Feature request, sync real time progress reporting within gui

[bradkrause67 1]

How long until sync is completed? I open my Help:Activity Log window and watch the scroll as the % completion is displayed.

Since the sync process makes the client unresponsive, the log scroll adds confirmation that the process is not hung.

The problem is I must open this log each time, simply to watch the % saved increase in the scroll, I don't need a window that size or the options to save off the log.

I need feedback if I'm syncing successfully and an eyeball rate of sync so I can manage other tasks why the sync occurs.

Therefore, adding a single line scroll to the interface that is automatically rendering the activity log output would passively display an animated increasing sync percentage.

The same effect I get from watching the fast scroll animate the sync % in the pop up, only passively displayed in the corner of a frame somewhere. ?

[gazumped 7,758]

Hi.  In Windows I use the swirling 'Sync' icon as an indication that the app is busy.  Unless you;ve made a ton of changes,  syncs shouldn't last too long on a reasonable-speed connection.

If I'm experiencing a slow-down or lock-up I can watch the icon in Task Manager climb up and down the memory or disk activity column.  This happened during a search -

It's frustrating when it happens,  and there are some fixes around to stop the freezes - see this thread

I'd rather Evernote fix these issues than give us a guide to how long it might last...

[DTLow 4,998]

The screenshot is top-list view, with a column for the sync indicator

This gives me an indication of the sync progress.

[gustavgi 301]

2 minutes ago, DTLow said:

The screenshot is top-list view, with a column for the sync indicator

This gives me an indication of the sync progress.

You must have a pretty decent screen resolution to have the sync column visible for 1000+ notes at a time though..

[CalS 4,679]

3 minutes ago, gustavgi said:

You must have a pretty decent screen resolution to have the sync column visible for 1000+ notes at a time though..

Sort by sync indicator stacks them together at least.  And you can see the most in the vastly superior side list view.  But yeah, good sized screen needed to view 1000 notes at a time.   I guess the swirling sync icon could be replaced with a highlighted percentage number as an enhancement.  Seems like a fringe request to me, but what the hey.

[Don Dz 154]

Editing thousands of records at a time sounds like a corporation level database, or something an university might use.  Are you sure Evernote is the right tool for your application? 

I know how Evernote is marketed to deal with anything you throw at it, but I always suspected its limitations, though it is more than plenty for most users and small business. 

[jefito 5,524]

30 minutes ago, Don Dz said:

Editing thousands of records at a time sounds like a corporation level database, or something an university might use.  Are you sure Evernote is the right tool for your application? 

I know how Evernote is marketed to deal with anything you throw at it, but I always suspected its limitations, though it is more than plenty for most users and small business. 

There's only a small number of actions you can perform on multiple notes at a time in the Evernote Windows client; mostly reflected via the multi-select panel: add tags, move to notebook, and merge (I'll leave out the make table of contents note, share, and other actions that don't actually change the selected notes). From the right-click menu, you can also duplicate or copy notes, or move notes to trash.

As to whether it's a good use of Evernote to need to do so sorts of operations very often, it's not really my call and I don't think that we have the full story of the workflow, but it sounds like managing the notes has become a task in itself, rather than having the notes help to manage tasks. As far as the original request goes, sure, that's fine, but it feels a bit like an edge case to me...

[CalS 4,679]

3 hours ago, bradkrause67 said:

The utility of my suggestion helps the truly heavy users, not harm the light users, and inform all users of progress with more honesty when syncing. As this product ages, databases must only get bigger, along with the sophistication of the user's implementation. I think this will be more useful for more people, moving forward, since user's records accumulate in an ever increasing fashion.

Depends I suppose on how you define heavy users.  I would consider myself a heavy user.  I use EN every day and it is the centerpiece of my paperless, second brain strategy.  Store it all and find it all with ease.  This change would be of little use to me since I do not often perform mass edits, my syncs are quick.  As my DB grows sync duration is not affected.  Only modified notes are synced.

As best I can determine, the ways to generate long syncs are mass tag changes, mass moves between notebooks, or mass imports.  If this is your definition of a heavy user then okay, the change could provide insight as to sync status.  Again, I think that could be a fringe case re EN users.  And again, if EN  made changes such that the sync icon displayed progress, no issues from me.  However, I would just as soon EN invested its development resources in addressing some of the editing, cursor position type items that do not perform reliably.  FWIW.

[bradkrause67 1]

I have an EN of 15,000+ research notes, I can make changes to thousands of notes at a time. (so probably more than even your 'tons' would imply)

I turn off auto sync and sync manually so I can continue to work without constant freeze ups. Often my sync is over ten minutes at the end of say four hours use.

So the spinning gif isn't really what I need, and the task manager isn't really what I need.

The Log View is fine, but I'd rather that scroll was tucked in the corner, honestly showing sync state, since the text scroll is available windowed anyway.

It's already information being threaded through EN, I just want it thoughtfully displayed, as a feature request to the GUI. ?

Attached, see my tag list for the letter "C" topics, not people, not things, not events, it might illustrate the volume of sync annotations I can generate?

As a result, reading the tag list at the top of the html output can be a good executive summary to the content of a large pdf, etc. Likewise editorial changing or combining tags can change many tags indeed.

[bradkrause67 1]

@DTLow actually that is an animated gif that spins to indicate the processes of the sync are active, not the rate it is syncing anything. It's like clocking into work vs. actually working.

The Activity Log / disappearing items from the Sync column are the only real time, per item, sync progress indications one has in the gui that indicate a rate of progress that allows you to estimate the length of the sync remaining.

@gustavgi points out the sync list fails to be useful with more than say 22 lines or so of changes, even if you remember to sort by the sync icon before you begin, so you can see them update when the screen redraws. Actually screen redraw is slower during sync as well so these often pop off the list in pairs etc. on redraw. 

@CalS  The utility of my suggestion helps the truly heavy users, not harm the light users, and inform all users of progress with more honesty when syncing. As this product ages, databases must only get bigger, along with the sophistication of the user's implementation. I think this will be more useful for more people, moving forward, since user's records accumulate in an ever increasing fashion.

Thanks for your ideas,  everything is working for me so far. *crosses fingers* I'm just frustrated at some of the buried mechanics of EN that should be more accessible.

 

[bradkrause67 1]

@Don DzEvernote is simply the best capture and archive solution. I cast a wide net and it catches it all. I bought a faster cpu for the client, but the tool is real. Frankly I can't read as fast as I capture on some issues and the search of images and pdfs is invaluable. I admit to redundantly adding tags based on search results, in addition to saving search criteria as a "saved search". Because my tag list is a large glossary of specific terms assigned at capture, through later searches, as well as Filterized automated tagging; I keep waiting for it to break (and religiously back it up) and it's actually been stainless steel.

tl/dr: Capture and archive ubiquitously on all my platforms. Lots of tags as breadcrumbs for follow up research and lateral associations. That's the role EN fills.

@jefito I have the account specifically for this issue's research. I don't co-mingle personal notes on this account. We all benefit from the GUI showing sync process transparently without additional user acrobatics. But I'm annoyed by it right now. 

[bradkrause67 1]

@CalS Hopefully we will both get improvements. Thanks for acknowledging the ever so slight benefit of my suggestion, even if it isn't your top priority. ?