Tom S.
4/5/2009 4:41 pm
I thought I'd follow up on this out of deference for the other members of the group.
I didn't think any of the web outliners suited my needs though some may eventually get there. IMO they just weren't flexible enough, yet. The graphical outliners are more flexible but I just don't think I'd be able get used to using mindmaps and they tend to be too clumsy to suit what I want to accomplish.
I gave org mode a very long look and it definitely deserves mention. This is a very interesting program that runs within emacs and it has flexibility like crazy. You could spend a very long time messing with it. Be warned that the learning curve is extremely steep, especially if you aren't familiar with emacs. Fortunately it has good documentation with a very good manual.
Everything ends up in an outline in one or more files. Items can be assigned multiple tags and key-value property pairs. In the end I decided against it because it's better suited to people who live in emacs (which I no longer do). I also thought it might be a bit clumsy for use if you were interested in cross filing items and generating ordered lists in different views. Indeed, there are no views, per se. Just search results that would be very hard to order sufficiently unless one had them ordered correctly in the file(s) to begin with.
In the end I shelled out the money for Notecase Pro. Its not Ecco but its good enough. Folders and items are set up as nodes and sub-nodes which may contain notes. A sub-node may be cloned and the clone may be moved to another node. When changes are made in the original, they are reflected in the clone and vise versa. Effectively this is the same as assigning an item to multiple folders at once. Very nice and very necessary for me.
It has reasonable task management capability. It can generate flat lists. It has scripting capability though I haven't messed with it much yet. Its graphical, using rich text and you can embed images. Very active development with new versions roughly monthly. Solid enough to where I haven't found any bugs (yet).
The program needs improvement. There's no way to tell where all of the clones are located in the tree like in Ecco. The node flags and the task status are hard coded and not configurable (though you can use your own tags). No columns like in Ecco. The search facility needs to be more flexible though its not bad by most standards.
Nevertheless as the cross-platform programs that I looked at go, this one was pretty good. I liked it enough to buy a lifetime license (it wasn't cheap - roughly $150 US). There are cheaper, more limited, licenses that run more or less $50. There is a free version which is missing much of the above functionality.
Cheers to all who helped out with suggestions.
Tom S.
I didn't think any of the web outliners suited my needs though some may eventually get there. IMO they just weren't flexible enough, yet. The graphical outliners are more flexible but I just don't think I'd be able get used to using mindmaps and they tend to be too clumsy to suit what I want to accomplish.
I gave org mode a very long look and it definitely deserves mention. This is a very interesting program that runs within emacs and it has flexibility like crazy. You could spend a very long time messing with it. Be warned that the learning curve is extremely steep, especially if you aren't familiar with emacs. Fortunately it has good documentation with a very good manual.
Everything ends up in an outline in one or more files. Items can be assigned multiple tags and key-value property pairs. In the end I decided against it because it's better suited to people who live in emacs (which I no longer do). I also thought it might be a bit clumsy for use if you were interested in cross filing items and generating ordered lists in different views. Indeed, there are no views, per se. Just search results that would be very hard to order sufficiently unless one had them ordered correctly in the file(s) to begin with.
In the end I shelled out the money for Notecase Pro. Its not Ecco but its good enough. Folders and items are set up as nodes and sub-nodes which may contain notes. A sub-node may be cloned and the clone may be moved to another node. When changes are made in the original, they are reflected in the clone and vise versa. Effectively this is the same as assigning an item to multiple folders at once. Very nice and very necessary for me.
It has reasonable task management capability. It can generate flat lists. It has scripting capability though I haven't messed with it much yet. Its graphical, using rich text and you can embed images. Very active development with new versions roughly monthly. Solid enough to where I haven't found any bugs (yet).
The program needs improvement. There's no way to tell where all of the clones are located in the tree like in Ecco. The node flags and the task status are hard coded and not configurable (though you can use your own tags). No columns like in Ecco. The search facility needs to be more flexible though its not bad by most standards.
Nevertheless as the cross-platform programs that I looked at go, this one was pretty good. I liked it enough to buy a lifetime license (it wasn't cheap - roughly $150 US). There are cheaper, more limited, licenses that run more or less $50. There is a free version which is missing much of the above functionality.
Cheers to all who helped out with suggestions.
Tom S.