I never do more than scratch the surface of Tinderbox, but it has run my blog for years, and I did plan my last book in it. Tbx now comes with Yojimbo, an excellent database thingy. And as a newcomer to Scrivener - just writing my first article in it (liking it enough to recommend to my book editor) - I can foresee a workflow for the next book that goes something like Safari -> Yojimbo for research, then Tbx for planning the structure, and Scriv for the writing, pulling relevant material out of both into the Scriv environment.
I think that would be an extremely flexible workflow. I auditioned Yojimbo a while back, and while I liked it, I didn’t like it enough to shell out any cash. The next time I upgrade Tb I’ll be glad to have it. It looks like it will be a nice “inbox” kind of application. The type of place where you stash things that interest you, but do not have the time to fully read.
That’s exactly the way I use Yojimbo. It’s very accessible. I pop all kinds of things into it. Later sort them out and put them elsewhere, delete when done, or… just let them pile up.
I’m really glad to have it. And I got it because Mark Bernstein (of Tinderbox) extended the free inclusion of Yojimbo with a Tinderbox upgrade backward two months. So I just got in the door with it.
He’s a nice guy, Mark. Popped in to see us when he was speaking/holidaying in NZ.
I’d played with Yojimbo too, but when MB added it in to the last Tbx version increment package, I had an excuse to use it properly. It is good - makes it easy to get stuff stored away - nice bookmarklets for Safari, and a “drop dock” - and very easy to find things afterwards. I’d like some flexibility with the tagging - some sort of tag “stamp” would be nice, but the developers are responsive - and busy.
Perhaps Scriv could offload its research folder to Yojimbo, or offer interoperability (mind you, I’ve no idea if that’s even possible/feasible)…
Tinderbox is like Inspiration - a combination outliner and mind-mapper.
However, Tinderbox also has a build-in programming language, note attributes (which are like database fields - but which can be written in on-the-fly), and an extensive export template system (which allows one to create a website out of one’s outline, for example).
The programming language can be used to create agents (which are like automated database searches). If there are too many agents used at once, it can slow down the programming significantly.
The combination of attributes and a programming language makes Tinderbox like a database. However, unlike a database, there is no fixed form into which one enters data in Tinderbox.
In comparison to Filemaker (a database program), both can have fields added on-the-fly. But Filemaker doesn’t have Tinderbox’s outlining capability nor its mind-mapping capability. Thus, in Filemaker, note-writing is a fairly rigid pre-defined task, whereas Tinderbox is a much more unstructured in data entry.
Tinderbox cannot handle huge numbers of notes since it uses a straight XML file for holding the data - without having indexes like in a database to speed up searches. If one is to write a textbook which has more than 10,000 notes, then Tinderbox may become too slow to use. The mind-map of such a project would also be extremely unwieldly - thus negating that function of Tinderbox. Tinderbox’s author recommended using a database when one has a huge number of notes.
For lightweight outlining and mind-mapping, Inspiration is fantastic. Inspiration also creates prettier graphics than Tinderbox can for mind-maps used for presentations.
I would agree if what you need of an application is a whiteboard. In that case, something like OmniGraffle would probably be a better choice, and cheaper (even for the professional version). Tinderbox’s map view, which is the view most similar to a whiteboard, is a minuscule fraction of its power, which is more well expressed in the programmatic handling of data. If the manipulation and complex handling of information at a code level is not what you need, then there are probably better places you can spend your money. To put it another way, if you played with Tinderbox’s map view and presumed it to be no different than any other spatial-visual graphing application, you really, on all due respect, only scratched the surface of it.
Look at it this way, each “node” in the map can be programmed to do things. Further, groups of nodes can be programmed to do identical things based on their type. This is referred to as Prototyping. Each node can submit to its prototyping, or override specific aspects of its on a point-by-point basis. The sky is nearly the limit in terms of how you can program a node. You can even have it react and change itself according to where you put it on the map! It can be aware of its siblings, and its siblings can be aware of it. For large information problems, you’ll not find a more elegant solution—but for quick diagrammes of ideas with no depth beyond what can be seen, it’s probably overkill. It can be used for that, but I would only recommend such usage for people that already own it—otherwise its too expensive and complicated.
I agree with the above, in some ways it is more like an SQL compliant database. If you know how to program in SQL, you can do some awesome stuff, but its even more freeform than that, at the expensive of not being as robust in a large-scale environment. A good SQL database can handle millions of rows. You’d be insane to put that much information in to Tinderbox—but using an SQL database like Tinderbox would likewise be an exercise in madness. It’s just not as flexible.
I have put up three views of Tinderbox at my blog. The point of these posts is to show how versatile and useful Tinderbox is even if you do not grok all of its amazing functionality (which I still do not).
I am hoping to do some additional ones, but haven’t found the time recently. I will put a notice here and on outlinersoftware.com when I have something new.
I’m a lifelong resident of the northeast United States, but I love the southwest. Arizona and New Mexico are so beautiful, and have spent some amount of time out there, but I don’t think I’ve been on the Apache Trail.
Thanks for the visuals, Hugh. I’ve been near there – visiting Tonto National Monument – but I haven’t been on the Apache Trail. Is that a four-wheel drive dirt road, or a hiking trail?
Dirt road from Tortilla Flat, if not before. On the last trip I drove all the way to Apache Lake in a two-wheel drive rental car. This was some years ago, so the road may be paved now.
Tortilla Flat is a genuine mining “ghost” settlement, with not a hint of Disney-fication, as I remember. To European eyes, a real gem. Apache Lake was superb; I boated and swam. Not sure if I was permitted to do the latter. On that occasion the views back down the track towards the mountains on the drive back to Phoenix in the evening light were extraordinarily beautiful.
Last time I was in the southwest, I was able to spend about six weeks exploring New Mexico and Arizona – that was seven years ago. Your imagery has got me thinking it is time to return to Arizona (although I’ll be sure to bring my papers!).
Back on topic: Tinderbox 5.5 has been released. Its major new feature is sync-ing with Simplenote on the iPad, iPod or iPhone, like Notational Velocity.
