Help me better communicate what FoldingText really is
I think I’m not doing a very good job communicating what FoldingText is, and in particular how it relates to Markdown. The two trip ups seem to be “Markdown” and “text editor”.
The problem is that FoldingText is a Markdown-based text editor. But I think maybe that’s not getting to the core of it. A better description might be that FoldingText is a plain text outliner. That incidentally uses Markdown based syntax to create the outline structure. I’ve updated this FAQ page to further explained upon how Markdown relates to FoldingText:
http://support.foldingtext.com/kb/frequently-asked-questions/how-do...
Maybe another way of saying things is that the core FoldingText idea would still be in place if I switched to a completely different syntax. The primary goal of FoldingText is not to generate HTML documents. The primary goal is to allow you to think and work in structured plain text.
I think the fact that FoldingText uses Markdown based syntax is very useful. Because it’s already familiar to many people, and it means that, with some care, FoldingText can become part of bigger Markdown workflows. But there are going to be some differences that you’ll need to be aware of and workaround if that’s what you want to do that.
Does anyone know how I can describe all that in a short sentence that won’t lead people to think the end goal here is the creation of HTML documents? Does “plain text outliner” help?
Thanks,
Jesse
2 Posted by Clint MacDonald on 05 Aug, 2012 07:48 PM
Jesse:
“Plain text outliner” has much more resonance with me than “Markdown text editor” and some of the other ways you have tried to describe FoldingText. I recommend you move in that direction with your explanatory and marketing materials. Certainly, make that phrase one of the FAQs.
(For what it is worth, from your explanations and FAQs, I had no idea you were making a text-based outliner. I pictured myself using it that way, just as I currently use TaskPaper as an outliner. But your FAQs talk about things like “text is the most direct medium for solving many computing tasks,” which sounds like a product that is being marketed to programmers, not outliner users.)
Best wishes,
Clint
Support Staff 3 Posted by Jesse Grosjean on 05 Aug, 2012 08:41 PM
Clint,
Thanks, your feedback really helps, and I think it’s likely that we’ll move our description and User's Guides more in the outliner direction.
Yes, hummm… it’s what I believe, but maybe not so clear and a bit to grandly stated. Here’s what I mean by that statement:
If you boild down computing, especially productivity tools, I think plain text is the bedrock. My goal is to remove all the extras the interface that gets put between you and this bedrock. And the result I think is that you'll have a more direct hold on those ideas and how to manipulate them. So that's why I like text.
What I mean by "for solving many computing tasks" is you can use text, and in particular "text in FoldingText to":
But I think in this second case, maybe it's really "you can use an outliner to solve many computing tasks".
So the first part of FoldingText’s idea is: Plain text is good and you can use markdown formatting to create an outliner in plain text. And the second part is: outliners are good and can be used so solve many different problems.
Anyway I’ll revisit that, and please let me know (anyone) if there are any other specific places in any of the users guides that are confusing, intimidating, or just not very appealing.
4 Posted by Clint MacDonald on 05 Aug, 2012 08:49 PM
Jesse:
I like it!
Best wishes,
Clint
Support Staff 5 Posted by Jesse Grosjean on 05 Aug, 2012 10:54 PM
I’ve updated www.foldingtext.com to hopefully explain a bit more what FoldingText is intended for.
6 Posted by Clint MacDonald on 05 Aug, 2012 11:12 PM
Jesse:
Much better. Change “FoldingText is an plain text outliner that is literally as easy-to-use as typing on your keyboard,” to “FoldingText is a plain text outliner that is as easy-to-use as typing on your keyboard.” Also, consider moving it to the top.
Best wishes,
Clint
7 Posted by Myles Orme on 06 Aug, 2012 11:26 AM
I'm inspired by your question as by your approach of defining a minimal functionality for a product to launch then gaining the commitment of a community to make it just so.
So to contribute...
I am more of a knowledge worker than geek. Mostly i struggle to bring stuff into being from a field of possibilities against my natural tendency to give up and go to sleep.
I collect lots of material that strikes me as meaningful, important, relevant to whatever I am doing or think I may produce in the future - I keep this in DEVONThink - historically the difficulty has always been in retrieving things (the 'I know I knew that' problem) - and the artefacts that I keep are a mix of my own ramblings in plain text and various references in various media. Much of my text production is via Scrivener. Deciding what to do and keeping myself focused, well that's in TaskPaper and with the help of timers and other tricks to keep me on task.
As a used-to-be geek I might say that that FoldingText could be 'C' in my personal MVC.
8 Posted by yoroy on 09 Aug, 2012 08:57 AM
I've always liked VoodooPad's 'You put your brain in it', sadly that means that slogan is taken then :)
One text file to rule them all
Manage all your stuff in plain text. Use FoldingText to track your projects, todo's, schedules and whatnot.
Have you seen https://workflowy.com ? (via http://links.scripting.com/#p10591) Some parallels there. Never hurts to look at how the competition talks about their features and benefits.
Anyway, just some loose thoughts. I've been using FoldingText more intensively the last few days and I'm getting more and more excited about it.
9 Posted by S_A_B on 23 Aug, 2012 02:53 PM
"Structured text editor"?
"Outliner" is too restrictive I think.
Support Staff 10 Posted by Jesse Grosjean on 23 Aug, 2012 03:48 PM
I think I’m going to stick with outliner. It avoids the markdown editor box, and over the years outliner has become a pretty flexible term. “Structured text editor” is good, and is in fact how we described out goal internally for a long time, but it’s not a term most people know. And some people mean something different by structured text editor… a sort of programmers tool where you can’t type anything out of syntax.
11 Posted by Jóhannes Gunnar Þorsteinsson on 23 Aug, 2012 10:34 PM
I think the first thing I thought about when I saw/tried Folding Text was "smart". As in, "Smart text editor".
12 Posted by James on 28 Aug, 2012 01:38 PM
I think that use cases are most powerful. I saw the pomodoro article and started thinking about how I might use the program. I've decided to try using FT as a text journal book that is searchable, has structure and interacts with the workflow.
13 Posted by S_A_B on 28 Aug, 2012 03:00 PM
This is a good point: why should I bother using FT? what is new? when would I benefit from using it rather than anything else?
Use cases are the way to show that, and tailored towards certain activities or professions. Here is an example of what a scientist could use it for (especially if there were an iOS version ;):
# RT-PCR protocol
| Reagent | Volume |
| :---------- | -----------------------: |
| RT Buffer | 2 µl |
| dNTP | 2 µl |
| RNAse inhib | 0.5 µl |
| Oligo dT | 1 µl |
| Rev Tase | 1 µl |
| RNA | 1µg (or maximum amount) |
| H2O | to 10 µl |
### Steps.timer
37°C for 1 hour
99°C for 5 min
4°C onwards
14 Posted by Clint MacDonald on 28 Aug, 2012 03:17 PM
:
Nothing to add, but I am pleased to see another molecule biologist using FoldingText as a tool. :-)
Best wishes,
Clint
Support Staff 15 Posted by Jesse Grosjean on 28 Aug, 2012 03:47 PM
Thanks. I think use cases is the way to go to describe the more detailed functionality.
Our plan is to eventually write up some general use cased that will be linked to from the “Use For” section at http://www.foldingtext.com. Once we get a basic format for that down I think we’ll ask for user submitted use cases too. That would really help.
16 Posted by Frank Eves on 28 Aug, 2012 05:33 PM
Jesse, you might want to play with something like this, "A short pencil is better than a long memory." Think of FoldingText as the pencil for OS X (and iOS). It's where organization begins, the plain text nucleus of your workflow.
17 Posted by Frank Eves on 31 Aug, 2012 11:00 PM
FYI, I stole my own idea for an iOS related post at http://liveyourbestdreams.com/
18 Posted by Inge Hofmann on 01 Sep, 2012 07:34 PM
I used to be intrigued by outliners like MORE (plus advertisements!!) and Ecco Pro. So I suggest
FoldingText ist MORE than an outliner ;-)
I would try to get the userbase of More, the people who think via the keyboard and type along and appreciate a beautiful tool to keep the overview and surprise them with their own productivity (Dave Winer called it the MORE-feeling, and I had it typing in MORE, text just poured out of me).
(When I use OmniOutliner I feel caged into these orange lines around the text, you will not do this, I know.)
Regards,
Inge