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Comment by wpietri | Hacker News Reader

I keep trying mind maps and getting frustrated because my mind works differently. Anybody know of ones that let you start out non-hierarchical?

For me, key nodes are often obvious long before relationships are. E.g., if I'm working with post-it notes, I might write a bunch of notes, cluster them, winnow, and only then want to start locking in relationships between items. Has anybody seen something that's pretty straightforward that supports that approach?

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I tend to work this way with a tool called Markmap (https://markmap.js.org/repl). I start with one heading and a list then begin moving items and adding new headings/subheadings as the relationships form. For example:

  // Start with:

  # Ideas
  - Item 1
  - Item 2
  - Item 3
  - Item 4
  - Item 5
  - Item 6

  // Move to:
  
  # Ideas

  ## Group 1
  - Item 1
  - Item 2
  - Item 3

  ## Group 2
  - Item 4
  - Item 5
  - Item 6

I'm the same as you. Obsidian[0] is non-linear and has worked for me.

0. https://obsidian.md/

Looks great is this Free Software? I want to hack on this thing, where is the code?

If you want opensource and local storage look up Dendron. It is a VSCode extension in a similar vein, uses markdown so easily track changes in git/etc as well.

Links to code:

https://github.com/dendronhq/dendron

Or Joplin (has extensions for Graphs as well).

Or Foam.

Link to code:

https://github.com/foambubble/foam

Unfortunately Obsidian is not FOSS. It does have an open hackable plugins API though. There are lots of open source community plugins.

Link: https://github.com/obsidianmd/obsidian-releases

Additionally, the Obsidian plug-in for mind maps is amazing and very similar to how the tool in the root post behaves.

Scapple is what you are looking for. Its from the same crew that made Scrivener. You can use it free for a month I think or pay like 20 bucks for a lifetime license. It lets you start anywhere and is very simple and intuitive. The only thing bad about it is exporting data out of it. https://www.literatureandlatte.com/scapple/overview

This is sort of the problem I have with most things that aren't just a text editor. They may be better in some ways (and I do like Scrivener) but at the end of the day, when I'm done, I want everything to be in a universal format on my own filesystem.

let me recommend plugin of Joplin, everything is open source and at least two different implementation for this feature.

The best tool I've ever used for this no longer exists, as far as I'm aware. It was circa 1991, a spectacular lightweight Macintosh application called "Inspiration." There currently exists software in the same lane with the same name - but if there's any blood relation between the two, the current bears little resemblance to its progenitor.

I will mangle the terminology since it's been so long, but the basic idea was that on an infinite canvas you would create nodes representing concepts; these nodes were just UI "bubble" objects, like the ovals you might find in slide deck software. Relationships could be added after the fact by linking these nodes, and there was a fast way to create linked "sub-nodes" from an existing node. Also, very strong UI for arranging the node diagram.

Maybe the big problem with mind mapping tools these days is feature creep. A complex UI with too many options will absolutely get in the way of the thought process it serves.

Not mine, I am not affiliated with this tool, but I thought along the same lines as you and found this tool, could you give it a try and let me know what you think?

https://kinopio.club/

Very interesting, and does capture some of the transparency of Inspiration, in the sense that using the tool doesn't interfere with the process. Thanks for sharing this!

That looks like it's worth trying out, also I like the pricing model, god damn am I sick of monthly subscription.

But it looks like it is monthly (or yearly with a two month discount).

I think a yearly price of $60 is reasonable for a tool like this.

a review of Inspiration: https://archive.org/details/TNM_Inspiration_30_visual_thinki...

Inspiration : the thought processor Authors: Donald Helfgott, Mona Helfgott, made by Ceres Software, Inc

History of the company: https://psychology.fandom.com/wiki/Inspiration_Software

The software is still around and old vintage software sites have the earlier versions that you can run in a MacOS8 emulator. I last played with version 6 I think about 4 years ago; at that time you could have both an outline view and a mind map and switch between them.

I am currently trying a big sheet of white paper, folded once in the middle and a pilot frixion pen.

This is mostly for home stuff of which there is quite a bit for a home owner. It can just lie on since table or shelf and be updated easily. I put notes and todos together and the todos get a little check box in front of them. I'm in control of the hierarchy and it mostly mirrors the layout of the house. Doesn't get in the way for me.

I also want to extend it to other areas but for now I'm trying things out with the house domain.

Of course the downside is that i cannot easily edit it when I'm out and about and have some idea. And it's not really possible to have any automated reminders or integrations. (Not sure if there are open source alternatives to what rocketbook is offering; that might be a way to hook this into some digital setup)

I have 3 suggestions! because that's how I tend to work too

- Scapple (mac/windows only) https://www.literatureandlatte.com/scapple/overview I love how minimal it is, but wish there was a linux/web version. I'll probably make my own some day.

- kinopio (web/mobile) kinopio.club Works well, but has a strong, quirky personality which sometimes gets annoying for me; I prefer the minimalism of scapple.

- draw.io / diagrams.net You can configure it to hide most of the toolbars and then just use it as mind mapping software, this is what I'm trying at the moment.

What I really like to prepared D&D games are Entity Relationship Diagrams. A very handy app for from the Android Play Store is "Draw Express Diagram Lite" - the touch UX to create diagrams is unmatched in usability if you ask me.

Yeah this is a common problem that pops up all the time, typically a tree, or taxonomy etc aren't sufficient and you need an ontology. But they aren't so easy to grasp intuitionally so we try to dumb it down and then hit problems, imho.

Depending on the topic I'm working on, sometimes I need an approach similar to what you explained. I still use a mindmap, open a first-level node called 'temp' and start adding everything there and keep sorting them. As soon as a structure starts to emerge, I create other nodes and move those items to their new places. This is based on the assumption that your final output would be a tree with one-to-many relationships rather than a graph with many-to-many relationships. I've seen tools for organizing many-to-many relationships, but I never had the need to use one.

Im using iThoughts. It's Windows/Mac only though. I recently switched to Linux and trying to get it to work in Wine.

I do believe you can create nodes without any Hierarchy and you can always join the nodes into a hierarchy later.

It's got great export features and a ton of other stuff. For me it's the best mind mapping software I have ever seen and I have tried a lot of them.

The left-to-right trees of these mindmap applications has always felt a very bad fit for me. To me, a mindmap is a big piece of paper with the core concept in a bubble in the middle, and things drawn outward from it, with lines connecting things when they are related. The end result is much more organic, and spatial layout matters.

FastMindMap (https://fastmindmap.innovationgear.com) allows adding on the board the so-called 'floating topics', and later you can build hierarchical or parallel relations between the topics with drag-and-drop. (I'm the developer).

Usually the non-hierarchical is an option to toggle on/off in the tools I’ve used.

With hierarchy you can still achieve it though. If the topic is “alphabet” I might create major nodes A B C D without linking them. I then play with A B C and D and add more nodes in a brain dump and then re-arrange later and map the relationships

I’m a huge fan of Graphviz and git. Text is easily diffable!

Try SketchViz.com and see what you think.

Also a shoutout to yEd Graph Editor (free).

The one I created supports force diagrams as well as hierarchies. You can add nodes and later rearrange them ("move")

Feel free to try. Works on all platforms, can be used as a collaboration tool, and has a ton of other features

https://6groups.com

The only time I ever use them is when I’m making notes about something and realize that there are a lot of cross references. Helps to see them.

Also I like to use them in new organizations to map out the people I meet to make sense of who knows what about a topic. Especially in big orgs.

miro.com works great for this kind of thing.

Edit: Or if you want an open source alternative, check out ourboard.io

In the past when I've used them, I usually started by listing all the nodes in a long list under a single root, not trying to organize them at all. I fought the urge to organize everything from the get go.

I want this too. I found some answers in HN comments: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32536780

I use zim-wiki with the graph plug-in, along with external scripts that edit the underlying pages to both add and remove links.

I've emailed and tweeted.

I have recently started using kinopio and did like it. It has been getting more and more features recently, you could give that a try.

Perhaps iThoughtsX from https://www.toketaware.com/

MindNode is good for this. Unfortunately they went for subscription model.

maybe treesheets?

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