Outliner Software:

Posted by Dominik Holenstein
Jan 23, 2007 at 09:12 AM

Daly,

Here comes my requested replay.
Please apologize the delay.

The question is why I am prefering the use of the attributes system in UltraRecall than the Metadata system in ADM.

First of all, both systems are great. What I am writing here is my own personal opinion.

1. Look & Feel
I personally like the look and feel of UltraRecall because it is very similar to and IDE for software developers. So I arrange all the necessary panels I need the way it is convenient for me.
The ItemAttributes panels is always visible. This allows me to manage all the tasks and todos instantly without looking elsewhere. That’s not really and advantage against ADM because ADM is very similar.

2. Changing Attributes (Metadata)
Sometimes I have to add another field to add to an item. In UR, I just can add it with with a right-click in the ItemAtributes panel and then ‘Item’. A window pops up and I can add the necessary field. This new field is just available to the active item. When I have to change the template I navigate to the template and add the new field there.

3. Overview of all available fields
I have a better overview in UR than in ADM. In UR you just have to point to Tools -> Attributes and voilà the list appears. To update a field I just mark it and click on ‘Properties…’ and I can do the changes.

4. Table view
I don’t need tables. But here is ADM a lot better than UR.
ADM allows you to update the content of the metadata in the table view including using colors. In UR you can’t do that.
But you can do the following: Run a query in UR (lets say ‘all my open tasks’).
- You get the result listed in the ‘Search Results’ panel
- You can change the column layout and add columns and remove not used columns
- You can sort the columns
- You can click on a line in the ‘Search Results’ panel and then you instantly see and update the Attributes in the Item Attributes panel

5. Stored queries and search in general
Both applications don’t allow to search across different databases. This is a plus for MyInfo.
The search in ADM is not bad and you can save different views of searches. But here we have a BIG issue: ADM stores the result and not the query! In UR you just save the query and run it again from new when you start it. Not in ADM. What is the problem? Consider a Todo list. I have around 50 open todos today. If I save this as a view in ADM I get all the time these 50 todos. Even when I am closing five of them and when I am adding seven new. In UR I always get he current result (52). I have to constantly update the view in ADM again and again what doesn’t make sense.

6. Stability
Sorry to repeat myself.
But managing the metadata in ADM is risky. I always have a strange feeling when changing and updating the metadata. I had to create a file from scratch two times at least because of the strange behavior of ADM.
UR has a strong database foundation and allows you to compact and repair it. I never had any issue with it.

7. Multiline topics and Outliner layout
A great feature of ADM! I really miss it in UR. Yes, you can simulate it a bit in UR but it has never the capabilities of ADM.
I am using ADM to draft papers when I don’t need the sophisticated features of IdeaMason. ADM is kind of a textual mind manager. You can change the fonts, the colors (font and background) of each single topic.
Further, ADM allows to change the outliner layout what is another big plus compared to other systems.

8. Import of Documents and websites
No, UR is not like Net Snippets.
But you can import a link or a page into your databae (I agree: it takes time…). When I print an imported webpage it fits perfectly on the paper, even better as printing directly from IE or Firefox.
ADM has a lot of interesting web collecting features, too. Some are more sophisticated than in UR. But again, there are bugs and the system does not aloways behave than I expect it should.
Imported docs like Word, Excel, pdfs etc. are added to the index in UR. So you can use UR as a document manager. ADM does not allow to search in documents.

9. A lot more
....

The (rather simple) score is 6:2 for UR.

I don’t have the time to list more pros and cons for UR and ADM now.
But I hope these lines give you a good overview. As soo as I can find some time I will describe my Attributes for managing my todos in UR.

All the best,
Dominik