phenomenalog - functionalities

PHENOMENALOG - FUNCTIONALITIES Phenomenalog is a freeware open source interactive diary application, in versions for Mac and for Windows. Installers downloadable from www.phenomenalog.dk It is a laptop program (not yet for tablets), which the individual user can adapt to fit personal interests, habits and dimensions of subjective relevance. It can be used for easy time-indexed logging of activities and actions, events, experienced phenomena, ideas, dreams and quantifiable somatic circumstances. •

A central aspect of this project is the development of an arsenal of “Glyphs” ( pictogramcharacters) to serve as a kind of private shorthand for the swift logging of recurring typicalities . As of 2014 the number of such characters is only app 400 and many illdesigned. The frontline in further development will be the design and construction of several hundreds more, to fit user-indicated needs.

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Each day the program opens a new daycard , where there is an automatic timestamping of entered text and glyphs

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User has a choice between an available advance distribution of clickable glyph-buttons around the input-field or personally via glyph-menu to select and distribute glyphbuttons both round the input-field and in neighboring designed windows (Oikos, Body, Home)

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User can color the glyph-buttons for easier retrievability. But also establish differently colored version of same glyph button for different subjective significances.

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It is also easy to construct lasting textbuttons, which when clicked as shorthand enters their text –timestamped- in the textfield.

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There is a function: “RETRO” for creating earlier time-addresses (entered chronologically correct in the textfield) for retrospective text- or glyph-input(s)

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A parallel “ANNOT” function creates an option for (timestamped) addition of text or glyphs to chosen earlier input-lines

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A most essential feature is a button, which totally hides the diary, and thus leave free access to desktop and the operations of other programs. A special symbol in the laptop-panel retrieves the diary window.

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A selected range of entered text can with a click be copied to any of 35 separate usertermed thematic memos.

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There is a built-in facility : a password-protectable table organized to store and retrieve own user-names, pincodes and passwords.

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There is a built-in browser with an option to produce user-titled link-buttons to personally most relevant www-sites.. (It is important to note, that this browser has weaknesses, and will not work with e.g. a site like FACEBOOK).

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Such links lands in a separate window “MyCyberspace”, and reports to the daycard, when they are used.

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There is an option to search in the accumulated diary for words, names or glyphs, not least through a “parsing”, which creates a list revealing the dated and timestamped contexts in which the searched term has appeared.

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All glyph entries from the single day are copied to 10-minute fields in a specific “DayCircle” window of the daycard. This offers an option to browse back and forth in the accumulated diary and recognize typicalities and particularities in the daily glyph distribution abstracted from the text.

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When a new daycard is produced, the full content of the textfield of the previous day is added to a “diarysum.html” “AllDays” file, independent of the phenomenalog program.

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There is an option to create mindmaps: Rectangular text-buttons which can be connected by lines, which remains between them if they are moved. Useful to illustrate genealogy / family-relationships or tracks, steps and relations in your pursuits.

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There is established an option, “Draft”, where user can edit and modify text independent of the restrictions of the timestamping textfield. .

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The “Draft” option also permits opening of a drawing area with a tools palette . It is meant as an invitation to sketch out new glyphs.

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There is an option to produce screenshots from the program. They are saved as jpg files in a “Screenshot-folder”

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There is a crucial option to create link-buttons to activate other programs (e.g. mail, texteditor etc) and to open personally relevant folders and files. They report to the diary, when they are used, and typically hides the diary.

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As to Qualitative data there are o 5 fields for entering bloodpressure-data and other physiological data. o Fields for counting : cigarettes smoked. Drinks, medicine and sleeplength. o Counts are triggered from use of cigarette glyph, a beer/wine glyph(1), an Alcohol glyph(2), and a medicine-glyph. o Sleeplength is triggered by a rise-glyph as time elapsed from the time a specific sleep-glyph was entered the preceding day. (Of course only relevant for good sleepers). o It applies to all these fields that they can be manually updated.

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Data from these fields are – day for day – stored in a new line in a “Statistics” table, in columns after Date, Weekday, Number of words .

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There is a built-in Calendar. Text entered to later days is automatically referred when that day is reached. And the calendar can be used to open earlier daycards.

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There is a built-in Address-stack, where person-cards can be sorted and searched, and where entered e-mail addresses, when clicked, will open e-mail program.

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As the reader will understand from the large number of functionalities listed, it is essential that not all of these will be relevant to all users, and also will scare and confuse new users. Therefore only a strongly limited number are immediately visible on the downloadable version 19.7.5.

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User has – via a Preferences menu – options to specify o o o o o o

How often the automatic saving shall take place. At which time of the night new daycard shall be produced. Length of timeindexing , full (y-m-d 00:00) or partial (00:00). On/off for timeindexing of text. (Glyphs are always timeindexed). General Size of text entered in textfield. Advanced Preferences, where user can select/deselect exactly which functions, fields and buttons shall figure on the interface.

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Tool-tips (often rather elaborate) are supplied to most buttons, appearing if the button is tapped once, instead of double-clicked.

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A menu “Tricks” opens a window with reminders and advices to shortcuts, use of arrows, CLTR &ALT-key &special key-combinations relating to moving and changing buttons and copying between fields. User can edit and add own reminders to this window.

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It should be added that user first meets – and always can return to - a front panel, where there is access to a number of explanatory windows.