346/3

Dellu wrote:

Yes, it is the canvas plugin. It started in the forum: an then moved to
Trello.
https://forum.obsidian.md/t/super-fr-visual-spatial-note-taking-whiteboard-mind-map-concept-map/32346/3

My use of Tinderbox is 'trivial' and uses only a small proportion of its power, but it is invaluable when used it in this manner, with the advantage over Scapple, for instance, of being able to add text and meta-data to the visible nodes.

I converted nearly all of my note-taking to Obsidian earlier this year, but now use the two apps in tandem: Obsidian for the vault and all of its advantages; Tinderbox for the construction and development of more substantial pieces of work (I'm an historian of medicine) which use Obsidian as a resource.

To complete the horses for courses geekiness, I then export to Scrivener for final writing up.

Tinderbox has advantage over Scapple because it lets you assign a number of metadata that you can use for organization.

That power, however, comes with a price. Tinderbox will sink your time like hell.

Drawing a little graph, that could take a few minutes could take hours in Tinderbox. If you are a person who prioritize his time, the whole process of learning this agent or prototype, that hack and this script, etc, with unorganized and unsystematic learning resource dispersed all over the place, Tinderbox is a huge pain.

The maps in Tinderbox are not as neat as in Scapple or Moro, or Heptabase or scrintal, because they hide the content under the Title.

Can you draw maps like this using Tinderbox?https://medium.com/@reorx/a-look-into-heptabases-split-writing-experience-87f9c2bfb257

No, you cannot. Tinderbox hides the actual content under the title/folder, unless you want to write paragraphs of content on the Title itself; which will lead you to complicated problems, if possible at all.

Tinderbox is good for database kind of stuff.

But, for figuring out lines of argumentation, that I described at the beginning, there are better tools. Scapple or Moro, or Heptabase or scrintal let you figure of conceptual flows in a couple of minutes with ease so that you will use your valuable time for actual productive work.

Curiously, I'm not far from giving Tinderbox another serious trial run. I've always been disgusted by the convergence of promise and utter frustration. That's where Tinderbox always fell.

A few days ago I set up a Tinderbox document as a model for planning a novel. It's working perfectly. I'm still not certain it's The One True Way, but I'm starting to think it could be workable.

Be gentle if I have to retract that. My intended use is plotting a novel, because, yes, like everyone else I'd like to write a novel. I'm sure I'll hate myself in the morning.

I set up agent prototypes that look for the agent's name in note list variables. For instance, the aAssociation agent prototype looks for its name contained within any note's Associations list.

Create an aAssociation or aChapter agent, name it for what you want it to look for, and it collects things of interest.

The same functionality is basically automatic in Devonthink, particularly with the "exclude groups from tagging" option turned off.

But being able to see and edit notes in any corkboard view they appear in, that's nice. I'm waffling, at least a little.

I'm open to interventions. :-)

Dellu wrote:

Tinderbox has advantage over Scapple because it lets you assign a number
of metadata that you can use for organization.

That power, however, comes with a price. Tinderbox will sink your time
like hell.

So true. As a CRIMPEr of 30+years, I have never come across software so highly ratedand with so much potential, and yet so difficult to use as to be of no value to me

Dellu wrote:

Tinderbox has advantage over Scapple because it lets you assign a number
of metadata that you can use for organization.

That power, however, comes with a price. Tinderbox will sink your time
like hell.

Drawing a little graph, that could take a few minutes could take hours
in Tinderbox. If you are a person who prioritize his time, the whole
process of learning this agent or prototype, that hack and this script,
etc, with unorganized and unsystematic learning resource dispersed all
over the place, Tinderbox is a huge pain.

Simply not true - if it were I wouldn't be able to use it.

To make a concept map - click on map view to create visual note - add title and as much text as you like (so far, so like Scapple), or title and separate text (note). Connect notes by dragging connection from bottom of the note. It's that easy.

Why involve agents, prototypes and all the rest unless you have to? And you don't to draw a very useful concept map.

For processing a database of notes (a different task) you can be greatly helped by Agents (permanent 'smart' searches) and prototypes and all of the other meta-data operations - but as I said, I'm a trivial user in that regard and I now find Obsidian better for *my* note purposes most of the time.

I'm really not sure what your intemperate dismissal was supposed to achieve.

Dellu wrote:

Tinderbox has advantage over Scapple because it lets you assign a number
of metadata that you can use for organization.

That power, however, comes with a price. Tinderbox will sink your time
like hell.

Drawing a little graph, that could take a few minutes could take hours
in Tinderbox. If you are a person who prioritize his time, the whole
process of learning this agent or prototype, that hack and this script,
etc, with unorganized and unsystematic learning resource dispersed all
over the place, Tinderbox is a huge pain.

The maps in Tinderbox are not as neat as in Scapple or Moro, or
Heptabase or scrintal, because they hide the content under the Title.

Can you draw maps like this using
Tinderbox?https://medium.com/@reorx/a-look-into-heptabases-split-writing-experience-87f9c2bfb257

No, you cannot. Tinderbox hides the actual content under the
title/folder, unless you want to write paragraphs of content on the
Title itself; which will lead you to complicated problems, if possible
at all.

Tinderbox is good for database kind of stuff.

But, for figuring out lines of argumentation, that I described at the
beginning, there are better tools. Scapple or Moro, or Heptabase or
scrintal let you figure of conceptual flows in a couple of minutes with
ease so that you will use your valuable time for actual productive work.

- If you are going to use for simple mind maps (concept maps), and not exploit the great powers of it, why do use spend a hefty price on a premium app while you can achieve those effects with cheap, even free apps?

I’m really not sure what your intemperate dismissal was supposed to achieve.

I really had no purpose. I was just expressing my frustration; and regret on the amount of time I sank to Tinderbox. I spent a lot of time on it; and produce nothing specially important out it. With all honestly, I would have produced a lot of valuable stuff if I had used that time for actual reading and writing. Wrong decisions!

There are many unaware people here who would think they will master it and achieve great things with it. But, most of us end up spending our time and money for no real use. Aren't we all here to learn from each other's mistakes? I am just sharing the mistakes I made.


Tinderbox comes with a price.
1) if you want use the great powers of it, you have to sink a lot of your time. That might not be so for very intelligent people. But, for me, that has been my experience.
2) if you are going to use it just for simple things, you are again at lose because your paying hefty price for a trivial task you can achieve with free, or low cost apps.

IF you are going to gain for your time and money, your material needs to be extensive, and, very hard to work out with other simpler apps. That is my learning. Sb else might not mind paying money; or spending long hours on it--or be intelligent and master is all in a few days. Anyways, that has been my experience with TB. I get great value with Scapple--much better productivity with it.

Twitter-like Tinderbox pile-on. Nothing new. How very tedious.

Tinderbox's official documentation could stand some work. The community supported aTbRef is far superior.

Some of the distinctions in Tinderbox are easy to lose track of, like the meanings of agents, actions, edicts, and rules. On the other hand, I can look up what I need when I need it.

Tinderbox has a huge advantage over Scapple (and I like Scapple).

Scapple is a single corkboard. Tinderbox is 3-d. A map can have notes and it can have collections, which could be thought of as sub-corkboards. You can navigate Tinderbox. That's probably why I don't use Scapple. It's great, but I keep wishing a note in Scapple could dive down into a sub-category.

Given the choice between using Scapple and Tinderbox, it wouldn't be a hard decision. You could ignore all the bells and whistles and still have a more effective planning environment in Tinderbox.

Curio is another under-appreciated planning application. My humble and unwashed opinion, of course.

With a near zero time investment I can make a Curio project look like a polished, publication ready, design. With zero time invested in templates, it produces handsome work.

For my use, Curio hit the afterburners with synced text figures (notes). These are notes that can appear in multiple places throughout a Curio project.

Curio doesn't have Tinderbox's automation. It's very easy to use. Curio has its limitations, too.

Dr Dog wrote:

Twitter-like Tinderbox pile-on. Nothing new. How very tedious.

@Lucas, thanks for the many program/tool mentions. Several I had not heard of before. At least a couple of them look very interesting to me.

Scapple is a single corkboard.

You should not forget that Scapple is the little sister of sth big: Scrivener.

You drag your maps to Scrivener, you would have a draft to go. Indeed, if your project is smaller in size, you can do all the drafting in Scapple; and finish it up in Scrivener. They work together really nicely.

Curio is also great. I had experience with it a long time ago: never checked it lately. But, Curiota, the little sister, incredibly effective for jotting small ideas as they pop up in your head.

Lucas wrote:

For concept mapping I currently use a variety of tools:
- InfoQube ("Surface" view)
- linkfacts.link
- stemic.app
- Flying Logic
- CmapTools (a bit outdated but still unparalleled in certain regards)

There is another classic, VUE (https://vue.tufts.edu/ though these days I tend to reach for Plectica (www.plectica.com), which lives online, and so is cross-platform and cross-device.

No argument. Scapple should be viewed in context with Scrivener. A great combination.

Curio has in the past had rough edges. At present, it's generally polished.

It's also always seemed a little old-school and not quite agile enough for real-time note linking. You can take notes quickly enough. Adding linkages between notes is very flexible, and you can create a new idea space (corkboard) linked to a text block with a right-click, but there's no [[make a link on the fly]] mechanism. Linking takes a little manual effort. That's probably a deal-killer for many.

Mind mapping is very flexible in Curio, even if it isn't quite as spiffy looking as purpose-built mind mapping tools. For instance, if your mind map can live with branches no more than three levels deep, you can create a table of contents as a mind map. It will dynamically rebuild to match your hierarchy of idea spaces. Each node has a corkboard, potentially containing yet a deeper table of contents, not just the expected text attachment.

I've got an idea I'm outlining now. I'm dithering between Devonthink, Curio, Tinderbox, and Obsidian. Meanwhile, the outline is growing in OmniOutliner because I don't have to agonize about it. I can just use the thing.


Dellu wrote:

Scapple is a single corkboard.

You should not forget that Scapple is the little sister of sth big:
Scrivener.

You drag your maps to Scrivener, you would have a draft to go. Indeed,
if your project is smaller in size, you can do all the drafting in
Scapple; and finish it up in Scrivener. They work together really
nicely.

Curio is also great. I had experience with it a long time ago: never
checked it lately. But, Curiota, the little sister, incredibly effective
for jotting small ideas as they pop up in your head.

Amontillado wrote:

Mind mapping is very flexible in Curio, even if it isn't quite as spiffy
looking as purpose-built mind mapping tools. For instance, if your mind
map can live with branches no more than three levels deep, you can
create a table of contents as a mind map. It will dynamically rebuild to
match your hierarchy of idea spaces. Each node has a corkboard,
potentially containing yet a deeper table of contents, not just the
expected text attachment.

I've got an idea I'm outlining now. I'm dithering between Devonthink,
Curio, Tinderbox, and Obsidian. Meanwhile, the outline is growing in
OmniOutliner because I don't have to agonize about it. I can just use
the thing.

I used to have a similar, multiple-tool system at some point. I have tried Curio for some time. The maps look incredible. It also does some magic with pdf. Does it still do that? And the developer is an incredible human being. Tinderbox has also been my home for some time.

But, thinking hard about it hard, and learning about my own productivity, I learned that the lesser the number of tools, the better.
It is kind of sometimes exhausting to find where I wrote a certain note; and, even to decide which tool to use. Each tool also comes with its own features, that I have to learn about to use it effectively. That is why, after some contemplation, I decided to stick with the basics: DT, Scrivener, and Scapple combo

- Obsidian has been tempting as well. But, it is not as good as Devonthink. The fact that I have to rely on the markdown form itself is a drawback because I use text colors a lot. DT is just incredible. I am learning new things, and new avenues of organization, every day. I am doing almost everything with DT--organizing pdf and other resources, reading them, annotating, taking notes, and exporting annotations; drafting. I pull out Scapple when I face certain stuff that requires visual thinking. Once I have things in shape, I can open Scrivener. But, I often don't need that. I just straight from DT to Latex.

If it's about visually analyze a discourse map has someone tried Flying Logic (https://flyinglogic.com/ Would it be recommended?

Dellu wrote:

after some contemplation, I decided to stick with the basics.... Scapple

Seeing as you're in the Apple ecosystem, take a look at Apple's new Freeform app. Currently available on the latest versions of iOS and iPadOS, it is currently in the latest beta of macOS Ventura, due out soon. Seems to do what Scapple does and a *lot* more, allowing adding (and real-time sharing of and collaborating on) sketches, notes, files, web links, documents, photos, video, and audio.

https://techcrunch.com/2022/11/09/apples-freeform-aims-to-be-a-collaborative-whiteboard-for-everyone/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NPDX7JiQS1U

On my Mac I keep gravitating to either iThoughtsX (macOS, $12) or an older registered version of MindNode because Scapple was too basic for my needs and didn't allow easy remapping of nodes and chains like a standard mindmapping app. I don't want to pay for a Mindnode subscription ($20/yr for iOS/iPadOS/MacOS/), but their iPad implementation seems identical to the desktop version, which is quite appealing.

Bernhard wrote:

If it's about visually analyze a discourse map has someone tried Flying
Logic (https://flyinglogic.com/ Would it be recommended?

As mentioned earlier in this thread, Flying Logic is one of the tools I use for concept mapping. It's certainly top-notch. Since I'm an outlining type, I would use FL more if it had integrated outlining functionality, but it does allow for exporting maps as OPML outlines. (Importing options, from what I remember, are more limited.) I also like FL's dynamic auto-arrangement functionality, although that might not be for everyone. It's geared especially toward "theory of constraints", but it could certainly be used for analyzing a discourse map. There's a bit of a learning curve, but I think there's a 14-day trial.

For a more specific tool, in addition to Argdown, which I mentioned, there is also (among others):

https://www.rationaleonline.com/

Flying Logic came out with an update today, free to any already with a version 3 license.

I've always thought it was cool, but it never really worked for me like I hoped it would. The problem is my purposes aren't what it's for.

Frankly, I'm a little bummed. OmniOutliner has rough edges and does really nice things that nothing else will do.

For instance, you can outline with threads, using a column to specify the plot thread and filters to see just one thread at a time. Unfortunately, I don't know how interested OmniGroup is in the product. It's still developed, but it's not mentioned in OmniGroup's roadmap.

A shame.

Tinderbox will do great things, but it's also a little rough.

Devonthink is awesome. You can outline with it, but should you?

The array of powerful note-taking apps probably has something to suit me, but I'm grumpy about the cloud. I'd rather sync manually with a USB drive.

I'm probably impossible to please.

I have also tried Flying Logic long time ago. The maps look cool. But, it didn't work much for me either because the maps are too rigidly structured. It is designed for restricted logical argumentation. It is not suited for general writing purposes: for free experimentation that you would have do on the white board.

This is exactly the reason most mind mapping tools failed me. They assume pre-worked out structure (hierarchy). I don't have structure. I want to use the mapping tool to discover the structures by experimentation. The free form concept mapers work for me.

- Outliners also do not do much for me. I sometimes use bullet points, but, mostly, I write longer sentences such as paraphrases when I get ideas. I don't like any tool that forces me follow a certain template to write. It constrains my thinking.