When Bullet Lists Aren't Enough

Websites mentioned: BulletsToTable.com

Almost everyone takes their notes in bullet form. This system makes a lot of sense - it's orderly, concise, easy to rearrange, and perfect for a list of to-dos. But what happens when you build a hierarchical list with a few levels?

• Group A
  • Simon
    • Introduction
    • Closing speech
  • Paul
    • Logistics
    • Reminder emails
  • Maha
    • Notes
    • Facilitation
• Group B
  • ...

The information is all there, but it's messy. Your mind is forced to process it in a specific order, which it immediately objects to. The same information would be much better presented as a table, but:

1. There's no way to convert from a hierarchical bullet list to a table in most note-taking apps / word processors.
2. We don't make our notes in a table format, because that would be weird.

To get around this problem, I created BulletsToTable.com, where you can copy over your list and convert it into a beautiful and easy-to-understand table:

Much better!

It's a shame this functionality isn't built natively in apps like MS OneNote or Outlook, though chances are that it will appear eventually. Until then, we have our web-apps to rely on!