WikiSummarizer as a tool for “learning on your own"

Notes by Michael Szostalo:

Michael is a Composer at Self Studied Music Theory and Composition at New York University lives in Kraków Poland

Autodidacts now have a very powerful new navigational tool at their disposal; and it's called WikiSummarizer.

WikiSummarizer from Context Discovery automatically creates hierarchical summaries of articles from Wikipedia or any other database, organized by keywords, based on the Cornell method of note-taking.  In addition, it allows you to download and import this information to your favorite mind mapping software, giving you all the tools you need to make a mental map of any reasonably defined body of knowledge currently contained on a computerized database.

 

How might you use such a toolkit? The simplicity and elegance of the interface means that anyone who wants to learn something can use it in the way that suits him or her best. The summaries themselves are very valuable. I've spent the last several months studying for graduate school entrance exams in music theory and history. I have a very limited amount of money for books, so I decided to fill in the blank areas of my knowledge by scanning Wikipedia articles and taking notes. In other words, I've spent countless hours making handwritten pages that look like what WikiSummarizer produces instantly.

 

On the next level of functionality, it allows me to form an idea of what I do know and what I have yet to learn. It's very difficult to fill in the blank areas when you don't even know where they are or what they are. (I will take this opportunity to point out what I hope is self-evident: Wikipedia alone will not make anyone an expert on music theory, any more than an intimate knowledge of music theory alone will make me a good composer or a virtuoso flute player).

WikiSummarizer helps you to see larger patterns in the body of knowledge itself, to see where that body of knowledge intersects with other bodies of knowledge,  allowing you to then group and link ideas by affinity. Then, you can zoom between the most general and the most specific aspects of any subject as often as you need until you synthesize them, giving you greater insight into the primary sources to which this search may lead you. With this power of near-infinite zoom, you can see not only cooperations, affinities, and recursions in a body of knowledge, but also potential contradictions and dead ends. The more points of reference you synthesize, the more the idea comes together in your mind like a hologram. To help you illustrate some of what I'm saying, I invite you type the terms "Recursion" and "Cantor's Theorem" into WikiSummarizer, and let your mind roam. 

 

At its highest level of its functionality, WikiSummarizer helps you to coordinate your left-brain activity with your right-brain activity. People with strong left-brain activity are excellent with deductive tasks, but have some difficulty with synthesizing information and taking a holistic view. People with strong right-brain function are often very good at synthesizing information, feeling its outlines, and performing highly complex feats of inductive logic. This same trait, however, makes it difficult to approach a complex body of knowledge from a small part without first having some conception, however nominal, of the whole.

WikiSummarizer, in combination with mind maps, has the astounding capacity to both guide your inductive intuition in a purely deductive way, and to help you synthesize huge bodies of bare facts and draw helpful conclusions.

Gregory Zhukov Re: Universal Mind Mapping File Format

Greetings from Gregory Zhukov; founder and CEO of CS Odessa to all the readers of the universal mind mapping file format proposal blog at Visualmapper.

 

I am indeed very pleased and excited to read the enthusiasm and energy behind this idea.  I personally see this (in the long term) as the ability to interoperate between applications in a fluid manner, and also extending this capability to all desktop and web products.

For many years now, users have been asking mind mapping software developers; when will our applications be a standard among individuals and organizations? The answer is; when we provide the conditions for infusing mind mapping into the mainstream.  I believe this condition is provided in the guise of a Unified Business Graphics Format (ubgf).

For the past 5 years at my developer organization (CS Odessa); we have been studying compatibility issues that often occur between our respective mind mapping products and other graphic applications; especially within our own ConceptDraw office productivity suite.  The end result of our work has been realized with the successful integration of our own three software applications of Mindmap, Pro and Project using our "In Gyre Technology".

Looking at the wider implications of the interoperability success we have experienced with our own products; the issue of file standardization was one of those epiphanies that screamed of importance, for CS Odessa, and more importantly for the wider group of mainstream mapping developers too.  The benefit for the end user community is why I am committed to supporting a Unified Business Graphics Format within my particular software and that of my fellow developers at other notable organizations.

From an approach viewpoint I fully agree with Craig Scott that the file format should "not be over engineered"; but make it a well organized step for delivering to mind mapping users a file format which will provide major benefits, and a seamless data exchange of mind mapping data.

The ubgf format (in my opinion) must first of all be focused on servicing the needs of the customer over that of the vendor. Adopting an existing format may be a consideration, but I challenge our fellow developers to push their thinking further, and think out of the box.

It's simply not about any particular developer at all; it's all about, IMO; a collective work of immense importance for the furtherance of the products we, as developers, produce. 

Let’s agree to work together for the purpose of building a better file framework to help address customer requirements of interoperability and also assist the drive for mainstream adoption.

May I suggest the first order of business is to identify all of us (developers) who have an interest in this project to assemble in a group on Linkedin?  We can rough out our objectives regarding how we may work together on this significant groundbreaking project.

I have taken the bold step of opening a Linkedin forum titled; Mind Map Developers - Unified Business Graphics Format Group.

Please go here and join the group http://www.linkedin.com/groups?mostPopular=&gid=3954324

Best regards

Gregory Zhukov

 

 

Mind mapping: the ideal information exchange medium

During my many years of consultancy; I have noticed one aspect of the power of mind mapping that is recognized by all of my colleagues and clients alike.  It’s the use of a mind map to graphically convey, communicate and present data, information and knowledge.

The graphical capabilities of most of the mainstream mind mapping products are borderline Photoshop.  The ability to insert, manipulate and position images into the framework of a map has been one of the functions that have been the focus of my work as a consultant.

The use of images and icons within a mind map; borders also on the Information Architecture/User Experience arenas and the graphical facilitation arena. I don’t classify myself as being qualified to distinguish my skill set within the mentioned professional arenas; yet it is clear to me that we information management types bisect (on many occasions) the established professions of the IA/UX and graphical facilitation arenas.

Here’s an image I shared with a colleague relating to the Ford Production System (FPS).  FYI; the software used to create this map image was Mindjet MindManager 9; this is IMO the most polished and capable product for creating this kind of result.

The Image above was used as a means to convey, communicate and present (to both staff and labor) the basic understandings and self auditing capabilities (potentials) of all employees.  This approach to using mind mapping mixed with paragraphs of text as questions/instructions and inserted relevant images were noted as being extremely powerful as an information exchange medium.

If you are using mind mapping within your established business environment; consider using this format of use as the ideal information exchange medium.

I would be pleased to help you use mind mapping in this way to enable a more unambiguous format for information exchange within your organization.  I personally printed this image off as an extremely large (poster) format.  This image was placed strategically at positions within a manufacturing facility.  The feedback was excellent, and the employees regardless of position were impressed enough to make note of the power of the mapped format for future information/training use.

Let me know how and where you use mind mapping in this way and the feedback from your colleagues, suppliers, staff and labor?

UNIVERSAL MIND MAPPING FILE FORMAT PROPOSAL

I recently received communication from Gregory Zhukov; president and founder of CS Odessa based in the Ukraine. Gregory has proposed the standardization of an Universal mind map file format.  This is not new of course Vic Gee wrote of this during 2007 and nothing came of it.  So this proposal comes at an opportune time IMO.
 
The proposal of a universal mind mapping file format coming from a mainstream developer rather than a consultant/writer is rather significant though.

I certainly understand the leading mind mapping software developer, may indeed perceive this proposal as a threat to their established and most deployed/exchanged mapping format.  And; for the smaller developers; this would simply be perceived as an open door to the larger developers market place.

Let's not forget about the users; they are the most important part of the process that enables the further use, development and evolution of all respective software products.  The users are privately asking for some kind of standardized  XML format that can be read across product range.


Regardless of the perception of this proposal; an open mind and forward thinking philosophy may be best rested upon for this proposal.  The plethora of software products relating to mind mapping as a base graphical function and capability has, even until this time, struggled to break into the mainstream.

At this time; Mindjet, CS Odessa, NovaMind, ThinkBuzan, Simtech, Matchware, MindGenius and Seavus are to mention but a few (apologies if you're not mentioned here) product developers that are, and remain to be relevant.  Cloud developers such as Comapping and Mindmeister are without a doubt leading the cloud Mind mapping revolution.


So maybe; just maybe this proposal by Gregory Zhukov as a mainstream software developer; may spark positive debate and an outcome that gains more exposure for mind-visual mapping products period.

So here's Gregory's proposal, it is verbatim of an email invite that was posted to quite a few developers and thought leaders within the mapping arena.  And; I look forward to reading Gregory's input and feedback, which shall be posted as a new and separate blog post; in order to create a clear and unambiguous reply.



Wallace Tait: visualmapper
                                                                                                                                                                              




Fellow developer colleagues,

Mind mapping software users have for some time, been voicing their frustrated need for a universal mind map file format (ummap).  This would make it so much more convenient for users to effortlessly share mapped information with fellow mapping users who may use alternative mapping products.

The growing number of mind mapping product logically express a critical need for standardization.  At this time; the dominant obstacle to a mainstream adoption of mind mapping product is the lack of an ummap format enabling interoperability in and through a wide scope of information processing product.

Gregory Zhukov; president/founder of CS Odessa cordially invites you to join a round table group of fellow mind mapping developer organizations. The purpose of collectively developing an ummap format would be for the benefit of participating developers with a laser focus on current and potential end users.

The ummap format would indeed be a new standard that shall remove many barriers to market adoption of Mind mapping software product.

By participating in this initiative we shall collectively benefit by:

1. Ensuring attachment (embedding) requirements are addressed
2. Solving compatibility between products
3. Realizing a wider marketplace exposure
4. Developing standardized benchmarks that address the real needs of information management
5. Enabling interoperability with a wider group of business products
6. Improving customer satisfaction

Raise your hand of interest in this revolutionary change to the Mind mapping arena. With your participation; the work is about to begin.

Best Regards

Gregory Zhukov

NovaMind 5 for Windows get a significant update

new topic shapes, templates, gallery, PDF export and more

 

 

Gideon King founder of NovaMind announces:

We have just released a new version of NovaMind 5 for Windows with a number of exciting new features we thought you should know about.

How to get the update

The update should be found automatically when you start NovaMind. If for some reason it doesn't download, you can go to the download page on the NovaMind web site to download it.

 New topic shapes

There are a number of new topic shapes available to make your Mind Maps more interesting. The new shapes are: Parallelogram Left, Parallelogram Right, Arrow Left, Arrow Right and Cloud. We have reworked the topic shape gallery to make these shapes easily accessible, and also to improve the presentation of the shapes we already had.

Enhancements have also been made to the advanced settings to be able to deal with the new shapes, in particular the cloud shapes, where you can choose different shaped clouds.

The new topic shapes are very useful for adding visual impact to your Mind Maps, and conveying more meaning through the topic shapes.

New boundary shape 

Boundaries have also been improved with the ability to have cloud shaped boundaries, and again, there is the ability to choose different shaped clouds.

PDF Export

You can now export to PDF - the PDF export is a proper resolution independent PDF drawing (except for any bitmap images in your Mind Map), so will scale to whatever size you need without loss of quality. This is far better than the PDF export we had in NovaMind 4, and provides you with an excellent way to share Mind Maps with others.

Office 2010 style application menu

We have adopted user interface enhancements similar to those included in MS Office 2010 to give a new application menu. This allows us to provide you with a wider range of options for creation of Mind Maps, imports, exports etc, all in one common location.

Templates

Built in to the new version is the ability to create a new document from a template, and to save a document as a template for future use. It also comes with some templates to get you started.

The templates we supply are for common tasks - making a decision, a status report, and a to-do list, but if you have common requirements for documents, or particular layouts you want to reuse, you can save any Mind Map as a template and have it easily accessible through the template chooser.

New from existing document 

You can create a new document from an existing document - this opens the existing document as an untitled document and requires you to name it when you first save it.

Recent folders

In the Recent menu, you now have easy access to recent folders as well as recent documents. This is very handy for easy access to documents that you keep in the same folders as documents you have opened recently, so you can more quickly find what you are looking for.

Gallery of example Mind Maps

You have easy access to a gallery of over 50 example Mind Maps that you may like to use as a starting point for your Mind Maps. An internet connection is required to use the gallery. The documents contain one or more Mind Maps, and you have a preview and description of each of them so you can see what it is before you download the document.

This gives you a great resource for creating stunning Mind Maps.

Streamlined update process

The update process is much better, with the ability to see the download size and what has changed and decide whether to install the update straight away, or a very useful option if you have some pressing work to get done, where you can tell NovaMind to apply the update when you exit NovaMind.

While the application still automatically checks for updates at startup, there is now also the option to check for updates whenever you want to.

Easier access to tutorials and documentation

Now when you mouse over the tabs in your NovaMind document, you will see a preview of the Mind Map related to that tab, so you know what's there without having to click through the tabs.

Quick print

You now have a quick print option which allows you to print using the existing print settings. 

Presenter updates

We have had fantastic feedback about the Presenter in NovaMind Platinum. We're so glad that you're enjoying it and finding it so useful. We have tweaked a couple of things - the tweets in the intro are slightly smaller so that they look better in lower resolutions, and an issue with paragraph spacing in the notes has been fixed.

And more...

There have been about 20 other minor enhancements and bug fixes throughout the application.

Stay tuned: another announcement coming soon...

And while our Windows development team have been busy on producing those updates for you, we have had another small team working away at something else that will be launched sometime in the next couple of weeks. Stay tuned - we'll be in touch.

Regards
Gideon King, founder
NovaMind Software
Be Smart - Today

NovaMind
NovaMind Connect
HubPages Squidoo

MindGenius Version 4 Now Released

26^th May 2011, MindGenius Ltd has now released Version 4 of its popular mind mapping software, MindGenius.

MindGenius 4 boasts new ways to brainstorm and present ideas and information, and adds improved analysis, task and project management capabilities that let users develop and deliver more innovative solutions and projects than ever before.

 

The new brainstorming mode offers maximized space to view information in a new unstructured layout and makes full use of the unique MindGenius Question sets and categorization features. Users can move from brainstorming to action quickly using automatically created category or question centric maps on exit from the brainstorm.

The new presentation mode extends the power of visual communication to presentations with the ability to easily convert maps into slides and deliver fully formatted presentations directly from MindGenius. Users can deliver interactive presentations where information can be captured live onto the slides during the slide show.

There is also a range of enhancements to the existing analysis, task and project management features of MindGenius, including visual categorization, improved filtering and new Gantt chart link and constraint types.

Derek Jack, Director of MindGenius, believes that this latest release will further strengthen MindGenius's reputation as the Mind Mapping tool that helps users deliver business processes:

“This new release was developed to capitalize on the existing strengths of Version 3, as well as take the brainstorming, presentation and task and project management capability to the next level. As with all MindGenius releases, every feature and piece of functionality was added to support a specific business process and have been tried and tested in a real business environment.”

Stuart Orr, Managing Director of EALA Comms Industry, Accenture, believes: “Since I started using MindGenius it has enabled me and my international teams of managers to greatly improve our collaboration and productivity. Through utilizing MindGenius for brainstorming we are able to rapidly assemble key topics, sort the data and immediately assign priorities and actions. In addition, now being able to present ideas directly from MindGenius means our presentations can be interactive, and more visual. MindGenius is a key tool in our application suite to help give us competitive edge.”

Find out more about new features and functionality, and download a 30-day free trial at www.mindgenius.com, or view a short video on what’s new in version 4 at www.mindgenius.com/New-in-Version-4.aspx

About MindGenius
MindGenius has been producing mind mapping software for business and education since 2001 that allows users to capture, visualize and manage their information. In doing this, personal and organizational productivity can be enhanced.

MindGenius is the only mind mapping software tool that focuses on aiding key business processes such as brainstorming, presentations, strategy and project management and was originally conceived to support the successful compliance management solution, Q-Pulse from Gael Ltd. 

 

It is one of the few mind mapping software applications that has evolved from these core beginnings inside an actual business environment, and every single feature and piece of functionality has been added to help businesses successfully tackle the issues they face on a daily basis.

Customers in over 130 countries use MindGenius with over 600,000 licenses sold. MindGenius are Microsoft Certified Partners. Find out more at www.mindgenius.com, or contact info@mindgenius.com or +44 (0)1355 247766.

Marcus Baur of Goalscape: guest post

Why the Visual Overview is Vital

For Success in Sport, Business and Life

Marcus Baur, Goalscape Software

As a professional sailor I desperately wanted compete at the Sydney 2000 Olympics.  I had already done quite well and had won a few national regattas; but had not had much success at top level.  The Olympics is a serious challenge and I was no likely candidate.  But I just loved sailing the exciting new boat that had been chosen for the next Games; and I was fanatically determined to sail against the world’s best sailors on one of the most beautiful stretches of water anywhere: Sydney Harbor.  So I set out on the journey with my sailing partner, neither of us having any idea what a roller-coaster ride it would be.

The challenge before us was complex.  The 49er was a new class of boat that hardly anybody could handle and we had very little experience to build upon.  We also knew we would have to take our racing skills and our physical fitness to completely new levels, as well as learning to sail the boat.  And on top of all that we had organized everything ourselves and raise the money for what to many seemed like a 4-year holiday.  Of course the reality was a lot of hard work with long days and plenty of ups and downs.  It was intense, but very rewarding because we were really focused on our shared dream goal – and we loved to sail the boat for hours at a time, day after day. 

We had incredibly long to-do lists, so it was frustrating and stressful trying to fit in everything we had to do each day.  I knew that if we were to reach our goal, we had to approach this challenge in a better way.  Setting the right priorities is easier said then done when entering uncharted territory: there always seemed too much to do and resources were scarce.  But the clock was ticking, so we had to prioritize if we were to achieve anything at all.

What I needed was a visual map to show the entire structure of the challenge: every goal and subgoal.  I wanted to fly over the landscape of goals and get the view from 30,000 feet: seeing all the goals at once and the connections between them.  What’s more I had to track our progress in every area so I could always see exactly where we were in order to decide what to do next.

So I came up with the Goalscape goal map.  A multi-level pie chart seemed to be the best way to break down the huge challenge into specific goals and subgoals in every area.  The circle represented the fact that our resources were limited: when we spent time, money and energy in one area, we could not spend it anywhere else.  

My first goalscape chart covered only the boat handling area, a specific part of sailing that is particularly important in the 49er class.

The boat is so difficult to sail that many international champions from other classes spent most of their time upside-down – and quite a few of them quit.  My goalscape displayed ALL the maneuvers we needed to perform during a race.  On the goal map we gave the most important maneuvers (those that contributed most to our success on the racecourse) the biggest slices. 

For each maneuver the goal was to perform it automatically without thinking about it, so that we had all our brain capacity available for strategic and tactical decisions.  And on each goal we marked our progress by filling in its slice, so we could literally see our skills improving all the time.

We soon realized that this system could also be used very effectively in other areas like fitness, gear testing and tuning for speed, or planning our logistics and financials. 

Being able to actually SEE the challenge like this certainly helped us to be better organized and to improve faster in our sailing: we climbed to the top of the world rankings and qualified to represent our country at the Olympic games.  So we achieved our first major goal!

As we progressed through our campaign, we had been re-evaluating our goals: changing the relative importance of each to match the requirements of the next phase.  By the time we arrived in Sydney we were set on winning a medal. 

In fact we led the Olympic regatta until the 6th race, when we started to succumb to one of our weaknesses (I am not going to say what that was!).  In the end we finished 5th, which was respectable – but it was not what we had aimed for.  Even in defeat though, Goalscape helped a lot when we analyzed what went wrong.  It clarified how under the prevailing conditions one weakness had led to another. 

After that experience I was certain that the Goalscape concept needed a computer implementation to achieve its full potential.  Drawing goalscapes by hand was slow and tedious: it could not deal with the evolving challenge and its rapidly shifting priorities.  And I already had lots of detailed information in different formats (like notes and diaries, spreadsheets, even video files) that I needed to access for different goals.  So the idea of Goalscape as a visual software tool grew in my mind.  Soon I was just as determined to create it, as I had been keen to master the 49er.  Fortunately I was able to assemble a great international team to join me on the project.

Designing a solid, useful, simple and beautiful piece of software proved to be as challenging as competing at the Olympics.  After a lot of hard work (and a couple of false starts!) we launched our first public version of Goalscape in late 2009.  Today it's a complete, mature visualization solution: this is what the boat handling breakdown looks like now:

I only wish I could have had this back in 1997 when I first set out on my Olympic quest!

Goalscape’s real power lies in its unique ability to display in a single image the key success factors of any challenge:

·         Specific, inspirational goals

·         Clear relative priorities

·         Continual evaluation of progress.  

Its unique visual, prioritized work breakdown, together with the facility to collect detailed information about every goal, means that Goalscape is perfect for understanding, presenting and managing any challenge.  And because it’s dead easy to use, it never gets in the way of the “real work”.  

All top sportsmen and coaches (and many progressive businessmen) now use a structured, goal-oriented approach.  They know that goals are essential for motivation, commitment and focus; and that shared goals produce cohesive teams with a common purpose. 

Goalscape provides a single clear picture of the entire goal structure.  So it not only helps leaders to define goals and plans, it is also the ideal way to communicate those goals and plans to everyone involved, then track progress and agree any changes [required] as circumstances change. 

Unlike other, less structured, visual tools, Goalscape is not just for brainstorming.  Users can still "jot down" their high level goals and work out the subgoals needed to achieve them; but then they can set their priorities and allocate resources, building a complete project plan, down to the finest details.

The application has already spread rapidly in the sports community and is being adopted by some very large companies.  One of its major benefits to such organizations is that they can take a standard model and adapt it to suit specific requirements.

Similarly, corporations (and consultants) can take a standard industry, business or project model, adapt it to suit different goals and situations, then make detailed plans (with roles, responsibilities and timescales).  They can take it to any level of detail, including agreeing specific goals for every person in the company, which then form the basis for staff reviews.

Goalscape clearly shows when the quality of the goal in the center is underdeveloped, incomplete or badly expressed.  Most successful sportsmen are exceptionally highly motivated.  They have a clear goal, which is at the center of their attention all the time.  In business, average motivation levels are much lower.  The main reason for this is a lack of alignment of personal and business goals or the complete absence of a clear, well-communicated visionary goal.

Goalscape is a great way to establish and maintain a proper dialog about goals within an organization.  It supports full communication, top down and bottom up, so everyone can understand, adopt and influence the development of corporate goals and strategies.

With our new web version Goalscape Connect (currently available in preview), it becomes an unbeatable tool for fast, agile online collaboration.

Best of all everyone can be more focused and productive at work and at play – and have more fun!