Additional view option to display notes in a side pane rather than in-line

#1

I used to use a mindmapping tool, Freeplane, as an outliner before I found Dynalist. I like Dynalist better in almost all respects except one. In Freeplane it was possible to change the view mode such that the note attached to the active node was displayed in a side pane.

As an avid user of notes (sometimes very long ones) in Dynalist, a side pane would be my preferred way of viewing/editing notes. The view modes for notes could be: In Line (formerly Show), 1st Line, Hide, or Split (new).

In the new “Split” mode, the document panel could be split in two vertically with the left side showing the list (no notes) and the right side showing the note of the active list item. The two sides would need to be scrollable independently. The split could also be horizontal, which might work better for display on phones or if there is eventually a feature to allow multiple document panels on the same screen. It would be convenient if the list items on the left gave some indication of whether there is a note attached. Could be a different color or icon or something.

The main benefit of showing notes in Split mode instead of in line is the ability to scroll through long notes without scrolling your list off the screen. Currently if I scroll through a note that is more than one screen in length, I lose visibility of the entire rest of my list (which I would prefer not to). Even for short notes I’d prefer that my list doesn’t “jump around” as I expand and collapse different notes. I mostly treat my list like a navigation menu for selecting notes to view. For that use case, it’s much nicer if the menu stays put as different notes are opened/closed/scrolled.

Let me know if a screen shot would be helpful and I can show what this looked like in Freeplane.

#2

I like this, particularly as it gives you the ability to see the entirety of one note without expanding them all and all hell breaking loose. However it seems to me that the obvious place to put this would be where the document / bookmark / tag pane is now (i.e. as another ‘view’)? This can already be expanded to whatever width you like

Edit: maybe the other meta data associated with that node could be in the same pane also?

Shift-enter should behave the same as Enter if the cursor is already in a note
#3

I like this idea a lot too. I would love to have a “notes” pane that shows the note of the currently highlighted node. It would be nice to collapse/hide notes in the main node view but still have the current node’s notes available in the side pane.

Great suggestion @Rob1 !

#4

Related to this, it was once suggested to always show the note of the current root item in full. This would also solve this, right? You would zoom into the item you want to see / edit in full.

#5

This feels quite different to me. I imagine using the pane thing when you’re moving between many items at the same level - zooming in and out constantly is quite clunky for this.

Also Louis I think what you said has happened without announcement - it seems to be there for me anyway.

#6

I totally agree. I think putting notes/comments in a right-hand sidebar is a standard UI paradigm. The left-hand sidebar is pretty much reserved for navigation.

Moving notes out of the outline also keeps the flow of the document intact.