(Archived) New and loving EN. Organization advice and 2quick questions

[tutti 0]

I just started with Evernote and I already love it. First the quick questions. When I put movies/images etc in a note, do they just reference where they are on my hard drive, or do they exist somewhere completely separate in EN folders too? When I clip a webpage, does it actually save the webpage, or do I need to be online to see the clip?

I got started with it before learning or reading anything about it. My natural instinct was to order things with stacks of notebooks. I tried forever to get a stack in a stack! Then I started searching and learning more about how people organize and use their ENs, and about tags. I admit I'm still confused. I don't want to have hundreds of tags/notebooks, so I'm trying to create a easy system. My goals with EN are to become paperless, more productive, and to store cool/awesome/funny information.

I am not a productivity freak, and I think the entire GTD-type setup I've been reading about is a bit overkill for me. I'm still looking for some input, I attached a picture of what I have so far. Any thoughts about tags vs. notebooks, other important tags for notes you know of are welcome and appreciated. A note though, I do websites for myself and for others. I have a full time job that I am not including in EN. For all of my personal websites, I prefer to leave them as their own notebook inside the Web stack. For the other people's sites (I don't do tons and tons of work), I have them as one notebook in the Web stack, and plan to organize them by tags.

So any input you have about things I might want to do tags vs. notebooks, or even if there are other cool notebooks I might like, I'm all ears!!!

[Nadya De Angelis 24]

The only advice I have is not to create empty tags or notebooks, you can always add them when you feel that it's necessary. Keep it simple (and clean).

[jefito 5,589]

I just started with Evernote and I already love it. First the quick questions. When I put movies/images etc in a note, do they just reference where they are on my hard drive, or do they exist somewhere completely separate in EN folders too? When I clip a webpage, does it actually save the webpage, or do I need to be online to see the clip?

If you store a movie or image into a note as an attachment, then it's stored in the database (and sync'ed to the cloud if it's not in a local notebook). If you store a link to a movie or image, then just the link is stored, and you need to be online to view it. If you store a web page, then links are stored as links, embedded images are stored as images.

So any input you have about things I might want to do tags vs. notebooks, or even if there are other cool notebooks I might like, I'm all ears!!!

There is no best way to organize your Evernote stuff. Only you can decide what scheme is best. Notebooks are like boxes; they partition your notes into discrete collections. Tags are like labels; they're just descriptive text, and they can be applied to any note. Your scheme as I understand it seems reasonable, but maybe more notebooks than I would use; I would prefer to use tags.

[jbenson2 2,147]

My opinion would be to eliminate the majority of notebooks and only have:

• All Notes
  Inbox
  Personal
  Web Projects
  Files
  Reference
  Travel
  

Let tags serve the purpose of the eliminated notebooks.

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

So any input you have about things I might want to do tags vs. notebooks, or even if there are other cool notebooks I might like, I'm all ears!!!

IMO, working with EN (or any new product) as well as skimming/searching the board here will be most helpful. This topic has already been discussed a lot. Additionally, reading the board opens up new ideas for using EN. That's how I got started haunting the board so much b/c I found I learned a lot about how to use the product itself as well as learning how others use it.

[jbenson2 2,147]

Suggestion: When you use two levels of tags, consider a prefix for the child level tag.

Example:

• status
  
  • stat-complete
    stat-needs-attention
    stat-someday-maybe
    stat-waiting-for
    

Yes, they are a bit longer, but all you need to do is type stat and Evernote will restrict the list the tags to only the ones you want.

I also avoid using a space between words in a tag. If there are no spaces, you don't need surround the tag with quotation marks.

[Nadya De Angelis 24]

Example:

status

stat-complete

stat-needs-attention

stat-someday-maybe

stat-waiting-for

Yes, they are a bit longer, but all you need to do is type stat and Evernote will restrict the list the tags to only the ones you want.

I am not quite sure I understood your tip well. Whatever you type, Evertnote will show you the tags starting with it, so if you type "co" it will show you "complete". So what's the point of starting with prefix?

[jbenson2 2,147]

I am not quite sure I understood your tip well. Whatever you type, Evertnote will show you the tags starting with it, so if you type "co" it will show you "complete". So what's the point of starting with prefix?

Caveat: this is my opinion - others have different systems

It is not important if you have just a few tags, but if you have a lot of tags, it helps in remembering the correct tag name.

In my Evernote, if I type "st", I will get a variety of possibilities - such as: Statement, Steele-Michael, Stem-cell, Steyn-Mark, St-Michael

Also some users with mobile devices have found the hierarchy disappears and all the tags are sorted at the same level.

[Nadya De Angelis 24]

It is not important if you have just a few tags, but if you have a lot of tags, it helps. In my case, if I type "st", I will get a variety of possibilities - such as: Statement, Steele-Michael, Stem-cell, Steyn-Mark, St-Michael

Sorry, still don't get it. From your example it seems that prefix only makes things more complicated, because it increases the number of letters you have to type. In your initial example, you have to type at least six letters to get a unique tag; do you have many tags that start with "comple" or "someda"? I mean, even if you do, adding a prefix does not make them more distinguishable, quite the opposite. I have the feeling that I comple...tly misunderstood your point, but never mind.

[jbenson2 2,147]

Sorry, still don't get it. From your example it seems that prefix only makes things more complicated, because it increases the number of letters you have to type. In your initial example, you have to type at least six letters to get a unique tag; do you have many tags that start with "comple" or "someda"? I mean, even if you do, adding a prefix does not make them more distinguishable, quite the opposite. I have the feeling that I comple...tly misunderstood your point, but never mind.

It is easy for me to remember the prefix letters. I only need to type the prefix letters and then arrow down to the correct selection.

And I only do this to tags that are easily grouped. I don't have to remember which spelling I used for a company - HP, or H-P, or Hewlett Packard, or Hewlett-Packard because the correct tag version shows up when I type in com-

Here are some examples of tags I use with the prefix format.

Company

• Com-Costco
  Com-Ford
  Com-Logitech
  Com-Target
  Com-Wells-Fargo
  

Close family members

• Fam-JLB
  Fam-DLB
  Fam-BEB
  Fam-PBB
  

Government

• Govt-County
  Govt-Fed
  Govt-State
  Govt-Town
  

Insurance

• Ins-Car
  Ins-Dental
  Ins-Home
  Ins-Life
  Ins-Medical
  

[tutti 0]

Thanks for the replies... I've been looking through the general discussion forum all day! Lots of great ideas. I ended up reorganizing and I went to a very simple, non-stacked notebook layout. I like how nested the tags can be, and how if I have an "idea" tag, I can apply it to any notebook. I am wondering however, how people approach organizing the tags. (The tags that are empty at the moment, aren't really empty... I'm putting all of my files in here drip by drip and I know exactly what's going in some)

I'm mostly wondering what some of you do with the bulk of the tags... I so far organized it by Adjectives/Verbs/Nouns? Any other ideas?

Here's an image:

[jbenson2 2,147]

Looks like you are off to a fine start. There are some tweaks you could do, such as adding a special character ( ! ) in front of the important top level tags to get them to move to the top. But any changes will come with time as you personalize Evernote to meet your needs.

After a few weeks of use, I would suggest a weekly review of the tags and look for tags with very low counts. If during the review, you realize a low count tag is not important, then consider adding the tag as a text entry in the note itself and delete the tag. You can always use search to find the word at a later date. This review process will help maintain a well structured list of useful tags.

[katahdin 8]

Close family members

• Fam-JLB
  Fam-DLB
  Fam-BEB
  Fam-PBB
  

Hey ! I know her ! LOL

In your "st" example - expected along with Steyn-Mark, to see Stossel-John and with the s's Sowell-Thomas !! LOL

Couldn't resist - thanks for the tips

[mrgoerend 89]

Here is how I do tags and notebooks. Similar to what jbenson2 does: http://screentuts.posterous.com/my-thoughts-and-strategies-on-tags-and-notebo