Mind Maps - used them? like them?

[torekp]

What mind maps are. I've played around with FreeMind a little, and have a hard time seeing how this will be worth the effort. Am I missing something? Wrong software? Forget software, do it by hand? Just a few more hours to get past the bump in the learning curve and see how wonderful this stuff is?

[crelf]

What mind maps are. I've played around with FreeMind a little, and have a hard time seeing how this will be worth the effort. Am I missing something? Wrong software? Forget software, do it by hand? Just a few more hours to get past the bump in the learning curve and see how wonderful this stuff is?

I think they're useful for high-level conceptual designs and also good for brain-storming sessions. That said, they're easily overused, so draw a line in the sand on when/where you want to use them, and where other tools are more appropriate. We use Mindjet MindManager.

[Daklu]

I've played around with FreeMind a little, and have a hard time seeing how this will be worth the effort.

I second what Chris said. A screwdriver is a very useful tool if you need to tighten a screw. It's next to worthless if you need to loosen a hex bolt.

[PaulG.]

... Am I missing something? Wrong software? Forget software, do it by hand? Just a few more hours to get past the bump in the learning curve and see how wonderful this stuff is?

Glancing over the Wiki article I would have to say (IMO) yes, yes and yes. I thought this is what notepads and white boards were for. I spend too much time learning new software as it is.

[torekp]

I think the software might be particularly useful for (detailed, complex) arguments. Or tricky diagnostic procedures. I'll probably come back to it at some point for those purposes.

[Darren]

I've been to a few brainstorming meetings that used some kind of Mind Map software. It seemed like a solution looking for a problem to me. I prefer good ol' whiteboards and notetaking.

-D

[jcarmody]

What mind maps are. I've played around with FreeMind a little, and have a hard time seeing how this will be worth the effort. Am I missing something? Wrong software? Forget software, do it by hand? Just a few more hours to get past the bump in the learning curve and see how wonderful this stuff is?

I used to use Freemind a lot and was very happy with the way it helped me organize large bodies of information. It's not hard to learn enough to be effective. I don't use it any more because it's not Emacs.

[Falevoz Y.]

I'm a big fan of freemind! I mainly use it for brainstorming animation and organizing information from different sources before writing a summary. When you are familiar with shortcuts, I think it's a very powerful tool.

Yann

[pallen]

I've used Minjet's Mind Manager a few times. My boss really likes it. (...don't know whether to keep calling him "new" boss or not)

I really like Visio myself. Doesn't need to be a newer version either. Just give me "Technical 5" and it has everything I need.

For notes, I tend to keep one text file for every project that acts as a kind of "twitter" to myself. I just hit the F5 key before I type, and I get a time stamp that helps me keep track of things.

Since this are my notes only, I don't worry about what I put in them. Being very candid in those notes has actually helped me when revisiting a project at a much later date.

[JasonXCX]

I've used Minjet's Mind Manager a few times. My boss really likes it. (...don't know whether to keep calling him "new" boss or not)

I really like Visio myself. Doesn't need to be a newer version either. Just give me "Technical 5" and it has everything I need.

For notes, I tend to keep one text file for every project that acts as a kind of "twitter" to myself. I just hit the F5 key before I type, and I get a time stamp that helps me keep track of things.

Since this are my notes only, I don't worry about what I put in them. Being very candid in those notes has actually helped me when revisiting a project at a much later date.

I use Mindmanager and Cmap. Mostly for presentations it is very usefull to organise documents , and to answer questions .

Basicely Mindmanager organise tree ( you can make tree from a structured text written with Word and write text from tree )

Cmap use graphs and I do prefer that.