Hate the new Evernote

[matthew28 2]

Installed the new version after getting the update notification at the weekend. Thank goodness there is a Legacy version download and it works. Hurray.

Who on earth thought it would be a good idea to change the default typeface in the new version. I have three years of daily journal pages which are all carefully built up of text boxes, pasted in charts and a typeface size so that they fit my computer screen for how I have my Evernote view panels arranged. And then I open up the new version 10 (Windows PC), and the typeface has changed from the Segoe UI size 10, to the much larger Sans Serif size16. So none of my pages are now correctly formatted or laid out properly on my screen. As well as the fact that some titles are no longer underlined, and the odd line of text has been changed to Sans Serif size 13 instead of 16 so the text changes aren't even consistent.

Why on earth was it thought a good idea to remove the previous version's choice of what must be fifty odd different fonts available, and reduce that number to only six available fonts in the new version. And not include the previous version's default font as one of the fonts in the new version. Surely everybody who previously used Evernote has now found in this latest version that all of their saved work now looks completely different and fits differently on their screens to the way they had it yesterday, and how they had been happy with it for the past months or even years.

Completely ridiculous.

Time to start looking for a replacement application that will allow the import of an .ENEX backup file, as it appears from that Evernote can remove access for this Legacy version whenever they want.

[Ted 9]

I agree with many of the complaints about the new Evernote. During this 10.x experience, I have tried a number of Evernote alternatives for the Mac.  None of them have a decent web clipper (it's the first thing I test).  Evernote's web clipper is the absolute best that I have found.  But Evernote has not abandoned us.  I just re-installed Evernote Legacy for the Mac and I am weeping with tears of joy!

Evernote Legacy feels much faster. I can search all my notes from the main window.  I never have to open the Sidebar which takes up valuable screen real estate.  Links in notes open with a single click.  Legacy opens new notes with the cursor in the Title field.  Legacy lets me change notebooks in two clicks without having to open the Sidebar.

 

If you have issues with the new Evernote, reinstall Legacy.  I have been a Premium customer for eleven years and Evernote is crucial to my workflow.  I  migrated 8000 4900 journal entries from Day One (a Mac-only app) in April 2020 to Evernote.  I am now journaling every single day in Evernote on Windows and Mac.  I just wanted a single place for all my notes, web clippings and reference material.  Evernote is that place for me, a university instructor.

 

The good news about Legacy is that you don't have to migrate all your Evernote notes to use it.  It runs alongside the "new" Evernote.  Speaking of "new", I liken the new Evernote to "New Coke", if you get the reference. 

 

Evernote is receiving a lot of criticism about their new app, and frankly they deserve quite a bit of it.  However, in their defense, Evernote is still the best at what they do, they gave us a way to escape the tyranny of Evernote 10 with Legacy and it is still quite easy to export all your notes when it is time to leave.  I am grateful for Evernote and continue to use it every single day.  I have tried most of the others.  Most of them don't hold a candle to Evernote FOR ME.

 

I say that while we provide honest and useful feedback to Evernote about the new app, we must give thanks and applaud them for the greatness of the Legacy app.

 

Thank you, Evernote Legacy!

 

 

Edited December 7, 2020 by Ted
Correct a typo.

[DTLow 5,736]

On 12/5/2020 at 4:56 PM, dbvirago said:

The fact that they remove the legacy app each time you install

You can't have two apps with the same name; hence the latest legacy product version is called Evernote Legacy (installation here)
It doesn't get removed when installing the Version 10 product

[sgarcata 49]

On 10/23/2020 at 11:03 AM, Dave-in-Decatur said:

Hello, and welcome to the forums. Please search in the forums dedicated to v. 10 regarding performance, notebook colors, etc., which are already under discussion there: https://discussion.evernote.com/forums/forum/720-evernote-for-windows-issues-versions-100-and-above/ and https://discussion.evernote.com/forums/forum/731-evernote-for-windows-requests-versions-100-and-above/.

Why? because I didn't find those in a search... What I'm wondering is why wasn't it easier to get to them.

[Frankie1972 5]

On 12/4/2020 at 4:22 PM, clarkmcinnis said:

I will remain on a legacy version until I can find an alternative to Evernote or there are enough improvements to v10 to allow me to continue with my current workflow.  Creating and organizing nested tags is one of the most important features for me.

I agree I 've been looking at other options and nothing really interests me 

hopefully they can improve 10x to a point where it's usable for my workflow

[Danno321 23]

I have installed the latest Evernote on all my Apple devices.   I never did complex processing with Evernote so its OK for me but note loads are slower.  

[sgarcata 49]

4 hours ago, Ted said:

I agree with many of the complaints about the new Evernote. During this 10.x experience, I have tried a number of Evernote alternatives for the Mac.  None of them have a decent web clipper (it's the first thing I test).  Evernote's web clipper is the absolute best that I have found.  But Evernote has not abandoned us.  I just re-installed Evernote Legacy for the Mac and I am weeping with tears of joy!

Evernote Legacy feels much faster. I can search all my notes from the main window.  I never have to open the Sidebar which takes up valuable screen real estate.  Links in notes open with a single click.  Legacy opens new notes with the cursor in the Title field.  Legacy lets me change notebooks in two clicks without having to open the Sidebar.

 

If you have issues with the new Evernote, reinstall Legacy.  I have been a Premium customer for eleven years and Evernote is crucial to my workflow.  I  migrated 8000 journal entries from Day One (a Mac-only app) in April 2020 to Evernote.  I am now journaling every single day in Evernote on Windows and Mac.  I just wanted a single place for all my notes, web clippings and reference material.  Evernote is that place for me, a university instructor.

 

The good news about Legacy is that you don't have to migrate all your Evernote notes to use it.  It runs alongside the "new" Evernote.  Speaking of "new", I liken the new Evernote to "New Coke", if you get the reference. 

 

Evernote is receiving a lot of criticism about their new app, and frankly they deserve quite a bit of it.  However, in their defense, Evernote is still the best at what they do, they gave us a way to escape the tyranny of Evernote 10 with Legacy and it is still quite easy to export all your notes when it is time to leave.  I am grateful for Evernote and continue to use it every single day.  I have tried most of the others.  Most of them don't hold a candle to Evernote FOR ME.

 

I say that while we provide honest and useful feedback to Evernote about the new app, we must give thanks and applaud them for the greatness of the Legacy app.

 

Thank you, Evernote Legacy!

 

 

I appreciate your post and agree re: the web clipper.

I read a post from an EN employee that said it was impossible to install the legacy version, but then, by chance, I found a link to it so that's what I'm doing. I already had it on my other computers (but getting rid of two of them). I'm a long time Premium user so I was shattered by the idea that I had to suddenly switch to another tool. I would love to know what template you are using for journaling.

Thanks for your valuable post.

[Ted 9]

My goal each day is simply to share my feelings about the day.  I don't use a template for journaling because I have never found one that works for me.  I simply record important events, feelings about the day and near- and long-term goals.  BTW, I use a program called Things by Cultured Code for managing my GTD-style to-do list and not Evernote.  I do all I can to turn off the annoying reminders and to-do "features" in Evernote.

I might add that I teach software engineering to college students and I am opinionated.  I have always felt that the UNIX/Linux concept of a single tool performing a single task is the best way to design software.  Deviation from this single-minded focus is what causes software bloat and Evernote may need lap-band surgery.

26 minutes ago, sgarcata said:

I appreciate your post and agree re: the web clipper.

I read a post from an EN employee that said it was impossible to install the legacy version, but then, by chance, I found a link to it so that's what I'm doing. I already had it on my other computers (but getting rid of two of them). I'm a long time Premium user so I was shattered by the idea that I had to suddenly switch to another tool. I would love to know what template you are using for journaling.

Thanks for your valuable post.

 

[PinkElephant 8,103]

+1 to use Things 3 for the GTD setup, instead of stretching EN to this end.

Oh, and for all out there: It is Mac & iOS only. Another great way to reduce bloat in your life 👨🏼‍💻

[Joel O's 26]

I cannot be the only one seeing the jarring discrepancy here between what EN defenders are saying and what EN is plainly saying about its own product. 

The folks staunchly defending Evernote are fervently saying that V10 clearly isn't a finished product, and the hysterical whiners should just patiently stick to Legacy while V10 catches up and stop complaining, or just quit already and move on since they hate EN so much.

But CEO Ian Small himself said plainly in an interview with Tom Solid on YouTube that, from EN's perspective,  only a "very small minority" of users would feel bothered by V10's missing features. In the CEO's view, this is a mainly finished product with features that would please the bulk of its users (eg. he also was of the opinion somehow that only a very tiny percentage of EN users use tags, 3-5% if I recall, an assertion I find hard to believe). 

Wake up, people. I don't think they deserve our faith.

[dbvirago 502]

7 hours ago, DTLow said:

You can't have two apps with the same name; hence the latest legacy product version is called Evernote Legacy (installation here)
It doesn't get removed when installing the Version 10 product

Thanks, I was using 6.25.1 which did get removed. Reinstalling was quick, but resetting all my preferences was not.

 

[DTLow 5,736]

6 hours ago, Joel O's said:

The folks staunchly defending Evernote are fervently saying that V10 clearly isn't a finished product

I say the Version 10 product is a work-in-progress, and not ready for general use   
An opinion, but backed up by facts

I recommend users not install v10, or revert to the Legacy product

It's not  "staunchly defending Evernote"
My purpose is to assist users to not get impacted by the v10 issues

>>I don't think they deserve our faith

For myself, it's a question of satisfying my note/document requirements for storage and organization
At the present time, the best product/service is Evernote Legacy; ymmv

[bwydoogh 71]

1 hour ago, DTLow said:

I say the Version 10 product is a work-in-progress, and not ready for general use   
An opinion, but backed up by facts

Which facts? The fact is that when you go to the Evernote website and you click on "Download app", you get the v10. The fact is that when you go to the App Store and search for v10, you get the v10 version. So... where are the facts that it is not ready for general use? You don't decide about this (as you said... it's your opinion; but I don't agree that you see this is backed up by facts).

Evernote decides about what is to be considered as ready for general use. And they did. Evernote V10 is ready for general use, according to the company building the product. That's the only fact that matters (unfortunately).

[DTLow 5,736]

30 minutes ago, bwydoogh said:

Evernote decides about what is to be considered as ready for general use. And they did.

Evernote's document at https://evernote.com/blog/new-windows-mac/    
please be aware that there are a handful of features— ... —that are not yet available. If your workflow depends on these features, you can continue to use our legacy apps

[PinkElephant 8,103]

„Faith“ to a piece of software or to a company is a very one sided faith. In the end it is faith to myself, to pick the right solution.

Currently v10 is lacking a lot that was standard on the old versions. Maybe some of it was not used by many, but it was crucial to workflows that are now broken. I have no issue to use legacy until they get this stuff released - I would have a problem if some (not on the list of terminated features, but still not there) functions do not return.

What should make EN management rethink is this observation: Before v10 this forum was to a high percentage populated by Basic account users looking for help. Since v10 there are a LOT of P&P users here, those that pay for the show. And the v10-enthusiasts among them are - ZERO. So I say: Hey EN, GTD with v10 !

[Michael 1234567890 2]

On 11/10/2020 at 9:34 PM, Austin G said:

We appreciate all of your feedback and hear you. We're continuing to work on building more features and performance improvements in the new Evernote apps.  Our latest release, version 10.3 has significant performance improvements, bug fixes, and some UI improvements. Check out the Coming Soon section of our release notes to see what else is coming soon:

• Quickly search and move to different note using a keyboard shortcut (Mac - CMD+J, Windows - Ctrl+Q)
• Create new audio recordings and playback audio files
• Top list view (the same condensed view as side-list, but the list is on top)
• Dragging and dropping note links directly into your note
• Global keyboard shortcuts
• Additional export options

Others have mentioned it in this thread, but I did want to remind everyone reading that If 10.3 doesn't meet your needs just yet, you can reinstall the legacy version, 6.25.2. from here: https://help.evernote.com/hc/articles/360052560314

We're  committed to keeping the legacy apps available until we're closer to closing the feature gap between them and the new clients.  Since we're making no changes to the app, we feel that there's little risk in introducing a new bug that would potentially block you from using the legacy version. For example, there's still a handful of users using version 6.7.6. released over three years ago without major issues. 

if you develop a new version of a software and the best advice you can give users is to install teh previous version, then maybe you should realize you've gone in the wrong direction...in other words: a very very bad update

I will wait for another month to see if you are correcting your bad decisions and will release a new version that has all the features of the previous ones, or I will cancel my subscription and transfer my notes to an other note-taking-software. There are more than enough useful alternatives. And a customer that left you will not likely come back...

[Christophe Gevrey 13]

HELP

Where are my shortcuts? Win+Shift+A

Where is my toolbar???

I want my Evernote BACK!

[Christophe Gevrey 13]

4 hours ago, DTLow said:

I say the Version 10 product is a work-in-progress, and not ready for general use   
An opinion, but backed up by facts

I recommend users not install v10, or revert to the Legacy product

It's not  "staunchly defending Evernote"
My purpose is to assist users to not get impacted by the v10 issues

>>I don't think they deserve our faith

For myself, it's a question of satisfying my note/document requirements for storage and organization
At the present time, the best product/service is Evernote Legacy; ymmv

I made the mistake to "upgrade" - can I go back to the previous working one?

[Big Trev 35]

Just now, Christophe Gevrey said:

I made the mistake to "upgrade" - can I go back to the previous working one?

Yes, the Legacy version is available here: https://help.evernote.com/hc/en-us/articles/360052560314-Install-an-older-version-of-Evernote

[Christophe Gevrey 13]

7 minutes ago, Big Trev said:

Yes, the Legacy version is available here: https://help.evernote.com/hc/en-us/articles/360052560314-Install-an-older-version-of-Evernote

Thank you, just installed.

I can't add my notebooks or saved searches anymore to the toolbar. Any idea why?

[stur 31]

1 hour ago, Christophe Gevrey said:

Sorry for the dumb question: How do you colour the notebooks or tags in the legacy version? I have never seen the option.

Right click on the notebook and select "Style" there's a button to the right of the name of the book that allows a colour to be chosen.

[Christophe Gevrey 13]

On 11/18/2020 at 6:59 PM, Baron said:

What the Heck are you guys thinking?  Why would you release this version?  Its totally useless!  Put more time into fixing this instead of making fancy videos showing how great this crappy version really is.

No screen capture - which I use all the time.

Evernote scanner is broken

Half the shortcut keys are gone.  

Slow is molasses. 

Note's don't show up on the right pane when you click on them. 

Full of bugs.  Did you guys even beta test this?  I did it in 5 minutes and could tell you not to release this garbage.

This is total BS!  You made me waste a good morning uninstalling and putting the old version back.  Now I don't trust you guys anymore.

Very long time customer,

Andy

Very well summarized.

 

[sgarcata 49]

On 12/2/2020 at 2:13 AM, toao said:

I believe the reason is the emotional bond many folks have / had with evernote. the frustration we all hear - besides the legitimate criticism of the stripping of many features, the general sluggishness of the V10 apps and the communications ***** up around it - is part of a grieving process and a feeling of loss. I know this clearly sounds odd for a piece of software / a service, but it also shows just how dangerous evernote's ***** up could be to its economic base. only time will truly tell, but what's been going on here since the release of V10 is troubling to say the least...

It has to do with how much time and effort we have put into EN to have it really alleviate a lot of pain in handling our information needs and desires. 

It also has to do with the tremendous challenge of researching and choosing an alternative and then moving 10's of thousands of documents, notes, etc. over to a new system.

I was a Lotus Development Business Partner before I retired. I loved Lotus Notes; consulted with clients; developed various workflow/business processes with it. If there was any way to use it as a personal tool, I certainly would today. But, sadly, it isn't affordable for personal use. Then I found Evernote and it satisfies my information needs. Now, after years and 20,000 notes, I have to go through that process all over again. I'm sad and really pissed off.

[DTLow 5,736]

14 minutes ago, sgarcata said:

Now, after years and 20,000 notes, I have to go through that process all over again. I'm sad and really pissed off.

Why is this a concern for today?   
I'm currently using the Legacy product and have no switching plans for the immediate future

>>choosing an alternative and then moving

In the future, before Legacy sunsets, I will have reviewed alternatives and moved my notes   
The completed Version 10 will be one of the alternatives considered; it would be an easy move

[sgarcata 49]

1 minute ago, DTLow said:

Why is this a concern for today?   
I'm currently using the Legacy product and have no switching to an alternative for the immediate future 

First off, the legacy app has so many bugs, TMTC, and obviously they won't be fixing any.

Secondly, it is only a matter of time before it will no longer be available. I use the premium version which requires a subscription and certain functions that they could drop at any moment; In fact the entire sync function is totally dependent on their servers and their support. You're in a dream world if you think EN, the company, will lift a finger to ensure that these services go forward. 

[stur 31]

 

6 minutes ago, sgarcata said:

First off, the legacy app has so many bugs, TMTC, and obviously they won't be fixing any.

Secondly, it is only a matter of time before it will no longer be available. I use the premium version which requires a subscription and certain functions that they could drop at any moment; In fact the entire sync function is totally dependent on their servers and their support. You're in a dream world if you think EN, the company, will lift a finger to ensure that these services go forward. 

Plus if there's a security issue discovered, legacy won't be patched!

[luvmyc6 46]

2 hours ago, sgarcata said:

.... I was a Lotus Development Business Partner before I retired. I loved Lotus Notes; consulted with clients; developed various workflow/business processes with it. If there was any way to use it as a personal tool, I certainly would today. But, sadly, it isn't affordable for personal use. Then I found Evernote and it satisfies my information needs. Now, after years and 20,000 notes, I have to go through that process all over again. I'm sad and really pissed off.

Hi there sgarcata from a fellow Lotus Notes Business Partner. I LOVED Lotus Notes both as a user and a developer. As a developer at our company, I implemented hundreds of custom designed workflow/business process applications using Lotus Notes for 20 years (started with Notes v1!).

When I retired, I too found Evernote for my personal use. Very disappointed in the EN v10 code base so far, but hopeful that they will continue to add back some of the key v6 functionality that was not initially implemented.

[sgarcata 49]

I really tried to figure out how to utilize LN for personal info and tasks, but once I was no longer a (then) IBM Business Partner (2001) and thus no longer getting free software, I had to abandon that dream. If you ever come across something similar (esp with workflow included), please post here. I've followed you. As a Red Cross volunteer, I'm looking closely at the MS Sharepoint suite of inter-related products and I think I'll be able to cludge something together with them although I can't have my personal data store on the ARC servers so I'll have to see what's available retail. It is so bizarre to be using MS products again after being so critical of their pathetic attempts in the 90's to compete with Lotus Notes! Here we are 25 years later!

[PinkElephant 8,103]

Wonderful forum, if you want the latest doomsday rumors:

• The legacy client will not be fixed if it has security issues (oooooooohhhhh, s-e-c-u-r-i-t-y is such a killer argument, even if there are no security issues)
• It is only a matter of time until it will not exist any longer (on the long term, we are all dead, so is legacy)
• There will be NO support for you (o.k. that’s a good one: Tried support for v10 yet ? The difference to „no“ support is rather slim)

Personally I’m with Asterix the Gaul: The only thing on earth to be afraid of is that the sky may fall down. So don’t worry, just be ...

Happy evernoting with legacy, folks !

[luvmyc6 46]

2 minutes ago, sgarcata said:

... It is so bizarre to be using MS products again after being so critical of their pathetic attempts in the 90's to compete with Lotus Notes! Here we are 25 years later!

Oh yes, I remember those feeble and pathetic attempts by MS! To this day, some people at my company (esp the MS defenders) never understood that LN was more than just a "Mail" application.

[oliverthom707 1]

Hellodear, I have 10000 notes is my favourite... like you even look at 5% of them. I suggest if someone has 10000 notes that relies on colour coded tags you aren’t managing your information  very well.

[t8769 42]

If Legacy goes then I go with it!

 

[PinkElephant 8,103]

RIP ...

It is sure one day it will go, be it because a new OS will not support it, or because EN will be so convinced about v10 that they decide to pull the plug.

So basically continuing with legacy is living on borrowed time.

Either you have confidence in the EN team to develop v10 far enough to support your workflows, or better start looking for greener pasture.

[NorcalScott 53]

4 hours ago, oliverthom707 said:

I have 10000 notes is my favourite... like you even look at 5% of them. I suggest if someone has 10000 notes that relies on colour coded tags you aren’t managing your information  very well.

Hmmm, I have about 8,000 work notes from over 10 years.  Do I look at 5% of them?  No, not really, but that is missing the point of a solution like Evernote completely.  I may need to find a contact or a bit of information from one of those notes from 2012, and there is this thing called "Search" that lets me pull that up from the records database quite easily (in the legacy app, but not in the 10.x app currently).  I don't use color coding, but I do use tags extensively, so really, if I have a note from Company X from 2012, I can just click that tag and what I am looking for is likely no more than 10 records deep.

[CalS 5,280]

1 minute ago, NorcalScott said:

Hmmm, I have about 8,000 work notes from over 10 years.  Do I look at 5% of them?  No, not really, but that is missing the point of a solution like Evernote completely.  I may need to find a contact or a bit of information from one of those notes from 2012, and there is this thing called "Search" that lets me pull that up from the records database quite easily (in the legacy app, but not in the 10.x app currently).  I don't use color coding, but I do use tags extensively, so really, if I have a note from Company X from 2012, I can just click that tag and what I am looking for is likely no more than 10 records deep.

Yup.  51k notes at this point and I have no interest in house cleaning.  The thing with pruning notes is that based on Murphy's Law I would prune the wrong ones no matter my diligence.  Since it's a digital data base any space saved is inconsequential.  Not to mention, as lazy as I am I don't think the effort is worth the result.  Good tagging and overall search works well for me.  FWIW.

[Forum 2]

I have been a Premium User for over 15 years and I am thoroughly disappointed with the upgrade, or rather the downgrade. I try to search documents in only one Notebook but it doesn't limit the search to only one notebook. There is no "Search Everything" button as the support topic suggests. 

Evernote has always been my "goto" app but now I must resort to searching for a new similar app. If anyone has a suggestion please let me know.

Thanks

[rts 66]

6 hours ago, oliverthom707 said:

I have 10000 notes is my favourite... like you even look at 5% of them. I suggest if someone has 10000 notes that relies on colour coded tags you aren’t managing your information  very well.

This comment would be more useful if you indicated how EN users could more productively manage their information. If you were trying to encapsulate the current attitude of EN corporate management, however, then full marks.

2 hours ago, NorcalScott said:

Hmmm, I have about 8,000 work notes from over 10 years.  Do I look at 5% of them?  No, not really, but that is missing the point of a solution like Evernote completely.

Indeed. EN is a useful tool because it provides easy access to a database's information, its organization, and its presentation. Crippling those abilities in favor of a new facade is expecting customers to accept an inferior product. Telling customers they shouldn't be using a product as they have been using  it for years is at the core of the problems many of us have with the new v10.

[rts 66]

2 hours ago, Forum said:

Evernote has always been my "goto" app but now I must resort to searching for a new similar app. If anyone has a suggestion please let me know.

Thanks

Welcome, kinsman! There doesn't seem to be a drop in replacement at present, so your options are limited by what you most value in what's now branded as the Legacy version. If you are happy with a product that only works on Mac OS and iOS, for example, then DEVONthink is worth looking at. Reviewing the previous comments in this thread will provide numerous other candidates, again depending on what capabilities you most need/want and which EN capabilities you could easily live without.

I am currently testing Joplin because it appears adequate to my needs even if it falls far short for other people's circumstances. Web clipping seems to be a capability not easily replaced, so I suspect I may have to switch to a free EN account and adjust my workflow to use EN's clipper and periodically export the resulting notes to my new app. Ugh, just typing that possibility makes me sick to my stomach.

[Christophe Gevrey 13]

1 hour ago, rts said:

Welcome, kinsman! There doesn't seem to be a drop in replacement at present, so your options are limited by what you most value in what's now branded as the Legacy version. If you are happy with a product that only works on Mac OS and iOS, for example, then DEVONthink is worth looking at. Reviewing the previous comments in this thread will provide numerous other candidates, again depending on what capabilities you most need/want and which EN capabilities you could easily live without.

I am currently testing Joplin because it appears adequate to my needs even if it falls far short for other people's circumstances. Web clipping seems to be a capability not easily replaced, so I suspect I may have to switch to a free EN account and adjust my workflow to use EN's clipper and periodically export the resulting notes to my new app. Ugh, just typing that possibility makes me sick to my stomach.

I think AutoHotkey can be a nice addition to any note system to do web clipping.

[Vinh0129 1]

Fixed all error on 10.4 version pls, to many error....

[marty@wenizlaw.com 0]

The new version 10.4 took away too many valuable features so I switched back to previous version 6.5.  I could not email a note with 10.4 and I could not scan directly into Evernote. Too bad.. It had some good upgrades, but why would you take away those features??

[matthew28 2]

Please include the previous Segoe UI size 10 font that was the default font in the version I used, and have all my notes written in, as a font in the new version 10 which instead uses a different much larger font as the default so none of my previous notes were any longer correctly formatted for the new larger size typeface.
Why reduce the available fonts down to only four, and not include the previous default font as one of them?

[PinkElephant 8,103]

Nobody from EN here.

Issue a support ticket.

[zonderkoolzuur 14]

I add my voice to the chorus of people who hate this new Evernote.

Years of work in local notebooks locked away. Weeks of my life spent transferring notes manually from Evernote to another app.

Words cannot express how angry I am at Evernote, nor how disappointed I am at just wasting two weeks of my life just to ensure this sort of trick isn't pulled on me again.

[PinkElephant 8,103]

Sad story, should be posted at the black board at EN HQ, titled „Think before release“.

For anybody who wants to avoid a similar experience:

1) Install legacy (Mac/PC), includes local notebooks

https://help.evernote.com/hc/en-us/articles/360052560314-Install-an-older-version-of-Evernote

2) If thinking about switching: Research before moving !

There are enough apps to choose, and many offer an automatic transfer of your notes. The devil lives in the details: If your target app does not support tags, it can’t import them, etc. So when decided, use a small sample to test it, before going all in.

3) If moving: Export notebook by notebook.

The note-notebook relation will not be kept on export, so you need one export file per notebook to keep things tidy.

And most of all: Think about patience. EN made a terrible move by throwing this v10-stuff on all of us. But the data base is intact, the legacy clients work, so what do we have to loose by leaning back a little ? They are working on improving the clients, and maybe they succeed (what success is for you depends on the individual workflows and use cases).

There is plainly no need to force-exit from EN now, just to end up investing a ton of time and effort into a half-baked, badly researched and weak alternative. There are good solutions out there, but none of them fits all. Make sure to find your size and fit before going to check out.

[tavor 668]

Has anyone at EN indicated how long they will support (i.e., sync) EN Legacy? 

[PinkElephant 8,103]

No - better they don’t rush this.

Personally I know what to do, if I need to. Easier when on Mac & iOS only ...

[tavor 668]

2 hours ago, PinkElephant said:

No - better they don’t rush this.

Personally I know what to do, if I need to. Easier when on Mac & iOS only ...

My guess is they will closely monitor the number of Legacy app users. The sooner most of those users switch over, the sooner they will dump the Legacy apps (all they have to do is stop sync'ing). But if those users are numerous and don't switch over, then EN has a problem.

I suppose they are betting they will get the bulk of Legacy users to switch as they start adding back some of the features that were lost in the switch to new EN.

For local notebook users like me, it's just a matter of time before I have to move on, because it sure seems that local notebooks is a feature that is never coming back to EN.

[CalS 5,280]

25 minutes ago, tavor said:

My guess is they will closely monitor the number of Legacy app users.

A good reason not to use V10 until it is fixed, or at least better.  And yeah, local notebooks are an issue not matter what the other function that gets added back.

[tavor 668]

5 minutes ago, CalS said:

A good reason not to use V10 until it is fixed, or at least better.  And yeah, local notebooks are an issue not matter what the other function that gets added back.

I thought greying out the icon for the legacy app was an obnoxious move. Nothing like giving a cold shoulder to users who aren't as enthralled as management is by the latest version.  🥶

[Evernoter12345aaa 4]

Just finished downloading the legacy version and it is a relief to be back.  The new version is unacceptable, and makes me reconsider whether I want to stick with Evernote.  From my experience and those above, feels like a Beta version at best that was rushed out. Not close to ready for prime time.  The issues below need to be fixed by the time I'm forced off of the legacy version, or I will take my business elsewhere.

Issues:

1) Most inexcusable is the deteriorated search functionality.  Fast, effective search is the key reason I chose Evernote over competitors.  Multiple expert reviews cite superior search as the key Evernote differentiator vs the competition.  The new version is horrible.  For you to hurt your product's main differentiator is careless at best.  Known folders do not show up in my search after repeat testing, and it is cluttered with results from specific notes, making it harder to get to the folders I want to jump to quickly.  The old way where folders are prioritized in the search drop-down is preferred for me, and I'm sure countless others, who use search as a quick way to jump to different folders without using the mouse.  Using the pane to the right where notes are listed (with multiple hyperlinks available at the top to quickly refine the search) is vastly superior to the new approach where this refinement functionality is completely lost.  There are often too many specific notes in the results for adding them in the main search drop-down to be of value, so sticking with the old approach where they're only shown in the pane on the right is preferred.  Please bring back these features of the old search in the next upgrade.

2) The slow speed and cludgy feel of the new software is a dealbreaker.  A key reason I picked EN over OneNote is the ability to moved at hyperspeed in the Windows version with shortcuts and other tools.  The new version kills that and eliminates this competitive advantage.  If real-time sync is the cause, add a way to disable in future versions.  I'd gladly give up real-time sync for better speed, as I imagine most would.  At least give us the option.

3) Side list view has too much space between rows.  One reason I chose EN over OneNote was the ability to see many notes stacked on top of one another easily.  The update eliminates this advantage.

4) Note title no longer autopopulates with text in the body when no note title is added.  This feature was a nice time-saver for me with many note types and should be brought back.

5) I also noticed the app on my iphone was changed for the worse with the latest upgrade.  Needing to open the app to sync files makes no sense, and it takes way too long for notes to sync once the app is opened.  In general, the speed on the app is also significantly deteriorated vs the old version.  The webclipper is also less intuitive than the older version, with multiple taps needed for steps that took one tap before.

 

 

[CalS 5,280]

7 minutes ago, tavor said:

I thought greying out the icon for the legacy app was an obnoxious move. Nothing like giving a cold shoulder to users who aren't as enthralled as management is by the latest version.  🥶

I still use 6.25.1, last official release of the old stuff, which has the green icon.  No sense switching to legacy if I'm not switching to V10 at the moment.  

[tavor 668]

1 minute ago, CalS said:

I still use 6.25.1, last official release of the old stuff, which has the green icon.  No sense switching to legacy if I'm not switching to V10 at the moment.  

I made the mistake of updating EN without reading the release notes. I went in assuming it was just a 'dot' update, not a major new release. So I had to install the "Legacy" version, 6.25.2.

Really wish they had a warning on the update notification! That probably would have saved them a lot of the grief that ensued when people updated and were shocked by what they saw and realized that their workflows just got nuked.

[CalS 5,280]

2 minutes ago, tavor said:

I made the mistake of updating EN without reading the release notes. I went in assuming it was just a 'dot' update, not a major new release. So I had to install the "Legacy" version, 6.25.2.

Really wish they had a warning on the update notification! That probably would have saved them a lot of the grief that ensued when people updated and were shocked by what they saw and realized that their workflows just got nuked.

Yup.  You can find 6.25.1 here if you want the green icon.  

[PinkElephant 8,103]

Although if you have both apps installed, having one in another color than green makes sense.

I would not have picked sickly tristé grey - pink would have made a nice contrast !

[kbosso 0]

I cannot speak to any of the underlying reasons or decisions made regarding this game-changing release.  What I can say is:  It is now so slow and clunky as to be practically unusable.  I use a Premium version for my business and since I’m on iPad 95% of the time, I can’t see a way to be “running the older version.”  A few nice minor features were added; other, more important ones were lost (ie: simplify formatting).  But the overall usability has suffered:  It is slow, slow, slow, slow, slow.

[tavor 668]

1 hour ago, CalS said:

A good reason not to use V10 until it is fixed, or at least better.  And yeah, local notebooks are an issue not matter what the other function that gets added back.

Speaking of functions that will not be added back, or maybe way down the list - shortcuts? Some users of the Windows app such as you and I love our shortcuts. I wonder how that will translate in the new version that is meant to be mostly the same across platforms.

[PinkElephant 8,103]

This will probably be answered once the settings are released to the v10 clients.

Currently the iOS client seems to have the most settings options of all clients.

[barrimoon 9]

I guess the only good update is dark mode. The rest of this update is trash. I was really expecting this tho. I think the Evernote team really needs to consider creating general options for each notebook stacks and allow users to make their decisions on what new feature they want to use. Making changes and telling people get used to it or install a previous version. These are not good solutions at all.

My biggest problem is right now that I have to change the default "view as attachment" option to "view as All Pages".

And in the previous version first slide page was automatically seen as a small image I used to look at to understand what note I'm working with. It was giving a really good clue about the note.

If you don't give us general options for notebook stacks I will have to quit using Evernote in the future. We can't spend hours fixing every note after every update.

Edited December 10, 2020 by barrimoon

[dbvirago 502]

This is probably posted elsewhere, but I couldn't find it. Hopefully not too little, too late. It's the first of these I read all the way through. 

It still doesn't all ring true, but may be hope.

[PinkElephant 8,103]

57 minutes ago, fred2112 said:

Here lies the issue with cloud services. I warned about it 10 years ago ...

Oh, wow. If I drill this down, there are at least 3 narratives that resonate through the centuries. You can even go back to the Greek philosophers of the old ages (probably the first pieces of literature we know about) and will find them:

1) I‘ve warned you what will happen long ago ...
(just warn often enough, and by chance you get it right from time to time, as on the day when the sails of the Persian fleet populated the horizon)

2) The youth of today ...
(which probably was said at all times, which in itself proves it is wrong. Because these young guys of today became the old hacks later, uttering the same moaning)

3) Back then, in the good old days ...
(which were not really that good, remember Windows Vista and other fails ? OK, we had White Christmas pretty often, so not so bad either)

Does this comment help with the current v10 disaster ? No, just as little as the post I am referring to. No new wisdom to be found here when digging deeper. Just old philosophers, long dead, but not forgotten.

There is a situation at hand with this v10-release, and sentimental nostalgia will not help us to solve it.

[fred2112 8]

58 minutes ago, PinkElephant said:

Oh, wow. If I drill this down, there are at least 3 narratives that resonate through the centuries. You can even go back to the Greek philosophers of the old ages (probably the first pieces of literature we know about) and will find them:

1) I‘ve warned you what will happen long ago ...
(just warn often enough, and by chance you get it right from time to time, as on the day when the sails of the Persian fleet populated the horizon)

2) The youth of today ...
(which probably was said at all times, which in itself proves it is wrong. Because these young guys of today became the old hacks later, uttering the same moaning)

3) Back then, in the good old days ...
(which were not really that good, remember Windows Vista and other fails ? OK, we had White Christmas pretty often, so not so bad either)

Does this comment help with the current v10 disaster ? No, just as little as the post I am referring to. No new wisdom to be found here when digging deeper. Just old philosophers, long dead, but not forgotten.

There is a situation at hand with this v10-release, and sentimental nostalgia will not help us to solve it.

I guess I don't disagree with you too much here.  Just felt like a winge. Being a big user of local notebooks it felt okay to give a bit of finger.   I will delete it though as it solves nothing. 🙂

 

 

 

[NorcalScott 53]

Update from the CEO of Evernote pertinent to this discussion:

https://evernote.com/blog/state-of-the-product/

He acknowledges they screwed up pushing not ready for prime time versions out.

[MB11 15]

12 minutes ago, NorcalScott said:

Update from the CEO of Evernote pertinent to this discussion:

https://evernote.com/blog/state-of-the-product/

He acknowledges they screwed up pushing not ready for prime time versions out.

That blog post inspires less confidence than I had before.

And maybe I missed it but he didn't address the tortoise-like speed of the new version.

[NorcalScott 53]

1 minute ago, MB11 said:

That blog post inspires less confidence than I had before.

And maybe I missed it but he didn't address the tortoise-like speed of the new version.

Agreed, not a lot of inspiration there - maybe an acknowledgement that they will need to support the legacy app much longer than they hoped.

As a product manager working on cross platform software products, I suspected that this whole thing is driven by cutting down the effort from supporting several platforms with several teams to several platforms with a single team.  (I've gone through this a few times)  That's much easier desired than done without a lot of turmoil, and it has been seriously mishandled here in my view.  

I'll continue to use the legacy app as long as I can, and I will give the 10x app another go at some point, but to be honest, I'm not holding out a lot of hope and I am actively looking at other platforms.  All the alternatives so far have shortcomings, but also some compelling features that may actually improve my workflows.

[tavor 668]

1 hour ago, fred2112 said:

I guess I don't disagree with you too much here.  Just felt like a winge. Being a big user of local notebooks it felt okay to give a bit of finger.   I will delete it though as it solves nothing. 🙂

Lack of local notebooks (or E2E encrypted notebooks) are a dealbreaker for me, so I feel your pain. All cloud data eventually gets hacked, and it will happen to Evernote users.

For those who put their faith in EN to safeguard private notes, note that FireEye, a multibillion dollar market cap CYBERSECURITY company announced yesterday that they were hacked. You really think EN has better security? 

[tavor 668]

1 hour ago, MB11 said:

That blog post inspires less confidence than I had before.

Exactly. Seems it's always the same with EN management, even as the names at the top change. We have heard similar acknowledgements before.

I've been through this song and dance long enough to know that not breaking workflows of users is a low priority for management. They are focused on delivering for their investors, who, naturally, need an exit. EN is pretty old for a private tech company.

[CalS 5,280]

10 hours ago, tavor said:

Speaking of functions that will not be added back, or maybe way down the list - shortcuts? Some users of the Windows app such as you and I love our shortcuts. I wonder how that will translate in the new version that is meant to be mostly the same across platforms.

Yeah, I don’t get this one.  Shortcuts worked fine across Windows and IOS pre V10.  Haven’t been on my Mac in a while so don’t remember if they were there. 

[CalS 5,280]

6 hours ago, MB11 said:

That blog post inspires less confidence than I had before.

And maybe I missed it but he didn't address the tortoise-like speed of the new version.

He does mention speed and sync issues.  Does not mention speed as related to additional clicks required to accomplish the same tasks or scanning top and bottom of screen for note meta data.  Nor any mention of what feature is not coming back, like local notebooks.  The stuff listed as added to date is mostly add backs or cosmetics.  And 98% became 90%. 🙂

[Gnopps 29]

8 hours ago, NorcalScott said:

Update from the CEO of Evernote pertinent to this discussion:

https://evernote.com/blog/state-of-the-product/

He acknowledges they screwed up pushing not ready for prime time versions out.

Very good that we finally see some communication from Evernote about this. However he seems to talk more about bugs and performance issues rather than the very big decision by EN to deliberately remove functionality.

I still miss some kind of roadmap or strategic message on where the product is going medium- to long-term. Towards simplicity (and removed functionality stays off) or towards restoring previous functionality?

[MrIllustrator 165]

After getting over the shock of actually hearing from Ian Small, Evernote once reading his response there is nothing new. Our essential missing features are still missing and in the future, if we are lucky, with no dates given so version 10 remains totally unusable, slow and annoying, nothings changed. Did you get the digs at the complaining power users, he really hates us 0.2%ers

Im sorry but I had to laugh when he referenced some as yet to be announced killer new features in the pipeline for the new year. Did you notice the lack of specifics.

We haven’t even got preferences or keyboard shortcuts to mention just two, Oh please Ian, really,!what do you take us for?

this simply isn’t good enough but I am amazed he did anything. I bet he was grinding his teeth writing that, but well done Ian, all we want now is a weekly update from you and details on these killer features that will make the pain we all feel go away. 

[Alvin C 121]

Late to admit mistakes but better than nothing.

However he didn't mention when users were working hard to report bugs and provide feedbacks.

As a writer (sorry I forget who) said trust is like a China plate. When it is broken you can't go back to the state before breaking. Even you glue the pieces together.

[toao 148]

30 minutes ago, MrIllustrator said:

After getting over the shock of actually hearing from Ian Small, Evernote once reading his response there is nothing new. Our essential missing features are still missing and in the future, if we are lucky, with no dates given so version 10 remains totally unusable, slow and annoying, nothings changed. Did you get the digs at the complaining power users, he really hates us 0.2%ers

this simply isn’t good enough but I am amazed he did anything. I bet he was grinding his teeth writing that, but well done Ian, all we want now is a weekly update from you and details on these killer features that will make the pain we all feel go away. 

I see his reaction as an indication that the premature release has indeed hurt EN commercially (through subscription cancellation). only time will tell how bad it actually is.

[Wanderling Reborn 185]

On 12/9/2020 at 3:38 PM, Christophe Gevrey said:

I think AutoHotkey can be a nice addition to any note system to do web clipping.

Not on mobile, alas.

[tavor 668]

22 hours ago, Evernoter12345aaa said:

Issues:

2) The slow speed and cludgy feel of the new software is a dealbreaker.  A key reason I picked EN over OneNote is the ability to moved at hyperspeed in the Windows version with shortcuts and other tools.  The new version kills that and eliminates this competitive advantage.  If real-time sync is the cause, add a way to disable in future versions.  I'd gladly give up real-time sync for better speed, as I imagine most would.  At least give us the option.

I wonder how much of the sluggishness is related to the new common codebase. Meaning, if many or most of the underlying processes are now common across platforms, you give up some of the optimization you could otherwise have for the specific platform, whether that is Windows, Mac, iOS, or Android.

Of course if all the competitors are doing the same thing, it's not really a competitive disadvantage. 

[CalS 5,280]

2 minutes ago, tavor said:

I wonder how much of the sluggishness is related to the new common codebase. Meaning, if many or most of the underlying processes are now common across platforms, you give up some of the optimization you could otherwise have for the specific platform, whether that is Windows, Mac, iOS, or Android.

Of course if all the competitors are doing the same thing, it's not really a competitive disadvantage. 

I think it is more the development engine that is being used (Electron) and the fact that even on a desktop most of the processing is occurring on the servers.  It can be tuned up some but not likely it will be as snappy as a stand alone app on a desktop.  Laws of physics get in the way.  Any server based process will be slower than a local one.  Anyone using On Demand Sync on Windows would see that.  It's just can the lags be shrunk to the point that they aren't a nuisance.  

[ndav 0]

I'm an Evernote for macOS user since 2009 and I've never even logged into the forums before but I just updated to v10 and I'm in such disbelief about some of the workflow and interface changes that I figured I must be missing something. 

Please bring back the ability to set some app preferences!

I also make a lot of check lists and I'm shocked to see how many clicks it takes to create a list, indent items and set dividers.

I have to toggle between 3 different dropdown menus to do the above with no obvious keyboard shortcuts and I also don't see an obvious way to add the checkbox button back to the toolbar? 

I'm still digging around but I just wanted to share my initial impressions, as a long-time subscriber, about the poor impression I'm getting of this upgrade, for whatever that's worth – It's not just that people dislike change, it's that these changes are disruptive. 

Hopefully v10 improves quickly and gains back much of what was stripped away. In the meantime I'm hoping I am able to downgrade, which is something I have never needed to do once in the past 10 years. 

The hits just keep on coming in 2020, I guess... 

[luvmyc6 46]

19 hours ago, NorcalScott said:

Update from the CEO of Evernote pertinent to this discussion:

https://evernote.com/blog/state-of-the-product/

He acknowledges they screwed up pushing not ready for prime time versions out.

Thanks for this NorcalScott. Great that EN acknowledges their massively incompetent communication and roll out "plan". However the CEO states "...the releases have not gone as smoothly as any of us would have liked. Despite an extensive QA process and a long-running beta program, some of our customers have encountered frustrating bugs and performance issues.". I was a Software Quality Assurance and Testing manager at a major global company - and I find this statement "extensive QA process..." highly suspect - I found at least 25 "simple and basic" issues when I first launched the new iOS version of the app (for example, could not add a space between two images that were imported at the same time (minor), and duplicate (conflict) notes constantly being generated (major)).

So while they may have done a long beta program, my questions are:

• What level of user were their Beta Testers (how many longer term high use users that "stretched" the app beyond simple functionality) from which they documented their user functionality testing use cases?
• How many of the reported KNOWN ISSUES during beta testing were actually addressed before releasing the new V10 code base?

[Shad0wca7 2]

It's absolutely awful. The new app is slow and it has lost new notes now on a couple of occasions. 

The slowness is across my Mac as well as iOS devices. 

So.. I've removed my credit card details from my Evernote Premium subscription and will not be renewing - I'll be moving everything to Apple Notes.

[davidtderrick 54]

It's simple. There have always been 2 tiers. They should offer this new version as the totally free one. And the Legacy version as the one we pay for. And in present circumstances, I think we'd even accept a hefty price hike.

[CobaltJacket 3]

1 minute ago, davidtderrick said:

It's simple. There have always been 2 tiers. They should offer this new version as the totally free one. And the Legacy version as the one we pay for. And in present circumstances, I think we'd even accept a hefty price hike.

So the price for being a free user is that you get a buggy and bloated experience with less fidelity?

[davidtderrick 54]

Exactly.

[Bryanne 60]

Exactly!!!!

[Joel O's 26]

16 hours ago, CalS said:

He does mention speed and sync issues.  Does not mention speed as related to additional clicks required to accomplish the same tasks or scanning top and bottom of screen for note meta data.  Nor any mention of what feature is not coming back, like local notebooks.  The stuff listed as added to date is mostly add backs or cosmetics.  And 98% became 90%. 🙂

YES. That shifting of the goalpost from 95-97% to 90% stuck out to me too.

And I fully agree with you, beyond the feature loss is the crippled UX that's frankly so worse to me at least than the missing features. Every additional click, every thing being noticeably slower than it used to be... 

[pauljk777 0]

I absolutely hate this new Mac version. Click on a note - blank. Assign a tag, then view the notes in that tag - blank. Try editing some notes - "View Only" cannot edit. Nothing in the GUI is where it was once before. Shortcuts - forget about the ones you've used for years. Also the iOS version. I was at a very important meeting and opened the new iOS version on my iPhone to get some critical info for the meeting and whoa! WTF is this?? Took me 10 minutes just to figure out what the hell was going on. Very embarrassing to say the least.

Incredibly disappointing after using this app for my business for over 10 years.

[jancrow4 0]

I do not require the upgrade, I just want access to my saved notes. I can’t get into them. How do I get my data?

[Piotas 121]

On 12/8/2020 at 10:02 PM, luvmyc6 said:

Oh yes, I remember those feeble and pathetic attempts by MS! To this day, some people at my company (esp the MS defenders) never understood that LN was more than just a "Mail" application.

LN was great in early Exchange/Outlook days, BEFORE Microsoft created Sharepoint. Then it lost the competitive edge. I used every single office product since Word 2.0. I used Lotus Notes between 2000 and 2003. There was a reason why LN was replaced by Exchange.

[Piotas 121]

23 hours ago, CalS said:

I think it is more the development engine that is being used (Electron) and the fact that even on a desktop most of the processing is occurring on the servers.  It can be tuned up some but not likely it will be as snappy as a stand alone app on a desktop.  Laws of physics get in the way.  Any server based process will be slower than a local one.  Anyone using On Demand Sync on Windows would see that.  It's just can the lags be shrunk to the point that they aren't a nuisance.  

You cannot blame Electron framework for Evernote v10 being extremely slow. There are note taking apps written in Electron that are EXTREMELY FAST (for example Recollector - https://recollectr.io/) or very fast (see Joplin - https://joplinapp.org). I used both while searching for Evernote alternative.

Currently ALL alternative solutions I tried are FASTER than Evernote v10 during my usage scenarios.

[eric99 980]

57 minutes ago, Piotas said:

You cannot blame Electron framework for Evernote v10 being extremely slow. There are note taking apps written in Electron that are EXTREMELY FAST (for example Recollector - https://recollectr.io/) or very fast (see Joplin - https://joplinapp.org). I used both while searching for Evernote alternative.

Currently ALL alternative solutions I tried are FASTER than Evernote v10 during my usage scenarios.

That's exellent news, this proves that the performance issues can be fixed 🙂

[CalS 5,280]

13 minutes ago, eric99 said:

That's exellent news, this proves that the performance issues can be fixed 🙂

Yeah, as I said in the first post the closer EN can make it to the old desktops the better.  Whatever the tipping point is for pauses that cause a loss of focus on the task at hand.  

[NorcalScott 53]

2 hours ago, Piotas said:

You cannot blame Electron framework for Evernote v10 being extremely slow. There are note taking apps written in Electron that are EXTREMELY FAST (for example Recollector - https://recollectr.io/) or very fast (see Joplin - https://joplinapp.org). I used both while searching for Evernote alternative.

Currently ALL alternative solutions I tried are FASTER than Evernote v10 during my usage scenarios.

Agreed about Joplin - I am trying it out and both desktop (Windows) and mobile apps (iPad and Android) are very fast.  Searching is amazingly fast.  Downside with Joplin is no good way to create notes from emails, but I think I can get around that.  It should be embarrassing to Evernote that an open source app is so much better performing than their app, even with encryption enabled (which is a major perk of Joplin by the way).

[tavor 668]

19 minutes ago, NorcalScott said:

Agreed about Joplin - I am trying it out and both desktop (Windows) and mobile apps (iPad and Android) are very fast.  Searching is amazingly fast.  Downside with Joplin is no good way to create notes from emails, but I think I can get around that.  It should be embarrassing to Evernote that an open source app is so much better performing than their app, even with encryption enabled (which is a major perk of Joplin by the way).

For even more security, there is Standard Notes, also open source - big security difference is Standard Notes keeps data encrypted even on your device, while Joplin only encrypts data in transit and in storage on servers (and as you note, even that is more than EN does). Also has extensions (similar concept to Chrome extensions) which allows people to build on additional functionality, which is a great concept as it allows for crowdsourcing of additional functionality instead of waiting on the core devs to agree to add a particular feature and then get around to developing it. Even has a spreadsheet extension. I'll have to give this a try.

I haven't looked around at other note apps in years (back then, the only viable alternative was OneNote, everything else was more or less at the Google Keep level), and it's amazing how many have sprung up in recent years. To the point where we have viable open source alternatives, to say nothing of proprietary alternatives. 

[Kolmir 162]

On 12/11/2020 at 9:10 PM, luvmyc6 said:

 I was a Software Quality Assurance and Testing manager at a major global company - and I find this statement "extensive QA process..." highly suspect - I found at least 25 "simple and basic" issues when I first launched the new iOS version of the app (for example, could not add a space between two images that were imported at the same time (minor), and duplicate (conflict) notes constantly being generated (major)).

So while they may have done a long beta program, my questions are:

• What level of user were their Beta Testers (how many longer term high use users that "stretched" the app beyond simple functionality) from which they documented their user functionality testing use cases?
• How many of the reported KNOWN ISSUES during beta testing were actually addressed before releasing the new V10 code base?

I have pretty similar background like you. I was responsible as a manager to assure high quality software delivery (A-SPICE L2) for one of major players in the automotive sector.

1. Yeah, my reaction for "extensive QA process" was just laughing loud! 😉 Current state of new app doesn't give us evidences that they even perform minimum QA...

2. You can review old preview/beta forums here - they are still available in read-only mode.

In the first half of the 2020 many preview/beta users tried to convey the message to EvN that new software wasn't ready even for beta stage and testing phase should took at least twice as long or even more. Unfortunately, such voices were ignored - probably due to some high level managerial decisions.

By the way: no "testing use cases" were available during public preview/beta. Whole process just looked as an exact opposite to the best practices proposed for example by ATDD/TDD or ISO like 15504 or 12207 or 15288, etc. Dev team simply provided new test releases as is - without proper release notes... There were no test scenarios, no detailed infos what were modified or added...

Moreover, EvN definitions of "preview" or "beta" were against well established concepts like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Software_release_life_cycle#Stages_of_development

[marvelway 8]

Have you guys seen Evernote's CEO's response to the version 10 backlash? https://evernote.com/blog/state-of-the-product/

We can see what's slated for future releases here: https://help.evernote.com/hc/articles/360058361833 (not that I care bc for now I'll be using Legacy)

Here are quotes I find important: 

Quote

 

But possibly more controversial was our decision to roll out the new Mac and Windows apps while still missing features used by some of our most intensive customers. We believed this was the right path because Mac and Windows users dependent on missing features could continue to use (and reinstall if necessary) their legacy Evernote Mac or Windows client. Meanwhile, getting the new apps into people’s hands now—even if they only met the needs of 90 percent of our customers—opened up our ability to iterate quickly, so we could work through the backlog of rebuilding previously available features and make progress on new features to come. 

In retrospect, I think we went wrong in failing to set proper expectations with our power users in advance of these releases. If we had increased communication to help our most intensive users evaluate up front whether the new Windows or Mac release was ready for them, I believe we could have avoided much of the dislocation they experienced on exploring the new apps. Nonetheless, launching the new clients into market has enabled us to increase release velocity significantly over the last several months, so we still believe that we are on the right path...

Users who have reverted to the legacy Mac or Windows versions of Evernote want us to fill the gap of missing features. On the other hand, the majority of Evernote’s customers are looking forward to new capabilities. Both needs are real, so expect us to pursue both in parallel, taking advantage of our new, higher velocity release cycle...

It is clear that we still have work to do before our new apps will delight everyone. But it is also true that many of our customers are already finding great success with these apps, as we can see in improved product engagement metrics measured across millions of users. For instance, across the new apps customers are creating more notes and are more likely to share or tag notes than they are in the legacy clients. So while our work is not done, our direction is clear.

 

The positives: 

• They can ship improvements faster
• They're listening to feedback
• They're using product engagement metrics (real data not random whims) to guide their decisions

The bs

• They're basically admitting 10% of users are using the Legacy version. I don't know why they call that 10% "power" users, or the "most intensive" users. I've seen complaints from people who use Evernote just for recipes and were upset that they couldn't simplify formatting or clip content any more. And I bet more people would use Legacy if they knew about it. 
• They admitted the new release was extremely buggy, but believe releasing a buggy product with missing features was the right decision bc they knew most people wouldn't complain and they wanted to use users as guinea pigs. Or officially, bc they could ship future fixes and bc "power" users could revert to the older version while they work on adding missing features. Well, maybe they're right that the new version will attract more new users, and they have to force changes, particularly UI, on users. But version 10 was extremely buggy, and there's no excuse for releasing something so buggy. There's no reason they couldn't have waited a few more months to iron out major bugs. I don't believe they didn't know of those bugs. I noticed them as soon as I started using it, plus there were reports from beta users. So yeah, no excuses for shipping such an incomplete release.

[Bryanne 60]

To be fair, it was a good letter. The problem is - it was way overdue. But as he admits, their biggest error was in not alerting users to what was coming in the new release. This was just bad bad bad.......but at least they admit it and I doubt they will ever repeat that mistake.

it was like waking up one morning and finding ourselves on the moon - not a nice feeling

[s2sailor 2,191]

24 minutes ago, Bryanne said:

but at least they admit it and I doubt they will ever repeat that mistake.

Unfortunately, they are always repeating that mistake.  Poor communication seems to be in Evernote’s DNA.

[Bryanne 60]

yes, I agree it is hard for a corporate culture to change 

[eric99 980]

18 hours ago, tavor said:

For even more security, there is Standard Notes, also open source

I just installed Standard Notes on Android, but it seems to be very restricted. I'm I missing something? For instance; is it possible to add pictures, is there a camera option?

And if my notes (and index?) are encrypted at the client side as well, how does the search work?

[eric99 980]

On 12/5/2020 at 7:02 PM, LynuSBell said:

I didn't think about that... and I have quite a few things I wouldn't like to lose...
Maybe Joplin or something Open source and similar would be best, despite losing on quite nice features.

I just tried to import my 3229 notes into Joplin... it unexpectedly  stopped after 60 notes already.

The imported notes look great. What bothers me most is that all my human readable resource filenames are renamed to a cryptic ID.  This is a stopper for me: my filenames are self explaining and allow me to search for my raw data, without the encapsulating notes. In contrast, the evernote HTML Export keeps these filenames intact.

Edit: the original filename is still in the note as visible notelinks, which makes it potentially possible to rename cryptic filenames back to their original name (by some kind of  export tool)

Overall, I like the Joplin approach and I'll keep an eye on it in case EN  would stop https://github.com/sponsors/laurent22/

 

 

[tavor 668]

3 hours ago, eric99 said:

I just installed Standard Notes on Android, but it seems to be very restricted. I'm I missing something? For instance; is it possible to add pictures, is there a camera option?

And if my notes (and index?) are encrypted at the client side as well, how does the search work?

I don't know, as I haven't installed Standard Notes yet, though I do intend to give this a test drive, as well as Joplin.

Couple of places you can ask:

https://github.com/standardnotes/forum/issues/

https://www.reddit.com/r/StandardNotes/