Eric Blue's Blog

The Visual Understanding Environment (VUE) project at Tufts is focused on creating flexible tools for managing and integrating digital resources in support of teaching, learning and research. VUE provides a flexible visual environment for structuring, presenting, and sharing digital information.

At its core, the Visual Understanding Environment (VUE) is a concept and content mapping application, developed to support teaching, learning and research and for anyone who needs to organize, contextualize, and access digital information. Using a simple set of tools and a basic visual grammar consisting of nodes and links, faculty and students can map relationships between concepts, ideas and digital content.

Concept mapping is not new to the educational field. In fact, the benefits of concept mapping as a learning tool have been documented by over 40 years of cognitive science research. VUE provides a concept mapping interface, which can be used as such, or as an interface to organize digital content in non-linear ways.

Check out the VUE screencast here. According to an email I just received this afternoon, VUE 2 was just released with the following features:

• Tools for dynamic presentation of maps
• Map merge and analysis tools
• Enhanced keyword tagging and search capabilities
• Support for semantic mapping using ontologies
• Expanded search of online resources (Flickr, Yahoo, Wikipedia, Twitter, PubMed, etc.)
• Ability to publish your VUE maps directly to Fedora digital repositories and Sakai

Posted by EricB at 05:17 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Thanks again to del.icio.us, I discovered an amazing site today called Thinkbase.

"Thinkbase is a new way to navigate and explore information on the web. It is what we call a 'Visual Wiki'. It is based on Freebase, an open, shared database of the world's knowledge - in other words a Semantic Wiki. Thinkbase uses a visualization tool (Thinkmap) to create an interactive visual representation of the semantic relationships in Freebase."

This is actually something I've been wanting to do with my own Personal Knowledge Manager(a.k.a. Semantic Wiki or Memex). I'm a huge fan of visualization, and ThinkMap (The software used to power ThinkBase) is a pretty comprehensive toolkit. I've looked at quite a few different visualization solutions over the last few years, and ThinkBase is one of the most impressive ones. Recently I came across a stunning Flash-based project by Ruben Swieringa
called the interactive mindmap (http://www.rubenswieringa.com/blog/interactive-mindmap). It would be interesting to leverage some sort of open source solution like this to accomplish what the guys at ThinkBase have done. Overall, ThinkBase is a step in the right direction and I'm hoping it gets some well-deserved attention.

Posted by EricB at 11:02 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Chuck Frey has just published an extensive comparison chart of the major web-based mind mapping applications - MindMeister, Mindomo, Mind42, Comapping and Mead Map - covering over 60 features and capabilities of these apps.

This detailed chart covers criteria such as:

* Overview (versions, pricing)
* Map formats supported
* Map level features
* Topic-level features
* Import options
* Export options
* Publishing options
* Collaboration
* Other features

Click here to read more!

Posted by EricB at 09:21 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Every 6 months or so I mix things up and alternate my primary area of focus between studying philosophy and pursuing my creative technical interests (e.g. my multitude of pet/geek projects). I decided to switched gears a couple weeks ago and have been back into academic mode. My primary focus has been studying the history of philosophy; notable figures, major schools of thought, etc. I've also been creating a series of detailed mindmaps based on this research and hope to share those sometime next month.

Over the last 6 months much of my time and writing has been focusing on learning and personal knowledge management. So, it occurred to me that this might be a good opportunity to blend my interests in learning, technology, and philosophy. I've been using the Semantic MediaWiki for the past few months as my Personal Knowledge Manager and just recently started adding my own semantic data for major philosophers (date of birth, place of birth, influences, influenced by, school of thought).

I figured it would be uber cool (and geeky) to be able to query this type of metadata and aggregate it in the hopes of seeing new patterns. At a high level, here is what I'd like to do:

* View all philosophers on a timeline broken down by date and time period (Ancient Greek, Early Christian, Dark Ages, Modern, Post Modern, etc). Something like http://radicalacademy.com/diahistphil.htm.

* Map of philosophers based on place of birth, origin of school, or place of death.

* Graphical representation of lineage of influences by philosophers. This is somewhat similar to The Genealogy of Influence I posted about last year.

* Faceted Browsing on various metadata. Make something similar to the amazingly cool Elastic Lists?

In theory, this sounds very cool but could get complicated pretty fast. Luckily there are some great projects like Simile at MIT that solve some interesting problem domains. One particular subproject called Exhibit offers many of these features. I would just need to find a way to export my philosophy wiki data as RDF (which I believe it currently does) and reformat to JSON. This will definitely get some priority on my existing Pet Project Queue ;) More to follow later......

Posted by EricB at 03:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Chuck Frey, prolific mind mapping blogger and author, has published his new e-book "The Mind Mapping Manifesto". Here's a brief overview of the topics covered in the book:

• The true cost of information overload and multi-tasking (it will open your eyes to a looming crisis)
• What research proves about the benefits of mind mapping software in business (the productivity impact is substantial!)
• Perspectives from 10 mind mappers on the impact this type of software has made on the way they think, plan and work.
• A list of over 20 business applications where mind mapping software can be used to increase your efficiency
• Ten tips on how to select the right mind mapping program for your needs
• A checklist to help you identify your needs
• Reviews of 5 top mind mapping programs that I personally recommend
• My “best of” list of the programs that offer the greatest performance in 8 key areas.
• A collection of over 50 resources where you can discover the best tools, resources and advice about mind mapping software

The primary aim of Chuck's new book is to help business people become more aware that mind mapping can be a powerful tool in the workplace. The Mind Mapping Manifesto achieves this goal, and offers some fantastic advice on how to use mind mapping software to better deal with information overload, gain clarity on key projects and objectives, and become a much more efficient organizer. I would highly recommend this book to both people new to mind mapping, and those who are already seasoned mappers.

Chuck also dedicated a section of his book to allow a group of mind mapping experts to voice their opinion on the value of mind mapping software. This panel included some well known people in the mind mapping community. I'm honored that Chuck included me on this list as well. Here's are some snippets of my opinion on the value of mind mapping software:

"In my experience, mind mapping is the perfect fusion of creativity
and organization, and has applications both personally and
professionally. In a personal context, the experience of creating
maps can be both a huge creativity booster and a technique for
clarifying and understanding your thought process. Mind maps
are a useful tool for self-discovery, summarizing and aggregating
huge volumes of information, and vastly improving your ability to
recall and act on that information."

"In a business context, mind mapping is fundamentally about clearly
communicating thoughts, ideas, and concepts to others. During a
group meeting, regardless of each individual's primary learning
style, mind maps greatly help to visually get everybody "on the same
page". There is real value in being able to present complex ideas
in a visually pleasing format, and to let people focus on the big
picture of the idea you're trying to get across. Mind mapping can
help improve the brainstorming process, act as an effective visual
aid during presentations, and has proved useful when it comes to
capturing meeting notes and summarizing discussions."

"The applications for dealing with information overload and processing are vast, and being able to effectively prioritize, streamline, and act on relevant information is what distinguishes
successful, action-oriented individuals from others."

Please do checkout this book at http://www.mindmappingmanifesto.com/.

Posted by EricB at 08:50 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Vic Gee at mind-mapping.org has spent the last few months collecting information on various mindmap formats, and how to import/export between them.

Vic's site is:

... collection of information about how mind mapping software can communicate. Some packages have a built-in capability to import and export to other types of mind mapping software. Some software authors have kindly provided information about the format of their mind map or interchange files.

This is a starting point, from which this go-to source for interchange information, already substantial, will grow.

http://www.mind-mapping.org/interoperability-of-mind-mapping-software/

I personally think this is a great step forward, and will help mind mapping enthusiasts and developers work towards interoperability between mind mapping (and concept mapping) applications. Early last year I posted about the maturity of mind mapping products and the need for a common mindmap format. As Vic also noted in his blog post, quite a bit would need to happen in order to bring a common format to fruition. There needs to be a killer app or company that spearheads a common format, or a handful of major mind mapping vendors (hint: MindJet) that collaborate.

A few months I started taking another approach, and began prototyping a web-based(Flash/Java) mindmap viewer that allows you to embed mindmaps directly into your website/blog/wiki, and to also view mindmap links on other sites using a firefox plugin. Initially, the protoype only supports MindManager maps, however I would like to expand this to other formats, and ideally leverage some of the great work done by Vic.

Overall, I think the need for a common mindmap format and interoperability is a goal that both Vic and I (and I'm sure many others) share. Efforts to document and openly publish various mind map formats will ultimately lead to a wide-spread use and adoption of mapping software and applications. I hope in the next few months, Vic's site will continue to grow and gain attention from variety of enthusiasts and developers. Great work!

Posted by EricB at 09:39 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Tony Buzan, the creator of mind mapping, has recently published a number of new articles and videos on mind mapping. Some of these topics include: ‘How to Mind Map’, ‘Creating Your First Map’, ‘Mind Mapping for Dyslexics’, ‘Perfect Presentations’, ‘Problem Solving’, ‘Study Skills’, ‘Improving Memory’ and many more.

Articles
http://www.imindmap.com/articles/

Videos
http://www.imindmap.com/videos/

Posted by EricB at 09:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

The other day, ReadWriteWeb posted an interesting article on Visualizing Social Media Fatigue.

"Our attention is stretched so thin these days that there are times when I have actually tried to register for what I thought was a new service only to realize later that I already had an account -- it just got lost in the shuffle. With so many new web sites and services vying for our attention it is easy to feel the effects of social media fatigue. Andrew Shuttleworth, a social media junky living in Japan, thought it might be helpful to try to map his social media usage. The result is a staggering view of how information we put on the web flows."

You can check out Andrew's original post here:
http://hq.andrewshuttleworth.com/hq/2008/02/social-media-on.html

Posted by EricB at 02:14 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

After a little bit of tinkering around, I created a Firefox plugin for the MindMap Viewer. The plugin adds a right-click menu option. Whenever you right-click on a supported mindmap URL/link and select 'View MindMap', the mindmap viewer will be launched in a new window.

Right-Click Context

You can download from here, just make sure to allow install from "eric-blue.com":

Posted by EricB at 10:59 PM | Permalink | Comments (2) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

The BootStrapper Blog recently posted a comprehensive list of mind mapping tools, blogs, and tutorials. I'm happy to say I made the list (#78)!

Eric Blue’s Blog: Blogger Eric Blue shares his thoughts and opinions on productivity, mind mapping, creativity, visualizations and more.

Posted by EricB at 01:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Background

Earlier in the year, I posted about the need for a common mind map file format. With the proliferation of the next-generation mind mapping applications (e.g. MindMeister, Mindomo, etc.), the need to import/export in a standard way and to share mindmaps easily is becoming critical.

As I discussed in my earlier post, I'm a huge fan of commercial mind mapping applications (in particular MindManager). And, I love to share my mind maps with friends and colleagues, however there is a bit of a barrier if those people don't have my specific mind mapping application of choice.

One of the greatest things that the newer web-based mind mapping sites have done is to allow people to easily share their maps, and embed them directly onto their personal sites, wikis, and blogs. Yesterday while researching some sites on knowledge management, I discovered some wikis that support embedding of FreeMind maps using either a Java applet or flash player.

I thought to myself, wow....... I feel really left out. I would *love* to be able to do this myself using my existing MindManager maps. So, I decided to put on my "hacking cap" and wrote an application that allows you to easily convert, embed/share, and view your mind maps. The ultimate goal is have this service become some sort of Universal MindMap Viewer: multiple mind map input types, and multiple outputs (java applet, flash, and other forthcoming visualization frameworks/toolkits). Until the day that we do have a common mindmap format, this type of application will do the trick.

MindMap Viewer

Website: http://eric-blue.com/projects/mindmapviewer/

Screenshot:

* Downloads the mindmap at the provided URL (previously converted maps will be cached for a short time)
* Extract/convert the .mmap file to XML
* Translate to the FreeMind .mm format using XSL
* Embed or launch using the FreeMind Java Applet or Flash Viewer

Source: http://eric-blue.com/blog/download/Goals%20Mind%20Map%20Template.mmap
Website: http://eric-blue.com/blog/2007/03/use_mind_maps_to_achieve_your_goals.html
Type: Flash

Roadmap

This is obviously a work in progress, but definitely a great start. The Flash viewer is certainly promising since it's quite a bit faster than the applet, however there are currently some rendering problems with certain nodes. All in all though, this gets the job done. In the next few weeks I plan on adding some enhancements and would greatly appreciate some feedback!

Thanks!

Posted by EricB at 03:19 PM | Permalink | Comments (3) | TrackBacks (1)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

For readers that know me, it's not a stretch to say that I *love* learning new things. I've always been a bit of a self learner (autodidactic if you want to get technical), and a few years ago I started a search (a quest actually) for finding tools to help streamline the learning process. Over time I discovered that the realm of knowledge management is vast and, quite honestly, fairly nebulous at times. In the next few months, I'm going to shift the focus of the blog for a little bit and write some more in depth posts on discoveries I've made with respect to personal knowledge management and highlight software that facilitates organization, collaboration, and learning.

Personal Knowledge Management

First of all, what exactly is "Personal Knowledge Management", or PKM? I think the following collection of quotes from the KnowledgeBoard (Technologies for Personal Knowledge Management) summarizes best:

"PKM involves a range of relatively simple and inexpensive techniques and tools that anyone can use to acquire, create and share knowledge, extend personal networks and collaborate with colleagues without having to rely on the technical or financial resources of the employer."

AND

"PKM is a conceptual framework to organize and integrate information that we, as individuals, feel is important so that it becomes part of our personal knowledge base. It provides a strategy for transforming what might be random pieces of information into something that can be systematically applied and that expands our personal knowledge."

In my personal experience, I've used a range of tools to help organize my information. These have included traditional PIMs (Personal Information Managers), outliners and note taking applications, and mind maps. I highlighted a number of these tools in my recent post on Mind Maps as Personal Dashboards. What I find intriguing is the potential to enhance PKM by leveraging newer technologies and applications(semantic and "web 2.0"). This recent breed of applications and technologies can help people discover, collect, aggregate, and share knowledge in new and interesting ways.

Personal Learning Environments

Organizing information and sharing knowledge is critical, but it helps to have a strategy and framework for approaching your learning endeavors. Personal Learning Environments, or PLEs, are defined as follows:

Personal Learning Environments are systems that help learners take control of and manage their own learning. This includes providing support for learners to

* set their own learning goals
* manage their learning; managing both content and process
* communicate with others in the process of learning

and thereby achieve learning goals.

The following diagram is courtesy of Jeremy Hiebert:

Again, I think there is *huge* potential in this area. Advances in social networking and further development of the "Social Graph" will help accelerate learning and the development of communities geared towards specialized learning goals.

Posted by EricB at 07:12 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (1)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

This is truly a post that blends some of my major areas of interest: mind mapping, knowledge management, and the semantic web. Mind Raider is a unique and useful tool that brings a semantic twist to an outliner and knowledge management application. From the Mind Raider site:

MindRaider is Semantic Web outliner. It aims to connect the tradition of outline editors with emerging technologies. MindRaider mission is to organize not only the content of your hard drive but also your cognitive base and social relationships in a way that enables quick navigation, concise representation and inferencing.

I've known about Mind Raider for some time, and think it is one of the most promising outliners and knowledge tools out there. I was just browsing through some of my older KM and semantic web bookmarks, and discovered the author published a slideshow on Slideshare. I thought I'd share!

Posted by EricB at 06:44 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

I just finished reading Chuck Frey's ebook: Power Tips & Strategies for Mind Mapping Software. From Chuck's ebook website:

"I’ve made it my mission to gather the best applications, techniques and resources into one place - a definitive guide to getting the most out of mind mapping software in business. I have talked with leading mind mapping experts, and I have conducted surveys to find out what business users of mind mapping software want to know – information that can help you to leverage all of the power that it has to offer."

The book gives great tips on problem solving, brainstorming, information organization, decision making, and discusses mind mapping best practices. There's also a section, where Chuck interviews Kyle McFarlin, that's dedicated to using mind maps as personal dashboards (which I just posted about).

Chuck recently posted a quick video giving an overview of the book. Check it out!

Posted by EricB at 08:22 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Up until now, I've used mind maps for a variety of things: brainstorming, study aid, goal setting, note taking, and product research.   Recently, I've been exploring the idea of using mind maps to help consolidate all of my information related to time management, task management, and knowledge management into a single place... a personal mind map dashboard.  I'm not sure if I'm ready to move 100% to mind maps, but there are some compelling systems out there and I'd like to share some of these findings.  But first, I'd like to give some background.

Background

Earlier this year, I posted an article on Using Mind Maps to Achieve Your Goals. I've been using mind maps for a few years now, but this was my first attempt at creating a single consolidated place to track my goals. So far this mind map has proven to be very useful, and I feel that I've been much more focused as a result.

This map gives a 10,000 - 30,000 foot view of the things I want to accomplish, and an overall roadmap for the major areas in my life. Although It is wise to have a degree of detail for each goal (Using S.M.A.R.T Goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time-Based), the goal mind map doesn't lay out a highly detailed action plan for setting your goals in motion. Defining and writing down your goals is one major step. However, it takes a degree of knowledge, motivation and discipline to layout the detailed tasks and come up with a productive action plan.

• What are the major milestones involved in the goal?  What tasks are associated with these milestone?
• What are the priorities of the tasks with respect to each other?
• When and how do I block off time on my calendar to focus on specific goals?
• Where and how do I track my research, knowledge, and notes related to my progress?

Getting From 30,000 To Ground Level

“If you have built castles in the air, your work need not be lost. Now put foundations under them.”
-- Henry David Thoreau


My tricks and tools have changed over time, but as of today I've discovered a suite of utilities that have helped me be as productive as possible.  These tools have helped translate my high-level goals into actionable tasks.

Time Management

One major factor over the last couple years has been Getting Things Done.  I've found GTD to offer a very productive workflow and process for keeping track of the things I have to do, and for maintaining a high degree of mental clarity. For time and task management, I've used a fantastic product called My Life Organized.  MLO is by far one of the best time management applications out there, and the fact that it is tailored to the Getting Things Done paradigm is a huge benefit.


Knowledge Management

Most goals involve getting from point A to point B.  This journey includes personal growth, learning new skills, dealing with change, self reflection, and *tons* of reading.  What skills do I need?  What areas do I need to research?  Who do I need to model?  Where can I get my information (books, magazines, CD/DVD, blogs, etc.)?  I've researched and tried dozens of knowledge management applications.  These ranged from simple outliners to full-blown semantic frameworks (See Tools for Organizing Thoughts).

The best combination I've discovered is using del.icio.us for collecting interesting URLs, ScrapBook for quickly saving snapshots or snippets of pages, and DevonThink as a sophisticated digital repository.


Mind Maps

Mind Maps have been the tool of choice for consolidating knowledge for certain projects (raw information like links, PDF, and text), and summarizing books (using the MMOST technique).  I consider my knowledge management tools the source data, and mind maps the aggregation and summary.  I've learned that the whole process of creating the mindmap helps with comprehension and recall.



The Solution?

As you can see I've listed a handful of tools to help organize all of my "information" (goals, tasks, knowledge, notes, etc).  The real challenge I've discovered is that I'm lacking a centralized view of everything I have going on.  Yes, I do have a workflow that I follow and it works fairly well.  But, it can be painful jumping between these different systems (goal map -> task list -> bookmarks -> reading list -> PDF/Text repository search).  I plan on exploring how I can start incorporating a dashboard into my workflow, and am eager to see how I can help bridge the gap between my traditional mindmaps, knowledge management tools, and time management application.  I certainly plan on posting the progress of my research.


Here are a few resources I've discovered that help you create a personal dashboard:

• The Mind Map Life Framework of your Dreams (Kyle McFarlin - The Visual Strategist)

• http://mcfarlin.typepad.com/the_underlying_blog/2007/05/the_mind_map_li.html

• Managing Your Life with a Dashboard Map (Chuck Frey - The Mind Mapping Software Weblog)
  

• http://mindmapping.typepad.com/the_mind_mapping_software/2007/08/managing-your-l.html
  

• Personal Productivity Dashboard (Mindjet Map Gallery)
  

• http://www.mindjet.com/us/download/map_library/map_library_browse.php?pid=2&cid=11&page=1&index=2
  

Posted by EricB at 12:10 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Brad Isaac from Achieve IT! recently posted an article on LifeHacker on using mind maps for meeting notes. I think its great to start seeing mind mapping becoming more popular, especially via LifeHacker.

As everybody who reads my blog knows, I'm a huge mind mapping fan. Using mind maps for taking notes is definitely one of my favorite techniques. It's an incredibly quick way to capture information. And, I find that since I'm not caught up in writing down lengthy notes, I'm able to pay more attention to the speaker. This allows me to be more engaged in the meetings, and to also have a great mindmap as a take away.

When it comes to running meetings, I actually have mixed feelings on whether mind maps are the appropriate format for capturing and relaying information to the attendees. I think it really depends on who the audience is (e.g. are they accustomed to mind mapping?), the amount of information discussed during the meeting, and the context of the discussion. Also, using software to generate the mindmap is key (MindManager, ConceptDraw, FreeMind, etc).

In my experience, here are the situations where I prefer mind maps:

1) Brainstorming sessions

Mind maps are the perfect tool to help facilitate and capture a brainstorm discussion. I personally use MindManager to help with the brainstorming process.

2) Technical meetings (design discussions and reviews)

In many cases, I've found mind maps to be a great tool when it comes to capturing notes related to technical design discussions. This is an example of a meeting where a wide variety of topics are discussed any many decisions are made. You need to be able to convey at a high-level the key points, and at the same time, allow people to quickly drill down into the relevant area to get detailed information. In these cases, I've found that exporting my mind map to HTML is the best option.

3) Internal meetings

People who work closely with me know that I'm a mind mapping advocate, and are accustomed to reading mind maps on a weekly basis. For some meetings I set the agenda beforehand and create a mindmap to discuss key points: previous action items, important dates, major projects etc. While the meeting is underway I'll typically draw on the printed copy of the mind map to capture any important feedback and notes.

In situations where I have a meeting with a larger audience, and I need to send summary notes via email, I actually still prefer to use Microsoft OneNote. OneNote allows you to easily export your notes a single-page HTML file (.mht) and cut-n-paste in an email. Until my dream of a portable, common mind map format comes to life, I'll have to live with this. ;)

Posted by EricB at 10:25 PM | Permalink | Comments (4) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Chuck Frey recently posted about an interesting application called WikiMindMap that represents Wikipedia entries in a mindmap format.

WikiMindMap is a tool to browse easily and efficiently in Wiki content, inspired by the mindmap technique. Wiki pages in large public wiki's, such as wikipedia, have become rich and complex documents. Thus, it is not allways straight forward to find the information you are really looking for. This tool aims to support users to get a good structured and easy understandable overview of the topic you are looking for.

Here's the result of a sample search for 'integral thought':

WikiMindMap reminds me of an application I reviewed a few months ago called Pathway (for Mac). The big difference, of course, is that WikiMindMap is entirely web-based. Very cool stuff!

Posted by EricB at 09:45 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Mindjet just published a list of recommended blogs focusing on mind mapping. I'm happy to say that my blog made it on the list, and some of my more popular mind mapping articles were featured. I also discovered some new blogs that I wasn't aware of. If you're interested in mind mapping, please do check it out.

You can download the mindmap here:

Mindjet Recommended Blogs Map

Posted by EricB at 08:32 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

I recently came across a really fascinating Podcast on iTunes called Theatre of the Mind by Kelly Howell. The podcast I just finished listening to (originally produced last April) was on mind mapping and featured Michael Gelb, author of a number of books on creativity, accelerated learning, and mind mapping.

Here's an overview of the podcast:

"Kelly and Michael Gelb chat about mind maps, which can be used for almost any activity – for brainstorming, problem solving, setting goals and achieving them; and especially for writing and learning. Essentially, mind maps integrate the left and right hemispheres of the brain, and by creating new connections in your brain, they help you to be more creative.

Michael learned mind mapping from Tony Buzan, and his inspiration for mind mapping is Leonardo da Vinci's notebooks."

I hadn't heard of Michael before, but after listening to the podcast will definitely check out some of his books.

Posted by EricB at 08:30 PM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Where We Are

Call it a case of stating the obvious, but It seems like mind mapping has become more popular than ever. With the recent explosion of web-based mind mapping products (MindMeister, Mindomo, and others), there is going to be a great opportunity to bring mind maps to the masses. Mind mapping is not a new concept, and there is already a plethora of products in the market today (Just check out the list from MindMapping.org). But, I believe this new generation of web-based applications is going to significantly lower the barrier to entry for people wanting to start creating and sharing their mind maps.

The Hurdle

As of today, I believe there are 2 main factors that are going to limit mass adoption of mind maps:

1. Cost involved in obtaining the software to create mind maps

There are some great products out there like Mind Manager and Concept Draw MindMap. But, these great features do come at a cost. Don't get me wrong, I *love* both of these products. But, I'm a fan of the "power" features and am not your typical user. I'm willing to spend at least a couple hundred dollars for a well-rounded mind mapping application. And have been known to spend a *few* hundred dollars for some more advanced features: Outlook integration, Export to PowerPoint/Visio/Word, Export to a dynamic web page, Export to XML, etc.

For people not willing or able to purchase a full-featured product, there are some great free alternatives out there. FreeMind is one such example. However, (and I don't have exact numbers yet) it doesn't appear that FreeMind is being used by a large number of users as of yet. Using Chuck Frey's mind mapping survey (September 2006) as a sample of users, 72.6% of survey respondants listed MindManager as their primary mind mapping program used for work. Only 10.4% indicated that they used FreeMind. Ten percent market share from that sample survey is clearly not insignificant, however it does indicate that there is a huge gap between the clear for-charge market leader (MindManager), and free alternatives.

Clearly, the web-based competitors (especially MindMeister and Mindomo) have the advantage in this area over the traditional for-charge desktop applications.

2. Difficulty in enabling people to easily share, publish, and view mind maps

In my personal experience, sharing mindmaps is not always the easiest task. The lowest common denominator for the majority of applications is to export to a JPEG/GIF/PNG. However, something is definitely lost in this translation. The interactive appeal is gone, there is no ability to edit/update/collaborate, and this just does not work well for very large mind maps. Some applications like MindManger do offer a free mind map viewer, as long as the mindmap is saved in their format. But, this an installation hassle and only solves the viewing problem. What about collaboration?

Some applications do give the ability to save as OPML (Outline Processor Markup Language) and XML (which can be transformed to other formats with XSLT), but these type of solutions do not scale well. OPML does fit the paradigm of representing hierarchical data, but can't capture many of the mind map specific attributes (detailed information for each node/concept: links, icons, graphics, color, etc). And, transforming XML for developers can be time consuming and frustrating. What about average end-users?

It looks like the trend is that most other mind map applications support importing Mind Manager's .mmap files. Should this be the end of the story? All mind map applications should support .mmap files and call it a day? I'm not sure this is the best approach.

The Vision

In an ideal world....

There exists a standard mindmap format (Simple MindMap Notation?) that isn't tied to one particular product.

This new format can be easily authored on multiple platforms (web, windows, linux, mac, and handheld devices), and can also be quickly created by average humans.

Users can easily share their mindmaps with others, collaborate in real-time, and not be tied to a particular product (desktop or web-based).

Users can host mindmaps themselves, and choose from a number of innovative mindmap presentation libraries that will allow them to embed their map in their website, blog, or intranet portal.

Users can easily link their mindmaps together in a distributed fashion (no need for a central hosting provider). World-wide mind maps can grow organically, benefit from advances in the social and semantic web, and allow users to visually link, search, and share.

"Innovation is key: competition is a *good thing*, and users reap the creative benefits"

In an upcoming post I'm going to go into a little more detail on what this format should look like, and what technology would be the best fit (XML, JSON, RDF, N3?). In the meantime, I'm eager to hear some feedback:

* Is the need for a new standard an accurate observation?

* What needs to take place in order to make this vision happen?

* Who needs to adopt this format first, and what will be the major motivators to make progress in this area?

Posted by EricB at 08:23 AM | Permalink | Comments (12) | TrackBacks (2)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

After reading Chuck's feature matrix of the latest web-based mind map applications, I discovered that MindMeister allows you to easily share and embed your mind maps on your blog. This does require a premium subscription (~ $50 USD per year), but I figured I'd give it a shot. I imported an old mind map that I had created in Mind Manager, and then published so I could share:

Posted by EricB at 09:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Chuck Frey recently published an article that shows a side-by-side feature comparision of some of the latest web-based mind map applications. The reviewed applications include Mindomo, MindMeister, Bubble.us, and Thinkature.

Posted by EricB at 06:30 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Since I originally discovered Omega Mapping a couple weeks ago, Vitaly Kolesnik has created a more detailed article in English. You can read at:

http://www.kolesnik.ru/en/omegamapping/

Posted by EricB at 05:36 AM | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

I just caught a great article on Chuck Frey's blog. Dan Keldsen of BizTechTalk has posted an article and podcast on the topics of mind mapping and getting things done.

Posted by EricB at 10:06 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

Why is it that the beginning of the year always feels electrical with the excitement of *this year* being the one where you achieve all of your most important goals? Like most people, starting on New Year's, I spend time thinking about my goals, write many of them down, and start taking action. While I am happy with the progress I've made in the past, I've had the feeling that many of my goals seem to lose momentum after a few months. Starting a couple months ago I began researching how I could effectively be reminded about my goals on a daily basis, but not be overwhelmed by tons of information or underwhelmed by boring goals written on a piece of paper.

My research has paid off. I've leveraged my interest in information visualization, organization, and mind maps to create a unique approach to goal setting, and I want to share this technique with you. The entire process of getting your goals into the mind map takes 4 steps:

Overview
Step 1 - Find Your Purpose and Passion
Step 2 - Create Your Vision
Step 3 - Download the Mind Map Template and Install Mind Mapping Software
Step 4 - Write Down Your Goals

Overview

The mind map template I've created serves two purposes:

1. Give a quick overview - All of your goals can be easily printed and viewed on a single 8 1/2 X 11 piece of paper. Goals are organized by a particular area of your life (Physical, Financial, Relationship) and allows you to be reminded to keep a healthy balance. And, all goals have visual markers to show their priority in relationship to each other.

2. Save detailed information - Since the mind map will also be saved on your computer, you can add much greater detail than the printed version. This detail includes specific information for how you will achieve your goal (who, what, when, where, and why). And, also allows you to write down your longer-term goals, and even keep a personal journal.

The Internet and Blogosphere is literally filled with thousands of e-books, articles, blogs, and websites with tons of information on how to set goals. I'm not going to try to reinvent the wheel for this article, so I'm just going to give some pointers to some of the more useful resources I've found. OK, so let's get started.

Step 1 - Find Your Purpose and Passion

Many people (my past self included) usually start setting their goals, and don't spend a lot of time figuring out who they are, and if these are the things they really want. It's like the analogy of making progress climbing the ladder, but only finding out that your ladder was up against the wrong wall the whole time. The point of finding your purpose is to locate the one thing that your absolutely passionate about in life, and then realign all of your activities and goals to that purpose. Here are some great links:

Steve Pavlina - How to discover your life purpose in about 20 minutes

Curt Rosengren (Passion Catalyst) - The Occupational Adventure Guide

Personal Development Ideas blog - Discover Your True Self

Step 2 - Create Your Vision

Once you've uncovered your true purpose and passion, you should be feeling a lot clearer about the direction you want to take. Let's take it one step further and create your vision. You're vision is the long-term plan for what you *really* want in your life. Visualization is key, and there are some fantastic techniques you can use.

- Visualization

Instigator Blog - Achieve Your Goals With 3 Types of Visualization

- Written Vision Statements

Radical Mutual-Improvement - Write your ideal scene

- Vision Collages (Treasure Map)

Curt Rosengren (Passion Catalyst) - Treasure map

- Video Vision Statements

I've started blogging about this recently. Malcolm Cohan has created a fabulous way to make your own video vision statement. I'd highly recommend this!

Malcolm Cohan's Website
Eric Blue - Vision Statement: The Power of Goal Visualization
Eric Blue - My Personal Vision Statement

Step 3 - Download the Mind Map Template and Install Mind Mapping Software

I used MindManager to create the mind map template, however I can recommend some other (and free) mind map applications.

Mindjet MindManager 6 (Free 5-day Trial/Commercial)

FreeMind (Free/Open Source)

ConceptDraw MindMap (Free 30-day Trial/Commercial)

IMindMap (Free 30-day Trial/Commercial)

Now you're ready to download the goal mind map template:

Online Preview

Online Preview Using MindMap Viewer (flash)

Downloads
[Right-click and select Save Link As]

Goals Mind Map Template (.mmap)
(63KB, Mindjet MindManager format)

FreeMind (.mm)
(24KB, MM format)

Goals Mind Map Template (.xml)
(246KB, XML format - can be imported to other programs)

Screenshots

Step 4 - Write Down Your Goals

OK, this is it, the moment you've been waiting for! Fire up your mind mapping software, and load the template you just downloaded. To make your goal mind map most effective, I'd recommend setting a few guidelines when settings goals:

1. Balance in your life is important. I've created 8 major areas for categorizing your goals, ordered from right-left: (1) Physical/Health, (2) Career, (3) Contribution, (4) Finances, (5) Rest/Play/Hobbies, (6) Relationships, (7) Mental/Emotional, (8) Spiritual. These are not set in stone, so feel free to rename or modify these categories.

2. Try not to have more than 5 goals per each area.

3. S.M.A.R.T. (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, Time-Based) guidelines should be followed
*Who: Who is involved?
*What: What do I want to accomplish?
*When: Establish a time frame.
*Where: Identify a location.
*Why: Specific reasons, purpose or benefits of accomplishing the goal.

4. Assign each goal a priority within each respective area.

1 = Most Important: Critical!
2 = Desired
3 = Nice to Have

5. Focus is on short-term goals, but long-term goals are listed to keep perspective. Write down 3 year, 5 year, and lifetime goals.

6. Emphasize between 1-3 Top goals for the year. These take precedence over all others.

Posted by EricB at 01:26 PM | Permalink | Comments (11) | TrackBacks (1)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?

I recently found out that CS Odessa, makers of ConceptDraw MindMap, have a new blog called ConceptDraw Lab. Yesterday, AlexTG posted an intriguing article about a new thinking technique called Omega Mapping. The original article on Omega Mapping is in Russian, so AlexTG was gracious enough to provide a summary of the post in English.

Omega Mapping, coined and created by Vitaly Kolesnik extends traditional mind maps, and aids in lateral thinking and discovering creative solutions.

Here is the original article (Russian), and here is the translated article (English from Google Translate)

Posted by EricB at 09:59 AM | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBacks (0)

Post to del.icio.us | Do you Digg it?