Colors

[Yoav 5]

I've recently started using Evernote again, I use to hate it in the past because it was so heavy and cumbersome, but the iPad app was so impressive it got me back on, but now that I've moved all my notes to it and have several notebooks I use, I'm shocked to find that Evernote does not have any COLOR options.

How is it that there's no option to pick a color for each notebook, and then whenever you look at a note there is a hint to that color to help me quickly recognize which notebook it belongs to. It will make Evernote so much more appealing and it's something that almost every other organization app has.

Where can we add this to the suggestions box?

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

Hi. You have added it by posting here. Color has long been suggested, but given the gray landscape in Mac, and the predominantly black text on white background of Windows (I like both), I wouldn't hold your breath. Here is a solution I made for snippet and card view.

http://www.princeton.edu/~cmayo/template.html

Colors aren't high on my wish list, but I can see the usefulness.

[Yoav 5]

I don't think it's about being high on the wish list, but just that it's such a simple feature to add, and users who don't need it won't even be aware, while more visually inclined users like me would really appreciate it.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

I don't think it's about being high on the wish list, but just that it's such a simple feature to add, and users who don't need it won't even be aware, while more visually inclined users like me would really appreciate it.

I am no expert on the design process, and I certainly cannot comment on how easy it is to develop any feature, especially one that doesn't yet exist on any Evernote client, but my sense is that Evernote is working hard to focus on features that hundreds of thousands or even millions of users will use, and to strip away menu options that do not receive as much use, because this greatly reduces the need for developers to design and maintain features across multiple clients over time, and protects the app from feature bloat. In general, I think this is a smart thing to do.

Sometimes, though, this means it is difficult to convince developers of the need for a feature we want to see (in my case, I generally focus on appealing for parity across clients and not on the development of new features, and that is why it is not high on my wish list), but it is worth the effort. Perhaps, if you could state your use case and make an argument for it, then that might help developers out when they are considering whether to do it.

[Camicia 1]

Even this forum supports colors. Personally I cannot live without the ability to use red text or changing the background in yellow (highlighter effect).  

 

Everytime that I want to use colors, I open Word, then I type there and then copy and paste on Evernote.  Before I used a bookmarklet in the browser ( http://pancaketheorem.com/a-bookmarklet-for-putting-a-page-in-design-mode/ ), copy and pasted the sentence I need to color and manually modified the CSS.

 

It is extremely frustrating. There was a period in which I completely ditched Evernote and used only a Google Doc just because I could not use colors.

 

I feel that is pretty stupid that Evernote do not support colors. It would not take a good engineer more than 2 days to implement that feature. So it is not for technical reasons that they do not do it. They probably did not find anybody that in their ux interviews pointed it out. Maybe Evernote's designer is color blind. Maybe they had this discussion before and somebody says "We are not going to add colors" and even if people keep asking they want to be consistent ... who knows.

 

Ask anybody that used Evernote for more than a month and ask them if they have ever tried to use colors and you will hear their answer.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

Even this forum supports colors. Personally I cannot live without the ability to use red text or changing the background in yellow (highlighter effect).  

 

Everytime that I want to use colors, I open Word, then I type there and then copy and paste on Evernote.  Before I used a bookmarklet in the browser ( http://pancaketheorem.com/a-bookmarklet-for-putting-a-page-in-design-mode/ ), copy and pasted the sentence I need to color and manually modified the CSS.

 

It is extremely frustrating. There was a period in which I completely ditched Evernote and used only a Google Doc just because I could not use colors.

 

I feel that is pretty stupid that Evernote do not support colors. It would not take a good engineer more than 2 days to implement that feature. So it is not for technical reasons that they do not do it. They probably did not find anybody that in their ux interviews pointed it out. Maybe Evernote's designer is color blind. Maybe they had this discussion before and somebody says "We are not going to add colors" and even if people keep asking they want to be consistent ... who knows.

 

Ask anybody that used Evernote for more than a month and ask them if they have ever tried to use colors and you will hear their answer.

 

Hi. Welcome to the forums. Evernote supports colors. Using the Mac, press CMD + T to open the font menu, and use all of the colors you would like. You can also change the background color in selected areas to "highlight" (kind of ) text. It is the fourth icon in the font menu. Enjoy!

[penwriter 10]

Yoav and Camicia are obviously referring to very different aspects of colour use in Evernote. I understand that Yoav is asking for some kind of display conditions, e.g. "If this note belongs to notebook xyz, display it with a border (or background or whatever) of a specific colour". I have no clue how difficult implementation would be, but IF it was to be done, one could wish for a general way that would also involve tags (like: "If a note is tagged with xyz, display its title in red bold in snippet view"). Now, this is almost certainly not simple anymore. And while I agree that this may be a cool feature, for me personally there are other items which are higher up on my wishlist.

 

Camicia's comment on the other hand was related to formatting text. And while you can format text colour with the note editor of the Mac, Windows and Web client, the Android (and IOS?) clients do not allow this. My opinion is that it would indeed be nice to have more similar features on the different platforms. But rather than colour, two other text formatting issues once again range higher on my wish list:

• Consistent support of indentation on all platforms
• Support of sub-/superscript on all platforms (being a research chemist, I MUST MUST MUST have this , and so far only the web service can do it)

 

Obviously everybody has different requirements and therefore different feature requests. In my case, Evernote is giving me most of the features I want. Other apps do have features that are ´nice to have´, but if it comes to functionality I need (attachments, searching, text recognition...), Evernote does it for me.

[paul schuback 1]

Colours. I like the recent ""tap on x bottom right of phone fablet screen and obtain instant media recording f (x) -- However what I would like to know is -is there any groundswell of interest in being able to retain the elephant logo, but select an alternative to say, the green? Difficulty range if so?

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

Colours. I like the recent ""tap on x bottom right of phone fablet screen and obtain instant media recording f (x) -- However what I would like to know is -is there any groundswell of interest in being able to retain the elephant logo, but select an alternative to say, the green? Difficulty range if so?

Even on a good day, that would be amusing but of little interest to me. But with the current & ongoing issues Evenote has, different colors would be so far down my wish list that the page number would be in the three digits.

[JCR 2]

I just started using Evernote and have been looking at Youtube presentations about it. Almost all the videos I saw so far show Evernote in color with the tree in a medium gray background with Green Notebooks. Yellow tags and all the icons in the toolbar are in color.

 

My Evernote application, running Windows 7, is just a bland Black and White, unpolished looking interface. It reminds me of working on the old Palm Pilot or a black & white Kindle. I haven't used B&W applications since the 80's/90's. Even in the early days DOS would make use of the RGB 4/16 color displays.

 

In the Youtube videos it looks like maybe they were using a MAC? Maybe Evernote for Windows doesn't support color, seriously? In this side-by-side screenshot of Evernote the color slide is from a Youtube user and the ugly one on the right one is mine. "Where's the [beef] color?"

 

 

Regards,

Mike

 

[johneddy 2]

Let's get a color option for notebooks done quickly. It would be a huge help for people who have a lot of folders in small spaces

[johneddy 2]

 

I don't think it's about being high on the wish list, but just that it's such a simple feature to add, and users who don't need it won't even be aware, while more visually inclined users like me would really appreciate it.

I am no expert on the design process, and I certainly cannot comment on how easy it is to develop any feature, especially one that doesn't yet exist on any Evernote client, but my sense is that Evernote is working hard to focus on features that hundreds of thousands or even millions of users will use, and to strip away menu options that do not receive as much use, because this greatly reduces the need for developers to design and maintain features across multiple clients over time, and protects the app from feature bloat. In general, I think this is a smart thing to do.

Sometimes, though, this means it is difficult to convince developers of the need for a feature we want to see (in my case, I generally focus on appealing for parity across clients and not on the development of new features, and that is why it is not high on my wish list), but it is worth the effort. Perhaps, if you could state your use case and make an argument for it, then that might help developers out when they are considering whether to do it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Lack of color is the only reason I have to consider finding a product other than Evernote to use. And I am looking.

[BaroqueRocker 0]

 

 

 

My No. 1 reason for choosing a notes app is the use of customizable color to organize  groups of notes, (i.e. as FliqNotes or CatchNotes used to do). I am currently looking for a new note app as I have a new smart phone and the apps I've used in the past, first FliqNotes and then CatchNotes, both stopped support. I chose them specifically for the ability to categorize using colors. I first started using FliqNotes back in 2009, and in looking for a new note app in 2016 I'm very surprised there is no app with such a feature. I've decided to give Evernote a try, but it's so hard for me to believe that it supports no feature like this that I've been combing the internet to figure out how to do it, thinking the feature must be there somewhere, (and thus discovered this thread confirming it cannot yet be done). Google Keep doesn't support it either, which I am also trying. The first app to implement this feature I will use. I'd like it to be Evernote as it can do more than Keep, but I will go with keep if they do implement such a feature, (which, in my opinion, would give them a leg-up over Evernote, as a whole base of note app users in the past chose apps like FliqNotes and CatchNotes for this very reason). Please implement the use of customizable color to differentiate notebooks!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Romfaalor 0]

It would be greatly appreciated, if the feature of having cored areas in the notes. I'm noting down everything in Evernote and I'm looking for the feature of having different paragraphs in different color background, and I understand that I'm not the only one who is looking for this option. thanks