How to locate the new outline feature ?

[tuqqer]

New to the list, brand new to Nisus.

I've been on the hunt for a replacement of MS Word for the past year now, and have tried many, many word processors. None have had an outline feature like Word's, which is how I write my books and articles. It's become how I think!

I wrote Nisus to find out if it had an outline feature, and Dave kindly wrote back, saying that yes, the new 2.5 beta does have an outline feature. I downloaded it immediately, and my first impression is simplye WOW. What a gorgeous UI. I'm very excited about it.

But can someone point out how to access the outline feature in this beta version? I couldn't see it in the Help or any of the menus.

Praying that this is the end of my holy grail to get Word off my Mac

tuqqer

G5 2Ghz, Tiger 10.4.2, dual 20" LCDs

[MacSailor]

… the new 2.5 beta does have an outline feature…

It does? I didn't know. Where could it be hidden? I haven't found anything that I could describe as an outliner within NWE 2.5 beta. If it's there, it would be great to know where to find it and how to use it.

If it not there, I'll continue to use OmiOutliner Pro (I can highly recommend it), that is just great to use (as all the products from OmniGroup)!

[tuqqer]

Actually, I don't think is does now, either. It does have an "outline" style, but I was looking for an actual outline view, where you could collapse whole sections and drag/drop by section.

Dang!

MacSailor: do you use OmniOutliner for writing articles and books? I remember giving it a short tryout, but found it to much like a to-do list, and not a document writer. I'd be willing to give it another shot if I knew another author or writer was using it successfully.

G5 2Ghz, 2.5Gigs RAM, Tiger 10.4.2, dual 20" LCDs

[MacSailor]

MacSailor: do you use OmniOutliner for writing articles and books? I remember giving it a short tryout, but found it to much like a to-do list, and not a document writer. I'd be willing to give it another shot if I knew another author or writer was using it successfully.

I'm kind of new to OmniOutliner (bought a copy of it yesterday, but have tried it for several months though).

I'm using it primarily for my academic studies (political science) and but will be using it in other fields as well (writing articles and, maybe further down the road, books). As far as I can tell, it fits most of my tasks.

[Ryan]

Dave was probably talking about the bulleted list feature, which is not unlike outlining. It's under the Format > Lists menu.

It won't let you collapse sections or move them together as whole topics, but it'll at least let you make indented, numbered outlines of any style you choose.

OmniOutliner is fantastic. Everything Omni makes is great. I cringe whenever I have to use a web browser other than OmniWeb (I mean, it really hurts), or a diagramming app other than OmniGraffle (or as I call it, OmniGiraffle).

I haven't tried using OmniOutliner and embedding stuff into an NWE document, but it may work with LinkBack if you're using the newest betas of both. For more info about LinkBack, go to http://www.linkbackproject.org/.

[martin]

Yeah, we don't have a proper full featured outline mode as of yet, so Dave must have been thinking you were talking about a simple outline list. But now that we've got lists we're definitely thinking about adding an outline feature in a future version.

[MacSailor]

Yeah, we don't have a proper full featured outline mode as of yet, so Dave must have been thinking you were talking about a simple outline list. But now that we've got lists we're definitely thinking about adding an outline feature in a future version.

That sounds promising.

Do you think it will be possible to import from and export to OmniOutliner in a future version of NWE? (LinkBack?)

[cchapin]

Do you think it will be possible to import from and export to OmniOutliner in a future version of NWE? (LinkBack?)

You can export RTF from OmniOutliner, and Nisus Writer Express opens that without any trouble. (I just tried this with a single-column list.) However, the exported text is static. You can't collapse and expand sections. And OmniOutliner can't reimport it in a terribly useful form.

It would be great if we could combine the strengths of both applications, but I'd hold out more hope for the document outline feature that Martin said is under consideration at Nisus. This is not the first time an official Nisus person has mentioned the possibility.

--Craig

[bluloo]

Exporting to rtf (and plain text) from OmniOutliner is not perfect.

The app has a bug whereby space is reserved for the far left column upon export (regardless of settings in the preferences).

It's a PIA to remove all of the "spaces", line by line, in order to justify exported text.

I've reported this and Omni confirms it's a bug... with no firm date of revision.

This is why I don't use Omni as regular a writing tool, unfortunately.
It is, however, primarily built to ease the export of text to other documents, FWIW.


Mellel has outlining capabilities but the rtf export isn't teh greatest. The Nisus interface is one of the nicest I've seen and rtf is the default format.
The addition of true outlining, at some point, would be awesome.

cheers

[tuqqer]

Thanks all for the info.

I, too, am amazed at the elegant look of Nissus. My jaw actually dropped when I opened it up, especially after trying so many alternatives since looking for a Word replacement.

The outline view (as done by Word) is still the way I work. Wrote my last two books via that method, and its ability to organize/reorganize quickly whole chunks of info is the best method for the way my brain is layed out.

I will be back periodically to see if Nisus really does add something like this. Once it does, I'm in.

thanks again!
tuqqer

[midwinter]

Give OO a serious look. Once (the promised) Linkback for it is up and running, things should get very interesting.