Month: June 2010

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Mapyourinfo

Here is another on-line application for exploring Wikipedia with mind maps, less well known thanWikiMindMap, perhaps, but doing a good job.

Mapyourinfo

I signed up for this, and it allocated me a generous 0Mb of space for uploading maps, so I conclude that for sharing your own mind maps on-line, this is history, but it does have one operating function.  It can do a creditable job of mapping a topic from a Wikipedia page, pulling the structure from the section headings and levels, much as WikiMindMap does.

Clicking on red arrows next to a magnifying glass icon will cause Mapyourinfo to build a new map based on the word on that branch (again from Wikipedia).  Clicking a red arrow, when it appears on a node alone, just opens the appropriate Wikipedia page.

You can even download the resulting map as a FreeMind .mm file.

WikiMindMap is a little easier to use, but Mapyourinfo gets the job done and looks good.  If you start at its front page, you’ll have to dig to find how to call for a Wikipedia article, so here’s a shortcut: Go here and use the text box at the top left to search for the topic you’re interested in.

Vic

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More Power to your mind maps

Project and to-do list management are related and major categories of use for mind maps in business.  This has resulted in a healthy market in add-ins for popular mind mapping software.

MindManager was first to add project management data attributes, and several add-in companies have exploited the data to make our lives easier when we track our daily tasks and projects.

Nick Duffill is an old hand in this field but recently he came out with a new add in: Power Markers.

Power Markers

This is an add in to pull lists from MindManager maps automatically, and the lists are based on specified criteria.  So you get the best of both worlds – the freedom of mind maps and the quick view of a filtered list.  But there’s more to it than that, because “markers” may give the impression of something that you add to show, say, the importance of a task or node, but “power” in the name comes from the fact that these markers constantly check against targets and provide dynamically-changing colour indications on your MindManager map of where urgent attention is needed: For example, a task that is past due, or one where attention is required because it is due soon.

As the days pass, you will see other branches on your mind maps change colour.

The lists:  Well, off at the side, you’ll find a new tab “Hot Lists” with the Power Markers-generated list, and that also changes day by day, and as you mark tasks complete, or perhaps change dates.

This looks like a valuable addition to the range of productivity add-ins for MindManager.

Vic

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Is that the first Cacoo of summer, I hear?

Cacoo … cacoo.  This web app has finally made its way into Mind-Mapping.Org.

Cacoo

Cacoo is a neat browser-based diagrammer and it’s free (for now).  It has 13 stencil sets with useful images and shapes covering basic shapes, balloons, arrows, office equipment, sitemap symbols, network components, flowchart symbols, office layout, people, smileys, an intiguing freehand wireframe, regular wireframe and UML symbols. (Click image below for a full-sized view)


Three significant things that make this product particularly useful are:
  • Diagrams produced can be embedded in web pages, and remain linked to the original at Cacoo.com, so your readers will see them updated whenever you or your collaborators  make and save changes;
  • diagrams can be worked on by several people simultaneously;
  • each version made is retained, so you can go back through time and see the development of the diagram; You can also undo, right back to the beginning.

This is what it looks like when embedded in a page: Cacoo-embedded.  I tried to embed it here in the post, but WordPress would not show it and deleted the HTML on each save.  There’s probably a technique for embedding iframes in WordPress but I don’t know it.

It’s not immediately obvious how to generate the embedded code, so let me tell you what I found:

  1. After doing any work on the diagram, save it.  If you don’t it will not be lost, but the link generated will point to an earlier version.
  2. Click Save again, ensure “Open diagram to public by URL” is checked. Click Copy button beside the URL given.
  3. Paste that URL to your browser’s address bar and press Enter.
  4. Click “Link” button (top right)
  5. Copy the code in the “HTML to embed the image and paste the site” box

Otherwise, this is easy to use, and though nowhere near as powerful as Visio and its ilk, while it remains free it’s one to keep in mind for collaborative work.

Vic

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iThink – and I’m sure you do!

New at Mind-Mapping.org: iThink.

iThink

This is a high-end business process-modelling tool.  It allows business scenarios to be played out in simulation before disaster hits – provided that is, you can predict  suitable dynamic variables to model.  What does that mean?

Well here’s an example they give: “What if you radically increased sales and marketing efforts without adding network bandwidth? Website hits and download demands would go up (good), networks would go down (bad).  iThink helps you identify key leverage points for improving business performance without losing sight of unintended consequences.”

Let’s hope Apple doesn’t come after them for that “i‘ prefix!

Vic

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DropMind 2.0

Mind-mapping.org‘s entry for DropMind was limited, and out of date because it went into the Master List almost 18 months ago.  Now they are on version 2.0 and I have updated the DropMind entry.

[Update: I asked for some screenshots and DropMind sent me some – thanks!  Click on the thumbnails to see the full-sized ones.]

Vic

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Crystal Mapping

Something out of the line of regular mapping software this week: Crystal Mapping, with free or premium options.

Crystal Mapping

This works in concentric circles and allows each circle to be subdivided.  That produces a strict hierarchy, with each sector associated with a parent that is the sector of an inner circle that it touches.  Sectors are dynamic and accept links, notes and attachments.  Like many things, its so much easier to understand by seeing it rather than reading a description.

Crystal Mapping is an on-line application that can be run in a browser, but if you pay £30 for the Premium version, there’s a downloadable application (Adobe Air) that lets you run it off line.

See if its different format introduces a different way of thinking – it’s worth a try.

Vic

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