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'''__Personal desktop wiki for Windows__''' (http://philwilson.org/blog/2005/01/personal-desktop-wiki-for-windows.html)
"A number of small applications I'm working on have all had their release dates unceremoniously pushed back due to my discovery of Wikidpad.
WikidPad is a desktop wiki written in wxPython; '''and it's great'''. You can download it and use it for free for 30 days, but it only costs $12 (that's about ?6 in real money), and is well worth it. ''Especially now that it is free.''
After a few days of using it, it was good enough for me to want to write my own, but with some of the behaviour changed slightly. After a few more days of using it I realised that it would takes months of hard graft to create anything of the standard that WikidPad sets, '''it's really that good'''.
Apart from all the instant obvious benefits of having a personal wiki that's just on your desktop, no server needed, it has some great extra features: it can export single pages, or the entire wiki to HTML; there's no "edit" mode, you just type in the main window and it auto-saves your content; it saves its content in plain text files so you can modify them with any tool and best of all '''it's really customisable'''.
The regexes for styling text (such as headings, italics, bold etc) are all editable, so you can change them to match your favourite style - for example I changed the headings to match the JSPWiki syntax because that's what I'm used to using at work.
It has a list of public hooks so that on events like application startup, creation of a new page, saving of a page and so on, you can execute your own Python commands (it comes shipped with commented out CVS commands at the appropriate hooks, which would be very useful).
In addition it has a public API so that you can write plugins which can directly manipulate the application itself. You could probably even get hold of the parent window and create your own wxWidgets dialogs.
It also supports a kind of tagging for pages, whereby you can add something like [work=true] to a page and it will then be listed under the tag "work". This is slightly cumbersome at the moment (really you just want to add a list of space or comma separated values), but might be possible to change by editing the regexes.
As soon as I realised it was so extensible my mind took off in all kinds of directions - how about enabling rendezvouszeroconf on it, for example, and using it in an office? Or instead of using CVS as a filestore, just use simple FTP commands. Or hook it up to the del.icio.us API for quick access to your bookmarks, or your favourite blogging tool so that you can post directly. In fact, JSPWiki also stores its files in plain text, so there's the possibility of making WikidPad a desktop editor for JSPWiki, but one that you could carry around with you (hideous versioning problems aside). Just about anything's possible, and as it allows you to embed (and evaluate) Python code directly on any page, you can automate an awful lot of functions; for example I can now write up my meeting minutes then hit a key combo which converts the page to HTML, posts it to our internal wiki, and mails the URL to the attendees. '''Brilliant'''.
So all of this is why I'm behind. Sorry :)"
http://journalscape.com/wshaffer/2004-07-10-13:58
At work, I'm also playing around with a program called WikidPad. This is a notepad type program with a wiki-style interface. This seemed like a rather odd concept to me at first, since the primary use of wikis is to allow multiple people to easily collaborate in creating a set of web pages. What's the point of a one-person wiki? Well, the nice thin about a wiki is that it allows you to very quickly create hyperlinks on the fly. I've long been looking for some kind of note-taking tool that would allow me to sort notes into various separate categories while making links between related items. When I'm working on a project, I tend to be jotting down a constant stream of different items: little brainstorms on things to add to the document, to do items, questions that I need to ask the programmer or the engineer, lists of various kinds, outlines. Keeping all of this organized is difficult.
The catch is two-fold: that I haven't really found a tool that does exactly what I want. And up until now, all the tools that I have found that do something like what I want have been Mac only. (I know I've rhapsodized more than once about Omni Outliner. I've also been playing around a bit with DEVONthink, which seems flabbergastingly unintuitive, but potentially very very powerful once I get my brain in tune with it.) Normally I'd be intensely smug about the obvious software superiority of Macs in this area, but I have to work on a Windows XP machine 40-50 hours a week, and that puts a different complexion on the whole deal.
So, enter WikiPad, which is Windows XP compatible and seems like it might be able to do some of what I want, with some coaxing. (Not all of what I want - probably what I want is some kind of relational database with an outliner or mind map style interface, with hyperlinking capabilities, so that I could easily reference word processing files, pdf files, graphics, and external web pages in my notes. This program, despite its immense power, should be simple and easy to use, and cost less than $30. Also, it should be able to make flawless capucchinos and answer my telephone. Simultaneously. Okay, clearly I can still do pie-in-the-sky when I want to.)
The interface is a bit clunky, and parts of it are really very visually ugly. On the other hand, it is '''really really easy to create links and/or new topics'''. (Almost too easy - my company has a disconcerting tendency to name its products using valid WikiWords. Yipes.) '''And the program has a cute little mechanism for tagging things as to do items, questions, actions, etc. and displaying those in an easily accessible separate lists'''. So, it might work. I've got a 30 day trial version -- we'll see how it goes.
'''The program also lets you export your wiki as HTML or XML. I can imagine that that might come in handy'''.
http://b-spirit.com/blogollie/index.php?p=560
Grace a Mark, je viens de decouvrir, installer et tester le soft que je cherchais depuis des lustres: WikiPad. En deux mots, il s’agit d’un wiki personnel, installe en local (la plupart des wikis tournent sur un serveur) et qui fonctionne comme un '''“two pane outliner”''', c’est-a-dire que chaque page (correspondant a un mot wiki) est automatiquement ajoutae dans l’arborescence du wiki sur la gauche de la fenetre (voir capture d’ecran), de meme que les autres mots wiki qui se trouvent sur cette page. On a donc en permanence une representation structuree du wiki.
Plus fort encore, on peut definir, individuellement ou globalement, les attributs des pages: couleur, police, largeur, etc. Des attributs speciaux peuvent etre definis pour certaines pages, ce qui permettra de les repertorier (et donc de les retrouver plus facilement dans l’arborescence) en fonction de leur contenu (par exemple todo, questions, projets, etc). On peut egalement ajouter les pages a une simple liste de favoris. Des commandes Python peuvent etre saisies pour les actions plus complexes et assignees a des raccourcis clavier, toujours individuellement, pour chaque page. On peut exporter l’ensemble ou certaines pages / branches en XML ou en HTML. Enfin, un “ScratchPad” permet de copier/coller, non pas vers le presse-papiers mais vers une page wiki.
'''Bref ce truc-la, c’est d’la balle!''' Un soft pour toutes mes informations personnelles (hyperliens, fils RSS, notes, projets, idees, etc) sans barre de formattage avec 126 boutons dont on ne se souvient jamais, sans 36 frames de previsualisation et autres chichis. Il est gratuit pendant 30 jours et ensuite, il en coute 12 USD par an, mises a jour comprises. La version 1.13 annoncee sur le site est en fait la version 1.14. Ma bourse delier peut-etre bien vais-je. Petit bemol: l’aide sous forme de wiki est un peu obscure, j’ai donc resume les points essentiels dans un petit .rtf que je tiens a la disposition des interesses. Si vous n’etes pas convaincus, Mark repertorie plein d’autres solutions ici sous Information Management.
[Ajout 04.01.2005 16:38] J’oubliais de preciser que '''les donnees sont sauvegardees en texte sans codage d’aucune sorte, A raison d’un fichier par page wiki et d’un repertoire par wiki'''.
http://blog.ultralab.net/~blogger/andy/archives/000684.html
Via Contentious Weblog I latched on to Wikidpad. It's a personal Wiki for your own PC.
Q Huh?
Well you might use it to organise your own to do lists, jottings, embryonic articles, stuff like that.
Q But aren't Wiki meant to be collaborative?
Well yes, that's the BigIdea, but there are other aspects of Wiki as well, such as the ease of link making (WikiWords) and ultra simple markup language. WikidPad deploys these powerful features for personal collaboration.
Q Andy, you've lost me now. WTF is personal collaboration??
Ok, I made that up. But when you update a to do list, or start writing a report by sketching out headings which you might come back to later, it's a bit like collaborating with your past and future self. get it?
Q I ask the qustions!
Sorry. I think you might have to have the 'global learner' style to appreciate the advantages. Or if you were once a computer programmer perhaps, using the top down modular method.
Q Right. So what are you going to do with this new personal collaboration tool then?
I'll start off using it as an aide memoire, to paste in ideas and details I don't want to lose. But then next year or maybe sooner, I'm going to use it for the authoring stage of writing my ultraversity assignments. I'm going to move away from the Patchwork Text method, and start from the top down instead. It makes more sense to me. I've already decided I need to do the literature review first instead of at the end. I'll sit down with a blank Wikidpad instead of a blank Dreamweaver and grow the report wiki-style, with all the flexibility that entails - then export it as HTML and into Dreamweaver for further development and presentation.
Q Hmm, well good luck
That's not a question.
Q Ooh. Um, so are there any snags so far with Wikipad?
Yeah, It doesn't run on a Mac. There must be similar systems though - or soon.
http://pluralsight.com/blogs/craig/archive/2003/12/29/1148.aspx
My recent entry about my desire for a Wiki that thinks in XML instead of text/html led me to an interesting application. David Pickett pointed me at WikidPad. I've been trying it out, and '''I have to say I really like it'''. It's a desktop application that lets you build a series of linked documents in much the same way that a Wiki does on the web. To me, it's sort of like OneNote, except '''instead of pages and tabs and sections, you get hyperlinks, which is fundamentally more powerful'''.
'''I'm definitely going to be shelling out for this one'''. I mean, it's only $12, and the last release was just last month, so I know it's still in active development). Of course there are things about it that I don't like. For example, while the keyboard shortcuts are plentiful, there are a few more I'd like to have. But I imagine the devs will be hearing from me about all the little nits I don't like. :) And '''the app is easily powerful enough to tackle the particular task I have in mind for it''', which is to organize the hundred or so pages of notes I have for a role playing game I'm running. (Vampire, if you must know.)
http://stuarteglin.blogspot.com/2005/06/wikidpad-wiki-notebookoutliner-for.html
I've spent some time over the last few days experimenting with a new piece of Open Source software called wikidPad. '''It's an amazing piece of software''' based on wiki technology. I think it might be '''really useful for managing to do lists in a more flexible way than mainstream software like Microsoft Outlook'''. There is also a really helpful discussion group to support the software. It has recently become open source so I guess there will be a lot of development from the group over coming months.
It also looks like a '''really good outliner, and space for keeping notes'''. I've copied the book manuscript over to it, so that I can try it out. It has the '''ability to create hyperlinks between pages "on the fly"'''. You just type in a WikiWord, which is a word with capitals in the middle, like WikkiWord itself.
'''Another great thing which it can do, is to export the wiki as html''', so it is possible to put together a series of linked pages and then export it as webpages, all without the need to know any html.
One to explore some more.
http://www.joshteeters.org/2005/06/30/wikidpad/
'''Pretty neat'''. Think of it as Notepad mixed in with a Wiki. You can create Wiki-words on the fly, and then jump to that Wiki entry by double-clicking it. It '''sounds like an organizer’s dream-come-true'''.
http://www.ntwizards.net/2004/03/08/wikidpad
I am constantly looking for the ultimate Personal Knowledge Management tool. Most of my work-related KM happens in Outlook Notes. Those little yellow windows suck in so many ways, especially organization, but they have one strong point that is tough to match: the create-edit-save cycle is blazingly fast (Alt-Tab, Ctrl-Shift-N, Paste / Type, Esc).
After using wikidPad for a few weeks, I'm ready to say that '''Outlook Notes have finally met their match'''. wikidPad is basically a graphical single-user wiki. If you've heard of VoodooPad for Mac OS X, this is roughly the Windows equivalent.
With no web server or browser involved, wikidPad is pretty quick. WikiPages are listed using a treeview control on the left, expanding an item shows each of the WikiWords within that page. On the right is the page editor, a semi-WYSIWYG control (wiki formatting is not hidden). To create a new page you simply select an existing page, type in a WikiWord and double-click on it.
wikidPad comes with a seemingly comprehensive wiki that explains all of the usual wiki features that I've barely looked at. There are keywords and attributes, with automatically generated views. There's search, of course, and special views to find orphaned and modified pages.
When my 30-day trial expired '''I didn't think twice about pay the $12 that the author requests''', and for the right set of features I would happily pay several times that. Give me revision tracking and integration with a collaborative tool that supports authorization, such as a traditional web-based wiki or something like Groove, and I'll be in KM heaven. Bonus points if it can sync with a PDA or smartphone.
http://brian.carnell.com/archives/years/2004/10/000004.html
For the past couple of weeks I've been looking for a Windows program that will create a Wiki-like editing environment. I've gone to the trouble in the past of configuring a web server on my machine and using it to run a Wiki, but a) that's more work than I really want to do, and b) I need this to run from multiple machines, which is *really* more work than I want to do going the web server route.
There are several products for Windows that accomplish this, including Note Studio ($50 shareware) and at Notebook (freeware).
'''My favorite, however, was wikidPad'''. It's shareware, but the registration fee is only $12. Unlike either Note Studio or Notebook, wikidPad stores all files in plain text. I also thought '''its interface was much better than the other two programs'''.
http://maennerseiten.de/blog/index.php/2005/07/10/wikidpad-wikipad/
Vor einiger Zeit hatte ich ja schon ausfuhrlich TiddlyWiki vorgestellt - WikidPad, um das es heute geht, ist ebenfalls ein “Wiki fur Singles”, hat aber einen vollig anderen Aufbau. Bei diesem System handelt es sich um eine Art “Notizblock mit automatischen Ordnern” in Form eines ausfuhrbaren Programms fur den Computer (Export in HTML und XML ist allerdings auch moglich). Und das Programm ist seit einigen Wochen Open-Source, was ja auch nicht ubel ist.
Wie bei gangigen Outlinern ublich, sieht man nach dem Programmstart eine geteilte Oberflache: Links ein “Ordner-Baum” mit Unterpunkten, rechts gro? die eigentliche Schreibflache fur jeden Punkt. Die eigentliche Starke von WikidPad ist die intelligente Verwendung von WikiWords (= Worte, in den Gro?- und Kleinbuchstaben gemischt vorkommen wie z. B. “SusiSoja” oder “dasMerken”), mit denen nicht nur Textverweise in den Text eingefugt werden. Mit ihnen werden zugleich Unterpunkte in der Baumstruktur generiert und vor allem: verschiedene Gruppierungen und Ansichten der Textteile. Wenn ich etwa das ToDo-WikiWord dem Text “baldEinkaufen” zuordne, dann ist der nicht nur unter “baldEinkaufen” zu finden, sondern auch in einer Sonderansicht, die alle ToDo-Texte gruppiert. Oder ich setze ein Lesezeichen und finde dann diese Texte zusatzlich im Zweig “bookmarked” wieder.
In dieser Art gibt es noch eine Menge weiterer pfiffiger Einfalle: Kennzeichnungsmoglichkeiten mit einer Vielzahl von Icons, Prioriaten-Zuweisung, das Einblenden von kleinen Minifenstern, die z. B. eine History aufzeigen (welche Texte ich gerade angeschaut habe) oder mir bei der Suche eine Liste aller gefundenen Texte prasentieren usw. usw. Empfehlenswert also fur alle, die gerne mit der einfachen Wiki-Syntax arbeiten und viele unterschiedliche Textstucke ordnen, filtern oder gruppieren mussen.
http://www.framasoft.net/article4121.html
WikidPad est un bloc-notes qui vous permet d’organiser et de hierarchiser vos idees, listes des choses a faire et autres donnees personnelles. Donc, fini les post-it a gauche et a droite et les informations notees sur le dos d’une enveloppe.
Il presente la particularite d’etre un bloc-notes s’appuyant sur une logique wiki. Il se propose de recreer l’architecture d’un wiki dans un dossier cree par l’utilisateur et dans lequel on peut y ecrire ce que l’on veut. Une fois le logiciel lance, vous devez creer un repertoire qui sera la racine de votre futur wiki. Quand ceci sera fait, vous pourrez a loisir rajouter des pages, les modifier, creer des liens entre elles, tout cela a la maniere d’un wiki classique sur le web.
Par exemple, vous ecrivez un mot wiki dans la fenetre de droite (ex : “AutoStop”) et, des que vous cliquez dessus, le mot est ajoute au sein de l’arborescence a gauche, dans une branche sous-jacente a la branche courante. Vous pourrez mettre en forme vos notes (gras, italique, titre, pas de soulignement jusqu’a present) et rajouter des liens hypertexte internes ou externes vers des fichiers via un simple glisser-deposer. Une fonction de recherche autorise les expressions regulieres. Des icones sont disponibles pour enrichir et personnaliser l’arborescence de votre wiki.
Toutes les informations que vous entrez dans WikidPad sont stockees dans des fichiers plats, des fichiers que vous pouvez ouvrir et modifier a l’aide d’un simple editeur de texte. C’est une fonctionnalite interessante si vous souhaitez reutiliser ces donnees dans un autre logiciel. WikidPad propose par ailleurs d’exporter le wiki entier ou les pages individuelles au format HTML pour pouvoir les mettre en ligne par exemple. Ainsi, vous pourrez tres bien l’utiliser comme un editeur de site web ou moteur de blog.
Question mise en forme, c’est un peu court, mais ca demarre. A l’heure actuelle, WikidPad ainsi que sa documentation sont uniquement disponibles en anglais. Cependant, les communautes des utilisateurs et celle des developpeurs semblent tres actives (en temoignent notamment deux mailing-lists), et on trouvera facilement de la documentation et des informations. WikidPad etant programme en Python, il est possible de l’installer sous Linux. Ceci dit, pour le moment la procedure est loin d’etre immediate, surtout pour un(e) debutant(e) : il faut mettre les mains dans le cambouis afin d’y arriver.
I guess I was looking for such a tool since many time without putting a name on it. After 2 weeks of use, I started using it all the time to keep track of minutes, actions... After 3 month usage, I wonder how I managed to find everything before I had it !
Now almost everytime I sit close to someone in a meeting, after less than 30mn I get the question : "what's this tool, looks very convenient to organize things ?". In fact it happens a little less these times as many peoplearound already adopted it... It even gives me some motivations to improve Qscintilla as for the rest it's closeto perfection !
- many* thanks to Jason !