Created by OrgPad Info
Explaining big design decisions in OrgPad that may not be immediately easy to understand.
The linear structure follows the flow of speech. The written sentence is, in fact, a timeline of the sounds we produce. But the thoughts in our brains work like networks, in which space is more important than time. It takes a lot of energy to “export” these networks into sentences where we have to keep grammar, syntax, and stylistics in mind. So, we need an alternative to work with ideas freely and naturally.
We also had to get used to the linear structure and learn it. If we were to read from right to left, as is the case in many languages, we would also have a problem at first.
Baruš’s experience: “This is the conclusion of a TED talk I took excerpts from. I wanted to straighten this chain of sentences, but then I suddenly stopped and thought about why I originally placed them like this. If you look at it, you can see that the moment the speaker uttered a negative, I went down with the cell. But as soon as the BUT came up, I went up. And as the arguments graded, I climbed higher and higher up to the most important conclusion. This couldn’t have happened if the cells were automatically generated. Here I was able to observe how I actually felt and experienced what the person was saying.
These principles also helped me when I was working as a teacher. I suddenly had an incredible insight into the personalities of the children in my classroom and it completely revolutionized my approach and relationship with them.
Even the kids themselves said that it helped them to get to know each other and even themselves better. This is of great value to me. Even though it may seem like a small thing. But this is what OrgPad is all about.”
When you first see someone else’s document in OrgPad, you may not know where to start reading or how the concepts are organized. As you gain more experience, ideally through your own creation in OrgPad, you’ll develop a new way of reading that will help you navigate your way through the document quickly.
Usually, you quickly scan the whole document with your eyes and then focus on the items that catch your eye. These are either places where it is obvious at first glance that there is a beginning (e.g., the center of a star, the beginning of a chain...) or topics that are important to you. The arrows help to put the information in context.
The structure will also show you how the author thinks about the topic. For example, a cluster of many elements points to something that is important to them, a chaotic structure indicates chaos in the mind, a geometric structure indicates the need to keep things in order and under control, and so on. It’s a lot about intuition, much like looking at a work of art.
It is not our goal to please everyone at all costs. We believe that everyone can learn to read and work within this free structure. But the deciding factor is whether one sees the value in it to make it worthwhile to put some effort into it. It’s perfectly fine if someone just isn’t comfortable with OrgPad and doesn’t want to deal with it.
The manual placement of elements is actually similar to the principles of drawing. The drawing reflects many of our feelings (see “How to read OrgPad” for more), but it also has considerable benefits for our memory. The act of placing the cell yourself and playing around with the structure are important parts of our cognitive process. The associated visual memory, learning mechanisms and even sort of meditative moments where we let our brain take a break are amazingly powerful. Rearranging documents for you would destroy one of OrgPad’s advantages.
To deepen the understanding of your own and other people’s OrgPages, it’s useful to be aware of the structures and their meaning that all people create spontaneously.
We want the new user (which can be also a child) to know what to do right away after signing in. We want them to be able to create spontaneously without having to wade through a lot of features and elements.
We want OrgPad to be as simple as possible, without unnecessary features. Each new button requires your energy, the need to learn to understand and navigate them. It’s annoying and distracting.
You’ll never have overlapping cells; everything will always fit together so that the elements are just the right distance apart each time. This also saves you a lot of energy.
One of the drawbacks of mind maps is that sometimes people focus too much on the map itself – its embellishment, coloring, etc. This is something that OrgPad wants to limit so that people can fully concentrate on their work.
However, because visuals are very important, especially for memory support or in presentation materials, there is the ability to easily insert images and graphics.
 | That’s why we have carefully selected a palette of 15 colors that always go together. You can also make selections by color. This would not be possible otherwise. |
Sometimes people would like to see more distinctive colors. In the beginning, there were such colors in OrgPad, but we found them very distracting. That’s why we chose non-intrusive pastel colors that are still clearly distinguishable from each other.
Because content can be added to cells, it is possible to open and close them. This could cause overlapping content, which we definitely don’t want. We also want you to be able to conveniently add new cells without having to manually reorganize the entire document. This wouldn’t be possible if the position of some of all the elements were fixed.
We care very much that you feel comfortable in OrgPad, that everything is dynamic, smooth, and always easy to see. That’s why the behavior of cells and connections is programmed to interact intelligently with each other, always moving out of the way and organizing themselves. We are constantly tweaking this behavior of elements in OrgPad.
The moment you are to be relieved of the need to pay attention to aesthetics, we need to take over this task for you.
We think carefully about every single element and decide whether it should be a part of the user interface or not and in what form. It even makes a big difference if you have a choice between two or three options. It completely changes the way you think and your mindset when you work. That’s why people switching from other applications may experience some frustration in OrgPad, but it's just a matter of habit.
We are convinced that the specific way of thinking that the OrgPad environment leads to, guides people to new ideas, solutions, more clarity, and better efficiency. It prevents us from creating overly complex systems that are difficult to navigate. It also opens up possibilities for introspection.
By limiting the options and putting a lot of emphasis on visualization. Having the whole topic constantly in sight allows one to see when things get tangled up, where they are complicated, or when one cannot grasp them properly. Limiting options leads us then to increased focus on the work at the expense of setting styles and “beautifying” our OrgPages. As a result, documents are simpler, have a relatively uniform look and feel, and so we can once again talk about preventing overcomplication.
