Websites for flow charts or concept maps?

November 17, 2009 9:10 AM

Is there a good website for making flow charts or concept maps or cognitive maps in groups? A group of my students and I will be making a website together, and I am hoping to find a free or low-cost way for all of us to make such a chart together online. This would be to show how all of the sections of the website relate to each other. Any thoughts or experiences with such services would be most appreciated.
posted by tnygard to Computers & Internet (11 answers total)

Best answer: A college course I teach uses concept maps, and I am in the process of moving a lot of it online. I am currently planning on using bubble.us next semester, although I am eager to see what other people have to say on the matter!
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:54 AM on November 17, 2009

A couple of my friends built a site called Thinkature to do just this sort of thing. It hasn't been maintained over the last few years, so I can't guarantee everything is still hunky dory, but if it's working properly it'll integrate both text and voice chat while you're doing this stuf.
posted by olinerd at 10:28 AM on November 17, 2009

Gliffy has the functionality you're looking for. It's only free for 30 days and then there is a monthly fee based on the number of users, though they do apparently offer a 50% educational discount.
posted by camcgee at 11:36 AM on November 17, 2009

Google Wave.

Check out the first thing on this list for an extension that will do what (I think) you're looking for.
posted by sciencemandan at 12:00 PM on November 17, 2009

Best answer: We used Webspiration last year to do this with students and it worked pretty well. It's the web version of Inspiration. It's still in Beta (I think) so it's still free, but I think eventually it will cost money.
posted by crios at 12:01 PM on November 17, 2009

Best answer: CMapTools is free and has collaborative editing. Concept maps only.
posted by Free word order! at 12:58 PM on November 17, 2009

Seconding CMapTools.
posted by k8lin at 2:25 PM on November 17, 2009

I was going to recommend Scriblink, but the bubble.us site that GenjiandProust linked to is fantastic!
posted by oulipian at 3:43 PM on November 17, 2009

Not online, but XMind is open source and has a sharing feature.
posted by hooray at 7:16 PM on November 17, 2009

This might work for the sharing part, even if it's not specifically mind maps?

Skitch
posted by canine epigram at 6:29 AM on November 19, 2009

Oh, Mind42
posted by canine epigram at 10:13 AM on November 19, 2009