MindManager is a mind mapping and project management tool that aims to boost users’ productivity. It is designed to facilitate a wide range of project types, and includes cross-platform functionality and 3rd party integrations.
I actually use all these tools for different purposes. OneNote isn't ideal, but it's on my Mac, PC and iPad and all the notes are seamlessly available everywhere. Mindjet is better for documenting things that can be grouped or put into hierarchies. Visio is (for me) a …
Stands ahead of the competition; native compatibility and robustness of solution make it the tool of choice. OmniGraffle's price and level of functionality surpass the alternatives.
I love to outline in MM and its ability to link related maps. Great help to me as a writer! I don't love the export of the outlines. Needs to be a cleaner, simpler look. I work around it, though. I rated the above question 6 only because it's too expensive. I've had it for years and, until recently, got almost every upgrade. I can't afford it now and may have to look for an alternative to keep updated software. Bummer!
Omnigraffle is great for documentation, mapping, flowcharting, and other technical diagramming scenarios. It's simple enough to bang out a quick illustration and powerful enough to build complex blueprints for complicated technical systems. If you need cross-platform compatibility, though, you're probably better off looking elsewhere. If you want complex integration with data sources (ala Visio's SQL Server integration for shape metadata), OmniGraffle also falls short — but those scenarios are few and far between in my experience.
OmniGraffle is fairly simple to use, but the one thing I think it does best is working with curved lines, particularly if you are using some of the available arc templates. Drop an arc onto your page, then tell it the dimensions it needs to be, and viola! Done. Manipulating the arcs is as simple as clicking and dragging offset points.
OmniGraffle has also done an excellent job in stirring up the creative minds of many people who create templates and tools to work with OmniGraffle (not that Microsoft hasn't done so either), and managed to get the bulk of those into well organized repositories.
What it all boils down to for me is: it just works. One doesn't need to have a computer science degree to work with it either. It is as simple or complex as you want it to be.
I find formatting a challenge. Example, make all the boxes the same format and fonts so when you add a box, it understands the format of the top level box.
I have played around with some of the templates but find creating my own each time is better route. The project plan template is very good but I find myself deleting boxes and again, takes more time than creating a new map every time.
I try to get colleagues to use MM but they are intimidated by the UI. I am really comfortable with it but to them it can look more complex than it really is.
I'd love to be able to keep more than one of the different tool tabs open at a time.
The stencils are amazing. Would be great if a whole lot more of the free ones came standard as opposed to having to download them from Graffletopia or other sites.
I feel the main issues of the old Mindjet seem to be gone with the Corel purchase. With the huge advance of sharing via browser HTML even 1 user can affect many. And, actually, using MM kind of forced my rigid brain to rethink how I categorize and classify information/projects.
The idea of paying $69USD for an annual cost is more than fair and a great model for Corel/Mindjet to keep rolling out improvements!
MindManager is very intuitive. The user interface is not cluttered and the ribbon icons are easy to understand. Several excellent "how-to" videos are available on the MindManager site as well as on YouTube. MindManager starts quickly and the user interface is very responsive. Launching other programs from MindManager such as Excel is very fast and issue free. The browsing feature is lightning fast. The drag-and-drop capability is also very fast and reliable.
The application is quick and responsive. We are able to produce mindmaps and reports with ease. The program is not complicated at all and integrates well with software and programs like Microsoft Outlook and Teams, which we truly appreciate.
I have called technical support a few times. During the COVID Crisis, I called a few times repeatedly due to a rush request. The technical support guy called me back in minutes. He somehow knew that I had called repeatedly and wanted to make sure my issue was resolved immediately
The videos are not well categorized...I had to do a bit of digging to get what I wanted and many videos on older versions. If Mindjet was to improve the titles used that would help.
Both are equally good. Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect is used to get the models in a more technical format in comparison to the MindManager. MindManager is easier to use in comparison to Sparx Systems Enterprise Architect. MindManager makes collaboration easy and can be understood by a layman and does not need to have specific software training.
While these other tools are great for what they are, OmniGraffle’s solid focus on and support for diagramming makes it our tool of choice for communicating workflows and concept relationships, creating documentation, and creating other diagrams. Its libraries allow us to create designs quickly, and its ease of use enables us to use the tool widely across the company without much time or effort spent on onboarding.
When scope planning before I was introduced to this tool, I needed to make one master Work Breakdown Structure (WBS) for the entire project and move on. With MindMapper, I typically generate about 20 WBS-like charts throughout the project, which encouraged conversation with staff members. The major key in such ease of use has been some well thought out and very intuitive keystroke planning that allows me to keep up with the free flow of ideas.
This software's cross-functional capability allowed 10 engineers to create their projects directly within their own environment without use of a virtual machine.
Omnigraffle isn't an expensive software tool, so there isn't really any negative from the perspective of raw cost. Thinking in terms of time spent using it on a project - what you create in omnigraffle will inevitably lead to a dead end. It's useful only as documentation. There are other tools like Sketch that integrate into prototyping software and can create useable visual assets for applications in addition to being able to create wireframes.
