Outliners / List programs that launch external apps

[DoubleDippin]

I have an antiquated outlining program that I picked up years ago as shareware. It’s a very simple program and I’ve setup my GTD system in it. The problem I have is that it is not portable and the print function bombs on me at least 8 out of 10 tries.

Some of the nice features though is the ability to quickly and easily promote or demote items and move them up or down the stack. You can also attach notes directly to an item or, you can click the launch icon and launch a word document you associate with the item (actually a .wri document, that should tell you how old this app is).

At work, I am behind my computer full time, so I want the desktop version of whatever software I get to be as robust as it’s accompanying PDA version (still laboring over PocketPC or Palm, especially since my company switched from Outlook to Lotus Notes, my options now seem to be more limited for syncing my calendar).

What PDA / desktop outliners allow you to easily link an application such as a word doc or excel spreadsheet to an item that you can launch into?

And, based on the software out there, would you consider the PocketPC or Palm more Lotus Notes friendly?

TIA,
Mike

 

[tonester]

Hi there.

I use Bonsai for outlining. It's pretty easy to move things around the outline, including cutting and pasting branches from one outline to another. You can attach notes to outline items. It is possible to put URLs in the notes, so you can have a note containing "file:myfile.xls" which you can then click on. I don't know of any way to achieve this on the handheld though.

With regards to Lotus Notes - you should be able to sync either PPC or Palm to the built in apps using intellisync. There is also a productivity suite called mNotes, which is designed to replicate the notes environment on the PDA (similar to the way Key Suite and Beyond Contacts replicate the outlook environment). According to their websites both intellisync and mNotes work with PPC or Palm. There are other options available, try google for "lotus notes palm sync" or similar.

Regards,
Tony

 

[tim99]

Bump.

I am also looking for a two pane outlining program that has outlining on the left side, but in the right pane has the ability to view Word documents, Excel worksheets, and fax documents.

I would like to outline a series of events by typing in text notes, but also attaching word and excel files or references, and be able to view those documents in the right pane or launch Word or Excel with those documents or worksheets ready for editing.

What outliners will do this?

I am not looking for this for GTD. I am learning MyLife Organized for that. I am looking for something to use to create and manage my projects. I gather data and information and ideas, submit a report, gather written (faxed) equipment and labor price quotes, then submit my quote, then order equipment and send progress reports. We have other software that does the invoicing and keeping track of our POs and work hours. I want something that keeps track of and helps me with the creative/study/report/quote side.

ActionOutline?
InfoSelect?
UltraRecall?

Will they do this?

Thanks,

tim99.

 

[aderoy]

I have been using:
Ecco Pro (PIM can link/launch applications)
TexNotes (both normal and Pro)
TreePad Business (can run from USB thumb drive)
Zoot

 

[tim99]

Thanks for the reply, but...your reply does not help me know if those softwares do what I want.

I have read about many of the outliners, and been to some of the websites...but I do not know if they do what I want. For example, there are simple outliners that only deal with text notes that I know do not do what I want, and complex organizers like UltraRecall that do way more than I need.

I am looking for something inbetween, something that outlines notes and in addition keeps documents in a way that I can view them and if I need to execute the main program to edit that document. It would be great if I could save a project as one file where my notes, my Word documents, my Excel worksheets, my tiff fax images, my emails, and my web page references are actually saved in that file.

It looks like UltraRecall will do this, but it seems overkill. Do I jump on that or on some other. I do not want to use multiple outliners for different situations or different projects.

tim99.

 

[tim99]

Ok. I have installed an evaluation copy of Action Outline, I like the look. This program allows me to create a link in the left pane for a computer disk file like a Word document, and it allows me to double click that link to launch that file in microsoft word. Ok, that is pretty good. But I can not view the document within Action Outline, and the long link reference remains the long file name with all directories, I can not edit to a short name like "Quote 20050001".

Ok. I have installed an evaluation copy of TreePadPlus. Nice look also. I can insert a hyperlink in the right pane that I can doubleclick and launch Word for a specific file. AND I can name that hyperlink anything I choose. That is pretty neat. But no view, and no link on the left pane "node" or task.

tim99.

 

[tim99]

Ok. I downloaded UltraRecall and it does allow documents to be referenced by filename, but it DOESNOT appear to show them in a window pane view. The only things that appear to show in a window pane view is digital photographs and web pages. Darn. Does that mean that what I want to do can not be done with any software?

tim99.

 

[1drummergirl]

Does that mean that what I want to do can not be done with any software?

tim99.

Probably so, but what about your operating system? Couldn't you use one of the programs you liked best and then setup windows side by side on your desktop with your ouline app on the left and Word/Excel/Etc. on the right? Not 100% perfect, but close.

 

[tim99]

Ok. So I was looking at TreePadPlus and ActionOutline yesterday.

Neither allows a me to create a left pane hyperlink that when I click it I view the document in the right pane.

Both allow a hyperlink in the right pane, that when clicked, launches the application with that file current.

Both allow drag and drop filenames from Windows Explorer into the right pane that then creates a hyperlink that launches that file.

Ok. When I drag and drop a Microsoft Word file from Windows Explorer into the rigtht pane of ActionOutline I see the Word icon and below it it says, "Microsoft Word Document". I like TreePadPlus better, when I drag and drop a Microsoft Word file from Windows Explorer into the rigtht pane of TreePadPlus, it shows a text hyperlink as the filename.extension (without the long drive and folders stuff) I like that. And I can configure TreePadPlus to launch that document with one click.

Ok. ActionOutline allows me to change that icon into some type of file view that seems to want to show me the document, but with my company logo and headers and footers, it does not get the job done. Almost. Darn.

Ok. In TreePadPlus, I can have an Article in the right pane, where the hyperlink filename is at the top, then I can quickly launch Word, ctrl-home, shift-ctrl-end, copy, then past into the TreePadPlus right article pane and my company logo and all the text fonts come in correctly, so I can see a "picture" of my file.

This is ok. It will take work to make sure the right pane is current, but in like 15 seconds I can update the body of the document. That allows me to have that text to copy and paste into new documents that I am creating, which is the real key. I want to search through, and view previous quote documents, and copy paragraphs into the new document I am creating.

I will work with TreePadPlus and see how it goes.

If you have any ideas or sugestions, please post.

tim99.

 

[John_Hammond]

Tim, I think there is a program that almost meets your requirements. It's called MyInfo and is some sort of outliner (like AO, TreePad and UltraRecall). You can insert Word, Excel and other files there and everything is saved in the same file. When you edit the file, it is saved back in the MyInfo file. It has some sort of file preview at least for the Word files. When you insert a Word file, it extracts its contents and places it in the Notes section. You can see more on thier web page: http://www.milenix.com

 

[Vadim]

Try TaoNotes

Ok. I have installed an evaluation copy of Action Outline, I like the look. This program allows me to create a link in the left pane for a computer disk file like a Word document, and it allows me to double click that link to launch that file in microsoft word.
tim99.

Hi Tim99! You can try our software TaoNotes 3D... it's not displaying Word and Excel files by default but we can arrange this option in the next version.... so, you could try it. It's defenitely best outliner amongst others (I say it moderstly :O) )... http://actitrend.fre3.com

Vadim

 

[TesTeq]

No spell-checker I suppose...

It's defenitely best outliner amongst others (I say it moderstly :O) )...

I'm afraid that it is not equipped with a spell-checker.

 

[mramm]

It's defenitely best outliner amongst others (I say it moderstly :O) )... http://actitrend.fre3.com

Vadim

And the CONSTANT self-promotion of your software is getting old also. :-x

 

[aderoy]

There is an outliner that I did not see mentioned - Blackhole Organizer, uses the Outliner / treebased display model.

I have been using the tickler files for all my paper documents etc, and was looking for a simple to use application to use for tracking electronic documents (pdf, rtf, url etc). Did not wish to use Outlook for this (sledge hammer approach?!?), I actually like my email client and do not wish to change. Found Blackhole Organizer from Lincoln Beach Software ($24.95 USD) website:

http://www.lincolnbeach.com/blackhole.asp

It allows for importing or linking to just about anything and has one really neat feature - Document reminders! Can be set for a date and time for any document within its datastore. There is a dialog to display any currently set reminders.

Very light on resources - when minimized to the tray only 1MB of memory usage is displayed via TaskManagr under WinXP. There is even a way to have it run properly from a USB thumbdrive.

Now I can setup either a tickler file as an outline, Year then month, and use the Document reminder for any day within the month and not worry about seeing it, as the reminder dialog will popup. Or use just the year and sort on the column for reminders. Currently it is set to startup minimized when Windows starts.

Not sure if this will help. Good luck in the search.

 

[tjisolutions]

It's defenitely best outliner amongst others (I say it moderstly :O) )... http://actitrend.fre3.com

Vadim

except it doesn't have a print command?

or it isn't real obvious how to print the outline

 

[joeycan]

Probably not the perfect solution, but a program which will do this nicely with some major additional features would be MindManager from Mindjet.

http://www.mindjet.com/us/

They have a free evaluation version, I personally use it for project management, but there are many who implement GTD with it.

Actually you can also get an add-in called ResultManager for MindJet which adds many GTD functionality to it. They offer a free evaluation as well.

http://www.gyronix.com/

I like mindjet as it works well with MS office, and actually will export an outline to MS Word. As well it offers many ways to integrate with other programs as well. Anyway might be a bit much for what you want but worth the try.