I’m not sure what it is with the Europeans, but they seem to be obsessed with Mind Mapping. I just wrote about MindMeister, an excellent online mind mapping tool that is in private beta at the moment (I’ve still got invites available if you’re interested). Along comes Mindomo to up the ante. Thanks to Nick Duffill, a principal at Gyronix - Mind Mapping and Productivity Consultants - to pointing this one out on his blog.
As Nick points out, this online application is simply stunning for it’s ‘desktop like’ interaction and flexibility. You have the ability to assign task information (due date, start date, task assignment, etc.), associated graphics (both default graphics, and importable ones), and change the layout of the map, just like MindManager.
Similar to nearly all online applications today, Mindomo’s abilities from a collaboration level also shine. Nick’s gone as far as to explain the Wiki-like qualities that collaboration may enable with Mindomo.
Mindomo can import MindManager files just like MindMeister, but just like MindMeister, some formatting features are lost. I’ve just started to play around with Mindomo, but can already tell that this is one heck of an online application.
There is a standard ‘free’ edition, and three other options. This one is definitely worth checking out.
Last week, I wrote about a great new online mind mapping tool called MindMeister. Well, as it turns out I have 20 beta invitations to hand out. If you are interested, leave a message on this post (remember to put your correct email address in the email address section), and I’ll send out an invitation.
I do a lot of air travel, and much of it is cross-country. Flights in excess of three hours can really be a drain on energy and productivity if not managed correctly. My usual routine is to break up a lengthy flight into time chunks with some time devoted to work, some for reading, and some for entertainment. My plan today, cruising across the country from Orange County, CA to the Atlanta airport, was to filter through some light reading, spend some productive time on work related things, and mix in some music that I download onto my laptop via the Yahoo!Jukebox service. Today, however, the music part was not meant to be. Instead of firing up a random playlist, I got the following message:
Well, I’m unable to connect to the internet while in the air, so I can’t access music that I’m paying for? I know that the Digital Rights Management (DRM) regime was designed to protect the creative rights (and profits) of artists, but what use is music that I’ve subscribed to, but cannot listen without logging in? Yes, I know that the subscription model requires a routine ‘check in’ with servers to make sure that I’m not ’stealing’ music. I do, regularly, log Yahoo!Jukebox onto the Yahoo!Music website to check in. I also know that Jukebox was logged in last night. Despite being logged in, this security upgrade was overlooked! This is not the end of the world, but it is pretty frustrating. Now that “His Steveness’ has weighed in on the subject, there may be hope that the music industry will agree to some sort of protective scheme that doesn’t break when you’re cruising at 37,000 feet!
Just a couple of days ago I wrote about a new online brainstorming tool called bubbl.us. That application seemed a little too simple and off the standard mind mapping approach to be of much use to many. A commenter left a note about an online mind mapping application that was closer to traditional tools, known as MindMeister. I signed up for access to the private beta, and was approved within a few minutes. The online tool is still in that private beta stage, but I can tell you that it looks spot on when compared to traditional mind mapping tools.
Mind maps generated inside MindMeister are easy to setup and manage. Maneuvering inside MindMeister is similar to FreeMind and MindManager, although keyboard shortcuts aren’t as intuitive (or similar) to either offline application. Dragging nodes around is identical to offline applications. In fact, it’s easy to forget that MindMeister is an online application. There is version control, allowing you to revert back in a fairly granular fashion.
Like nearly all online applications today, one of the core features of MindMeister is to enable collaboration on maps. A map can be shared in a true collaborative environment or as view only. Another powerful feature of MindMeister is the ability to import FreeMind or MindManager files. This feature alone makes MindMeister incredibly useful. In the private beta, text formating, icons, and fancy layouts of maps are lost during the import process, but all text nodes are retained. Exporting, at the moment, is not as evolved as the application only lets you export as a graphic file or as a bulleted text file in RTF format.
MindMeister is in early stage beta, so I’m sure there will be many improvements along the way. The developers are looking to offer a standard and premium version of the tool at some point, as the ‘my account’ page indicates. Most of the premium features of MindMesiter are available in this beta phase. Overall I’ve been very impressed with the way it handles and feels, and can’t wait to see this application evolve into a full blown mind mapping tool.
The guys over at Download Squad just pointed us to a new ‘mind mapping type’ online tool called bubbl.us. I’ve been searching for an online mindmapping application, and to be frank, bubbl.us falls far short of the mark for any serious mind mapping. Like most online applications nowadays, bubbl.us incorporates the expected collaborative capabilities. The application still has the look of being in the early stages of development, so it may evolve into something more meaningful from a mind mapping perspective. In the meantime, I’ll continue to rely on FreeMind for my personal mind mapping needs. Hopefully we’ll see an online mind mapping tool emerge soon.
If you think you may be interested in weaning yourself off of Microsoft (or Apple) dependence, check out this post from Ismael Ghalimi over at IT|Redux. I’ve signed up, and plan to do a thorough review of ThinkFree’s portable edition when I get the drive. I’ve done some work with the ThinkFree Suite online, but not enough to do a substantive review. I guess this USB drive will be the incentive to dig deeper into ThinkFree’s offering.
