Is there an organizer program that does this?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Alexei and Cory Panshin
  • Start date Start date
A

Alexei and Cory Panshin

I'm looking for a tree-style organizer program of a particular kind. The
closest I've come to it is Idea! -- but the free version of that is
heavily crippled, and it's also rigidly oriented towards setting up
business projects, with due dates and priority levels. I want a program
like that, but with with more customizability and with all its features
accessible.

In Idea!, each file consists of a database of records which are entered
in spreadsheet form. Each record consists of several data fields plus an
attached note field, and the database can be sorted on any field.

In addition -- and this is the important part -- Idea! lets you create a
tree-style outline, using any categories and organization you choose.
You can then associate the records in the database with the categories of
the tree in a completely flexible manner. Each record can be assocated
with one category, with multiple categories, or with no category at all.
And both the tree itself and the records within the tree can be moved
around at will with drag and drop. That flexibility of association and
easy of reorganization are what I need and haven't found anywhere else.

The main reason I want a program like this is to organize my book
collection. I've checked out all the freeware book cataloguers, and at
best they're category-based to a limited degree. None of them allows you
to place a book into multiple categories, none of them offers a hierarchy
of categories with more than two or three levels, and none of them
provides a separate visual representation of the categories in tree-form.

I've also looked at a lot of other organizers, even at shareware, without
finding what I want. If it doesn't exist, someone really should create
it.


Cory Panshin
 
Ok, it *is* a long shot for me - and therefor also for you 2 ;-) -, but you
might take a look at:

NAME: Treeline
VERS: 0.7.1
AUTH: Doug Bell
SITE: http://www.bellz.org/treeline/index.html
DOWN: http://www.bellz.org/treeline/treeline-0.7.1-install.exe
PLIC: Freeware
BLIC: Freeware
NOTE: Think of it as a Tree like PIM with field options. Linux version
aviable
INFO:
What is TreeLine?
Do you have lots of sticky notes lying around with various useful
information jotted down? Or many lists of books, movies, website logins,
personal contacts, or things to do? Can you find them when you need them?
Well, I often couldn't. So here's my answer.
Some would call TreeLine an Outliner, others would call it a PIM. Basically,
it just stores almost any kind of information. A tree structure makes it
easy to keep things organized. And each node in the tree can contain several
fields, forming a mini-database. The output format for each node can be
defined, and the output can be shown on the screen, printed, or exported to
html.


MightyKitten
 
The main reason I want a program like this is to organize my book
collection. I've checked out all the freeware book cataloguers, and at
best they're category-based to a limited degree. None of them allows you
to place a book into multiple categories, none of them offers a hierarchy
of categories with more than two or three levels, and none of them
provides a separate visual representation of the categories in tree-form.
Click to expand...

Keynote is a freestyle information organizer that can be very powerful with
a little bit of ingenuity.

In your case:
1. Set up a template. In this template, list every descriptor for your books
that you are likely to use.

2. Create your tree-list of books. Each book could be listed alphabetically,
by date of publication, however you want. Within each note, write whatever
information is relevant to you with respect to the book, e.g. plot summary,
author's bio, whatever.

3. At the end of the note, insert your template. REMOVE whatever
descriptions DON'T apply to the book. That will leave you with just the
words that apply. Try to keep them short, ideally to one word.
(You could get very fancy with this, creating checkboxes with the symbol
font, etc. How fancy or simple is up to you. . .)

4. Whenever you want to search for books by descriptions, use Keynotes
Boolean search engine to find the books that meet your criteria by searching
on the appropriate descriptors.

5. Use the built in checkboxes to check the nodes (books) that apply, then
use the export function to export only those nodes whose boxes are checked
to a separate text file to get a list of book that meet your needs.

This is one way to do it, not the only way. Hopefully, it will give you some
ideas. The trick is to give careful consideration to your template, and node
structure. The Boolean search engine can be very powerful.

Unfortunately, Keynote doesn't let you create tables which would help
organizing your info. You have to re-create the functionality of a table
through careful consideration of your template layout and tree layout. It's
free though and written by just one guy so you make do with what you can.

You can also do this with Treepad Lite, except that it will only search for
terms. To get the Boolean search capability you have to download the Treepad
viewer. I don't believe that you can export the results the way you can with
Keynote either.
 
MightyKitten said:
Ok, it *is* a long shot for me - and therefor also for you 2 ;-) -, but you
might take a look at:
Click to expand...

(My reaction: the OP's requests were looking into the high-end, a large,
advanced application outside the realm of freeware.)
NAME: Treeline
VERS: 0.7.1
AUTH: Doug Bell
SITE: http://www.bellz.org/treeline/index.html
Click to expand...

Nice find. I've always paid thorough attention to programs that use the tree
hierarchy for holding data. This is the first time I've ever heard of this
one. I've craved a freeware combination of tree-layout with some database
records handling. So it's definitely worth taking for a drive.
 
omega said:
(My reaction: the OP's requests were looking into the high-end, a
large, advanced application outside the realm of freeware.)


Nice find. I've always paid thorough attention to programs that use
the tree hierarchy for holding data. This is the first time I've ever
heard of this one. I've craved a freeware combination of tree-layout
with some database records handling. So it's definitely worth taking
for a drive.
Click to expand...

<Grin> I just found it my self the other day,
in my everlasting search for good databases

You will hae to get used to this one, but when you are,
I think it might rival with Treedbnotes, KeyNotes and the like.

MightyKitten
 
Alexei said:
The main reason I want a program like this is to organize my book
collection. I've checked out all the freeware book cataloguers, and at
best they're category-based to a limited degree. None of them allows you
to place a book into multiple categories, none of them offers a hierarchy
of categories with more than two or three levels, and none of them
provides a separate visual representation of the categories in tree-form.
Click to expand...

Have you tried BookTrakker Lite and/or HomeBase? (hit lists, multiple
catalogs)

FYI there's a list of book related freeware here (with URL's):

http://www.pricelessware.org/2004/programs/P_ORGANIZERS.php#1.10Organizer:Books

BiblioExpress
BookDB
Bookminder
BookTrakker
collectorz
HomeBase
OXD Software Book Organizer
shelve.py
Greenstone
Athenaeum Light
Library Manager
Openbiblio

Susan
 
Have you tried BookTrakker Lite and/or HomeBase? (hit lists, multiple
catalogs)
Click to expand...

Those and the other titles at Pricelessware are exactly what doesn't work
for me. They're oriented towards libraries, booksellers, and collectors
-- lots of fields for publisher, date, binding, condition, etc, but very
few for categorizing by content.

The problem may be that I'm not really looking for a book catalog so much
as a working index to my reference library. If I'm after information on
Bronze Age Greece, or cryptozoology, or the early recordings of Elvis
Presley, I want to be able to zero right in on the two or three titles
that are most likely to give me what I need. And I want the category
structure right out there in a visibly accessible tree form, with
multiple different paths to get to the same result. I don't want to have
to scoll up and down in a list of thousands of titles, trying to figure
out which of several possible categories I might have put a book under
when I entered it in the database.

I'm sure what I'm looking for is possible. And it might even be useful
for a lot of other purposes besides what I'm describing. I just doubt
that it presently exists.

Cory Panshin
 
Alexei said:
Those and the other titles at Pricelessware are exactly what doesn't work
for me. They're oriented towards libraries, booksellers, and collectors
-- lots of fields for publisher, date, binding, condition, etc, but very
few for categorizing by content.

The problem may be that I'm not really looking for a book catalog so much
as a working index to my reference library.
Click to expand...

Perhaps these are more like what you're looking for:

Bibliographix
http://www.bibliographix.com/

Literary Machine
http://www.sommestad.com/LMP_1_1.htm

Susan
 
The problem may be that I'm not really looking for a book catalog
so much as a working index to my reference library. If I'm after
information on Bronze Age Greece, or cryptozoology, or the early
recordings of Elvis Presley, I want to be able to zero right in on
the two or three titles that are most likely to give me what I
need. And I want the category structure right out there in a
visibly accessible tree form, with multiple different paths to get
to the same result. I don't want to have to scoll up and down in
a list of thousands of titles, trying to figure out which of
several possible categories I might have put a book under when I
entered it in the database.

I'm sure what I'm looking for is possible. And it might even be
useful for a lot of other purposes besides what I'm describing. I
just doubt that it presently exists.

Cory Panshin
Click to expand...

It seems to me that you could use one of two solutions:

You could create categories in a program like treepad or keynote. That
will give you the tree form. Then, if you want to associate a book
with more than one category, you can simply cut and paste the book info
under each additional category.
The other solution would be to use any database program and add
keywords in each book record. You will not have a tree form but you
can easily do a search by keyword....

Emmanuel
 
Perhaps these are more like what you're looking for:

Bibliographix
http://www.bibliographix.com/

Literary Machine
http://www.sommestad.com/LMP_1_1.htm
Click to expand...

I've got Literary Machine, and it's great for dumping in free-floating
snippets of information and finding unexpected and serendipitous
connections between them. But I really do want to be able to find any
book by author or title, as well as by topic, and Literary Machine isn't
good for that sort of direct lookup.

However, Bibliographix is a new one to me, and it looks fascinating.
I've just downloaded it, and I'll be checking out what I can do with it.
Thanks for pointing me to it.

Cory Panshin
 
Alexei said:
I've got Literary Machine, and it's great for dumping in free-floating
snippets of information and finding unexpected and serendipitous
connections between them. But I really do want to be able to find any
book by author or title, as well as by topic, and Literary Machine isn't
good for that sort of direct lookup.

However, Bibliographix is a new one to me, and it looks fascinating.
I've just downloaded it, and I'll be checking out what I can do with it.
Thanks for pointing me to it.
Click to expand...

You're welcome. :)

Susan
 
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