"Andrea" wrote: Hello there everybody,

…and this is precisely why I don’t use the nested tabbles – In addition to making the classic workspace rather useless in intuitive drilling into my info (following an idea thread) it also requires adding upwards of 5 (or more!) very useless tags to all my files. And yes, Maurizio, for me, and it sounds like how mkayi is using it, using the nesting function -does- make the workspace useless to our way of use and the negates the reason for using tabbles in the first place.

This was pretty much my exact argument when you implimented this version of nesting and why I’ve asked for a switch or some other way to allow the user to chose whether the parent-tabble is inherited, at minimum. In the workspace, have the tabbles break out by parent tabble, much like it does by color group or alpha.

Ok, let’s see if we get it right:

– what you like of the old main window is that you can have all the tabbles always visible and zoom/pan to have a better look over them.

(Before I reply, I have a feeling there may be some confusion regarding terms both here and with the ‘inheritance’ discussion, so to begin; I have used the term workspace to refer to the main window (the menu choice does say "Tabbles Workspace" but so does the main default in the file panel) so from now on I’ll refer to the Tabbles main window as the "desktop" and the now default window as the ‘file panel’, which contains the ‘tree’ on the left. Hope this helps.)

Correct. AND the ability to move tabbles into little ad hoc groupings during an idea generation process and/or to group disparate topics/people/agencies/places together that I believe will collect or generate more info over a short(ish) time period.

"Andrea" wrote:
– what you don’t like of the nested tabbles is:

1. * it reduces the usability of the old main window because you see only a portion of the total tabbles, and when you double click into one you’re brought to the file-window and to the tree.

* when you using the tree, you have to click into each node (tabble-father) in order to see its children, and this is a lot of work each time…

Regarding item 1 – Yes and no. Yes in the sense that I do want the ability to see any or all tabbles I want to see and not have to go through a rather clunky hide/unhide process. One idea to that end was a ‘profile’ ability where hide/unhides are user defined and selected easily. Another was, when the categories were discarded, a way to have collapsible "windows" in the desktop where you could drop in tabbles no matter their color and collapse or expand them as you wish. (Both these ideas, in fact, would form a basis for access levels in a business version, but that’s moot now anyways.)

No, in the sense that I don’t have a problem going into the file window when I’m drilling for the files themselves. I don’t know if it makes alot of sense to you, but the "idea generation" thing I’ve been talking about from day one is about the biggest reason I use Tabbles; in my ‘writing’ db to get ideas about characters and settings, in my ‘bills’ db to lay work out who gets paid now and who later (getting too common these days in my household… oy), and in the primary db to get a visual sense of the players and topics surrounding a political issue.

I guess it’s kind of a zen visual processing kinda thing and is a different ‘level’ than when I get down into the file window where I’m still doing an amount of visual processing via the tags and filenames, by then I’m really more following an idea thread and am "info generating".

Sorry for the long explanation for such a short question. 🙂

As for item 2 – Nope – my problem was not clicking to open it, but my misperception of how inheritance works overall, and quite honestly I’m still confused about that. No issue with the tree at all, but with the nesting as it’s displayed in the desktop screen as noted in item 1…

"Andrea" wrote:
Did we get it right?
If so, what if we put a button in the tree that allows you to open all the nodes at once, or even better, one level at once? This way you would click once (or twice…) and have all the tabbles visible in the tree. I believe this would improve the situation and solve 50% of the problem. 😮 :geek:

Um, ok… As I said, not a problem with the tree, but it sounds like a nice idea…

"Andrea" wrote:
I guess (please let me know if I’m wrong): that we could split the left 50% this way:

• * 25% = having the tabbles to group differently within the tree (alfabetical, color group etc.) – this may be done soon or later

• * 25% = the fact that by zooming/panning you feel you have way more control – this is more complicated for us…

Bring multiple sort abilities to the tree seems to me to be a natural evolution of it, much like the various sorting that can be done in the desktop.

And no, it’s not a feeling of control or anything of the nature, zooming and panning are requirements to using the freehand layout. I hope I explained my use of the desktop vs file panel well enough above to show you that I use them in different, but complimentary, ways.

"Andrea" wrote:
What we’ve been thinking too is implementing a view mode in the old main window where you can see all the tabbles at once (regardless of their nesting) and get them grouped by color… this is also feasible but rather complex to implement therefore we can’t put in top of our roadmap right now… 😕

Well… Ok, but I can achieve the same thing by just keeping my "flat file" configuration and using the sorts already available in the desktop. I don’t use those sorts though, I use the freehand layout so I can move tabbles around.

I have no doubt many of my thoughts and ideas are probably nightmares to code and you guys are doing a great job in improving and refining the program into something with wider appeal than just in the dna household… 🙂