Zengobi's Blog

Curio 8.6 with Panic Status Board support

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-05-06T07:10:53-07:00

Curio 8.6 is out with one major new feature for you power-users out there: support for Panic's incredibly cool Status Board application. For more information see the latest release notes.

Once running, you will see a Status Board chart showing your starting and due tasks:

And a Status Board table showing your action items, which are tasks that need to be started or are coming due:

Exporting to PowerPoint

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-05-02T06:19:18-07:00

While Curio doesn't support a direct export to PowerPoint, it does support image exporting where each produced image has a sequential, numerical prefix so the resulting images mirror the ordering in the Organizer. We can use this feature, introduced in Curio 8.3, to produce our PowerPoint presentation.

First we start with this handy tip from Microsoft on how to import photos into PowerPoint. Using that tip you can quickly create the 2-step Automator application described in the article. I called mine CurioToPowerPoint.

With that helper app ready, simply follow these steps:

In Curio, click the Share toolbar button then choose Export As > Image. Choose to export JPG images and also create a new folder for the output. This is also where you might want to specify a scaled size for each exported image. Then click the Export button to fill your new folder with image versions of your idea spaces.
Launch PowerPoint and close any windows that appear when it launches.
Launch the CurioToPowerPoint Automator application and then, in the dialog that appears, select all of those exported images and click the Choose button.
PowerPoint will create a new slideshow and import each image, in order, to create the presentation.

Ta da! You now have a PowerPoint presentation of your Curio project. Enjoy!

Curio 8.5.1 important fix!

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-04-23T16:36:45-07:00

I'm terribly sorry to report that there was a bug in yesterday's Curio 8.5 release that may move Scrapbook asset items to your Trash.

If you're currently running 8.5 then just do a Curio > Check for Updates to grab the latest 8.5.1 release which fixes this issue. Otherwise you can download Curio 8.5.1 directly from here.

You can recover any Scrapbook assets out of the Trash and drag them back to the 8.5.1's Scrapbook. Again, I'm sincerely very sorry for this issue.

Update
If you use Time Machine or another backup system then you can also recover your Scrapbook file more directly, as follows.

Go into the Finder.
Hold the Option key down and click the Go menu then choose the Library menu item.
Within the window that appears go into the Application Support folder, then Curio, then Repository, then Libraries.
Select the Scrapbook.curio project and activate Time Machine to grab a version of that file from Sunday (i.e. before you installed 8.5).
Click Restore within Time Machine to bring back that older version of Scrapbook.curio.

Curio 8.5

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-04-22T06:55:43-07:00

Curio 8.5 just tiptoed out the door. While it has a handful of new features the main thing is a huge list of robustness tweaks and fixes. Basically every bug or stability issue reported to Zengobi has been addressed in this release.

On the feature front, table fanatics will really enjoy Curio 8.5's incredibly cool support for new drop options when dragging items into Curio tables. Curio can now place the dropped items in a single column (adding rows as needed), a single row (adding columns as needed), or spread across and down (adding rows as needed).

Also, if you use standard OS X text lists (via the Lists popup on the ruler) within table cells you're going to enjoy Curio 8.5's smarter support for the tab key. If you are editing a list then tab and shift-tab will indent or outdent the current text list item. Otherwise, if a non-list cell is being edited then tab and shift-tab will move to the next or previous cell, as expected.

Lastly, something I've been meaning to add for ages, is support for moving files directly into Curio.

Normally when you insert a file into Curio, a copy of the original file is made and stored within the Curio project package. By holding down the Option key you have been able to store an alias to the original file instead.

Now you can move a file directly into Curio by holding the Command key while dragging a file into the idea space, the project library, or the Scrapbook library. The Insert > File dialog has also been updated to support moving in addition to copying and aliasing. Slick stuff.

The oft-forgotten Help menu is now a lot more useful. It now includes links to the video tutorials on YouTube, to the Zengobi Forums, and to the Curio 8 Advanced Settings page. As well as a handy "Ask Support" item to quickly send questions to Zengobi Support.

Check out the incredibly complete release notes for all the details and enjoy!

Request: Your project statistics

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-04-17T07:52:12-07:00

I have an open request to all Curio 8 customers out there who really love Curio and want to help me understand how you use Curio in your own projects.

Take two or three of your best, most representative projects and choose the File > Mail As > Project Statistics menu item for each of those projects and send those stats to me (I think everyone knows my email address).

You can preview the email before sending it but, don't worry, the stats don't include any private data from your projects. It just lists things like how many sections, idea spaces, videos, PDF's, and mind maps you have, the common sizes of your idea spaces, if you use scribbles and Calendar syncing, etc.

I really appreciate it as it will give me a good idea about how everyone uses Curio which, in turn, helps me determine future directions and feature sets.

Getting the latest Dropbox app

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-04-11T02:47:21-07:00

After reading another review of the overhauled Dropbox 2.0 I became perplexed why my Dropbox hadn't updated yet. I was still back on an older 1.6.x version with the older interface, even though Dropbox is supposed to auto-update.

To determine what version you're running:

With 1.x, click on the Dropbox icon in your menu bar and choose Preferences > Account.
With 2.x, hold down the Option key and click on the Dropbox icon in your menu bar and choose Preferences > Account.

I went to Dropbox's download site and manually downloaded and installed the latest which is 2.0.6, at the time of this writing.

I know many Curio customers use Dropbox and it looks like lots of bugs have been fixed recently, so if you're not on 2.0.6 then make sure to grab the latest version.

On a related note, Curio 8.4.1 and above support a new, much easier technique for syncing your Curio application support folder across multiple machines using Dropbox.

Curio 8 mind map tips video

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-04-02T11:41:41-07:00

Check out this new video tutorial which goes over some useful mind map tips in Curio 8.

One thing I forgot to point out regarding Manual Child Coloring versus Automatic Child Coloring is that manual is a one-time operation. It copies the colors of the parent down to its children just that one time. If you change the parent's colors the children won't update themselves. However, with automatic coloring the children will dynamically update themselves any time the parent's coloring changes in any way.

Enjoy!

Updating your Zengobi RSS feed

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-03-20T12:35:38-07:00

Since Google Feedburner may not last for long, given Google's treatment of the Google Reader service, I've set up a new URL for our blog feed.

Update your feed reader so the link to the Zengobi's blog feed is this:

http://www.zengobi.com/feed

Currently it simply redirects to Feedburner but with this in place we can redirect it to a different URL when the time comes.

By the way, in Google Reader you can't actually change the feed. Instead you have to remove the old and add the above link as a new feed.

Thanks everyone!

Curio 8 and Evernote Business

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-03-15T03:39:03-07:00

Curio 8's integrated Evernote shelf works wonderfully with Evernote free and premium accounts. We've heard from many customers that it's one of the biggest features they love about Curio and is incredibly useful for accessing notes collected while on-the-run with Evernote's various mobile clients.

However, Curio 8 does not currently work with Evernote's new Evernote Business, which was announced in December.

A user with an Evernote Business account essentially has two note stores accessible via the same login: a personal store of notebooks and notes, and a business store of shared notebooks and notes. Currently Curio 8 will only show those items in your personal store.

There are a number of additional code changes we would need to make to support Evernote Business accounts including separately authenticating the user with their business store and separately retrieving their business notebooks.

More importantly, while your personal authentication is valid for 1 year, the business authentication automatically expires after just 1 hour which means you would need to be re-authenticated pretty frequently.

From a security and privacy standpoint, allowing a 3rd party app to access a corporation's shared Evernote Business repository also raises some issues and concerns.

While I investigate this further, please continue to use Curio's Evernote shelf to access all your normal Evernote notes but use Evernote's native clients to access your Evernote Business notes.

Curio 8.4 - relationship lines!

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-03-13T05:42:14-07:00

The #1 requested mind mapping feature is now in the just-released Curio 8.4: mind map relationship lines.

Select two figures in your mind map, right-click then choose Add Relationship Line, and a curved line with midpoint will be added to your mind map pointing from the first figure to the second figure.

It's important to note that this relationship line is a real Curio line figure and thus supports all the normal line attributes such as labels, coloring, width, arrowheads, scaling, dash patterns, etc. Style it any way you wish using the Shape inspector. Add additional midpoints. Add one or more line labels. Make it curved, straight, or orthogonal.

Here's another new feature in Curio 8.4 that will make lots of customers happy. Normally when re-arranging nodes in your mind map or list, Curio maintains the styling of those figures. This way you aren't surprised by Curio suddenly changing your carefully tweaked figure styles. However, now if you press and hold the Shift key right before dropping the figures then they will adopt the style of the branch they are being dropped to.

You can read all the details here in our Curio 8.4 release notes. Enjoy! :-)

Curio will automatically alert you that the new update is available. Or choose the Curio > Check for Updates menu item to grab it now.

Lastly, I should note that Curio 8 has just received 4 out of 5 stars from Macworld UK! Fantastic!

Listen to George on Systematic

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-03-06T05:24:46-08:00

I was the guest this week on the Systematic podcast hosted by Brett Terpstra. I had a great time discussing Curio 8, brainstorming, and keeping your mind open to new ideas. I had a blast doing the show and sincerely enjoyed talking with Brett about something I care so much about, both personally and professionally.

Quick flowcharting / concept maps

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-03-04T03:22:49-08:00

A customer wrote last week asking about concept mapping in Curio. The main difference between a concept map and a mind map is that the latter has a requirement that a child can only have one parent. With concept maps, a child can have any number of parents. The resulting map looks more like a freeform diagram or flowchart with figures connected to each other using directionless, unidirectional (a single arrowhead at one end), or bidirectional (arrowheads at both ends) lines.

Curio has a true mind map collection figure but we don't currently offer a general concept map container. However, they can be easily constructed using Curio's attached text functionality which we added back in Curio 6.4.

Simply by holding down special modify keys (Command, Option, Shift) and clicking you can expand your map with connected figures. This is a fast and fun way to brainstorm in a freeform way, without the formality of a mind map, directly within Curio.

And attached text was recently improved in Curio 8.2:

If a selected figure is a freeform-sized figure, then when creating an attached figure (by holding Command or Command-Option or Command-Shift and clicking), Curio will now make the new attached figure a freeform-sized figure of the same size.

and

After creating an attached figure we no longer auto-remove the figure if you don't type something into it at that time.

This makes certain types of freeform thinking maps, such as bubble and double-bubble maps, much easier to produce. Curio now includes examples of both as bundled figure stencils.

Happy brainstorming!

Curio 8.3

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-02-28T06:38:33-08:00

True, it hasn't been that long since 8.2 but I've been coding like crazy and there are some great new features in this release that I couldn't wait to get out the door.

Now you can drag any document into the Organizer and we'll use Quick Look's viewer for any files where we can't use an RTF, WebView, or PDFView. This is a great new feature as you can add iWork documents directly into the Organizer and fully browse their contents all from within Curio.
The Organizer Filter text search will now look into Organizer document contents instead of just at the document titles. Wicked cool.
The ever popular Spread PDF feature is now even more useful. Read the release notes for the full details.
You'll love this one: when you use the Search shelf to search for text that appears in a spread PDF'ed document, Curio will now only highlight those figures which show the pages that the term appears instead of all of the pages of the PDF. Students around the world, rejoice!
Bookmarks have been improved.
Double-tap (aka Smart Zoom) support to quickly show you all your current figures.
New Scribble detachable popover color palette for easier sketching.
The Status shelf now has a splitter so you can change the size of the Projects vs. Tasks area.
Line labels are now easier to position using the arrow keys.
New sort by alias option in the project Library.
Lastly, an export image change where each exported file now has a sequential numerical prefix that keeps all exported files in the same order as they appear in the Organizer.

You can read all the details here in our Curio 8.3 release notes. This really is a pretty nifty release. :-)

Curio will automatically alert you that the new update is available. Or choose the Curio > Check for Updates menu item to grab it now.

Back to school promotion

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-02-25T03:37:44-08:00

Thanks to a student from beautiful New Zealand, I was reminded that schools are beginning in the lands down under. To make going back to school a bit easier we're announcing a back to school sale!

Just enter the coupon code BACKTOSCHOOL at our online store to get 20% off a new, single-user Curio 8 license (upgrades are not eligible). This brings the price of our full-featured Curio 8 edition down to just $79.99 USD, which is one of our lowest prices ever, so jump on this offer before it expires on Friday, March 8th, 2013.

Professors, teachers, and students make up one of the largest audiences for Curio. We have thousands of academic customers around the world that use Curio for their note-taking, research, and brainstorming needs. Download a trial and check it out today!

Curio 8.2

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-02-19T09:11:20-08:00

Curio 8.2 was just released with lots of new features and tweaks for everyone to enjoy.

One of the big new features is Biggerplate.com integration. So now you can browse one of the largest mind map repositories on the net within Curio and instantly download and import mind map templates directly to your idea space.

Another feature, at long last, is support for line figure text labels. Just double-click on a line to create one or more text figures that are stuck to the line itself. You can slide a text figure up and down along the line using the mouse or the arrow keys to reposition it. To remove a text figure simply select it and press the Delete key.

There are many other enhancements and fixes, including an urgent fix related to the Move to Back/Front arrange slider, so I encourage you to read all the details here in our Curio 8.2 release notes.

Curio will automatically alert you that the new update is available. Or choose the Curio > Check for Updates menu item to grab it now.

Valentine's Day

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-02-14T05:37:36-08:00

Ten years ago I started Zengobi and created Curio. My goal was to provide a tool for you to use to achieve more in your endeavors. To be a top-of-the-class medical student, an amazing professor, a best-selling author, a world-renowned designer, a prize-winning scientist.

I love getting your emails and reading about what you've been creating with Curio and how it has changed your life. Plus your feedback makes Curio an even better product.

All of this makes me deliriously happy.

In short, I ♥ my customers. Happy Valentine's Day to all of you!

Nifty date stamped note stencil

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-01-30T10:30:42-08:00

A customer wrote earlier today asking how he can create a text figure that included an automatic date and time stamp as the first line.

I thought the solution was pretty slick so I'm posting it here for everyone to enjoy.

1. Create a new text figure by double-clicking on the idea space.
2. From the main menu choose Insert > Variable > Figure Date Added > Medium Format.
3. Press spacebar.
4. From the main menu choose Insert > Variable > Figure Time Added > Medium Format.
5. Press return.
6. Type "This is a note."
7. The resulting text figure should look like this:

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
{%FigureDateAddedMedium} {%FigureTimeAddedMedium}

This is a note.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

8. Hit Escape to stop editing the text figure. Note that variables are now rendered with the date and time the figure was added to your idea space.
9. Right click on the text figure and choose Save As Basic Figure Stencil and give it a name like "Date Stamped Note".

Now, whenever you want to add a date-stamped note to Curio just click the Insert toolbar button, then click Styled Shape or Stencil, then choose your nifty new stencil in the Personal > Stencils category.

The date and time within the note will automatically update itself to the actual date and time the note was added to your project.

Of course you can use these nifty date and time variables with any sort of figure in Curio. If you want a date-stamped index card or list, just insert the variables in there and save the result as a figure stencil.

Curio 8.1

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-01-28T11:22:48-08:00

Curio 8.1 was released today with a bunch of new features, tweaks, and fixes including new PDF highlighting colors, a nifty single page spread PDF, a cool Insert > Space menu, much smarter Curio hyperlink handling, better window restoration, and tons of fixes with Calendar syncing and Notes inspector handling.

Read all the details here in our Curio 8.1 release notes.

Curio will automatically alert you that the new update is available. Or choose the Curio > Check for Updates menu item to grab it now.

Backups and peace of mind

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-01-15T06:26:33-08:00

I just finished an email exchange with a customer who had deleted a Curio 7 section, confirmed the alert that appeared stating that the deletion is non-undoable, and then realized he clicked the wrong button after watching over a year of notes disappear.

There are some recovery techniques we can use in Curio 7, as long as the project isn't re-opened. And there are even better recovery techniques we can use with Curio 8's more robust internal file architecture. But, in this case, it was too late to recover this particular data.

Accidents will occur, hard disks fail, bugs happen, and lightning will strike without warning. This is where a great backup strategy can save your valuable data.

The easiest, in my opinion, is Time Machine. Built into OS X since Leopard back in 2007. It backs up all changed files every hour to an external drive. I use OWC's drives and have always found them fast, quiet, and reliable. Lion added encrypted backup support and Mountain Lion added support for rotatable drives. The interface for exploring older versions of your files is intuitive and easy to use. For the cost of a cheap drive (about $100) you have peace of mind and incredibly fast local backups.

Next, a cloud backup service is highly recommended in addition to a local backup. I personally use BackBlaze. They offer unlimited backups and support monthly, 12-month, and 24-month plans. Paying $95 for two years of unlimited backups to an offsite cloud is a pretty darn good deal. Other services include CrashPlan, Carbonite, and Mozy.

You can also implement a whole-disk backup plan with either Carbon Copy Cloner or SuperDuper. Either application can create a bootable backup disk on an external drive -- basically an exact, up-to-date copy of your internal drive. So if you have a catastrophic disk crash you can simply boot off this external disk and you're instantly up and running with no need to re-install OS X and recover from either Time Machine or a backup service.

Lastly, don't forget about services such as Dropbox. Their free 2GB plan is perfect for creating periodic backups of your important files. Just Option-drag them to your Dropbox folder to quickly sync them up to their cloud.

On a related note, you may be wondering why Curio doesn't use Lion/ML's Versions feature. I'd love to but it doesn't support super large project files very well. When it needs to create the archived version it will freeze the main thread, and thus the UI, to make that backup copy. For large projects, this can result in a significant delay (measured in minutes). More details are here in the forums.

If you don't have a backup strategy then please take a few minutes to check out some of the links above.

Keeping it simple

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2013-01-07T07:41:48-08:00

There were several objectives in mind for the Curio 8 release but the key mantra was simplicity.

Coincidentally, during this period of development, I read Isaacson's fantastic Steve Jobs biography. Steve repeatedly pushed the goal of delivering a simple product and service. Where everything just works. Where the focus is on the user experience. This deeply resonated with my new mantra.

I stepped back and looked, not just at the product, but at everything Zengobi and focussed on simplicity.

Yes, Curio 8's new user interface is vastly simplified compared to its predecessor. Every screen was scrapped and re-written to create a better experience. Likewise, the internal file format and code architecture were re-constructed to be more robust and to more easily facilitate future extensions and new functionality.

But then other areas outside of the core Curio product were also tackled.

The user manual was re-written to make it more useful as you stepped through the user interface.

The Getting Started project bundled with Curio was re-created to better offer a guided tour of the major features.

The trial system was scrapped. Instead of the confusing default trial and extended trial dual process we now have a simple, longer default trial. Also no more obtrusive dialogs getting in your way during the trial, and no more extended trial "spam" going to your inbox.

The website was re-designed and re-built. Many pages were combined or eliminated. A calmer, less cluttered, and more informative look was delivered.

Instead of three editions of Curio, which required a confusing feature matrix for potential customers to decode, we brought out a single super-fantastic product. This simplifies the purchasing process and greatly reduces support inquiries.

With a single product the online store was also greatly simplified. Yes, we could have maintained the confusing crossgrade/upgrade matrix, say a range of $49.99 to $79.99 depending on what you currently own, but that's against the simplicity mantra. Based on past experience we know that would have created confusion as customers made incorrect orders leading to support emails, partial and full refund requests, and frustrated re-orders or cancellations.

With new pricing, primarily in honor of our 10th anniversary, we also no longer have separate retail and academic stores. Instead we simply offer a single store with a lower price for everyone. I'm no longer deluged with emails from financially strapped non-profits, charities, religious institutions, the recently-unemployed, and self-financed startups requesting the academic price. Everyone gets the same low price.

With a single product with simplified new and upgrade pricing the store database, store code, purchasing scripts, and purchasing database were all greatly simplified with far fewer erroneous orders.

In the end, you have a better experience at every stage and I have more time to produce the features and products you want.

Curio 8 tips and tricks video

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2012-12-14T08:08:49-08:00

I just posted a quick tips and tricks video based on questions I've received since Curio 8's launch. Enjoy the tutorial and please send me any suggestions for videos I should tackle in the future.

Curio 8 review at Macworld

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2012-12-10T09:51:01-08:00

Another awesome Curio 8 review! This week the folks at Macworld awarded Curio 4½ mice out of 5:

I have yet to review a better, friendlier, or more powerful tool for taking on any project under the sun.

Curio 8 review at MacLife

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2012-12-10T09:47:32-08:00

Great review of Curio 8 at MacLife where we received an excellent 4½ out of 5 rating:

If Evernote and Keynote and NovaMind all got together and had a baby (never mind the mechanics, OK?), the offspring might look a little like Zengobi's Curio. A virtual whiteboard with presentation capacities, Curio has the organizational chops of Evernote, mind-mapping capabilities comparable to the best apps, and the ability to run slideshows with transitions, though with a limited palette. Taken together, Curio is one fast-loading, responsive package with fantastic potential and tons of flexibility.

Curio 8 review at Mac.AppStorm

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2012-11-14T02:09:27-08:00

Fantastic review of Curio 8 at Mac.AppStorm with an overall score of 9/10:

Two years ago, when I reviewed Curio 6.4, I described the application as a “workshop for your creative projects.” Today I’m going to take a long look at the just released Curio 8. According to Curio’s developer, George Browning of Zengobi, the new version is “the most ambitious Curio release since its inception ten years ago.” Does Curio 8 live up to this billing? Is it a major improvement? Should you upgrade? I hope to provide those answers for you, as well as giving you an orientation to the new version that will help you better evaluate it for yourself.

Curio 8 overview video

noreply@blogger.com (George) — 2012-11-06T03:30:46-08:00

On our Curio website I recently posted a Curio 8 overview video that gives a quick 10-minute tour of Curio and some of its major features.

Next to the video you'll also find an HTML and PDF export of the Getting Started project that comes bundled with Curio. Both exports are great ways to see what you can do using Curio.

Separately, you can also read the complete Curio User Manual if you'd like to check out all the features in detail.