Whiteboards

You will usually start off by inputting your information to a "whiteboard", as you saw in "Quick start". The alternative is to use "column views" which are described below.

Both views allow you to scroll as soon as there is more information than fits into the window at one time. You can use the scroll-bars at the right and lower edge of the view, or the PgUp, PgDn, Home and End keys. Keeping Ctrl pressed while using one of these keys or cursor-left or cursor-right scrolls further than without Ctrl.. If you have one, your mouse-wheel scrolls - and in combination with the SHIFT key it scrolls horizontally.

Creating a "Column view"

A "Column view" is like a whiteboard, but it has a few added functions. As the name suggests, it has "columns". A column shows all items with a particular value for a certain aspect. In the example "Project plan" the aspect "Who" has the values "John", "Sue" and "Alex". 

An item is considered to be "in" a column when its left edge is in the column.

Use:

Create a column view by clicking or choosing "View | New column view" in the menu. In the dialog, select the aspect which should define the columns (in the example above, that was "Who"). Click OK and the new view appears containing the data you have entered so far. If you already input various values for the chosen aspect, a column will appear for each. There is always a nameless column for items in which no value has been entered for that aspect.

(If your project has exactly ONE aspect, you won't be asked which one should be used - i.e. no dialog appears and the view is created immediately.)

Columns

An item is in a column because it has a particular value for the aspect which defines the columns. (E.g. it's in the column "John" because that's its value in the aspect "Who".) Dragging and dropping an item from one column to another changes that value; the change is immediately visible in other views. In short, the position and the value of an item are directly linked in a column view.

Use

While a column view is active, the menu item "Insert | Column" is enabled. Choosing this is one way to create one or more new columns.

The following explanation uses the example "Project plan".

When you drag the item "Burn CD" from Alex's column into John's, in the current view and all others, the value in that item is immediately changed to "John".

When you edit an item, its position is changed accordingly. If you input a new value for the aspect defining the columns, a new column is automatically created and the item jumps there. E.g. you edit "Burn CD" so that "Who" has the value "Pat". A new column with the header "Pat" is created and the newly edited item moves there. (Of course, this only happens when you complete the editing by pressing ENTER while the cursor is in one of the input fields.)

Columns can be renamed. All items in that column get the new value. Example: John leaves the project and all of his activities are taken over by Steve: simply rename John's column to "Steve"; Steve now owns all items in that column.

To rename a column, double-click the header of the column. Alternatively, right-click the header, choose "Rename" and enter the new name.

If you click the mouse on the line dividing two columns in the header
    you can drag the line to the left and right, thus narrowing or widening the column to the left of the line. Note:
 - You can't move the line further to the left than the left edge of the right-most item in that column. Otherwise you might accidentally change the value in an item without noticing. 
- There is also a minimum width a column can have, so you can't drag the line further to the left than that, either.

You can change the order of the columns by choosing "Move left" or "Move right" in the header's context menu. (The nameless column must stay on the left.)

Similarly you can sort the columns using the header's context menu and "Sort columns".

Advanced usage

You will frequently find that you want to change a number of items so that they all have a particular value for a given aspect (e.g. they should all belong to "Alex"). A good way of doing this is to use a column view. Even if you haven't got one for that aspect, you can create one on the fly, drag the items into Alex' column, then close the window again.

Alternatively, if you happen to have a view with the requisite aspect defining the colors, use the button in the color scheme. 

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