An outliner (or outline processor) is a specialized type of text editor (word processor) used to create and edit outlines, which are text files which have a tree structure, for organization. Textual information is contained in discrete sections called "nodes", which are arranged according to their topic–subtopic (parent–child) relationships, like the members of a family tree. When loaded into an outliner, an outline may be collapsed or expanded to display as few or as many levels as desired.
Outliners are used for storing and retrieving textual information, with terms, phrases, sentences, or paragraphs attached to a tree. So rather than being arranged by document, information is arranged by topic or content. An outline in an outliner may contain as many topics as desired. This eliminates the need to have separate documents, as outlines easily include other outlines just by adding to the tree.
The main difference between a hand-written outline and a digital one is that the former is usually limited to a summary or blueprint of a planned document, while the latter may easily include all of the content of the entire document and many more. In other words, as a hand-written work an outline is a writing tool, but on a computer, it is a general purpose format supported by a robust development and display medium capable of handling knowledge from its creation to its end usage.
Outliners may be used in content creation instead of general word processors for capturing, organizing, editing, and displaying knowledge or general textual information. Outliners are ideal for managing lists, organizing facts and ideas, and for writing computer programs. They are also used for goal and task management (including personal information management and project management), and for writing books and movie scripts.
An alternative to outliners are mind mappers, which display a tree structure as a node–link diagram.
single pane outliner with second pane used for notes or reference tracking. A third approach to intrinsic outlines is the multi-column outliner. It is similar...
Bloom The Outline (band), an experimental band from the United States "Outlines" (song), a 2014 song by Mike Mago and Dragonette Outliner, a software...
WorkFlowy is a web-based outliner created by Mike Turitzin and Jesse Patel at a Y Combinator startup camp. The idea for Workflowy arose from Patel’s prior...
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to Europe. Atlas of Europe Central Europe Eastern Europe Northern Europe Southern...
associated with a desktop outliner, such as the ability to use of columns to structure information. However, The Outliner of Giants does not support...
builds two outlining products, Little Outliner and Fargo. Little Outliner, an entry-level outliner designed to teach new users about outliners, which launched...
Originally developed by UserLand Software as a native file format for the outliner application in its Radio UserLand product, it has since been adopted for...
The Omni Group. OmniOutliner has most of the features of a conventional outliner, allowing the user to create nested lists of topics for almost any purpose...
to a power-user outliner with "word processing features" while raising the price to $295. They praised improvements in the outliner, rating most features...
The Outline may refer to: The Outline (band), an American rock band The Outline (website), an online news magazine Outline (disambiguation) This disambiguation...
word processor, a cork board with support for index cards and photos, an outliner, and a project manager. Support for comments, images, headers, footers...
A chalk outline is a temporary outline drawn on the ground outlining evidence at a crime scene. The outline provides context for photographs of the crime...
procedure used in Canadian legislative bodies Patient lift, for lifting people Outliner, filter for viewing In computing, hoisting may refer to: Loop-invariant...
software is used as a free-form personal information manager, personal wiki, outliner, personal knowledge base, game master tool, GTD filing system and others...
editors Editor war Line editor List of HTML editors List of word processors Outliner, a specialized type of word processor Source code editor Cameron, D., Rosenblatt...
Nutrition is the biochemical and physiological process by which an organism uses food to support its life. It provides organisms with nutrients, which...
includes not only a client-side blogging tool but also an RSS aggregator, an outliner and a scripting language. Radio UserLand is an offspring of UserLand's...
Fashion Fine arts Graphic arts Drawing (outline) Painting (outline) Photography (outline) Sculpture (outline) Also regarded as a Social science African...
A small outline integrated circuit (SOIC) is a surface-mounted integrated circuit (IC) package which occupies an area about 30–50% less than an equivalent...
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to telecommunication: Telecommunication – the transmission of signals over a distance...
Global Information