Question about ConnectedText, Ultra Recall and others

Posted by Dr Andus
Sep 22, 2012 at 08:29 AM

tradercclee wrote:
>If CT didn’t click with you before, I doubt
>the latest version would.

My experience was different. I have checked out CT repeatedly over the years and it didn’t click with me at all. However, having read some user case studies (http://www.outlinersoftware.com/topics/viewt/3799/), Manfred’s posts (http://takingnotenow.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/ConnectedText), especially the one on the CT website (http://www.connectedtext.com/manfred.php), and finally Steve’s review (http://welcometosherwood.wordpress.com/2012/02/19/connectedtext-tinderbox-for-windows/) helped me visualise how CT can help me with a particular information management problem I had.

As for writing with mark-up, I use minimal code, such as the headings, occasional italics and bold, URLs, file links, and the “include” and category tags. And the highlight mark-up here and there. That’s pretty much it. I have most mark-ups automatically displayed in dedicated colours, which helps the eye recognise where they are in the text and it is less disruptive (counter-intuitively) when you are writing and reading.

Sure, this is not as clean as writing in Word or Notepad, on the other hand the benefits of using CT far outweigh any possible inconvenience (which after 7 months of daily use I simply don’t notice).

Here are the advantages to me of writing in CT’s edit mode:
- ability to dock Table of Contents pane on the left, so I can see in real time the emerging outline of the text that I am writing (as any of the 5 levels of headers get automatically displayed);
- ability to dock Outliner on the left (can be hidden in a tab behind the TOC and called up by one click) and either use it as an outline to guide the writing or as an outline for the overall project that can be amended while you’re writing a sub-section.
- ability to dock Topic list pane on the right, so I can quickly navigate and switch between other topics that might be related (CT automatically saves content of your current topic when you do that);
- ability to have Navigator open on another monitor, so I can see how the topic I’m currently working on might be related to other topics (visually, as a map).
- ability to have a Notes pane docked on the right, where I can jot quick notes down to the topic I’m working on.

The main thing here is that all this happens within the same window (except the Navigator, although you can dock it within the same window if you want as well), so there is no need to exit and use another app for those tasks. So there are some huge efficiencies here, which compensate for me any inconveniences of having to use mark-up.