Don Campbell, Evangelist from Microsoft Office team [MSFT] has created a nice mind map related to Office 2007 release news and other related resources at his blog post. Good to see all the updates related to Office 2007 from a one single map.
Archive for April, 2006
I recently completed a project that opened my eyes to the power of MindManager maps even though I was already an advid MindManager user. What I learned was that using MindManager to develop complex documents:
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Saves time
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Saves money
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Improves the quality of my work
This is true even if I ultimate publish my work in a “traditional” document format.
As a professional writer, my primary authoring tools have always been products like Microsoft Word, FrameMaker, or HTML editors. Here at Mindjet, however, we create a great deal of internal communications using MindManager. Most of our coporate documents are published as maps. So when I was asked to produce technical documentation for internal use, I thought, “Why not create this document using MindManager?”
In the back of my mind was the thought that I’d be able to work much more quickly using MindManager. Creating complex documents such as policy guidelines, reports, project plans, marketing requirements documents or technical documentation is hard work. Not counting the research, thought, and actual writing, the mechanics of producing a document is typically about 30% of your total effort.
By using MindManager, I wanted to eliminate as much of that production overhead from my project as possible. I was amazed at the results. My task was to document a complex server installation process. I had to interview my subject matter experts, gather lots of data, understand the technology, consult with my end users, create procedures and validate my results. All of that work doesn’t include the time I need to write and produce a document.
As I went along, I used MindManager to record my progress. After 35 hours of work, I had everthing done—a complete, accurate, and very usable document for installing and configuring this server. As far as my internal customers were concerned, I was done. An effort that would have resulted in a 25-30 page document and would have required 100-125 hours was done in 35 hours. I’d just saved the company 60 to 80 hours of work.
That’s when I started thinking about taking the next step. What if I now wanted to publish this document as a traditional PDF? I had a great starting point. The map was a perfect storyboard for converting this to a traditional document. My estimate is that I would still have 40-50 hours of work to do. So even if I were to publish this document, I would have still saved 20-40 hours.
What are the lessons I take away from this experiment? By using MindManager to gather and organize my information, to turn my map into a “storyboard” for a large and complex document, I am able to significantly shorten the time it takes to author a publishable document. Not only that, but by freeing myself of the mechanics of authoring during the early stages of my project, I could focus more of my attention on gathering good data, improving my thought processes, and validating the information with my intended audience. Better output, less time.
I would be curious to know if any of you have had similar experiences developing complex information with MindManager. Where do you find value, what are the obstacles you need to overcome? What suggestions do you have for people facing large writing projects?
Taming Chaos
Apr 20
Walter Terry has an interesting blog called "Taming Chaos – 28 Days With ResultsManager." ResultsManager, created by Nick Duffill and Nik Tipler of Gyronix, is designed to use MindManager to implement David Allen’s very popular "Getting Things Done" methodology.
Terry offers a very pragmatic and, occasionally quite frank assessment of project to run ResultsManager through its paces. The blog enables readers to, as he says, "Vicariously experience the trials and triumphs of applying Gyronix’s ultimate professional & personal productivity tool ResultsManager to running my companies, managing projects, completing (and not completing tasks). Will it help me get things done . . . or not? In 28 days it’s Thumb’s Up or Thumb’s Down."
I’m not sure when the 28 days ends. But it looks like Terry will let ResultsManager live! "Here’s a conclusion I’m rapidly drawing about the ResultsManager. Because it automates the tedium of project management so seamlessly, that as much as it is a great management tool for getting things done — it also a tool for generating more peace of mind."
Timothy Bulwerk, a certified Project Management Professional (PMP), will be presenting "Visual Thinking and How it is Changing Today’s Information Worker" to the central Ohio Chapter of the ACM tomorrow night in Columbus. More information can be found here.
Background
All software develoment teams use some some sort of bug tracking and task management system. At Microsoft (MSFT), these teams use an application called Visual Studio Team System (VSTS) an enterprise-class scalable system that was developed in-house by Microsoft and released to the public this past Fall. One of the project managers for Visual Studio Team System has been a MindManager user and saw an opportunity to use MindManager to fill a hole in the product development lifecycle manged by VSTS. His idea was simple: use MindManager during the requirements gathering phase of a software project and have those requirements published to VSTS as work items (the individual units of work in VSTS).
Can this be done?
Because I developed a similar integration scenario for Salesforce.com, I knew that it would be possible, but at the time that the idea was proposed, we still had MindMangaer X5. MindManager 6 was still in development and I knew that some new features that would be in MindManager 6 would make it much easier to build. In addition, in MindManager 6 the integration would be much more seamless because of the new business topics feature and the ability for add-ins to add task panes. At that point, I just wanted to make sure that when MindManager 6 came out, it had the functionality to support such an integration. Since that initial contact, we have had many other discussions with other vendors of project management software systems and we started to see a pattern emerge:
Use MindManager to capture ideas, organize the ideas to assigning them meaning, and share them with others using an project management system. In this way, the map that was used to plan a project and develop the consensus and buy-in is now used to track its progress. The team members who were in on the planning all left the planning meetings with the same pictures in their minds (the maps) and they were all, literally, on the same page.
Where There’s a Will…
Just like MindManager, in developing VSTS, Microsoft built an application programming interface (API) with the intention of having other companies build extensions and integrations to it. All enterprise-class software has some sort of API, so that’s a good indicator of the intentions of the vendor that you buy software from. The very smart people on the VSTS team at Microsoft put much thought into the design of this API to make it powerful but also easy to use. But the real proof is in how long it would take an independent developer to understand it and develop something useful with it?
The Answer is: 4 Days
Because of our mutual desire to demonstrate an integration, Microsoft invited me up to Redmond to be part of a Visual Studio Industry Partner (VSIP) program for a four-day dev lab at the Microsoft Platform Adoption Center. At this dev lab, they would supply me with the hardware, software, and technical resources to be able to understand and develop the integration. After an initial meeting to outline the scope of the project, the very helpful Mareen Philip was assigned to help me with this and guided me through the API. Before the start of the dev lab, I had never used VSTS or see its API. I started out my project with the Visual Studio Add-in Template that Vivek Vishist, our solutions engineer, had built and was able to build the basic functionality in about 1 1/2 days and finishing the project in 3 days with bi-directional data transfer and automatic link generation. It took another day for QA, building an installer, documenting it, and making a demo video. (And I did have a full night of sleep each night). It is available as a free download (with source code) at www.mindjet.com/labs/mjrm.html. Watch the flash animation demonstration on that page to see it in action.
My Conculsions
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Microsoft Visual Studio Team System is a powerful, extensible software project management system.
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Microsoft really wants their partners to succeed, as evidenced by their VSIP program and Platform Adoption Center.
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It’s really easy to build Capture, Organize, Share integrations with MindManger Pro 6. Why don’t you give it a try?
A smooth user experience is the result of relentless attention to many small details. Here’s one that’s being discussed right now at Mindjet:
When you open a map in MindManager 6, and expand or collapse some topics in order to see what’s there, and you close the map again, you get a "Save changes?" dialog. We’re considering changing this so that if all you do is expand or collapse, and then close the map, the Save Changes dialog would not appear; that is, the expand/collapse info would not be saved. Essentially, we’d be treating expand/collapse as "view" information, like scroll and zoom.
You’d still get the dialog if you made a more substantial change (like editing a topic), and expand/collapse info would still be saved whenever you saved the map. So to save a particular expand/collapse state, you’d simply save the document manually before closing the window, instead of having the system prompt you to do it.
The benefit is that if you’re "just looking", you avoid a dialog, and you don’t have to wonder if you’ve made a change without realizing it. The drawback is that you might sometimes forget to save the map with the expand/collapse layout you wanted. (Remember, this would happen only if you had made no other changes.)
What do you think about this proposal? Does it depend on the kind of map you’re dealing with, or what you’re using it for? We’re also considering a user-settable option for this behavior, but whether that happens or not, we still need to make the right decision regarding the factory setting.
If you feel strongly one way or another, please speak up!
Some pretty cool things launched yesterday in the wonderful world of Mindjet.
First, Mindjet’s own Gaelen O’Connell and the founders of Note Talkers have orchestrated a really nice competition for everyone and anyone who takes notes (excluding judges and employees of the sponsoring organizations), with a prize package worth nearly $1200. The contest is being done in collaboration with Note Talkers, which notes that:
"Note Talkers, Mindjet, and our affiliated Sponsors value innovation. That’s why we’re looking to you, to show us your creative talents! Enter our Note Talker’s MindManager Map Contest and you could walk away with some of the best tools for supporting and increasing your innovative drive. Here’s how it works:
We’re inviting readers to design and submit up to three MindManager map entries (one per category per person, please) by email to contest@notetalkers.com…
- A MindManager map* about “Note Taking”
- A MindManager map* that describes “What’s on your Mind?”
- A Screencast** demonstrating MindManager"
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Also, Mindjet’s UK and European offices have launched a really nice way to people to manage World Cup 2006 brackets, learn more about all the teams, and find their way to the dozens of stadiums where the games will be played. As we note on our World Cup 2006 page:
"The 2006 FIFA World Cup Germany™ commences in less than 100 days. Start preparing for the “event of the year” today with access to all important information about the teams, matches and stadiums. The ultimate World Cup 2006 Map is available for you here."
