This article will give a brief overview of two content management programs available for Macintosh computers: Eastgate's Tinderbox and DEVONtechnologies' DEVONthink Pro.
This article will give a brief overview of two content management programs available for Mac computers: Eastgate's Tinderbox and DEVONtechnologies' DEVONthink.
Content management software is designed, as its name implies, to help users organize and use data as efficiently as possible. They work like databases, allowing data to be entered and queried in various forms. Some programs are finely tailored to contain specific kinds of information, arranged within a controlled environment (for example, journal entries by date), while others leave everyhing -including the form- up to the user. The two programs discussed here represent both types: Tinderbox is freeform and completely user-dependant, while DEVONthink takes on the task of being a "paperless office."
Tinderbox
Tinderbox, by Eastgate, is designed to contain information. How simple or sophisticated the information files become is completely up to the user. A Tinderbox file is made up of notes, containers that can hold text, links (to other notes or URLs), and pasted images. Notes can be nested within notes, as in an outline, which is valuable in projects such as writing a book. They can also have various shapes and colors, and be sorted according to numerous criteria. All of this information can be viewed in various ways: an outline, a map, and a chart, among others. It can also be exported as text or HTML files by pushing the notes through templates (it's actually possible to create and run a website using Tinderbox).
That's the simple description: a file containing notes containing data, easy and useful from the start. A look at the product's manual and website, however, reveals that there is much more. For example, notes can be turned into prototypes, templates that can be applied to other notes with the click of a button. Therefore, if a user wants to assign a color to identify a specific kind of note (red for private data, for example), they can create a prototype note for this purpose.
Color and shape are only two of many attributes notes can have. Attributes are characteristics a user assigns to notes. They range from basic identification (showing the dates a note was created or modified, or a word count) to more sophisticated options for fetching and exporting web content. In addition to the many attributes included in the program, users can create their own. These attributes are essential for using some of the program's more advanced features, such as agents (user-created queries which collect notes with specific attributes) and actions (which modify, move, and otherwise control what happens to notes based on user-defined conditions).
If all this seems daunting, users can turn to the friendly, helpful community that has grown around Tinderbox. Eastgate's website has many pages devoted to Tinderbox, along with a forum and an email list where Mark Bernstein, the program's creator, is present and active.
Tinderbox is a program that does whatever the user wants to. For some, this is liberating; other users, however, need a more defined workstation for their data. Such users might prefer a program like DEVONthink.
DEVONthink
DEVONtechnologies describes DEVONthink as a "paperless office," a place to deposit and create files. DEVONthink can store various kinds of media: images, sound, video, and text. Users import files (from a drive, the internet, or even from email messages), and DEVONthink stores these into the file's database. Once a file is imported, it can be deleted from its source, and will remain in DEVONthink. Files can also be created within the database, as either plain or rich text, and exported in various formats: Word, PDF, text, RTF, or HTML. Any file can contain links to URLs or to other files within the database. It can also be further identified via attached metadata. All of this information can be placed within folders, which can then be nested to form a user-defined hierarchy of data. Alternately, DEVONthink itself can classify documents using its Artificial Intelligence capabilities (see below for more on this).
The program also has a built-in web browser, with the ability to store live URLs (which can be viewed within DEVONthink) and also web archives (pages or sites saved into the database). Furthermore, any links appearing in other kinds of documents can be viewed within DEVONthink (or, alternately, in the user's preferred browser).
This format has many potential uses: a photo collection, an archive of PDF files (which are searchable in DEVONthink), and an inventory of sound clips are just some examples. This is greatly enhanced by DEVONthink's AI (Artificial Intelligence), which can, for example, index all the words in all text documents, or suggest documents that are related to one another. For this reason, the more data the user puts into DEVONthink, the more powerful and "smart" the program becomes. For example, a student writing a thesis can put all their research material into a DEVONthink database (notes, URLs, and other media), and ask to see material related to other files that they are writing or reading.
DEVONthink comes in three versions: Personal, Professional, and Professional Office. They differ in terms of the quantity and type of material that can go into the database, and in that the Office version has features such as email and scanner import. Either of them, however, will be priceless to anyone seeking to rind themselves of file clutter, either digital or physical. And as with Tinderbox, the DEVON online community is dynamic and always ready to help new (and experienced) users.
Conclusion
This article can only skim the surface of what these two great programs can do. Fortunately, both are available in trial format, to help users decid whether they prefer the freeform Tinderbox system or DEVONthink's paperless office.
