NovaMind Software recently released a beta version of NovaMind 5.7 for Windows that has some intriguing new capabilities. Two of them have clear productivity benefits; the third I’m still scratching my head to figure out how it could possibly be used in a business setting.

Format painter

In Microsoft Word, the format painter acts like a smart cut-and-paste, enabling you to copy the formatting from one block of text and then apply it in other parts of your document. It’s a very useful feature, in my opinion. Imagine that capability within a mind mapping environment, and you’ll get the idea of what the developers of NovaMind have accomplished here. This is how the format painter in NovaMind works: You first select a topic, then click on the format painter button (which looks like a paint brush – just like in Word. The cursor changes to resemble a highlighter marker. Any topics you click when the format painter is selected are transformed to match the style of the “donor” topic.

In Microsoft Word, the format painter is designed so that if you click it once, it can only be used to format one block of text, and then it automatically shuts off. However, if you double-click it, it stays “locked” on until you toggle it off, so you can apply the formatting of the “donor” text to multiple blocks of text. I’m pleased to see that NovaMind has decided to mimic this behavior. I tried this feature, and it worked really well. Please see the video above for a demonstration of how this works. It’s pretty slick. The “marker cursor” provides excellent visual feedback, while a single click applies the formatting – no dragging the cursor as you have to do in Word.

New themes added

NovaMind has offered map themes for a while now – pre-set collections of topic, connector line, text and background settings that enable you to change the look of your mind maps very quickly – but version 5.7 adds several new ones, including corkboard and draft (which incorporates the new flexitopics – see below for details). But there’s more that has been enhanced under the hood, if you will – you can now designate themes as favorites and can select one theme to be used as the default for creation of all new maps.

If you are using NovaMind Pro or Platinum, you can create a new theme either from the current mind map or from an existing theme. As the screen shot below shows, NovaMind opens a new “theme view,” which displays a genericized version of a mind map with named elements, and a ribbon toolbar that enables you to adjust any of the map’s properties. You then give your template a name, and save it. That’s all it takes.

I’m impressed with how easy this template editor is to use. Many programs (like the aforementioned Microsoft Word) enable you to create templates, but the process of doing so is somewhat byzantine. In NovaMind 5.7 beta, everything you need is neatly arranged on the toolbar, and the theme name input box is even integrated there. This increases the odds that new users will feel confident to create their own themes.

Flexitopics

The third major enhancement in NovaMind 5.7 beta is something completely new called flexitopics. The format/topic shape menu now contains a new flexitopic option. This converts any topic into a flexible branch with several control handles, which enable you to stretch and reshape it at will. Advanced users can add or delete control points, giving you a very granular level of control over the appearance of your topic lines. This new functionality is tightly integrated with NovaMind 5′s new layout engine, which causes other branches to move out of the way, yet stay fairly close for a compact map layout.

Flexitopics can contain task information, checkboxes and adornment images (NovaMind’s term for icons or symbols); these elements follow the curve of the topic line.

What’s nice is that you can apply flexitopic formatting to any topic, and can create maps with a combination of normal and flexitopic lines. For even greater control. What’s curious to me, however, is how this new capability would be useful in a business setting. Also, NovaMind claims that flexitopics aren’t available in any other mind mapping program. iMindMap has offered a “freehand branch” for some time that enables you to draw complex shaped topic lines, and then manipulate them using control points.

I have now installed this beta version on two computers, and it seems to be very stable. If these enhancements are of interest to you, then you ought to download the beta and try it yourself.

NovaMind Software released NovaMind 5 for Mac last week, which has been rebuilt from the ground up with many innovative new features that no one else on this platform offers. This new version represents the most significant upgrade to NovaMind for Mac in its history.

Here’s what’s new in this innovative mind mapping program:

Because a lot of the changes have to do with map design flexibility, we’re going to take a closer look at those new capabilities in particular:

New layout engine: NovaMind 5 for Mac has been rebuilt with the same layout engine as the Windows version of the program, which makes very efficient use space and automatically repositions topics to minimize wasted space. NovaMind goes further than this, and allows you to arrange the subtopics of any topic either linearly or radially, at any angle – all while keeping the mind map automatically in the most compact format possible. In addition, NovaMind allows you to move any topic to where you want it, while still ensuring that topics don’t overlap each other and maintaining the compact layout.

Automatic design support: Many users of mind mapping software don’t want to mess with styling and coloring topics. They just want to be able to capture and organize their ideas quickly, and create a beautiful-looking mind map with a minumum of hassle. NovaMind 5 for Mac enables with a number of design support systems that operate quietly in the background as you build and edit your mind map. In other words, apart from setting things up the way you want them to start with, the colors and shapes and layout of the topics is automatic.

The first tier of this system is themes. Themes provide an overall design for the mind maps, and are made up of a series of settings that apply to topics, callouts, floating topics, and shapes. The theme system allows you to change the overall look and feel of your mind map in a single operation, while keeping any custom settings you have added. And any new topics you add to your map adhere to the theme settings.

Each theme comes with a color set, which defines a set of colors that are designed to go well together. These color set colors allow you to create great looking mind maps even if you don’t have an artistic bone in your body. If you want to experiment with a different look, you can just change the color set that you are using, and all the colors change to their equivalent colors in the new color set. The same applies for font sets, so with a couple of simple changes in settings, you can update the look of your mind map, while maintaining design consistency.

The next level of automatic design support is automatic coloring, which includes theme-based coloring, as well as “rainbow coloring” and a completely new concept, called array coloring – where you set up an array of colors, and NovaMind cycles through them for the children topics. This means you can do things like having subtopics colored in alternating colors, or cycle through three or more topic colors automatically. I’ve used the rainbow coloring in NovaMind 5 for Windows, and really like it a lot. I’m pleased to see that the developer has taken this idea one step further with array coloring (also available in the latest version of NovaMind 5 for Windows) – which gives you much greater control over the appearance of your mind maps.

NovaMind 5 for Mac also allows you to design a topic the way you want it to look, and selectively get the subtopics to inherit the shape, fill, or line settings, to again automatically set the design of the topics you have added. It even automatically colors the text so that it uses light colored text if the background it is drawn on is dark, and dark text if it is on a light background. I can’t even count the number of times I’ve recolored topics in other mind mapping programs, and then have had to recolor the text because it blended in too much with the topic’s color. It’s great to see that NovaMind’s development team has this handled!

Redesigned topics: NovaMind has redesigned everything about topics, too, in version 5 to give you another level of freedom in customizing the look of your mind maps. For example, you can now have up to 4 images on each topic (which are positioned using a very clever quadrant indicator), multiple hyperlinks and attachments per topic, 10 different topic types plus custom topics where you can change the shape of your topic to create something completely unique. And you can make it more interesting by using the gradient fills, shadows, reflections, glassy look, texture images and more.

You can attach free floating shapes, images and text to topics. There is no need for the topic to finish at the topic boundary – you can enhance the topic with as many shapes as you like. They can be in front of or behind the topics, and can either push other topics out of the way or float behind or in front of the other topics. All the shapes can have text and images on them, allowing you an incredible amount of flexibility to enhance your topics.

iCal integration: NovaMind 5 for Mac now enables you to synchronize checkboxes in your mind map with to-do items in iCal and tasks with events in iCal. It allows you to use the full features of iCal, such as setting alarms, and sharing calendars in order to keep up to date with tasks, which can be particularly useful for businesses using NovaMind.

Cross platform support: The Windows and Mac versions of NovaMind 5 use the same file format, and same license keys, but the programs themselves are developed using native technologies on each operating system, to provide the best user experience. For instance, the Windows version uses the Ribbon bar, which is familiar to Windows users, while the Mac version uses inspectors and toolbars which are familiar to Mac users.

Mac OS X 10.7 Lion support: While NovaMind 5 will run on MacOS X 10.5 and 10.6, they have come right out of the blocks with full Mac OS X 10.7 Lion support, with built in support for Resume, Autosave, Autosave in place, Versions, and Full Screen mode. In addition, NovaMind plays nicely with other applications, importing images from iPhoto, Aperture, and Lightroom, contacts from Address Book and links to Mail messages.

There are three editions of NovaMind: Express, Pro, and Platinum, designed to suit the needs of customers from individuals and schools, through small and medium sized business right up to large businesses.

NovaMind 4 users have been waiting for NovaMind 5 for quite some time, but the wait appears to have been worth it. NovaMind 5 for Mac (and Windows) are light years ahead of version 4. The development team continues to show a lot of innovative thinking that is reflected in practical, time-saving features and intuitive operation. Specifically, the program is designed to look after the layout and graphical design of your mind maps automatically – so you can concentrate on the content.

For more information about NovaMind 5 for Mac, please visit the developer’s website.

NovaMind has launched another update to its Windows based mind mapping software program that offers some nice enhancements to the program’s functionality and usability. This is a free update, which you can install the next time you open the program.

Here’s what’s new and notable:

New topic shapes: NovaMind 5 for Windows now includes a number of new topic shapes, including: Parallelogram Left, Parallelogram Right, Arrow Left, Arrow Right and Cloud. The advanced settings panel now has a “cloud slider” that enables you to modify the shape of the clouds in your mind maps.

New boundary shape: To mirror the addition of the cloud topic shape, boundaries in NovaMind 5 can now have a cloud shape, which is also modifiable in the advanced settings panel.

Office 2010 style application menu: NovaMind 5 now follows the model pioneered in Microsoft Office 2010, with map creation, open and export commands are all centralized into a single drop-down menu.

Enhanced template capabilities: In this latest update to NovaMind 5 for Windows, you can not only create a new mind map from a template, but vice versa – you can save a mind map you’ve created as a template for future use. All templates, including the ones supplied with the program and those you;ve created, are accessible via the file/new menu.

New map gallery: NovaMind 5 for Windows now connects with an online gallery of over 50 example mind maps that you can use as starting points for your maps. These appear to be some of the best maps from the NovaMind map sharing gallery that the developer has updated to be compatible with NovaMind 5. The gallery view lists numerous business-oriented map examples, including a marketing plan, business building using mastermind groups, preparing presentations and more. Each listing in the gallery includs a summary and visual preview, so you can see what you’re about to download. All of these maps are fully editable, which means you can easily customize them to meet your needs. This should be especially useful to new users of NovaMind.

Recent folders: In addition to recent documents, you can now access recent folders. Why is this useful? Some users, including me, don’t always place our mind maps in one centralized folder. Rather, we group them into project folders. So this is actually quite useful to someone like me!

For all of the details, please view the blog post about this update on the NovaMind website.

Never one to rest on their laurels, the developers at NovaMind Pty. have raised the bar on what’s possible with presenting mind maps with the release today of version 5.5 for Windows. It moves to a new slide-based presentation motif, where you can select which topics and subtopics to display, or use something called “walkaround” mode to do a “conventional” mind map presentation – where the program decides what to display. The new presentation tools are only available in the Platinum version of NovaMind for Windows.

The presentation mode in NovaMind 5.5 pushes the envelope in a number of key areas:

• An introduction screen that can be customized to give the audience something to look at prior to the start of your presentation – including a title, subtitle, multiple lines of scrolling text – even a twitter feed!
• The ability to select from one of 3 zoom levels for displaying a topic or topics in a slide
• Auto-updating of slides after you edit any of the map elements pictured in it
• The ability to “hide” slides
• A slide selector, which enables you to view all of your slides in a single screen and quickly jump to any one of them
• The ability to create a slide from multiple elements of your mind map, or from different mind maps within the same file (NovaMind enables you to have multiple maps in different tabs)
• A black screen at the end of your presentation – which keeps your audience from being distracted during the Q&A session after your presentation

These aren’t innovations just for the sake of creating something new, but practical features that will enhance your ability to make stunning presentations, formatted exactly the way you want. I played around with it while creating the  mind map pictured above, and I found it to be very well behaved, very intuitive. I think they have a winner here!

The new presenter mode of NovaMind 5 gives you an unprecedented level of control over your mind map presentations. For more information, I highly recommend you view two new videos that founder Gideon King created to explain the new features of presentation mode, as well as the walkaround mode.

Here’s what’s new and improved in NovaMind 5 for Windows:

Full screen mode: The NovaMind Pro and Platinum editions add a full-screen editing feature, which hides the toolbar and footer to give you more screen real estate in which to edit your mind maps. This should be especially useful for those of you who frequently work with large mind maps. If you’re operating in full screen mode and need to access a command on the ribbon toolbar, you simply move your mouse cursor to the top edge of the screen, and the toolbar slides quickly into view. When you’re done with it and mouse away from it, the toolbar slides back into hiding. I tried this on the big flat screen on my home PC, and it really does make the workspace appear to be much more spacious. I may use this mode for any complex mind maps I create in NovaMind 5 from now on.

New detail levels: The latest update of NovaMind 5 adds a set of controls that enable you to quickly adjust how many levels of your mind maps are being displayed. Your choices include showing only the first level of topics, the first two levels, show all levels of subtopics or collapse a topic. Each of these new toolbar commands has a corresponding Windows hotkey (for example, show only the first level of topics is Shift+Alt+1), so you can quickly change your view of your mind map without touching your mouse. You can also use another hotkey to toggle through each level setting until you find one that meets your needs.

Focus in: As part of the detail level controls, NovaMind 5 for Windows now enables you to “focus in” on a specific topic – which expands the selected topic and collapses all others. There is no focus out command, because NovaMind is still displaying your entire mind map, but with only the currently-selected branch open. As you may know if you’ve been reading this blog for any length of time, I’m a big fan of the focus in/focus out capabilities of certain mind mapping programs, because it enables you to remove all other distractions from view and concentrate on the topic you’re currently trying to develop. If you’re ADD like I am, this feature is quite valuable. Unfortunately, NovaMind doesn’t remove the rest of your map from the workspace, but only collapses the other branches.

When it comes to zeroing in on a topic in your mind map, NovaMind distinguishes between focus and hoist. In their view, focus in is when the currently selected topic and its children are expanded while all other topics are contracted. Hoist, on the other hand, is when only the currently selected topic and its children are visible in the work space. According to NovaMind founder Gideon King, his development team decided to implement this functionality using the former technique, because it retains the context of the currently-selected topic by showing its siblings in relationship with it. One of the big drawbacks of hoist, according to Gideon, is that you lose the context surrounding the current topic.

Also, because of the map layout engine NovaMind employs – in which you can position topics wherever you want and to have different layouts at any point in the topic hierarchy – coming back out of a hoist state and once again displaying all of the topics in their correct position would be very challenging, he added.

Find and replace: NovaMind 5 now enables you to find and replace text in your mind maps, and gives you a nice set of options to control how this new functionality behaves. For example, you can tell it to “look in” all open documents, the current document, selected topics or the selected map (a NovaMind document may contain more than one mind map, in tabbed pages). You can also use a pair of check boxes to restrict your find and replace to topic text and/or notes. I tried using this on one of my existing maps, and found the find/replace dialog box to be initially a little confusing. At first, I only saw one form field, with “replace” and “replace all” buttons next to it. Normally, a find and replace command in a software program has two form fields – one for the text you’re looking for, and the other, of course, for what you want to replace it with. Upon closer inspection, I finally noticed that there was another form field above the replace field, but it completely spans the width of the dialog box from right to left, and I didn’t even see it was there at first. There’s some text sitting in it that says “type here to start a search,” but I thought it meant to type in the form field below. If this first form field was a little shorter, it would be easier to see. This is a minor usability detail, however.

Improved image handling: As you know if you read my review of NovaMind 5 when it was first released, I really liked the way the program enables you to easily add images to your topics, using an innovative four-quadrant selector (see example at right). The developers have improved the functionality of this aspect of the program to make it even more versatile. If you drag and drop an image to a new topic that doesn’t have any text, the program removes the text box completely and tiles the image across the shape of the topic.In addition, the quadrant selector now has a new box above the upper left quadrant (see image at right), which enables you to easily attach an image to the currently-selected topic as a shape.

In NovaMind 5, shapes are powerful layout elements that are attached to topics but are not part of them. Shapes have a number of unique qualities, including the ability to overlap the topics to which they are attached, and to be in front of or in back of the topics. Shapes can either be part of the layout of the topic, pushing other topics out of the way, or be floating independent of other topics, allowing you to overlap a shape with other objects.

The best way to explain shapes is to say that they behave like visual annotations of a topic, enabling you to alter the shape of it and make it more interesting and meaningful. Some examples of what you can do with shapes in NovaMind 5 are shown above right.

For more details on other improvements to NovaMind 5 for Windows, please visit the NovaMind Blog.

Conclusion

While none of the enhancements and new functionality are in themselves earth shattering, the cumulative effect of NovaMind continually upgrading the program’s capabilities is a big win for users of this innovative program.

If you already have NovaMind 5, this update will be available for download the next time you open the program. If you haven’t made the move to NovaMind 5, perhaps now is the time!

In some cases, these lines go behind existing topics, which is really a pain in the butt. It just looks dumb. Several programs provide one or more drag handles that you can use to change the curvature of these lines, but you’re limited in how much you can reshape them. Why can’t you draw more complex lines, like you can in a vector drawing program like Adobe Illustrator or CorelDraw?

Finally, one developer has done just that. NovaMind Pty. Ltd. recently launched an update to NovaMind 5 for Windows that enables you to draw more complex relationship lines, and does so in a very intelligent manner (click on the map image above right to view a larger version). The NovaMind Blog also contains a video where Gideon King shows what the new link lines feature can do.

You know me: I can’t just take a developer’s word for it. I’ve gotta download the update and play around with it, so I can tell you if it’s everything the developer says it is. I’m quite impressed with NovaMind’s new “link lines.” Here’s what I like about them:

• You simple draw a path that you want the line to follow, and the program smooths it out. Nice!
• Multiple control points along the line give you a finer level of control over the line’s shape; you can easily delete control points to further smooth its curvature.
• Adding a new control point is as simple has hovering the cursor over the line; a hollow circle appears on the line and you simply left click your mouse to insert a new control point at that location.
• When you select a control point, a faint line appears that extends to either side of it and it has a pair of handles, one at each end, which you can drag in or out, or rotate it to further shape the line (see close-up image at right).
• Right-clicking the link line gives you access to a properties palette that gives you further options for tweaking the appearance of it.

In short, this new feature is easy and intuitive to use, and is ideal when you want to show a relationship between two widely separated topics in a larger mind map.

If you already own NovaMind 5 for Windows, this is a free update. If you don’t, then I strongly urge you to check it out. The program’s development team is committed to ongoing innovation, and they continue to gain ground as one of the key players in the mind mapping software market. Keep up the great work, guys!

Exceptional control over printing

NovaMind 5 for Mac OS X will feature a new printing dialogue box (click on the image above to view a larger version), which give you options for printing with or without the background image (printing with it tends to take a lot of ink), printing with crop marks so that you can accurately cut pages and join them to make larges-scale print-outs, and adding a border around the entire mind map. There is also the option to print without the topic text, ideal for use in settings where you want to provide the audience with handouts where people fill in the blanks as you go through your presentation.

One of the challenges of printing large mind maps in any program is keeping font sizes legible. NovaMind 5 for Mac OS examines the text of all of the visible topics that are going to be printed, and determines the minimum font size in your map. Then, when you tell the program how many pages your map should be printed on, it displays the minimum font size that will be legible at that level of scaling – very cool!

NovaMind 5 for Mac OS X will also provide users with improved control over pagination when printing out large maps; a preview in the printing dialog box will show you exactly how your map will look when it is divided into the number of pages you select.

Finally, you will be able to select an image for the header and footer of your printouts – ideal if you want to incorporate a logo into your printed maps. NovaMind 5 will automatically scale it to 120 pixels in height, so it doesn’t overpower the mind map.

Map themes and color sets

Like the Windows release of NovaMind 5, the Mac OS X version will offer map themes, which give you control of the overall look of your mind map in a single simple setting, and color sets, which help you to create more attractive mind maps – even if you don’t know anything about how to select complementary colors.

Media browser

NovaMind 5 for Mac OS X adds a powerful media browser, which includes access to your iTunes music library and an integrated Flickr image search – which is ideal for finding just the right image to enhance your mind map. The NovaMind development team is also experimenting with access to Lightroom and Aperture image libraries, plus providing access to images acquired through Image Capture interfaces (e.g., from iPhones and cameras) via the media browser. It’s very cool to see a developer being mindful of all of the new types of content collections that are available on your Mac or out on the web, and giving you the ability to search for them and incorporate these assets into your mind maps. A media library manager will also be included in the new version of the program, which manages the downloading and maintenance of its extensive media libraries. Like the Windows version of NovaMind 5, the new Mac version doesn’t include the media library files in the initial program download. By making them available as a separate download, NovaMind gives users the option to use this asset library or ignore it.

Attachments – on steriods!

Multiple attachments can be added to any map topic in NovaMind 5 for Mac OS X. One intriguing new feature is a tool tip that pops up when you mouse over a topic’s attachment icon (which looks like a paper clip). It displays a number of icons that enable you to:

• Open the file in its default application
• Select which application to open the file in
• Remove the attachment from your file
• Extract the file for use outside of NovaMind
• Edit the attachment information

This new version of NovaMind also adds the ability to monitor any attached files, so it can tell when they have been edited outside of the mind mapping program. A dialog box gives you the option to copy the latest versions of these updated files into your mind maps – that’s cool!

Holy hyperlinks, Batman!

Similar to attachments, NovaMind 5 for Mac OS X gives you a much greater level of control over your topic hyperlinks. Each topic may contain multiple links; a small pop-up window enables you to edit the URL and the visible description of the link (very nice!) and for file links, designate whether the path to the file is absolute or relative. The absolute path defines the exact folder structure within which a file is stored: a relative path starts from the folder where the document is saved.

This is just a snapshot of what Gideon and his team of talented coders have been working on. For more details, please visit the NovaMind Blog.

In my latest report in the Effective Mind Maps series, we’ll take a closer look at what’s notable about this mind map from the NovaMind Connect social mind map sharing gallery, which summarizes the author’s notes from three Jay Abraham workshops into a single visually engaging summary that goes above and beyond a typical mind map.

In these reports, I deconstruct mind maps and analyze what’s good about them and what could be improved – all in the interest of helping you to understand the principles of effective mind map design.

To access this report, you must first login to the Mind Mapping Insider area. If you don’t have one, please click here to learn how to get one.

I recently did a “conventional” product review of NovaMind 5, but to really do it justice, you need to see it in action. In this video review, I focus on the most innovative and useful new features of it that really set it apart from other mind mapping programs.

This video product review is only accessible by members of the Mind Mapping Insider membership program. To become a member, click here.

Let’s take a closer look at what’s new and most notable in NovaMind 5:

New layout engine

Perhaps the biggest change in NovaMind 5 is its all-new layout engine, which automatically keeps your map as compact as possible and minimizes white space – especially useful if you want to print a mind map on regular-sized paper. The program automatically arranges the topics in your maps in the most compact form possible, only moving topics the minimum amount to prevent them from colliding with each other. This makes NovaMind 5 unique among mind mapping software programs, most of which insert large amounts of white space to prevent topics and subtopics from “colliding” with one another.

According to NovaMind Pty. founder Gideon King, there is some sophisticated behind the scenes programming that make all this happen smoothly. The result is very impressive to see in action. As you add new subtopics to a branch, any adjoining branches automatically move out of the way – but only the minimum amount to keep the topics visually separate. If you shorten a topic’s name or collapse a map branch, the other topics around it move in to absorb the extra space created. The layout engine handles callouts, floating topics, shapes and boundaries in much the same way. For a video that shows this new layout engine in action, please click here.

NovaMind 5 does all of this “space control” automatically, but still gives you the ability to drag and drop topics anywhere you want them, while still managing all objects on screen to keep them from overlapping with each other. If you do drag and drop a topic or branch so it overlaps another, the second object will automatically and smoothly move out of the way. Nice! If you’ve worked with any mind mapping program and wanted to adjust the location of a topic to improve the look of your mind map, but the program prevented you from doing so, you know how frustrating that can be. So it’s nice to see that NovaMind 5 gives you the flexibility to place topics with complete freedom. You can also use NovaMind’s advanced settings to adjust the offset and “repel” distance between siblings, which will change the distance at which the program’s “collision avoidance” capabilities will be invoked.

NovaMind 5′s new topic layout engine also includes a new 4-quadrant control, which enables you to tell the program which direction topics should grow – up, down, right or left. So, for example, if you created an organizational chart (which grows downward), you can quickly transform it to a right-facing map using this control. What’s most surprising is that you can use the quadrant control at any level of your map. So if you created a fairly complex radial map (with topics branching out in all directions), and wanted to create a subtopic that had children facing right, you can do that!

In addition, NovaMind 5 gives you the ability to adjust the angle at which the subtopics branch out from a topic, not just at 90 degree angles. If you want a branch to be laid out at another angle, just drag it to be the angle you want. I’m not sure how often people will use this capability, but it’s somewhat cool.

User interface improvements

Often, when you’re working with a mind map, you want to be able to view as much of it as possible on screen. To enable that, NovaMind 5 now includes translucent scrollbars that only become opaque when you mouse over them, and a sidebar that you can close so that it doesn’t take up any room. You can also double-click one of the tabs of the ribbon bar and it will collapse to display only the tab names. If you need to access a command on the toolbar, simply single-click its tab name and the ribbon bar opens once again. As soon as you click on the toolbar button you need, the ribbon collapses once again. To snap it back open again, simply double-click on any collapsed tab. Very slick!

At the bottom right of each section of the ribbon bar tabs is a small square icon called a dialog box launcher. If you click on one of them, it opens that toolbar section as a floating dialog box, which you can drag and drop to a convenient place in the map workspace. This is great if you’re doing a lot of work on a particular part of your map, because it saves you from having to move your mouse to the program’s toolbar each time you want to do something.

Between the new layout engine and these UI improvements, it’s clear to me that the NovaMind development team has been working hard to provide a truly cutting edge mind mapping experience for its users. Please click on the image at the top of this review to see a larger version with callouts for some of these UI improvements.

Flexible map themes

Themes automatically define the color, font, style of the objects in your mind maps. But if you override them, your customizations will be honored by the program. The developer has also makes it easy for you to return to the default style, so you can’t accidentally “ruin” anything by customizing it. That’s nice, because I can easily imagine myself getting to a point where I might say, “Help! How do I get these settings back to the way they started?!” In NovaMind 5, all you have to do is click a “return to default” button, and your worries are over.

Color and font sets

I’m convinced that the reason so many people produce black-and-white mind maps is that the process of changing topic, font and line colors on your own (outside of installed themes) can be time-consuming. Not only that, but few people except for artists really have a sense for what families of colors complement each other.

In addition to offering a selection of attractive map themes (which incorporate complementary colors), NovaMind 5 gives you another level of creative freedom with something new called “color sets” – families of 10 colors that go well together. From those are derived additional families of complementary colors, with names like “business blue,” “earthy” and “pastel.” These are displayed by clicking on the “colors” button in the map design tab. If you click in one of the rows to select a color for an object in your map, NovaMind 5 will automatically apply the rest of the colors from that set to the other objects in your map. For those of us who are color impaired, this ensures that your map will always contain colors that go together and share a similar level of contrast.

NovaMind 5 gives you a great amount of creative freedom, but constrains that just enough to help you create some very attractive mind maps, with a minimum of fuss. If you want an even greater level of control than color sets provide, you can use a separate color wheel to select custom colors and adjust the transparency to create some interesting effect – such as “ghosted” topic shapes. You can also use the red, green, blue, and alpha sliders to pick a color, or enter values in the range 0 to 255 if you know the color values you need. Very cool!

Font sets work in much the same way as color sets. If you apply a particular font face to a topic in your map, NovaMind 5 will automatically apply the same font face to the other objects in your map, to maintain a consistent look. The font size and other attributes are still derived from the map theme you’ve selected. This is another example of the deep level of thinking that has gone into NovaMind 5 – which enables you to do more, without overwhelming you.

Advanced topic shapes

NovaMind 5 contains the usual selection of ovals, rectangles and rounded rectangles for topic shapes, but it also gives you access to an advanced settings dialog box, where you can significantly modify topic shapes – altering their shape (changing the rounding of the corners or adding chamfered corners, for example), fill style, outline, boundary and layout. As with the other customization options in this program, if you get carried away, there is a convenient “return to default” button. This new version of NovaMind also gives you a gallery of shape styles, which automatically set a number of options, all at the same time, that go with the map theme you’re using.

Images and adornments

Images can be dragged on to the topics, and you can have up to four images on each topic. Just drag an image on and drop it in the quadrant you want it (the image at right shows this in action; the quadrant selector is the gray box in the middle with the smaller white boxes around it). You can resize an image by dragging the two edges that have resize handles on them, so you can adjust it in relation to the edge of the topic or relative to the text. When you first add an image, it will be scaled to fit the space that you have available for it, but if you right click the image, you will see the options for scaling it to fit the available space, or stretching it to fit the space.

This brings new possibilities for adding images to topics. For example, you could place images in the top and bottom quadrants to create a decorative framing for a topic. As I played with this capability, I found myself wondering: Why didn’t anyone else think of this first? It’s quite useful!

NovaMind takes a smart approach to its image library. The program as purchased doesn’t contain a very big image library, but you’re immediately instructed to download a much larger collection (3,000 images) separately. Why is that important? If you’re a new user and just want to experiment with the basics of NovaMind, you can do so with the default image library. When you’re ready to expand your abilities, you can easily download and install the full image library, at no extra cost. I like the way they think!

Adornments are NovaMind’s term for icons or symbols – small images that are displayed on the left side of a topic, and are used as a visual indicator of a particular meaning. You can have as many adornments on a topic as you like, and they can be dragged and dropped from the adornments library to topics, or from one topic to another.

Conclusion

NovaMind 5 gives you an unprecedented amount of creative freedom to create awesome looking mind maps, quickly and easily. It gives you many options, but thanks to excellent user interface design, it never overwhelms you. If you want to create a simple mind map, you can. But if you want to create something that makes people say “Wow!!” that is within your reach as well.

I’m very impressed with how the program seems to anticipate what you’re doing and adjust everything else accordingly. Yet you can still override all of these defaults if you want – or quickly revert to default settings if you get lost in customizing the appearance of your map. It’s the perfect blend of hand-holding for beginner and intermediate users, yet NovaMind contains enough customization options to satisfy even the most discerning power user.

If you want to see more examples of what this amazing program is capable of, I recommend that you visit the NovaMind Blog and watch Gideon King’s series of NovaMind 5 tutorial videos. I strongly recommend that you do this, because words and static pictures just can’t do justice to this very impressive mind mapping program. You can also view the NovaMind 5 features page for a complete rundown of all of its new and improved features.

NovaMind 5 Platinum for Windows is currently available for US$249; a Mac version will be available on May 12, 2010. Pro and Express versions are also available for US$149 and $49, respectively. Trial versions are also available for download here.