I understand that it's been a long time since we charged our customers for an upgrade, and that some people are still waiting for specific features that we don't have planned for a 3.x update. But OmniOutliner 3 certainly hasn't sat still over the last 7 years, or even for the last year—for example, OmniOutliner 3 introduced support for Auto Save and Versions and full screen mode on the day Lion shipped.

We've been constantly making major improvements to OmniOutliner 3 for its entire life cycle—starting with adding Intel support on the day Intel processors shipped. (If you remember back to that transition, can you think of another third-party developer that added Intel support for free—rather than charging for it in a major upgrade—and that had Intel support available on day one? Or even within the first few months?)

Between that early Intel update and our most recent Lion updates, we've also added support for Spotlight (on the day Spotlight shipped), dictionary lookups, LinkBack (for editable embedded content from OmniGraffle and other apps), Automator workflows, Quick Look (both for outlines themselves, and for their embedded attachments), custom toolbars on specific documents, Word 2008 export, saving unsaved documents even when the system crashes, revamped inspectors and unified window toolbars—and quite a few AppleScript features. (And that's not counting all the work that has happened underneath the hood: bug fixes, performance improvements, security updates, operating system compatibility updates, exporter updates, and so on.)

I'm glad that folks are looking forward to OmniOutliner 4—we are too!—and I know that it's been such a long wait for people wanting some of the features we've implemented for it. But please appreciate that a big reason that OmniOutliner 3 has continued to be so useful for as long as it has is because we've been giving it a lot of attention the whole time: it hasn't just been sitting still.

[QUOTE=Ken Case;104773]If you remember back to that transition, can you think of another third-party developer that added Intel support for free—rather than charging for it in a major upgrade—and that had Intel support available on day one? Or even within the first few months?[/QUOTE]
I'm not shy about voicing criticism (see my previous post!) but I have to say that in this regard you are #1 in my book, and there are some other third-party software vendors out there who may not be getting more money from me any time soon! I'm especially thinking of a certain vendor which for years tried to obfuscate the fact that they were not shipping Intel-based software by making a Universal version of their launcher application, but leaving the software that did all the work PowerPC only. Naturally, Intel support could only be provided in a new major release (read: major upgrade price), and not available until the Lion timeframe!

[QUOTE=Ken Case;104773]... a big reason that OmniOutliner 3 has continued to be so useful for as long ...[/QUOTE]

It continues to be [B]the[/B] most useful single piece of software on my machine, not least because it has a really excellent Applescript library, through which it can be reshaped to do more or less anything ...

(FWIW, on price elasticity and upgrade intervals – I would personally have been quite happy to pay higher levels of rent on it over the last few years – I hope that a generous approach to these things hasn't made it sub-economic, or limited the number of hires that could be afforded).

I admire the patience that you all seem to have. I have made it a habit to look every 3 or 4 months on the status of OO for Mac. It's hard for me to understand how is it possible that it takes so long. I am now confused but I have the sense that's been more than a year late than the original date?

I wish we had a better outliner for mac. I have grown accustomed to Evernote for most of my work, but do miss the outliner functionality.

Maybe some day...

Waiting for zoom
 

I too have been waiting for the OO4 update for over 4 years, ever since I first switched from PC to Mac. I was hoping to use OO back then, but the lack of a zoom feature made it unusable for me. I check back on these forums often and have even bought OO for iPad, as well as all versions of OF. There was inference made on these forums that OO4 would have zoom implemented, but the development pace of OO4 seems to be glacial, even though I am aware that OG has bettered OO3. I hope we are getting close to the finish line, but I wonder...

[QUOTE=Yata-Hey;105108]I too have been waiting for the OO4 update for over 4 years, ever since I first switched from PC to Mac. I was hoping to use OO back then, but the lack of a zoom feature made it unusable for me.[/QUOTE]

I would also find oo3 unusable without a simple zooming script which toggles between screen size and print size, but with such a script I find that the issue of display font size simply doesn't arise for me in practice ...

[CODE]property pScreenSize : 16
property pPrintSize : 12
property pBackColor : {65535, 65535, 65535} -- {64928, 63055, 60274}


-- OmniOutliner Professional
on run
ToggleSize(pScreenSize, false)
end run

-- Optionally apply a variant screen size directly through LaunchBar
on handle_string(strSize)
try
set lngSize to strSize as integer
on error
return
end try

ToggleSize(lngSize, true)
end handle_string

on ToggleSize(lngSize, blnScreen)
tell application id "OOut"
if (count of documents) < 1 then return
tell style of front document

-- temporarily increase the font size in screen mode
tell attribute "font-size"
if blnScreen then
set pScreenSize to lngSize
set value to pScreenSize
else
set blnScreen to (value is pPrintSize)
if blnScreen then
set value to pScreenSize
else
set value to pPrintSize
end if
end if
end tell

-- temporarily lower the the background contrast in screen mode
tell attribute "text-background-color"
if blnScreen then
set value to pBackColor
else
set value to default value
end if
end tell
end tell
end tell
end ToggleSize
[/CODE]

Thanks
 

Thanks - I'll give it a try!

[QUOTE=Yata-Hey;105206]Thanks - I'll give it a try![/QUOTE]

I just added the script. It should solve your problem.

Thanks, RobTrew.

Is there a list somewhere of the current changes that will appear in OO4? I really, really like OO. It's what I build and maintain my talks and lectures in, which as an university professor is a good chunk of what I get paid to do. At the same time, things like View Zoom seem increasingly weird not to have. I have recently consolidated a whole host of my workflow in DevonThink, and while it's not my ideal app for writing, I am wondering if I wouldn't be better off trying to use it in some fashion. If I had a sense that OO4 was going to offer some of the features I have been looking for, mostly having to do with better view and print options, then I could more easily plan to take advantage of those features. If they remain off the table, well, then, I would know it's time to move.

I still depend on OmniGraffle and OmniFocus, so it's not like I'm leaving OmniGroup behind, but simply letting a venerable application go its way while I go mine.

[QUOTE=StefanPapp;102935]Hi,

Right now, there is no note taking app for Mac with a mobile client that fulfils the requirements of knowledge based notetaking as an outliner app would solve the problem.

Stefan[/QUOTE]

Stefan,

Would you mind elaborating on what you mean by a knowledge based notetaking app? I'm very curious! Thanks