Post by dormouse on Jun 15, 2020 13:17:14 GMT
Sorry for being infrequent visitor - have little time at present and none spare for writer forums.
But thought I ought to pop in to mention these in case anyone is unaware.
Obsidian and Roam Research are new(ish) programs originally aimed at researchers, students and web writers. They offer the best environment for storyboarding, world-building and general development that I've seen. The key features include bidirectional links and 'maps' that show how notes interconnect. They are both developing rapidly and other programs are rushing to add this functionality (Workflowy has it in beta).
Roam costs $15 a month, so I doubt many writers will use it unless they have it for other reasons.
Obsidian is free.
It's unlikely that it's worth anyone switching away from an established, successful system.
All these programs use markdown which would need to be learned (but not difficult). Markdown is prevalent in mobile programs (Android, iOS) and internet sites, and is basically text with text syntax commands.
Obsidian uses local, markdown files sitting on your hard drive, so completely under your control. I remember K'Sennia saying that she used documents, so this could suit her, although formats might need to be converted. I expect that someone will write a visual storyboard plugin sometime in the next 12 months.
The big advantage is the automatic linking. If you are writing, or world-building, and mention a character or place and then create a link it will create a Wikipedia type link and create a new blank page, if you haven't already created one. And all using text documents.
I also suspect that if anyone becomes comfortable doing it, they could then write web pages, and do podcasts and sell courses. Because no-one else is doing it yet.
But thought I ought to pop in to mention these in case anyone is unaware.
Obsidian and Roam Research are new(ish) programs originally aimed at researchers, students and web writers. They offer the best environment for storyboarding, world-building and general development that I've seen. The key features include bidirectional links and 'maps' that show how notes interconnect. They are both developing rapidly and other programs are rushing to add this functionality (Workflowy has it in beta).
Roam costs $15 a month, so I doubt many writers will use it unless they have it for other reasons.
Obsidian is free.
It's unlikely that it's worth anyone switching away from an established, successful system.
All these programs use markdown which would need to be learned (but not difficult). Markdown is prevalent in mobile programs (Android, iOS) and internet sites, and is basically text with text syntax commands.
Obsidian uses local, markdown files sitting on your hard drive, so completely under your control. I remember K'Sennia saying that she used documents, so this could suit her, although formats might need to be converted. I expect that someone will write a visual storyboard plugin sometime in the next 12 months.
The big advantage is the automatic linking. If you are writing, or world-building, and mention a character or place and then create a link it will create a Wikipedia type link and create a new blank page, if you haven't already created one. And all using text documents.
I also suspect that if anyone becomes comfortable doing it, they could then write web pages, and do podcasts and sell courses. Because no-one else is doing it yet.
But I'm glad it's been working for you, and maybe your posts will help other lurkers, too. 
