Visual Mind

It’s always better to visualize your activities, and even your thoughts, and ideas. The practice is called mind mapping, and with the help of specialized applications like Visual Mind, you are able to create such patterns for both personal, and business tasks, with tons of customization options at your disposal.

Accommodation is among the last things you need to worry about, and one reason behind this is the popular ribbon menu style used to house all functions, and features you get to work with. Most of the space is the canvas, with options to bring up an additional notes panel, as well as a quick access bar to jump to different project elements, or search for specific items.

There are several built-in templates you can start from, depending on the task at hand. You can also start from scratch, or create your own template for later use. From this point on, it’s only a matter of creativity, and the way you bundle tasks, and ideas inside shapes, categories, and groups.

Adding new items can take some time, but this is only because of the variety, and abundance of customization options. Sure enough, there are some preset style shapes to indicate high-priority tasks, or simple notes, but the application allows you to take control over all visual style options, ranging from text font options, to all lines, and shapes used to draw. Don’t worry, styles can be changed on the spot, at any time.

Each new items can be fitted with one or more child branches, or left floating to indicate separate tasks. Layer support, in this case complexity, allows you to quickly collapse, and expand multiple branches to either view general tasks, or all steps you need to take.

The application lets you insert different types of external data, which can mean any kind of file. Pictures are shown as thumbnails, and there’s also the possibility to link websites, with corresponding icons automatically grabbed.

Reminders, news feeds, callouts, or email addresses can be added to any of the items you create. In case you’re the only one authorized to access a project, everything can be secured with a custom password. When done, exporting can generate files compatible with Word, PowerPoint, Microsoft Project, or directly as PDF documents.

To sum it up, Visual Mind is sure to enhance the way you approach any kind of situation. The familiar interface makes sure you have no trouble accommodation, and the abundance of presets, and customization options can keep you busy for quite some time, if you want everything to look good. All usually goes well, but you need to be patient, because it can show signs of stability issues every now and then.