(The)BrainDead? (Hopefully not yet)

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Posted by MadaboutDana
Oct 27, 2020 at 10:10 AM

I’m running Obsidian on macOS, where it works very well. Some fascinating features, including their table report and summary report concepts (both based on tags – a genuinely innovative way to use tagging, I must say). My only criticism to date (given that it’s still in beta) is the lack of support for multiple windows, which is a sine qua non of knowledge management systems (IMHO!).

I’ve also been experimenting with an interesting alternative to Scapple, Tidy Mind (by Qrayon: http://www.qrayon.com/home/tidymind/). Unfortunately only available for Mac at the present time. It’s well worth a look (a free version can be found on the Mac App Store; there’s also a – very inexpensive – Pro version).

Cheers,
Bill

Posted by MadaboutDana
Oct 27, 2020 at 01:49 PM

Ah dear, poor old chap – I’ve confused Obsidian with Life Notes. Sorry about that!

Life Notes in its current beta form is also well worth a look, although it’s not yet as polished as Obsidian. Obsidian does, of course, allow you to look at multiple notes simultaneously.

But Life Notes has a number of interesting refinements. Backlinks are nicely implemented, although I prefer Obsidian’s separate lists of backlinks (linked mentions) and – genius! – unlinked cross-references (unlinked mentions). Life Notes also allows you to open a spreadsheet view of notes with the same tag and the same “fields” (not unlike the AskSam approach to fields, for those who remember good ole’ AskSam), as well as a “summary” view based on shared headers. It doesn’t yet have a proper search function, although it’s under development.

I’m sending the developer notes on weaknesses, but already rate Life Notes very highly.

Cheers,
Bill

Posted by 22111
Oct 28, 2020 at 02:04 PM

“For me this is wrong thinking. With the price you pay the past developments. Because exactly as you say, i pay for software based on their current features not on what i expect in the future.”

Mr. Scholz tries to make a “point” here - but he fails miserably, again -, by citing the developer of TablePlan and HyperPlan… who systematically says so in order to cut off expectations / wishful thinking in his offerings - good for him, but in my allegation, I explicitely referred to the opposite “user strategy” - which I do NOT adhere to! but which is quite common!!! - that implies “I want to facilitate / make possible further developments (in general or specific ones)”, so I continue to pay (by updates, in the absence of real inventions; by annual “rents”, ditto) even when I could do without those current, minor adjustments I get for those additional payments”. - I clearly set up this mind set - to which, again, I don’t adhere -, so “wrong thinking” - IF Mr. Scholz here meant my thinking, is obviously another aggression of his, not justified by my wording; on the other hand, if Mr. Scholz wanted to imply that those people I cited in my implied citation, were/are wrong in their turn, I’m with him, again.

But as said, my main point is, “you” - the majority of “users”, and the majority of participants in this forum - should have allowed developers to do their “home work”, i.e. to strive to excellence within their respective area of excellence, be that Windows or Apple desktop = “Mac” programming; instead, first, you asked them to deliver their goodies on up to four platforms (Win, Mac, i, Android), and then even, nowadays, you ask them for full-featured (!) and secure (?) web applications.

So you get what you finally asked for, something not-so-good in the end, instead of allowing for real ace work - “allowing” here meaning “deliver the funds for”, i.e. accepting such solutions in numbers, instead of going elsewhere, “going cloud” instead - onto your traditional system, be that Mac* or Windows.

*For Mac, I mentioned the two quite outstanding applications above, but as already said above, the better one of the two seems to “cripple itself” (3-pane > traditional 2-pane, whilst the 3-pane design obviously the “real one”: they had it: they left it behind: incredible!) - I explain the “latest” developments in the Mac IM area by their developers also strolling into the panic mode, seeing more and more of their income going to - FAR!!! - lesser “cloud” offerings, thus trying to make their, henceforth quite or really elaborate, desktop offerings more “available to the masses”... instead of doing some real development and then multiplying their prices by three: in other words, whilst many other software areas already have been acknowledged of being “special”, hence being entitled to ask for (very low) 4-digit prices (on buy, or the equivalent prices on rent), IM, up to now, has NOT reached that status - WHY not? If something really outstanding came around, I’d buy it at more than 1,000 bucks plus VAT… (And TB is the “hybrid offering” in-between: 3 times the price of the most expensive of its contenders, not ten times their price, but then, “promises, promises”, instead of deliverance…))

As for my allegation that a portable Windows device should be fine - or then, a respective Mac device - and please, I don’t have the slightest “relationship” with either Dynabook or then Toshiba (from which the former was sort of a spin-off or the like): all to the contrary, my Toshiba notebooks over the years rather failed me “before (due?) time” - today, I’ve reached an age where I’m happy with my “desktop”, but I had notebooks for around 30, 35 years of my life.

Dynabook Portégé (that’s the old Toshiba name for their high-brow notebooks) X30L G115, 13”, i7-10something, 16 GB, 512 SSD, official price in Germany 2,139 euro, “street price” 1,564,51 euro (the euro being at 1,183 bucks currently), incl. (currently) 16 p.c. of VAT, so in the U.S., this should be available for around 1,500 bucks, plus local taxes again.

It has got even LAN - yes, I’m a conservative, very sorry here again! - and a keyboard - ok, without num block, and I, personally, would never ever again buy any notebook without a num block, I’ve got too many macros to manage, to trigger… -

at it weights 834 g - now compare with your i-, your Android-something, without keyboard, without your regular OS.

Battery life 8 hours, within a “very demanding” PC Magazine 9/2020 test, i.e. regular office use to be expected, 10 to 12 hours, and then:

People who are on the road, most of their time, could use it with an add-on (typically 250 euro or such) in their office environment, and people who are in their office most of the time, could use some good synch tool whenever, here and then, they leave the office.

No need, in both use cases, for Apple, Amazon (! they own some 60 or more of current “cloud” rent space, after all), Google, MS, whoever “owns” your data…

and, instead of getting inferior “cloud” functionality, you’d motivate the “core” developers (i.e. Windows, Mac) to really go forward in their developments.

Obviously, people alleging I was on drugs*, are out of their mind.

(And alternative offerings in the range of 834 g, from the make of your choice, will come soon.)

*I know that my submissions are very dense, but then, you all around here have a master degree, minimum, so what?

Posted by 22111
Oct 30, 2020 at 09:12 PM

Not pretending above that AI was infallible though. Yet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zoJP2FkpgU

Posted by 22111
Nov 16, 2020 at 10:57 PM

Just wanted to let non-fanpersons know there isn’t a “free” version of TB anymore, it’s just a not-time-limited trial, crippled to the point of not being usable for anything I could imagine.

I trialed TB again. After install, they guide you to their official intro: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=krABngwnuX0&feature=youtu.be where right in the first sentence/paragraph, they imply it’s a db for hundreds of thousands of items (“all your stuff” - my wording, but that’s what they say). (i.e. as I suggested above, but that was refuted by another contributor above)

They have a version comparison page (“The Pro License includes upgrades released within 90 days of the purchase date. After 90 days, users with a perpetual license can purchase a year of upgrades and services for $159.”: Nice!)

“Features may vary between releases of the software (e.g. TheBrain 8 vs. TheBrain 9).” - hahaha, that’s for possible efforts in “designing it down”...

I cite:

file Attachments (but web attachments and notes, BrainBox only for Web pages, not also for files)

NO Pro features:
Thought and Link Types
Tags
Expanded Layout
Outline Layout
Mind Map Layout
Reports
Advanced Attachment Features
Multiple Attachments per Thought
Data Importing
Integrated Spellchecking
Events and Timeline View

Basic Sync only :
Thoughts and Links
Notes
Thought Icons
URL Attachments

NO Full Context Sync
Internal File Attachments
Internal Folder Attachments
Events
Two-Way Google Calendar Sync

So you assume you can live with that in case if you intend to use TB just for playing around a little bit! (“expanded, outline and mind map layout” will be “special” layouts, the regular view will do for you…)

Nope.

You know that some elderly develop that “tunnel sight”, “naturally”, and which has the same effect as have blinders for horses, and then they (the people, not the equids) lose their license.

That allegedly “free” TB version does the same: You ever only see some item (“thought”) with it’s children, that’s all if I’m not totally mistaken, thus, forcing the most brutal possible blinders (“mindcuffs”) onto the users, then calling those items “thoughts”, that’s cabaret.

I had had the intention to do a little bit brainstorming for the problem mentioned in https://forum.gettingthingsdone.com/threads/lawyers-and-case-managers-outcome-centred-vs-categorical-file-centred-gtd-projects.16611/ commented by me in https://www.outlinersoftware.com/topics/viewt/9205/15 , then export that into a list and open a new thread for that subject, but well… would have been some 20, 25 linked terms in all on 3, 4 level: not possible with “free” TB it seems, or then you hold it, again, in your memory whilst not seeing it. Which contradicts their pretty vid claims. And then, I got both Visio and MyDraw, just had hoped to get something “dirtier and quicker” - but paying 230 plus 160 p.a. plus VAT (up to 25 p.c.) for that? Would be nuts.

And yes, they also have got a “regular” trial, 30 day with “login”, “account creation” and all… (Be sure you get your stuff into the thing (“powerful import capabilities”) BEFORE the 30 days are over…*

It seems that without a subscription, you can’t even get (i.e. not buy) their iPad version…

Frankly, I had thought (my last trial: 8,9,10, 12 years ago?) they had a (usable) “drag-in” version, and that then you get accustomed to it, you’ll get to like it, you want more, you accept the price.

But nope. They obviously don’t see that chance you could get their paying customer after some real use, they only see (or: much more fear) the risk you’d say, “free for something light, ok, but it’s not good / robust enough for weightier stuff, and not worth the price).

Thus, their crippling of the “free” version down to unusability teaches me something about the paid one, in particular since…:

* = Oops, that doesn’t seem to be possible, for the “powerful upgrade capabilities”, you need the “Pro” version! Well, let’s hope for them you fiddle around some weeks with importing, then with necessary reorganization, and then you will not have any time left for real use of TB Pro. So you buy, and then, over the weeks 5, 6 and 7, you perhaps will gradually become aware of TB Pro not that master mind (sic) thing you had hoped for (let alone “your brain in your iPad”).

Conclusion: Most prospects will probably switch to “Pro trial” the first day of their trial, in order to be able (sic) to trial, and then they will create some stuff… and with what they will be able to create in there - learning by trial and error (oh, their vids!) - during 30 days, TB will cope.

And that’s why we get those forum posts saying, “I use TB for ...” - which really doesn’t indicate TB was an integrated system (see that linked gtd post) for them - and perhaps with Visio or MyDraw for their special uses they would have been better off in the end?

Again and again, with TB staff, I have the impression they want to outsmart the user, and I don’t like that. But that’s just me.

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