layout: post title: Welcome to Vancouver, Dan - let the Outliner games begin created: 1128063742 categories:
- Windows
- outliner
- OPML
- Dan V
- vancouver
- Application
- Vancouver
- Microsoft
Roland already did the podcast for Bryght Radio with Dan, but I owe him a post talking about some of the ideas we discussed regarding outliners, OPML, the universe, and everything.
Dan is aiming high. He's here in Vancouver doing heads down work on Focus, the best outliner for Windows. Basically, he says he wants to build the Omni Outliner for the Windows outliner market. I asked him all sorts of devil's advocate questions, like what about web-based outliners, or cross platform ones, or Dave Winer's OPML Editor. Well, for starters, he's got a wiki filled with all the outliner apps he can find, so he's definitely surveying the competition. The next part is that he's got some definite market segments in mind. He's going to build his outliner so it meets the needs of Getting Things Done disciples. And he's building it on Windows because he a) wants to make money and b) thinks there's room for a great desktop outliner on Windows (maybe cross promote with Omni?).
I bugged him a bit about open source, but there are very few examples of great desktop apps in that category. As well, Dan plans on a plug-in architecture -- actually, embedding Python via the .NET framework to make the whole thing scriptable. Sounds pretty cool, and pretty much the equivalent of AppleScript on the Windows platform.
I think he's got some other plans with regards to "instant outlining" and connecting with Dave's OPML editor, but I'll let him make the big splash about that.
So, welcome to Vancouver, Dan. I'm sure we'll see you at some more Vancouver Web 2.0 User Group meetings, and of course, if you're a supporter of the Innovation Commons concept, go add your name to the list.