Screenshot of bubbl.us
For my latest website project, I decided to get organised and start keeping an electronic log of my ideas and plans. For this I decided to use mind-mapping software.
Searching for a suitable (i.e. online and free) product, I came across bubbl.us. It’s a very simple facility, enabling you to create an interlinked network of idea ‘bubbles’, arranged in a basic parent/child/sibling hierarchy. You can edit the colour of each bubble if that helps you (for example, in the screenshot here, you can see black bubbles – these represent ideas that have since been abandoned or shelved).
One of the great things about this is that I can access it from any computer with a Internet connection. Previously I would have had all manner of scraps of paper littering the place with ideas scribbled onto them – often in a barely decipherable pseudo-shorthand that I developed years ago. Now I’m organised.
Of course, I still have scraps of paper everywhere with design sketches, layout concepts etc. But I quite like it that way; you should always keep it a bit old-school…
Epilogue
Screenshot of bubbl.us
I’ve also taken to colouring white any bubbles that have been dealt with, resulting in a lovely black and white chart as seen here, indicating a job well and truly done!