Give me directions to a map

September 11, 2007 4:47 PM

Are there any wikis that offer mind-map visualization (somewhat like Wiki Mindmap)? How about concept mapping software which also has wiki-like functionality?

I want something which allows me to establish links between documents, akin to a wiki, but which will also show me a visual representation of all those links (it'd be nice to be able to do it in reverse too...) Basically a whiteboard, but with the referencing and cross-referencing power of a computer.

I'd like it to run locally, on a PC if possible, and ideally not be hierarchy-based (ie. Free-form maps, not like FreeMind. Being able to work in text, or having some sort of non-proprietary output, would be pretty keen too.)

I'm amazed how hard it is to find this. I'm guessing there's no free option. There may be some commercial software out there that does just what I want, and it simply hasn't been clear through all the corporate productivity buzzjargonspeaksoup such things tend to be drowning in.

Please don't say Tinderbox, even though I'm this close to buying a Mac if I have to. I'm probably also almost equally close to paying you to write the damn thing for me if I have to.

posted by regicide is good for you to computers & internet (5 comments total)

Is The Brain what you're looking for?

I remember spending a few hours with it when it first came out in the late 90s, and thinking that it was pretty cool but sluggish on my Win95 machine...
posted by i love cheese at 5:40 PM on September 11, 2007

Corrected link
posted by i love cheese at 5:41 PM on September 11, 2007

Thanks i love cheese... interesting, but perhaps overkill (and I don't like the idea of dropping a couple of hundred just to link a bunch of text files...). Still, I'll try it out.

Is there nothing else? Plugins for existing wiki software? I guess even Mac programs would be acceptable too.
posted by regicide is good for you at 7:25 PM on September 11, 2007

FreeMind is a freeware example of this type of thing.
posted by Drastic at 7:30 PM on September 11, 2007

In case anyone seeking something similar comes across this thread, I should say I at long last found pimki (specifically, I'm using the pimki2 alpha release), which uses GraphViz to show a clickable mindmap of all the pages in a wiki.
posted by regicide is good for you at 10:03 AM on September 17, 2007