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Why doesn't Evernote support the paperless life better?


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I've been using Evernote since its beginning and have gone paperless with it. The only documents I still have in paper format are the ones where you are required to keep the original. Everything else goes right into my Fujitsu Scansnap and then straight to the shredder. My library has roughly 6000 documents.

I've always been hoping Evernote would understand its destiny (which is a PDF archive for people who go paperless) and subsequently put an emphasis on features, that support this kind of usage. To name a few improvements that anyone using it in a similar way (and I can't think of much else it could be useful for):

  • some sort of suggestion of tags based on the contents of the document and other already tagged documents in the library
  • making the change of "date created" easier and not harder (which they did some time ago, to my dismay)
  • even maybe automatically capture the creation date from the document
  • identify duplicates (during adding a document and also in the library)

Maybe I'm mistaken and there are actually relevant use cases beyond a PDF archive, but I strongly doubt it. Although, I must admit, even I occasionally enter a note 🙂

So here is my question:

How can Evernote even survive without providing the best thinkable support for people who want to go paperless?

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Improvement on these points would be positive. Just a few remarks:

  • There is the feature to „intelligently“ assist with tagging and notebook picking already. I have tried it and switched it off again, because I am faster with creating these few inputs myself than correcting the system guesses.
  • Picking information like the date printed to a document is a capability of the ScanSnap Software. It works sometimes, but often picks the wrong information. I usually don’t need this, because if I search for an invoice, the name of the company or the article purchased will do.
  • Same with creation date. For me this is a time stamp when the note was created in reality. I think it is not meant to be edited, thus the lack of easy tools to do so.

Some users have created their own way of setting up a standard header text, where search can be restricted by using the <intitle> argument. Maybe this could help you as long as the features mentioned above are not available.

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@PinkElephant thanks for the insights.

Regarding "intelligently" assisting with tags and other metadata:

I hear a lot about AI nowadays. It doesn't seem to be too hard to apply this to "train" the software to extract metadata from the document (scanned or received electronically). This would, however, be based on all documents in the library and therefore couldn't be done by the scanner software.

And this would certainly meet the expectations of the customer who wants to be delighted 🙂

I agree that tagging, creating a good title and adjusting the creation date is not too much work, especially if there are only new documents coming in and you process them regularly (I do it semi-daily).

The reason I'm not relying on full text search too much is that I don't believe in folders (>95 % of my Evernote documents are in one folder) and I do sometimes look for stuff where I don't even remember the name. With my tags I can almost always bring it down to a list that is quickly scanned by the eye. I also use full text search in combination with tags quite a bit. The creation date I adjust because I want to be able to have the results ordered by "real date", but maybe I'm overdoing it here.

 

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1 hour ago, Stefan Timm said:

Maybe I'm mistaken and there are actually relevant use cases beyond a PDF archive

At it's core, Evernote is a tool to store and organize notes/documents
The documents are not restricted to pdfs; I have web pages, images, word processing, spreadsheets,  ...         

My notes also include links to external information sources

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3 minutes ago, DTLow said:

At it's core, Evernote is a tool to store and organize notes/documents
The documents are not restricted to pdfs; I have images, word processing, spreadsheets,  ....

I understand that, but why would anyone want to put a file into Evernote, when the contents isn't even visible?

I think one is way better off keeping word processing and spreadsheets in the file system und maybe dropping a PDF of it into Evernote if needed.

Also, unless you use Evernote for work (and I don't see this is a significant percentage of users) I don't think a relevant portion of documents are word processing or spreadsheets if you go paperless.

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1 hour ago, Stefan Timm said:

I understand that, but why would anyone want to put a file into Evernote, when the contents isn't even visible?

I think one is way better off keeping word processing and spreadsheets in the file system

1879875544_ScreenShot2020-07-30at3_12_26AM.png.81b198d07e6f7e51602a9f0588adbdbb.pngI'm familiar with the "file system"    
Generally, filenames are listed - the contents are not visible   

Evernote provides much better support for organization and retrieval

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First I think the ideas in the initial thread have their merit, and implementation would help users in the „paperless quest“.

Second I think that putting many notes in few notebooks, and do the majority of organizing with tags is the way it should be done. If one notebook or a few, but if using more than that one easily ends in a system that mimics a file system. This is not the way EN works.

About the AI Support: It would be nice, but a few thousand documents are probably not enough to train a self learning software. When the scanner tries to do it, it usually comes with OCR by the scanner (or supporting software, in case of Fujitsu by Nuance). When the scan is imported into EN with OCR data already, currently EN will not OCR it again.

This means to support such an AI, it would have to do it all inside of EN. I do it outside because if done by EN, the OCR is part of the note, not of the attached document. I think it is better to have the OCR data embedded into the file itself.

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As to the original question "are there relevant use cases beyond a PDF archive",  I'd say the answer is a resounding 'yes'.

I totally agree that other apps are sometimes better for processing individual tasks,  and I still use mind maps, post-process digital images, and send emails using other software.  It's a question of using Evernote to the best advantage - which can be a very individual measure.

Forinstance my mind maps are attached to notes because that makes them available wherever I can access the internet,  and have a local mind map client on which to run them. (Outputs to images and PDF files are also possible for purely view usage)

I keep my images on an external hard drive (with backups) but Lightroom is (sorry Adobe) still a huge amorphous blob of menus and capabilities,  complicated by updates.  I clip web pages, blog posts and general interest items about LR processes and workflows to help me better learn how to use it.

And emails - I use Gmail and Outlook mails,  and apart from the spam which gets deleted,  and the newsletters which get read - then deleted,  my email history is in Evernote.  I'll BCC or forward a 'sent' copy of outgoing emails to my database,  and copy or drag-n-drop replies into my notes.  (DnD means I can still open the email in my mail client and then forward or reply to it.)

Evernote also runs my GTD lists,  my reminder system and acts as a library of possibly useful information - like the 'Road trips' notebook where I save clips and forward emails related to (surprise) possible road trips to interesting places.

I think it's a general-purpose tool that users can employ however they wish - including,  obviously,  PDF archive.

The whole question of suggested tags, automatically changing dates and flagging duplicates though fills me with horror. As of today there is no true "AI" - all we have is coders making educated guesses about what we might want to see,  and learning systems using tens of thousands of iterations to see which one(s) work out best.

I wouldn't claim to be smarter than ALL coders,  but some of the ones I have worked with have not impressed.  If there's going to be a 'system' to deal with my saved data,  I'd rather set that up myself thanks.  And I have - I use Filterize to tag and file around 50% of my notes according to rules I chose.  Training systems is pretty pointless,  because the number of transactions on any one account is too small to be useful.

Now Evernote could milk ALL its accounts to see how folks have sorted their data,  and watch in real time so that their system could 'learn' the best way to process new notes.  But that drives a coach and a bunch of horses through any privacy and security concerns,  and the last time that was suggested by Evernote there was almost a riot...

Just sayin'  ;)

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8 hours ago, Stefan Timm said:

I've always been hoping Evernote would understand its destiny (which is a PDF archive for people who go paperless) and subsequently put an emphasis on features, that support this kind of usage. To name a few improvements that anyone using it in a similar way (and I can't think of much else it could be useful for):

  • some sort of suggestion of tags based on the contents of the document and other already tagged documents in the library
  • making the change of "date created" easier and not harder (which they did some time ago, to my dismay)
  • even maybe automatically capture the creation date from the document
  • identify duplicates (during adding a document and also in the library)

I've gone paperless using EN as well.  To date I have 23,865 PDFs out of 48,606 notes.  The bulk of my access is via compound tag search and/or text.  To your points:

  1. I don't really trust auto tagging at this point.  All scans or PDF downloads run though a Scans notebook so I tag them and then move them to the main notebook.  If smart tagging got smarter fine, but too many variables to me.
  2. I don't change this often enough to worry.  If you do this often on windows you can have the date that appears at the top of the note window be created date.  Then it is one click away.
  3. Not sure this one is practical without a template per document type.  Too many dates and none in the same place.
  4. Fine with me if EN developed it.  Though I'm not sure how much benefit or use for me.  Any dupes tend to show up when I do a search and I fix then.  Otherwise not doing enough harm to make it something to worry about.

And EN is useful for things other than storing PDFs.

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9 hours ago, Stefan Timm said:

I've always been hoping Evernote would understand its destiny (which is a PDF archive for people who go paperless) and subsequently put an emphasis on features, that support this kind of usage. To name a few improvements that anyone using it in a similar way (and I can't think of much else it could be useful for):

  • some sort of suggestion of tags based on the contents of the document and other already tagged documents in the library
  • making the change of "date created" easier and not harder (which they did some time ago, to my dismay)
  • even maybe automatically capture the creation date from the document
  • identify duplicates (during adding a document and also in the library)

Maybe I'm mistaken and there are actually relevant use cases beyond a PDF archive, but I strongly doubt it. Although, I must admit, even I occasionally enter a note 🙂

So here is my question:

How can Evernote even survive without providing the best thinkable support for people who want to go paperless?

I think the use of the word destiny is strong language. It implies a singular result  from inception to infinity. Any true system will evolve or change over time to fit the needs of the environment, or in this case its users over time. The only constant is change. 

To your points...

  • tag suggestion system is a touchy area. There are millions of users with their own work flows and styles. Any suggestion system implemented may work for a few, but then generate complaints it doesn't work for everyone else.
  • I don't see any issue with changing the date created on the desktop apps, perhaps more explanation can be provided?
  • capturing the creation date could only support one source, that would be the file creation date from the system OS. Doable, I could see this as a feature.
  • What constitutes a duplicate? Your definition of a duplicate can easily be different from another user. 

Your use of Evernote is different then others. You use it as a document storage and retrieval system.Others user it for notes. And others use it for task management. In all, these are the functions users have designed into Evernote for their needs. Evernote is a framework, and you build on that frame work.

One of the problems with trying to implement features to please everyone is running into the Microsoft syndrome. Microsoft tried to implement features in their office products to try to please everyone. But it became to bloated, it developed a reputation for being slow, clunky, and bug ridden. Microsoft has turned that around. Evernote can't fall for the same trap. 

Honestly its sounds like you need a dedicated document management system you can customize. 

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Thanks for all the valuable responses. And yes, a dedicated document management system might be better. I use Devonthink for work and it is horrible. I doubt there is anything better out there at this time.

Getting back to my initial points:

  • I receive almost ALL my documents digitally as PDFs. I hardly create any documents myself (other than maybe some overviews and notes). So I simply don't understand why it should be so hard to recognize an invoice from the some company based on 10 years monthly invoices already in Evernote, and suggest the appropriate tags. It would even help if "similar" documents with their tags could be presented, making it easier to keep a consistent tag system.
  • About the "date created": I think the only useful way to use it is to change it to the date printed on the PDF (if the content is a PDF, at least). This was made unnecessarily harder last year, now it have to click the three dots, select "Note details" and only then I can adjust the date. The file date or scan date are both completely useless and I want to be able to sort by document date, which (again) is the date printed on the PDF. In the past, I could just click on the date field in the note to change it. While I understand it might be difficult to reliably extract this from the PDF, it should be one click to adjust it manually (and not be victim to some mediocre user interface "improvement")
  • A duplicate is the same PDF attachment in 2 notes (at least if there is no other content in the note, headline is considered metadata in this context)

I hear you, Evernote is much more than a PDF archive, but going paperless for me is mainly one big, easy to search PDF archive. Like I said, most people do not create any significant content themselves (and, to make it even a bit more controversial, there honestly is more than enough content already 🙂 ).

If there was an easy to use, affordable, cloud based PDF archive solution which I can use on all my devices (macOS, iOS) without any syncing, I'd probably move on to that. My hope was certainly that Evernote would cover this use case 99% (at least over time), but I don't see any improvements. Having to click twice before I can change the "create date" is even a move in the opposite direction (luckily a small one).

So, back to my original question: Why doesn't Evernote support the paperless life better? In particular for users who do NOT create any documents, but just receive them as email attachments, downloads and on paper.

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57 minutes ago, Stefan Timm said:

So, back to my original question: Why doesn't Evernote support the paperless life better? In particular for users who do NOT create any documents, but just receive them as email attachments, downloads and on paper.

"Better" is such a personal concept.  Your specifics were addressed by most who responded to the thread, no eureka moments.  IAC, working fine for my paperless life.  🤷‍♂️

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  • 1 month later...

Thanks again for all the responses. I've been reading everything again today and here is my conclusion:

My use case is most likely an important one. Not because it is mine, but because I know other people who use Evernote in the same way. For some reason it seems to be ignored. Looking at a post on the Evernote blog from January, there seems to be so much technical debt that it is probably keeping development busy for some time, so I expect no improvements.

About the narrow focus: The worst thing is trying to be everything for everyone. Tables in Evernote where I can't even sort by column or do simple calculations are completely useless, just as an example. And for text editing, styles have been around since the 80s! What I see is the result of a lack of focus.

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Probably yes, there was a lack of focus.

From the time it takes to develop, test and roll out the new generation of clients the roots of the problem are deep. 

We will all know when the „big“ release is available. To be honest, I do not expect a wave of innovation from this. If the clients get more streamlined and some of the most persistent bugs (spotlight crashes on Mac, iOS shut down issue from my list, others have other issues on Windows and Android) solved, it would be a good step.

Conclusion: If unhappy, probably check your workflow, and either adapt or find a tool better suited.

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8 hours ago, Stefan Timm said:

Tables in Evernote where I can't even sort by column or do simple calculations are completely useless, just as an example. And for text editing, styles have been around since the 80s! What I see is the result of a lack of focus.

Agreed - the integrated Evernote note editor has no focus on spreadsheet functions   
Perhaps a little focus on word processing functions; I see heading styles introduced in the latest beta versions.  However, I don't consider this a word processing app

I continue to  use dedicated apps when I need extended features; with the documents stored in Evernote as note attachment files

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On 9/9/2020 at 2:17 PM, DTLow said:

 

I continue to  use dedicated apps when I need extended features; with the documents stored in Evernote as note attachment files

I've tried using this in my workflow before but the fact you can't really do it in iOS easily makes it a bit subpar. You have to open it in another app, do your work, export it back to to evernote, then move the attachment back into the original note and delete the first one. I suspect it's an iOS limitation but it's still a shame because it would be ideal otherwise. 

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Well, the new iOS version 10 now supports 3 levels of headers, and some other formatting features. This is based on the new framework which means this will be rolled  out to the other clients as well.

Currently I would not switch to the new EN client on iOS if I am still using the old one. There needs to be some more bug fixing done.

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5 hours ago, PinkElephant said:

Currently I would not switch to the new EN client on iOS if I am still using the old one. There needs to be some more bug fixing done.

.... and features returned.  😉

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  • 1 month later...

Not necessarily spot on the topic, but still somewhat related:

After Evernote on my iMac was updated to 10.3.7, it became almost unusable. I see a spinning green circle all the time, tables that had shown properly before have now huge areas of white space, amongst other things. On top of that my particular workflow became even worse.

Whoever is doing product management or user interface design at Evernote should seriously consider getting into a different profession, best far away from anything with software. This should not be taken as an insult, but as good advice.

Just one thing: Why can't I change the Notebook and add tags in the "Note info" window.

Sorry, there is no excuse for that. We have a German word for that: "Verschlimmbesserung". Basically that means you made everything worse when trying to improve things.

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I now switched to Evernote Legacy. Thank god it exists. Everything is back to normal.

As someone who has extensive experience in product management and product ownership, I'm now more than ever convinced that focus is the critical success factor number one. Even trying to build a tool that is a mixture of note taking, text editing, file system, email archive, bookmarking and more is simply a bad idea. Those tasks need to be handled in separate applications, which are there for a reason. Maybe Evernote is still infected with its founder's idea of being the one place where one puts all information. 

I had really hoped he had taken this vision with him when he left the company.

So I will keep using Evernote for the only suitable use case I see, which is a PDF archive. Yes, even I occasionally add a note with a checklist or a picture, sometimes even a table. This makes up less than 1% of my notes.

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Quite a philosophical question: Have many apps, each more specific in serving a task, or a general approach that may only reach 80% in each field, but puts everything under one roof.

If you follow the GTD method, they promote to collect stuff in as little inboxes as possible, to make it easier to review and sort them into a productive structure. This is opposed to a setup with many little information silos.

For me EN serves as the central point to collect it all. Currently I stick with legacy, and hope they get it sorted out.

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28 minutes ago, Stefan Timm said:

Even trying to build a tool that is a mixture of note taking, text editing, file system, email archive, bookmarking and more is simply a bad idea.

Why is this "simply a bad idea"

I'm a long time Evernote Legacy user

At it's core, Evernote is a generic note/document/file storage and organization tool

I use the integrated editor is useful for basic notes,    
and dedicated tools for extended features (documents stored in Evernote as attachments)     
The Evernote editor is not a text editor, but text files can be stored as attachments 

I archive emails in Evernote from various services.  Do you have a recommendation for a better tool? 

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40 minutes ago, Stefan Timm said:

Maybe Evernote is still infected with its founder's idea of being the one place where one puts all information. 

I don’t know,, 6.25.1 is a great multi use tool for me, for all the items listed.  V10 not so much.

Trade offs for sure yet still EN 6.25.1 is a highly effective single app solution for me.  FWIW. 

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I don't think Evernote Legacy is even a mid-term solution. If I'm not mistaken, it is a dead product, meaning it does not receive updates.

Version 10 (at least on macOS) is so bad right now that (even taking future improvements into account) I have no doubt it will be a total failure. Time will tell if I'm right.

If someone is not even able to display a PDF on a current machine without any delay, they should find a different profession. And BTW scrolling through the PDF is usually much more efficient than having to hit the page forward button for every page. If I was an Evernote Ambassador I would not know what to tell the people I convinced using it. Would probably have to find a new profession myself, as nobody would trust me anymore in my field.

I hope Evernote Legacy lasts long enough until someone has built a decent replacement, at least for my main use case (PDF archive with tags, robust sync, powerful iOS client and basic note taking capability, maybe supporting markdown).

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12 minutes ago, Stefan Timm said:

If I'm not mistaken, it is a dead product, meaning it does not receive updates.

Your switch from Legacy to Version 10 involved receiving updates.  How"s that working out for you?

Evernote Legacy is still very much "alive"; I'll hold off on the product burial for the immediate feature

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1 hour ago, Stefan Timm said:

I don't think Evernote Legacy is even a mid-term solution. If I'm not mistaken, it is a dead product, meaning it does not receive updates.

Wasn’t commenting as to its life span, its days are obviously numbered.  Just saying it was a one stop shop for all my info and task and second brain stuff.  

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  • 2 months later...

I wish you all good luck, talked to a couple of people I know use Evernote and all of them are looking for alternatives.

Personally, I found one which serves my needs better than Evernote in every way:

  • uses iCloud storage, which is certainly a much safer option than Evernotes servers (and yes, I never used Android in my life and eliminated Windows almost a decade ago)
  • It uses smart ways to create metadata (e.g. creation date from PDF)
  • It stores single type objects (like PDF, JPG) exactly as they are, can drag and drop them right from the app to the desktop
  • Double clicking an object opens the associated app on macOS, just like in Finder
  • Any object that Quick Look supports will be rendered

While one could still argue that trying to be everything for everyone might actually work, trying to solve the problem of multiple platforms by using some framework for me is undoubtful the nail on the coffin. Time will tell, but I can‘t remember one time when I was wrong about such an assessment (Blackberry, Windows Mobile just to name the most prominent ones I predicted to disappear long before their demise)

 

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Sure, I use "Keep It".

For work we use DevonThink, so I'm quite familiar with that one as well. There was no way I would have used that for my personal stuff, although with the latest version (iCloud Sync, proactive sync to my iDevices) I might have given it a thought, if I hadn't found Keep It.

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Is anyone using ScanSnap Home as a document management system?

I only occasionally use Evernote to take property survey notes with pictures for work, but my primary use has been as a document filing system, 90% being in .pdf format. 

Last year, long prior to V10 fiasco I was asked to share a collection of documents on a specific use case. Because of IT protocols the company would not download Evernote to share an EN folder. I ended up having to copy all out as pdf files again and sharing as a OneDrive folder which suited their case as they were all an Office365 subscription. 

A lot of my interaction with companies is with O365 so I considered better working with them than trying to reinvent the wheel. The past year I've stored all these documents in a OneDrive account, using ScanSnap Home as the front end. To me this provides the best of both worlds. The documents are all in OneDrive folders, to be shared at will, whilst the Scansnap allows me to Record memo descriptions onto the file and to use a Tag based filing system for search recovery just the same as my Evernote tag system. 

I'm also confident that should Fujitsu someday withdraw Scansnap Home, the worst that will happen is that I will loose the tagging system. The base files remain in their native format and retained within OneDrive which I don't see disappearing anytime soon. 

I'd be interested to hear of anyone else's use case of ScanSnap Home. Details of it appear to be thin on the ground in a web search and I cannot find any independent user forum. 

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Over the last years I‘ve moved all my personal stuff and all my mobile work stuff from the iMac and MacBook Pro to my iPad Pro. When I bought my 2013 MacBook Pro, I had already decided this would be my last notebook. Given all that, I don‘t think ScanSnap Home would be an option.

I also use a sophisticated (but easy to handle) tag system, loosing my tags would be almost as bad as loosing the documents (even though all docs are full text searchable). Keep It also has an intuitive search that combines full text, tag based (and other metadata based) search without having to learn an inhuman search syntax.

Given the history of Fujitsu with their scanning software (there were major problems with a macOS Upgrade a couple of years back) I‘d strongly advise against it. But that‘s just my 5 cents.

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ScanSnap Home is a scanning software, not a document manager.

Document management can be done in a files and folder structure (SSH is using this when it „organizes“ documents), with all the problems this causes. Or one moves to more professional solutions, of which EN is one possibility.

What keeps me away from all that ScanSnap stuff is that Fujitsu has a mixed record with keeping their software current. I used ScanSnap Manager on my Mac - upgraded to Catalina, and *bang* ScanSnap Manager refused to start. It was still 32bit, not supported any longer. Fujitsu communicated „no more SSM for Macs, use SSH“. OK, switched my workflows over.

Last summer a new 64Bit Version of SSM surfaced. No information from Fujitsu, read about it in a forum. First release not supporting cloud services, chaotic web site, no good information. The release from September now interacts with EN (legacy) again. It is still hard to find, and badly documented.

Conclusion: EN v10 is not what you wish in terms of releases, but Fujitsu is worse. I would never rely with my document management on them. My ix500 does the job, the hardware is very good. But not the software that comes with it.

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On 2/28/2021 at 4:54 AM, Powerfab said:

A lot of my interaction with companies is with O365 so I considered better working with them than trying to reinvent the wheel. The past year I've stored all these documents in a OneDrive account, using ScanSnap Home as the front end. To me this provides the best of both worlds. The documents are all in OneDrive folders, to be shared at will, whilst the Scansnap allows me to Record memo descriptions onto the file and to use a Tag based filing system for search recovery just the same as my Evernote tag system. 

Not quite the same.  When EN eliminated local notebooks with V10 I needed to find a way to handle the 8,500 private notes I stored therein, mostly PDFs.  As they are private notes sharing is not so much a requirement other than tax time.  The solution I am deploying uses a Windows root folder containing folders for years, Windows indexing (turned on for only those folders), and file explorer.  

To your tag point, a bit barbaric, but I append the file name with [tag1 ...], brackets included.  Typically no more than three tags per document, mostly two in my case.  This should preclude future issues for tag loss.  Using a bulk file rename utility has made this simple as I save the attachments to the folders.  Drudge work but required to ensure access to these documents. 

To my surprise Windows search works remarkably fast and well.  With preview enabled on file explorer the screen looks similar to EN, notes on the left image on the right.

I am moving everything pre 2021 at this point, about half way there, doing a bit of cleanup along the way.  I am leaving the notes in place in EN during the move, tagging with Moved   I am doing periodic 7zip encrypted backups to OneDrive.  I may switch to putting the folder structure into a VeraCrypt container on OneDrive so as to eliminate the backup step.  Won’t fully decide until I decide how best to recover.  Decision to be made when most is moved.  Many options based upon the folder structure and the like.  The index stays on the local machine in any case.

When I do get everything moved I would still be okay if EN added back local notebooks.  Better to have it all in one place in my view.  FWIW.

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7 hours ago, Stefan Timm said:

Over the last years I‘ve moved all my personal stuff and all my mobile work stuff from the iMac and MacBook Pro to my iPad Pro. When I bought my 2013 MacBook Pro, I had already decided this would be my last notebook. Given all that, I don‘t think ScanSnap Home would be an option.

I also use a sophisticated (but easy to handle) tag system, loosing my tags would be almost as bad as loosing the documents (even though all docs are full text searchable). Keep It also has an intuitive search that combines full text, tag based (and other metadata based) search without having to learn an inhuman search syntax.

Given the history of Fujitsu with their scanning software (there were major problems with a macOS Upgrade a couple of years back) I‘d strongly advise against it. But that‘s just my 5 cents.

I'm on Windows so Keep It doesn't work for me. Pity I like the look of it. 

I get what you're saying about Fujitsu, I'm aware of their history and do have concerns about the quality of their software and product development. I wouldn't give ScanSnap a second look if it was holding by files in a proprietary container. 

I'm very much on the fence with Evernote at the moment. I've been an advocate of it since very early days. Back then I was an avid note taker, today this has migrated to a document hoarder. Data portability and sharing to others have become much more important to me. 

I guess I might be guilty of Evernote weariness and admit to trying many of the competitions products over the last year. be it Notion, Nimbus, Joplin or OneNote. It might be familiarity, but EN still suits the best. If EN10 could come back to Legacy parity I might be content as is, I do like the new format. 

Oh well,... back on the fence for now. 

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5 hours ago, PinkElephant said:

ScanSnap Home is a scanning software, not a document manager.

Document management can be done in a files and folder structure (SSH is using this when it „organizes“ documents), with all the problems this causes. Or one moves to more professional solutions, of which EN is one possibility.

What keeps me away from all that ScanSnap stuff is that Fujitsu has a mixed record with keeping their software current. I used ScanSnap Manager on my Mac - upgraded to Catalina, and *bang* ScanSnap Manager refused to start. It was still 32bit, not supported any longer. Fujitsu communicated „no more SSM for Macs, use SSH“. OK, switched my workflows over.

Last summer a new 64Bit Version of SSM surfaced. No information from Fujitsu, read about it in a forum. First release not supporting cloud services, chaotic web site, no good information. The release from September now interacts with EN (legacy) again. It is still hard to find, and badly documented.

Conclusion: EN v10 is not what you wish in terms of releases, but Fujitsu is worse. I would never rely with my document management on them. My ix500 does the job, the hardware is very good. But not the software that comes with it.

I never could get on with SSM, to me it was only a scanning conduit. SSH didn't start out too well, and I fully agree Fujitsu communication and update process is a shambles. I only see SSH as a front end conduit for my documents, OneDrive is the storage platform.

As I've replied to Stefan, I think a lot of my issues are Evernote weariness. For me V10 has the potential to be a great product, but its not a patch on Legacy for getting work done. I cancelled my premium subscription last Autumn in some form of protest, only to renew again at the start of the year when I couldn't find a better home elsewhere. 

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1 hour ago, CalS said:

Not quite the same.  When EN eliminated local notebooks with V10 I needed to find a way to handle the 8,500 private notes I stored therein, mostly PDFs.  As they are private notes sharing is not so much a requirement other than tax time.  The solution I am deploying uses a Windows root folder containing folders for years, Windows indexing (turned on for only those folders), and file explorer.  

To your tag point, a bit barbaric, but I append the file name with [tag1 ...], brackets included.  Typically no more than three tags per document, mostly two in my case.  This should preclude future issues for tag loss.  Using a bulk file rename utility has made this  simple as I save the attachments to the folders.  Drudge work but required to ensure access to these documents. 

To my surprise Windows search works remarkably fast and well.  With preview enabled on file explorer the screen looks similar to EN, notes on the left image on the right.

I am moving everything pre 2021 at this point, about half way there, doing a bit of cleanup along the way.  I am leaving the notes in place in EN during the move, tagging with Moved   I am doing periodic 7zip encrypted backups to OneDrive.  I may switch to putting the folder structure into a VeraCrypt container on OneDrive so as to eliminate the backup step.  Won’t fully decide until I decide how best to recover.  Decision to be made when most is moved.  Many options based upon the folder structure and the like.  The index stays on the local machine in any case.

When I do get everything moved I would still be okay if EN added back local notebooks.  Better to have it all in one place in my view.  FWIW.

Thanks Cal, In some ways your storage need is very close to mine. I haven't had a worry about local docs, I've no problem with mine being on EN servers, I see  this as better security than a local hard drive and back up files elsewhere. That which I store is information useful to me and my clients, but of little commercial value or sensitivity to others. Anytime I've needed, I've made use of data encryption within a note. 

I'm running on a Surface Pro, so hard drive space is limited, hence my use of OneDrive for file storage. I've never explored windows indexing, I assume it works across both local and OneDrive files? I think the only thing putting me off this approach is the tagging workaround. As you say drudge work and I'm the first to admit I'm lazy this way. I'm unlikely to maintain a consistent filename tagging approach for any length of time. 

I understand what you're saying about the file explorer preview, I've mine set up this way also. OneDrive on the iphone also gives me document portability and has been faultless in my use. 

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2 hours ago, Powerfab said:

Thanks Cal, In some ways your storage need is very close to mine. I haven't had a worry about local docs, I've no problem with mine being on EN servers, I see  this as better security than a local hard drive and back up files elsewhere. That which I store is information useful to me and my clients, but of little commercial value or sensitivity to others. Anytime I've needed, I've made use of data encryption within a note. 

I'm running on a Surface Pro, so hard drive space is limited, hence my use of OneDrive for file storage. I've never explored windows indexing, I assume it works across both local and OneDrive files? I think the only thing putting me off this approach is the tagging workaround. As you say drudge work and I'm the first to admit I'm lazy this way. I'm unlikely to maintain a consistent filename tagging approach for any length of time. 

I understand what you're saying about the file explorer preview, I've mine set up this way also. OneDrive on the iphone also gives me document portability and has been faultless in my use. 

You are welcome. 

I bought a 2 TB USB SSD drive to accommodate OneDrive storage, only have a 256 GB on my laptop.  Costed as much as a low end PC but works nicely.

For me the drudge work has been in the cleanup/consolidation of the documents prior to the save.  With the bulk rename utility it is easy to add [FY2020 Trd] for example to the end of a batch of file names.  Since I don't use that many tags the risk of a mistake is acceptable to me.  May not work for all.  

One thing I didn't mention above is that I am also looking at something like BoxCryptor to encrypt all the files and have access on multiple platforms.  Test is if I can index the files in that fashion.  Don't think so but worth a look.  Another bridge to cross.  🤷‍♂️

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