Labs

Visual Concept is one of two products included in this round-up that allows you to present thoughts and ideas as a 'mind map', which is used to aid thinking and using information more productively. A mind map is a diagram with ideas connected by arrows that show the relationships between them. They can be used for brainstorming, planning, learning and many

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other applications.

Visual Concept is essentially a drawing package, although its facilities are tailored specifically to creating mind maps. It allows you to lay down ideas - mostly boxes of various shapes containing descriptive text - and join them up using arrows. The publishers are at pains to point out that mind maps should not be unduly large or complicated, so to help you keep them to manageable proportions, it provides a means of organising them in a hierarchical structure. A single box in a mind map can therefore represent another mind map, which is opened up if you double-click on it. A number of templates are provided for specific tasks such as brainstorming, conflict resolution or creating time-planners.

Visual Concept is a competent product, but not an exciting one. If you want a package that will produce visually attractive mind maps that you can use as an aid to learning, you'd be advised to look elsewhere.