If you want an idea of what the Instant Outliner is, check out this excellent survey by Hutch Carpenter.  

Very quietly, and I mean very quietly I've been working on rounding out the features of the latest OPML Editor-based implementation of Instant Outlining. This one is a keeper, I think -- more so than the previous releases. 

The realtime updating code is pretty good. Based on long-polling and mailboxes. It works even if you're logged on at more than one location. Even if they both have the same IP address. 

There's now a follow-unfollow paradigm, so not everyone is hooked in by default with everyone else. It works like RSS. The person being followed is not aware who is following, and does not have to give permission. However the updates are restricted to a single server. 

The server is also part of the implementation. You can't get the client software without getting a server. However the server is disabled by default. The point is that is should be very easy to set up another instance.  

Federation isn't implemented, but it is being thought about. 

And the protocol is open. To prove that it's open, I've been working step-by-step with Marc Barrot, who is implementing an instant outliner that works with mine in his Javascript outline editor, iJot. It's important for a lot of reasons. For me, selfishly, it means I will be able to edit my instant outline on my iPhone or iPad, which doesn't have an implementation of the OPML Editor. 

And I hear that might not be totally impossible.  

Next week I'm going to Seattle to hang out with my old programming partner, Brent Simmons, and his lovely wife Sheila. We're going to get me booted up on kernel development. It's been way too long since I've gotten in there and been able to fix bugs and add new features. Funny how time flies when you're having fun. 

If you want to try the Instant Outliner, let me know, send an email. All I have to do is create a username and password on my server. All the software is released.