Does anybody here know a program similiar to DEVONthink, which runs on Intel-platform? An app for Windows or Linux? I mean, it can’t be so difficult to code - but I only found Mind-Mapping applications. :(
Any suggestions?
Best regards,
-mARKUS
No idea as we don’t do Windows over here ;D
A colleague of mine saw devonThink on my laptop and wanted something similar for his own ude. He spent most of the afternoon looking for a solution…at the end of the day he said that there are a few tools, but al of them are either missing features, bloated, or just plain impossible to use. 
Just wanted to share this bit of trivia with you - so much about the myth that Macs lack software.
Of coure - if anyone knows a good Windows application similar to DT, do tell.
Hallo Markus,
I dont have an answer to your question, but you say, you have found only Mind-Mapping apps loking for DT on Win…?
I do Mind Mapping since many years and have further developed MMs to a self learning UI, which will run on WIN and Linux too. But MMs have nothing to do with a database tool DT, which I use to store infos. What do you mean with this…?
I mean, I’ve searched Google for "knowledge management" and similar words. But I only found links to MM-software (e.g. "TheBrain" - which sounds promising, but is an ordinary MM-app) and DT - but no single app for Windows which has similar features like DT. 
Best regards,
-mARKUS
Hello all…
I did come across dtSearch Desktop, an indexing program on PCs that offers some of the same capabilities (and, as far as I can recall) stellar search options: boolean operators if not regular expressions galore. I believe it may be closer to what you’re looking for…
Claude Bolduc
Translator
Editra
Windows is aptly named: throw it a pebble and it shatters.
Markus–
I’ve just switched to a Mac after 20 years on the PC, and have lots of experience with the kind of software you ask about. To my mind, the best of the lot is askSam (asksam.com). There are several that have something like the DT user interface: InfoSelect (http://www.mic-log.com) and TreePad (http://www.treepad.com) are the best known. If formatted text is not important to your friend, he should check out the eccentric but enormously powerful Zoot (http://www.zootsoftware.com).
If DT’s Standard Edition comes to have many of the features that have been promised, and if it becomes possible to assign documents to multiple folders, it will be more powerful than anything comparable for Windows.
HTH,
Steve
Thanks, Steve. But from what I’ve seen, these are all database apps, where you have to manually sort the data into a tree or categories or something like that. Besides, these apps have too much functions which I don’t need.
I’m searching for a simple app which let’s me store texts and automagically creates links between matching documents. Perhaps I’ll try to code such an app myself … can’t be so difficult.
Best regards,
-mARKUS
That’s already possible - just replicate your documents and add them to multiple groups. Or if the "Classify" drawer is open, select multiple destination groups.
Yes, but there are two problems with this approach, one minor and one major. Say I have five iterations of the same document, in five different folders.
-
The minor problem is that, if I search on a term included in that document, all five iterations will be returned in the search results. The blue color and the word "copy" appended to the title insure against confusion, but it is still a little inelegant.
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The major problem, which makes DT much less useful for certain kinds of research than it might be, is that any change I might make to that document must be made separately, five times.
Though the distinction between "copying" and "assigning" an item is drawn from PC programs–the old (and great) Lotus Agenda for DOS, and Zoot for Windows–I hope you won’t think I’m whining about the inadequacies of the Mac and its software. I love my Mac, I love OS X, and I love DT!
Best,
Steve
Steve:
If you replicate (rather than duplicate) a file and place replicants in multiple folders, neither of the problems you anticipate happens.
[1] Only one occurrence of the file shows up in search results.
[2] Since there is really only one copy of the file in the database, edits to the file show up in all the replicants.
Yeah, DEVONthink really is good!
It would be nice, though, if the Info window displayed the locations of all the replicants of a file.
Thanks, Bill. That is indeed what I was looking for–but I didn’t look hard enough! Apologies for wasting everyone’s time. I promise humbly to RTFM before mouthing off again…
Steve
I also think it would be good if all the instances of replicants/duplicates could be displayed somehow simultaneously when one of them is displayed. (I don’t know how - perhaps even through contextual menus?) This is part of the issue of navigating the database as it gets bigger and more complex, which can get confusing without some kind of outline or map. Especially when trying to coordinate it with files located in numerous other places on the computer, other volumes, or network…
In one of the next release we’ll display the different locations of replicants in the info panel (probably using a combo box or popup menu).