all alone ?
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d0f53ec6d9f34b069577dbbd42109dd6
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all alone ?by holden - 01:56AM, Nov 09, 2003 |
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no writers here ? |
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It would be helpful, if someone would think through the process and tools plus have a structured writing work flow knowledge base. Topic exploration > info gathering > info filing > info arranging > ... publication ... more info floats in ... revision. How many notebooks per project and their structures. Yada, Yada, Yada ---
Adventures in time: http://homepage.mac.com/bobembry/free/
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Only just noticed this forum... I'm still working on how to properly incorporate software into writing projects. But to get the conversation rolling, here's my current take on things: I've been using Notebook for storing smaller snippets of information that benefits from having some structure imposed on it - contacts that I don't want in Address Book, interview transcripts, job notes, etc. At present (but see below) everything is kept in plain text - the way I use NB has meant that I've had no need for RTF or images. I've been using Devonthink for piling up great unwieldy gobs of information, mostly off the web or PDFs, and most of which I don't want to read fully at the time. I just chuck it into DT based on relevance, and trust the software's search abilities to pull it up in the right context should I ever need it. That said, I've just discovered what everyone else no doubt knew: that NB clips web pages complete WITH images and WITH the page's URL. For me, compiling a NB section full of reference web pages with their original design intact fits more comfortably with my book-centric way of working than DevonThink's database. DT still has the edge on speed, but the ability to flip through pages and consult an index offers me a way of working that more than compensates for a few milliseconds of lost life. Having this information in the same place as my own structured outlines promises to be an ideal way of putting together project references. From here, I imagine NB will be the repository for everything I know I want for a specific project. DT will serve for everything I may want someday, or as an archive for stuff I've finished with. Or at least until I understand NB's cabilities better. After a couple of years of looking for some software Nirvana that will do everything for me, I've come to the belated conclusion that I've a) wasted a lot of time, and b) software won't help me be a better writer. Obvious, perhaps, but easy points to forget in the thrill of the chase. What will help me is a system that will simplify the mechanics of the writing process, and allow me to work - write - more or less unconsciously, in that mysterious place where the muse dwells. With NB, I see that possibility emerging for the first time. In case you were wondering, I'm an agricultural/environmental writer who occasionally revisits my past as a travel writer. Matt
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Is my name Matt? and If so, what the hell am I doing in Wongwibinda, Australia? Seriously,my experience pretty well matches yours, though I'm a little nervous about Notebook's ability to usefully hold my own great wads of research material. If it can, I may give up DT as well. In the meantime, I'm using Devonagent to find and store web material, devonthink to store it longer term, and Notebook for shorter snippets that I'm sure are useful in the short term. I'm a playwright with way too many notes and multiple versions/drafts of scenes, so I've divided things into three notebooks. One for clippings/research, one for Notes, and one for Drafts/scenes. That way I can have my notes open on my 2nd monitor, while working on a scene on my Powerbook screen.When I'm ready to work on a new scene I search, highlight and gather the notes, transfer them to the appropriate page/section of the outline and evaluate them by checking/graying out notes or lines that are either used or useless. Then I write. Once this play is done, I'll transfer it to Final Draft for correct formatting. So far I'm finding 1.2 (in Panther) very fast and quite solid -though a few recent spontaneous quits have me worried. Let's keep this discussion going - I'm always looking for the perfect setup that will allow the words and ideas to flow unimpeded by tech.
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quote:I'm not a writer, but there has to be more than one way, doesn't there? This sounds like an area that would benefit from having some kind of "Circus Ponies User Samples Area", where people who have developed their own ways of working with NoteBook can upload them for other people to try. I think we could use some guidance and/or webspace from the Diminutive Equine Entertainers. 
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NoteBook has made my life as a screenwriter that much easier. I've always been fairly horrible at keeping my thoughts organized in an efficient manner and when I happened to stumble upon NoteBook (mentioned in someone's blog) I knew it was something that I could benefit from. I love being able to keep one notebook for an entire script and usually divide up my sections between story/plot ideas, character history & psychological make-up, influences, and miscellaneous clippings. I realize that this sort of thing could be done in other programs, but I'm obnoxious when it comes to aesthetic sensitivity and I LOVE the way NoteBook addresses that. I can customize my notebooks to match the mood of my project (through fonts, background colors and textures, etc.) and I find it makes using my PowerBook more conducive to creating than it already was (and that's saying a lot). Combined with Final Draft, I've got everything I need to make my process as smooth as possible and all I have to do is worry about the writing itself, and not organizing and formatting.
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I’m wondering what writers feel about linking in nb.While i tried to follow events in the late 90’s with the extensible linking language http://xml.coverpages.org/xll.html and RDf http://www.w3.org/TR/REC-rdf-syntax/ i ran up against my lack of technical prowess but they seemed ways of making linkages much thicker and more interesting than they are now.I’d like to hear what others have to say.Even the idea of wiki links are appealing for the browsing effect they seem to generate or do people feel this is more the terrain of software like tinderbox(which i have tried a few times unsuccessfully to use).Is ted nelson using nb or for that matter does he use a mac?twingle twingle little star inter alia gets you far? damn everything but the circus (ee cummings supposedly)
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Anyone read that important New Yorker article? Available online (somewhere) in a PDF. Conclusion: the piles on your desk are important, critical to the way the mind works. The planes must circle JFK until the control tower is ready to bring them in. That's a space I've always looked for, as a writer, one that paper has only been able to approximate - hence, the proverbial messy desk. Many months later, I'm still getting it through my head: NoteBook can do anything. Even though I've been able to write first draft directly to the Powerbook for ten years now - and that was a major shift, handmade to machine - this leap feels enormous. And I think it is. In terms of potentiality alone. Creating, moving, sorting, renaming, linking, trashing these. . .entities. Notebooks, catalog, chapters, sticky notes, voice clips. What wealth of form. Changeable, customizable form. And nothing gets lost? Nothing gets lost. Perfect. Now, if I could just figure out how to blog right from NoteBook. . . Zo
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One of the things I've been excited about the last few months are some of the new tools for wrting that are erupting on the OSX platform. Mellel, NoteBook, Ulysses, Nova-Mind... It has been fun for me to experiment with "doing" writing in different ways. Old school.. artist sketch books (blank paper, not ruled - very important). Typically started off mind-mapping an issue/theme/angle/whatever. Then explored through writing. Then mulled it over past the deadline..Played with different organizations, then under threat of losing a client and my reputation, I'd either go to a coffee shop and crank it out or roll out of bed in the morning at 5AM and write like a banshi. Then moved to laptop and word. Output, creativity and enjoyment plumeted. New ways.. Tried Ulysses.. like the ability to just tab across several versions/variations of the same piece. Tried NoteBook. Love the ability to put different elements into cells and move all around strucurally. Nice to through in pdf's, powerpoints, documents etc into the mix. The ability to add pictures are a nice addition to kill boredom and feed the mind. Next tried Nova-mind... Not quite as fast as jamming it out on a clean sheet of paper, but being able to mind-map again definitely kicked my output up a notch. My fluidity returned. Now - I flesh an article or piece out in Nova-mind. Go through the painful process of inporting into NoteBook and begin adding categories, researching, restructuring organization etc. Export, format and clean up in Word. My one wish.. a simple way to doodle ugly illustrations of my points like I did in the paper sketch books write into Notebook. Okay, I guess that's all I have to say about that.
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quote: I'd love to use Notebook as a catchall, but I've been burned a few times over the years by dumping all my notes in one place and ending up with a buggy unsearchable slowed down sodden mess. So far in NB I've learned that if I put too much on any single page things start to slow down, but I don't seem to be giving the indexes and overall stability much of a workout. My growing and changing sticker and keyword collections have gotten hard to handle in that pathetic little inspector window, and I've had to get creative with turning page tabs on and off.Otherwise things seem to be running smoothly enough in version 171. How about you folks? Has anyone here pushed the limits of NB?
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quote: NoteBook actually does fine with some very large pages - it's the ones with a huge number of cells that can cause a slowdown. I've had several megabytes on one page before. When it was all in one cell, performance was good. When split into thousands of cells, that page slowed down a lot. Regarding the inspector: I agree with you. I think NoteBook has outgrown its present inspector-window format. The inspector now has fifteen panes, many of them with overlapping types of information (example: four different inspector panes have font information, plus there's the default font setting in the Preferences). It's all perfectly logical, but for me the set-up makes it difficult to find what I'm looking for. I could envision an inspector that I would like better: have all the information about stickers in a single pane, all the information about fonts in another single pane, and so on. So instead of "cell inspector", "page inspector", and so on, there would be "text inspector", "numbering inspector", maybe a "tabs & stickers" inspector - you get the point. That way the tools would be categorized according to what type of tools they are, not what they work on. (Just as a mechanic doesn't separate "body tools" and "engine tools", but instead separates "wrenches" and "buffing wheels".)
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quote: Makes sense to me, though personally I'd settle for a RESIZABLE window so I could see all (or a lot more) stickers and be able to reorder them easily. While we're at it having the menu pop down while clicking on a sticker (or keyword) would seem cleaner to me than having to control click on the note itself. One could just checkmark the individal stickers from the pop up favourites menu.
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quote: You obviously make much more use of stickers than I do. It does make sense to be able to re-order your stickers if you have a big list of them, and to have a way of seeing them clearly. (If you only have ten stickers, you can keep them in an envelope. If you have hundreds, you need a shoebox with dividers and a filing system!)  quote: This seems to be another example of how you and I think - "I want tool X" and "Now I want tool Y"; rather than "I want to work on cell A" and "Now I want to work on cell B". Knowing which cell I want to work on is already clear, once I've selected it. [This message was edited by David on Mon December 01 2003 at 01:13 PM.]
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quote: Since you can move cells around in Notebook, what added features does Nova Mind provide? In other terms, what more is a mind map than a fluid outline structure?
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srdiamond wrote: "Since you can move cells around in Notebook, what added features does Nova Mind provide? In other terms, what more is a mind map than a fluid outline structure?" Technically, nothing. I've used outlines to brainstorm often. But for some reason I'm more fluid in a mindmap format. Can't tell you why. This is nothing wrong with NoteBook. Just a personal way of working that is smoother. For example, when push comes to shove, I can still write faster-better with pen and paper than typing. Just flows better. I started mindmapping for brainstorming before I started using outlines. Maybe that's why. It is definitely more visual. All the main points and subpoints in a single glance. But you could argue the same for an outline. Valid question for which I don't have a valid answer. Sorry. Perhaps someone else can fill in the reasons that my reason cannot grasp.
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quote: You may already know that on the PC-side, Microsoft has come out with OneNote, which lets you handwritewrite notes, with a mouse or tablet PC, integrated with typed material and pictures. It is rumored that Apple will market a Tablet computer next year. I would hope NoteBook will be compatible. But from how you describe your workstyle and productivity, this might be a high priority functionality.
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Sounds like a drawer a la Mellel would offer the most flexibility. To be able to resize the Stickers panel, Fonts, whatever you're working with, and even dump some. I think it's Mellel - maybe Nisus Express which seems to have turned into a product after all. I agree that the Inspector makes no intuitive sense. A drawer is, I suppose, much more pedestrian, but in NoteBook more than anything I've ever used, bumps in the work flow are profoundly. . .bumpy. Mousing up to that little tab to set a font, pulldown and click. NoteBook invites wild creativity. . .but can't happen with fonts and colors hidden away. Gasp: maybe two drawers! One for various sets of tools, another for inter-notebook management. Zo
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quote: How awful! [see my other post regarding drawers] There has to be a better way than resorting to using them. I did briefly discuss with Jayson in a couple of emails my thoughts on the Inspector and how felt it needed to be improved, and I must say that it has with the 1.2 update. Nevertheless it still could do with some work, especially as you correctly mention regarding fonts and colours. These were the very same reasons I emailed Jayson in the first place. At that time I suggested he take a look at the new OmniGraffle inspectors as Omni have made the frameworks available to all. Now I'm not so sure about that as after trying out the demo I found them to be quite slow. What Jayson told me was that the inspector in NoteBook is using the frameworks already built into OS X. But surely they could include type controls, could they not? You know, I hate to say it, but the inspector in Word has some nice features.
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quote: Analyzing why mindmapping is helpful may enable a program to provide the same advantages in a different format. A problem with topic outlines is that they use space inefficiently, so you might not be able to fit an entire outline on a paper page or a computer screen. A program that accepts input anywhere on the page would compensate, as would any feature that provides more space on the page, for instance, eliminating mandatory left margins. If this is right, a monitor with a large screen would also help.
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Thanks srdiamond... I'll go out, switch back to microsoft, get their tablet as well as a bigger screen - I should have thought of that, doh!
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quote: As it's what I'll probably do, I don't find the idea entirely irrational. Then I'll probably switch back to the Mac in a few years, if developers realize the promise of Apple's programming tools.
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Try these links: http://www.nova-mind.com/Documentation/ All about mindmapping --- http://www.nova-mind.com/Downloads/index.html NovaMind features --- http://www.nova-mind.com/ Example uses ---
Adventures in time: http://homepage.mac.com/bobembry/free/
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quote: As it's what I'll probably do, I don't find the idea entirely irrational. Then I'll probably switch back to the Mac in a few years, if developers realize the promise of Apple's programming tools.
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I'm new to NB, and after only a week I find I'm using it more and more to help me collect and collate research material, integrating it into current projects (I'm a freelance writer - I do articles and reviews on art, architecture, and design). As a big fan of Tony Buzan's mind-mapping methods (although I don't necessarily buy into some of the associated psycho-babble) I find outliners a good way of writing on the computer from scratch, but as others have mentioned, I missed 'the big piece of paper' for mindmapping. I've been using a piece of software called 'Inspiration' for a number of years, and find that it fits well into the workflow: gather->collate->mindmap->outline->draft->review->copy. I see NB fitting well into the first 2 and 4th steps above, but the great thing about 'Inspiration' for me is that it automatically converts its mindmaps/diagrams into outlines, and will then export them into a word-processor. I'm now wondering how closely I can integrate my activities with NB and 'Inspiration' into one workflow. Any thoughts?
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This is my interest also . . . I'm in the beginning of a doctoral program . . . I use Word, Endnote, and Inspiration . . . I have looked at NB for months thinking it might help my work flow/research/writing process . . . but I can't seem to figure out just how and that's frustrating for me . . . I love the research process, gathering information & bringing together an outline in Inspiration . . . yet sitting down to actually write is the most difficult thing for me . . . I process "out-loud" so if I can't talk it out, my brain simply mulls it over and ruminates for days, weeks, or months . . . depending on how much information there is to process . . . How can I incorporate NB into the work flow to shorten the the processing time???
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someone asked what NovaMind provides that a standard outliner doesn't. I've pondered that, too, because there are definitely times where Notebook is the right app for me for the job, and there are times when NovaMind is it. Here's my take: outliners are hierarchical in nature and force (or at least encourage) one to think hierarchically. For me, that works great when I'm trying to make sense of data or information that flows or is structured in a hierarchical manner, but when I'm trying to brainstorm or be creative, or when the information isn't hierarchically structured, then I find NovaMind to work much better for me. NovaMind does a much better job of spurring my creativity than NoteBook, but is a far inferior organizational tool. So I see these two apps working very well together. And like the initiator of the thread, I'm using Ulysses as well and loving it. In fact, my four main info managers at this point are... NoteBook NovaMind DEVONthink (a terrific app well worth a look) Ulysses The Mac platform is blessed with a lot of terrific software.
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No, not all alone! I just purchased NoteBook for a book I have been working on for about 2 years now. I went through the video demo's on the site and found that NoteBook was exactly what I was looking for. So far, I love it. I have used MindMap as well. I find it very useful for building organizational charts and plotting out ideas, but not so much for writing. NoteBook is allowing me to do so much more. I have organized my writing and research into some main categories/tabs including "history", "politics", "people", "notes", "research", "writing" and "bibliographies" as well as some others. Right now I am importing the data I had in so many other documents and folders and finally getting them organized. NoteBook is incredible for this, IMO, (especially if you're not a paper person and have most of your research in files on your computer). So far, I think this is a great program and I can't wait for the new release in March. ~M
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So… five years have passed since the question was asked here about why mind maps work better sometimes, but here’s an answer. The right side of the brain is the seat of creativity and it functions in spidery, totally non-linear ways. Information is all linked together like brain neurons. So when you are creating a mind map you are creating a 2D version of what your right brain understands – as far as you can show a 3D entity in 2D, anyway. The right brain understands “the bigger picture”. The most spontaneous/empathic/disorganized/creative people are right brain dominant. So in the act of recording what’s in the right brain, a mind map is unbeatable. The left side of the brain is the seat of control; of categories, words, and sequential and hierarchical thinking, seeing things as moving from a to b, then c and after that (and definitely not before) d….. Information is linked linearly (in lines) in this way. The left brain understands the small parts inside the whole, and the most controlled/procedural/efficient/analytical people are left brain dominant. So in the act of accessing the left brain, a hierarchical outline (the typical list) is unbeatable. Inbetween the two kinds of note-making (mind map or list?) you have what I think of as “the heartfelt outpour.” It combines the feeling of the right brain with the language ability of the left. A finished, written article that has meaning beyond bald information fits this category, and such an article, or book, is often the aim of a writer, whichever brain dominance they start from. Can you tell I’m an enthusiast? :) Beth
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As someone who always starts a project from a mind-map, I would like the drafting abilities of NoteBook were better integrated with the outliner. Now, diagrams are graphic elements. I guess it would make sense to make them outlines with “floating” cells, or link diagram’s with outline’s elements.
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What sort of writing projects are being discussed here? Incorporating this tool into writing projects – small ones, seems to be useful, if you are writing technical docs that are outline or TOC driven & not really massive. Its a pretty good tool. Lends itself to organizing thoughts in projects which are structured. However, I wonder if you are going to be able to accomplish that “Great American Novel!” It seems to me StoryMill or Montage might be a better tool overall for creative writing of any extended length. Not that I want to direct you to another tool… A really decent mindmapper doesn’t seem to exist – at least affordably. There are the open source critters like Freemind & ThinkingRock, but I’d love to hear if anyone has really hit upon a facile one which is under $100. Inspiration is OK, but a little clunky for my taste. — Last edited 05:08PM, Mar 12, 2010 |
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I find MyMind surprisingly good, for how light it is. And, until it is free, it is also in the desired price range…
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bobembry
Member
09:51AM, Nov 09, 2003