Timelines are an amazingly useful tool. Because my work is so interdisciplinary, I’m always trying to situate my teaching on a particular text or subject within a historical context. Over the years I’ve found that the ability to bang out a quick timeline can really help as a handout for students or a visual for your powerpoint while you’re teaching to quick anchor a subject in its context. As a grant-writer, timelines can also also be a really helpful way of visualising a project, setting milestones, etc.

There are a wide array of timeline-makers that are web-based or make for tablets and smartphones, but having tested about a dozen of these, I’d say that none are really worth the effort. I’ve gravitated towards two desktop software products for different reasons. Continue reading

I wrote my undergraduate thesis (back when 30k words seemed like a big deal!) in Microsoft Word. No, I’m not one of those default Microsoft haters – one of the original developers of MS Word is a close friend of mine – it’s a decent product that was a superior option in the early days. However, for a professional writer, Word just has way too much going on. When I’m writing, I’m already really susceptible to distractions and it takes a lot of willpower to stay the course and put words down on paper. I’m not a typesetter – I don’t need to set weird margins, add tab stops, adjust page width, change line spacing, or use a bunch of different fonts. Also, I can’t lug a laptop around everywhere with me, sometimes I think of the perfect sentence to add to my last paragraph while I’m on the bus home and only have a smartphone. So, I went shopping for a new tool a few years ago.

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