mlevesquedion / outgraph-py

Produce a graph visualization from an outline.

Outmind

Produce a mind map from an outline.

Usage

python3 outmind.py <outline_file>

Recommended usage

I created this tool because I was dissatisfied with the available options for creating mind maps. Specifically, all mind mapping software I've tried so far is lacking in the following ways :

• Absent or poor automatic placement of nodes and edges (doing it manually is a pain)
• Editing the mind map is slow, usually due to absent or poor keyboard shortcuts

My recommended worfklow is therefore to open an outline in Vim and to register a command that runs outmind on file save. Open the resulting PDF using a viewer that has hot reloading capabilities, and voila. You can now mind map at the speed of thought.

Outline format

The outline is assumed to describe a tree, with a single "root" element. The indentation is assumed to be a single space per level.

Valid outline

Root
 Child1
  Label: Subchild11
  Subchild12
 Child2
  Subchild21

Output

Invalid outline (two spaces for indentation instead of 1)

Root
  ChildTwoSpaces

Todo

• Allow labeled edges
  • Implementation idea : edges can be indicated by a colon, e.g. is:ordered would create an edge labeled "is" to a node labeled "ordered"
• Relax requirement to have one-space indentation everywhere
  • Implementation idea : infer indentation and normalize to single space before passing to outline_to_edges