[Brian]

We've done pretty well in our 15 year history by listening to what our customers want and trusting that features with broad appeal make for an app with broad appeal.

This feature has deep demand among a narrow segment of the customer base. I'm really sorry, but it's not the same thing.

Solutions that involve walling off sections of the application into modes aren't going to fly; if there's one thing we've learned form OmniFocus, it's that customers hate arbitrary limitations like that.

Unless we can do it right - integrate it with the app's other features - we shouldn't do it.

[rogbar]

Hi Brian,

I understand - and agree - that deep demand among a narrow segment of the customer isn't the same as broad demand. But, for what it's worth, ECCO's cloning did not prevent people who didn't want cloning from using the program simply and easily without it.

I'm just hoping you guys figure out how to do integrate it so it it doesn't interfere with those who don't want to use it. It's an EXTRAORDINARILY useful feature that opens the app up to almost unlimited possibilities of customization.

I'm pulling for you ...

roger

[Allen Wicks]

Originally Posted by Brian

We've done pretty well in our 15 year history by listening to what our customers want and trusting that features with broad appeal make for an app with broad appeal.

This feature has deep demand among a narrow segment of the customer base. I'm really sorry, but it's not the same thing.

Agreed it is not the same thing. What IMO Omni is missing - by a lot, based on comments here - is how extraordinarily powerful a tool cloning can be. With cloning implemented and marketed the appeal could be broad, not just a narrow segment. The folks at MORE missed it too; they had an awesome tool they did not fully understand and hence did not market.

Originally Posted by Brian

Solutions that involve walling off sections of the application into modes aren't going to fly; if there's one thing we've learned form OmniFocus, it's that customers hate arbitrary limitations like that.

An app like OmniFocus requires free-form as part of its raison d'etre. An outliner however is by definition structured. I believe OO users would accept structural limitations of a feature like cloning. After all, the folks who do not need cloning lose nothing. Only those of us who need cloning would suffer limitations, and for clone users losing a few features like some columns interaction is no big deal.

Originally Posted by Brian

Unless we can do it right - integrate it with the app's other features - we shouldn't do it.

I could not agree more that unless you can do it right you shouldn't do it. However I do not at all agree that it somehow is not "right" unless it integrates fully with all other OO features present and future. Cloning is so powerful it deserves inclusion without being excused away based on conflict with some other feature.

Thank you.

-Allen

[Ken Case]

FYI, as part of the design work we did for OmniOutliner 4 we did figure out how we would like for cloning to interact with the rest of the feature set, so that's no longer an issue. (And we agree that cloning is useful, which is why we went to the trouble of designing it in the first place.)

But we still think it's more important to get OmniOutliner 4 shipping as soon as possible than to add cloning, so it's still not planned for this release.

[dude]

This thread is depressing.

[roframor]

This is good news! At least you solved the problem. We hope to see it in OO as soon as possible.

Roberto

[Allen Wicks]

Originally Posted by Ken Case

...we agree that cloning is useful, which is why we went to the trouble of designing it in the first place.

Thank you, that is very positive news.

...we still think it's more important to get OmniOutliner 4 shipping as soon as possible than to add cloning, so it's still not planned for this release.

I for one will upgrade for sure when cloning becomes available (or even buy a separate plug-in). However until cloning is available I expect to hold off on upgrading.

Thanks for your help!

-Allen

[steve]

Originally Posted by Brian

This feature has deep demand among a narrow segment of the customer base.

Perhaps there isn't a deep demand among a broad segment of the customer base because people don't fully understand the feature. I get the idea conceptually, but I have never used an outliner with a cloning feature.

[Robert Patton]

I have been using MORE since 1987 and find it so indispensable that I keep an old Mac around to run it. My life and my work as a writer is based on it. Every year I create a new calendar file which gives me a place for each day's to-do list and archive. I mark unfinished tasks from the previous day and then move them to the current day. If I wish to record that I partially finished something on the previous day I clone it and move the clone.

Notes about the task are added as they are created and appear in all cloned instances of the item. A stroke of the enter key opens up a word processor document at the heading of the task, For example, a task might be Post comment on cloning on Omni blog. Hit the enter key and type the post. When done the post can be created as a separate document in the format of choice.

Suppose I wish to keep a record of all similar blog posts. I clone the entry and move the clone under the appropriate heading. Cloning allows me to keep this document under separate headings for many different purposes.

Suppose I write an email on some technical subject. I can keep a record under the date, a clone under subject heading, another clone as a note for chapter heading in a planned book.

MORE 3.1 is still the best tool for my purposes but I dream of something still better. My dream outliner combines MORE features with mind mapping capability and many powerful features from Microsoft's OneNote. I especially like OneNote's ability to print to a file within the program and wish I could do this with a program which combines the features of OmniOutliner and MORE.

While I'm dreaming, this uberoutliner could also replace PowerPoint and be able to turn outlines into sophisticated presentations.

Well there you have it. That should keep you busy for awhile.

Robert

PS I also would like to be able to move files from one operating system to another and back again.

[Allen Wicks]

Robert-

I wish that I had done what you did, and kept an old box working just for MORE. I falsely assumed some modern outliner would quickly provide the HUGELY beneficial cloning capabilities of MORE but it has not happened. Great loss of the report/specifications generator that I had built using MORE cloning.

-Allen