FreeMind is a

free Free may refer to: Concept * Freedom, having the ability to do something, without having to obey anyone/anything * Freethought, a position that beliefs should be formed only on the basis of logic, reason, and empiricism * Emancipate, to procur ...

mind mapping A mind map is a diagram used to visually organize information into a hierarchy, showing relationships among pieces of the whole. It is often created around a single concept, drawn as an image in the center of a blank page, to which associated r ...

application written in

Java Java (; id, Jawa, ; jv, ꦗꦮ; su, ) is one of the Greater Sunda Islands in Indonesia. It is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the south and the Java Sea to the north. With a population of 151.6 million people, Java is the world's List ...

, which is further developed by the fork

Freeplane Freeplane is a free, open source software application for creating mind maps (diagrams of connections between ideas), and electronic outlines. Written in Java, it is supported on Windows, Mac OS X and Linux, and is licensed under the GNU GPL v ...

until today (2021). FreeMind itself was last updated in 2014. FreeMind is licensed under the

GNU General Public License Version 2 The GNU General Public License (GNU GPL or simply GPL) is a series of widely used free software licenses that guarantee end users the four freedoms to run, study, share, and modify the software. The license was the first copyleft for general us ...

. It provides extensive export capabilities. It runs on

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...

, and

macOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lapt ...

via the

Java Runtime Environment Java is a set of computer software and specifications developed by James Gosling at Sun Microsystems, which was later acquired by the Oracle Corporation, that provides a system for developing application software and deploying it in a cros ...

. As with other mind mapping software packages, FreeMind allows the user to edit a hierarchical set of ideas around a central concept. The non-linear approach assists in brainstorming new outlines and projects as ideas are added around the mind map. As a Java application, FreeMind is portable across multiple platforms and retains the same user interface, causing some amount of variation from the common interface on each platform. Mac users may notice the most difference from their traditional user interface, but a

MacWorld ''Macworld'' is a website dedicated to products and software of Apple Inc., published by Foundry, a subsidiary of IDG Inc. It started life as a print magazine in 1984 and had the largest audited circulation (both total and newsstand) of Macint ...

reviewer says the software's features should still appeal to the segment of users who accept function over form. FreeMind was a finalist for Best Project in

SourceForge.net SourceForge is a web service that offers software consumers a centralized online location to control and manage open-source software projects and research business software. It provides source code repository hosting, bug tracking, mirroring ...

's Community Choice Awards for 2008, which featured

open-source software Open-source software (OSS) is computer software that is released under a license in which the copyright holder grants users the rights to use, study, change, and distribute the software and its source code to anyone and for any purpose. Op ...

projects.

Features

FreeMind's documentation is itself available as a FreeMind mindmap, demonstrating many of the features of the application. This is accessed from the application menu: Help > Documentation. A flash based export of this documentation is available online and can be viewed from flash-enabled

web browser A web browser is application software for accessing websites. When a user requests a web page from a particular website, the browser retrieves its files from a web server and then displays the page on the user's screen. Browsers are used on ...

s. The link can be found in the

external links An internal link is a type of hyperlink on a web page to another page or resource, such as an image or document, on the same website or domain. Hyperlinks are considered either "external" or "internal" depending on their target or destination ...

section. FreeMind's most significant features are as follows: * Folding branches * Save files as

XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing arbitrary data. It defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable. T ...

with an suffix * Export hypertext to

HTML The HyperText Markup Language or HTML is the standard markup language for documents designed to be displayed in a web browser. It can be assisted by technologies such as Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and scripting languages such as JavaScri ...

and

XHTML Extensible HyperText Markup Language (XHTML) is part of the family of XML markup languages. It mirrors or extends versions of the widely used HyperText Markup Language (HTML), the language in which Web pages are formulated. While HTML, prior ...

* Export document to

PDF Portable Document Format (PDF), standardized as ISO 32000, is a file format developed by Adobe in 1992 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems. ...

and

OpenDocument The Open Document Format for Office Applications (ODF), also known as OpenDocument, is an open file format for word processing documents, spreadsheets, presentations and graphics and using ZIP-compressed XML files. It was developed wi ...

* Exports image to PNG,

JPEG JPEG ( ) is a commonly used method of lossy compression for digital images, particularly for those images produced by digital photography. The degree of compression can be adjusted, allowing a selectable tradeoff between storage size and imag ...

and SVG * Icons on nodes * Clouds around branches * Graphical links connecting nodes * Search restricted to single branches * Web and file hyperlinks from nodes * FreeMind browser/player for web in Java or

Flash Flash, flashes, or FLASH may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Fictional aliases * Flash (DC Comics character), several DC Comics superheroes with super speed: ** Flash (Barry Allen) ** Flash (Jay Garrick) ** Wally West, the first Kid ...

* Transform maps using

XSLT XSLT (Extensible Stylesheet Language Transformations) is a language originally designed for transforming XML documents into other XML documents, or other formats such as HTML for web pages, plain text or XSL Formatting Objects, which may subseque ...

FreeMind uses the

Swing Swing or swinging may refer to: Apparatus * Swing (seat), a hanging seat that swings back and forth * Pendulum, an object that swings * Russian swing, a swing-like circus apparatus * Sex swing, a type of harness for sexual intercourse * Swing rid ...

GUI toolkit The GUI ( "UI" by itself is still usually pronounced . or ), graphical user interface, is a form of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and audio indicator such as primary notation, inste ...

for Java. FreeMind developers or developers of other projects have made plugins for various

wiki A wiki ( ) is an online hypertext publication collaboratively edited and managed by its own audience, using a web browser. A typical wiki contains multiple pages for the subjects or scope of the project, and could be either open to the pu ...

and

content management system A content management system (CMS) is computer software used to manage the creation and modification of digital content (content management).''Managing Enterprise Content: A Unified Content Strategy''. Ann Rockley, Pamela Kostur, Steve Manning. New ...

software so that Freemind files can be viewed and in some cases created via the web interface.

References

External links

*
FreeMind Review

Online Demonstration of FreeMind Documentation (requires flash)
{{Mindmaps Concept mapping software Mind-mapping software Concept- and mind-mapping software programmed in Java Free note-taking software Free software programmed in Java (programming language)

Features

See also

References

External links