Automatically convert a MindMap to another app (e.g. MS Project)
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27-10-2019 - |
Question
Here is the situation:
- We ran a brainstorming session to find all the tasks we will have to achieve for our project
- Now, I want to create a Gantt Planning (for instance) with all these tasks
We already built a MindMap with Xmind (I sometimes use Freemind too, or I could also export the Xmind to a Freemind format).
I would like to create a Gantt Planning in Microsoft Project (this is what we mainly use here).
My questions are:
- Has anyone of you ever tried to automate the creation of a Gantt from the MindMap (using each level of the MindMap as Title and each leaf as Tasks)?
- Would it be possible with VBA? Or C#? I didn't find much API to Xmind of Freemind, did I miss something?
Solution
If you can convert your mind map to Freemind, there is some documentation on the Freemind site which provides a couple of approaches to reformatting the Freemind file as an XML file which MS Project can read.
I maintain MPXJ, a library which can be used to read and write file formats which MS Project works with. I felt sure that someone had already written an add-on for Freemind which allowed you to export mind maps as a project plan using MPXJ... however I can't find a reference to it any more! If you don't mind a bit of coding (in Java, or any of the .Net languages) it wouldn't be too hard to achieve what you want using MPXJ.
Jon
OTHER TIPS
We're doing exactly that with STOIC.