Tinderbox by Eastgate Systems

1st. of a couple of TB posts…

Today: Intro, learning curve and licensing scheme…

I personally find Tinderbox an extremely attractive albeit daunting beast.

Tinderbox is as it’s company puts it:

‘The tool for notes‘…

But it can be much more than that… It could easily become your (…)”personal content management assistant”… should you be willing to delve into a few HTML basics, database query basics, regular expression basics, etc.

I’ve been playing around with it, on and off, since November 2005 when I bought my license.

–Didn’t really wait to the trial period to expire… but that wasn’t as much a consequence of myself really getting absorbed by the software, rather than a personal problem with compulsive software license buying… but that’s a whole different story…–

Quite frankly, the first few months I felt extremely overwhelmed by it. I didn’t really put the app. to some serious work precisely because of this… It is my honest impression that most new users will find themselves in the same situation. Why would this be so?

Steep learning curve. [Lack of 'learn by example' documentation?]

It has been widely reported that Tinderbox hasn’t got the most colorful and friendliest documentation on earth. (You’ll find a couple of interesting reads about this and other aspects of the program that will be mentioned in this and following posts to come in my next TB installment.)

You’ve got to be a bit of a ‘technogeek’ to be willing to make the effort of putting up with the scarce and, once again, not-so-friendly documentation and start your research of the web, the community blogs and the wiki around the program.

I first reached the conclusion that wiki was started as a reaction from some users and ‘power-users’ because of this lack of learn-by-example documentation, since I found a couple of links pointing at an 404 URL at somebody’s private domain… I was wrong… the wiki is and has always been hosted at Eastgate. –Many thanks for the correction Mark!–

As of this writing, Tinderbox’s 3.5.2 .dmg downloadable file comes with a 234 page PDF manual, as well as with a handful of templates and ‘wizards’ aimed at different purposes… One of this ‘wizards’ is an add-on that will assist you in the process of setting up a blog and requires an additional paying license… (More about this on a later post…)

Should all these resources not be enough to make you proficient in the use of Tinderbox, you can always gather with its developer, a bunch of Mac-notables and other fellow users and join the cult at Tinderbox Weekends!

Tinderbox Day Chicago: March 2006

Though I recognize I’m quite eccentric and I’d love to write about how I crossed the Atlantic just to attend to Tinderbox Day Chicago… I would not be telling the truth if I said so… but it was a great and convenient coincidence that Tinderbox Day was taking place at a city I was having to visit this last spring…

At my suggestion, Mark Bernstein (reportedly Tinderbox one man developer team), was kind enough to provide me with a discounted early signing fee, though I couldn’t commit to attending the session until a few days before it was scheduled to take place. He also allowed me to pay for it at my arrival, which was a bit of risky on his side considering he hadn’t met me before… and that as far as he knew I was… coming from another continent?…

About Mr. Bernstein: I found him a very educated and well mannered man. Everyone who reads his blog – a must if you are into mastering the app. since more often than not he provides little tips and tricks here and there…– quickly realizes about his mind openness, wide interests as well as thoughtful opinions…

‘The Tinderbox Way‘ by Mark Bernstein, is the title of an extremely nice guidebook on Tinderbox features and uses that complements beautifully the aforementioned grey Tinderbox manual. All the attendees to TB Day Chicago were handed one copy of the draft.

Though still a work in progress, it provides some really interesting insights on the process the author undertook to develop the app. and also about the rationale behind its features and general way/s of accomplishing tasks.

One last word about the resources Eastgate makes available to its users: recently, it looks like they’ve seen the light and first through Mark Bernstein’s Blog –though currently you’ll find them as well as at the Tinderbox website–, they have started to provide a couple of screencasts showing (by example) how the app. can be used to accomplish different purposes… First examples include a video on how to use Tinderbox to gather ideas and design a plot, as well as a series of four really interesting ones that show how a user uses the app. to set up a sophisticated diabetes tracker.

Licensing Scheme

Coming tomorrow VII/30 … promise!
[Update: Licensing Scheme subject moved to a post of its own...]