Do not change 'date updated' when changing tags, notebooks, note title

[humanengr 52]

The default should be to change 'date updated' only when note content is changed.

Make this the default convention.

Perhaps include a settings option for users who prefer 'date updated' be changed when changing tags, notebooks, note title (either as a single or separate sub-options).

[AlbertR 318]

Tags are not part of notes. They are stored in an index database (like index data to accelerate search functions). So if you apply tags to notes or remove tags from notes or rename tags, nothing of the note content is changed.
It is a design fail of V10 to change a notes's updated time on changing tags. And that's that.

[AlbertR 318]

Yep. At least changes on Tag should not change note's update date. Tagging is often used temporarily to shrink down search result. 

[caipiao 7]

Agreed - literally creating an account to request this. One of the key reasons I am still using Legacy... impossible to sort / reorganise notes after creating the "content" so to speak! 

[humanengr 52]

You're wrong:

12 hours ago, PinkElephant said:

in a field that always have been written by EN … Most accept that the created and modified fields are under system control.

The field wasn't always written by EN. Pre-v10, users could edit the 'date modified' field. (They could also edit the 'date created' field, but that's not what's being discussed.)

And you're missing the point.

When changing tags or moving between notebooks, EN should provide an option in settings to not update 'date modified when tags are changed or when notes are moved between notebooks. Tags and file location are metadata, not content.

Pre-v10 EN didn't update 'date modified' when changing tags or moving between notebooks.

Neither does MacOS — which also doesn't update 'date modified' when renaming files (which supports my inclusion of 'note title' in my proposal).

EN should restore this key feature (as an option) that some experienced users have relied on.

[humanengr 52]

You still don't get it. And you're condescending.

The date updated field is metadata that the program needn't change when other metadata (tags, location, name) are changed. It should be user choice as to whether it is automatically changed.

All this proposal does is give the OPTION to restore that treatment. OPTION means you can have the current v10 treatment and others who want the pre-v10 treatment can have that.

[Sönke Luck 10]

I agree in the arguments of PinkElephant, I also hate complexity. But in this case there are different opinions about what should touch the last modified date. There is no true or false, but I think for those of us who are using this field to sort their notes, it is a disaster if after renaming a tag hundreds of notes getting touched, and removed from their context. 

[CalS 5,132]

If you've ever accidentally changed any of the above or accidentally deleted a note  tag you know how hard it can be to find and repair.  An option for those not wanting to change would be fine.

[humanengr 52]

It's not a 'core function'. If it was core, it would have been there pre-v10. And likewise in all other apps and OS's. But it's not.

This restores — as an option — pre-v10 treatment for those who prefer that.

And stop with the condescension: "We", "each personal method", "always the same", "only a fraction", "if they configure them badly".

Glad you can use the app without thinking.

[blakesphere 12]

hi there... Blake here...

original poster.

i still feel strongly about this issue in general.

Again, here's a simple use-case situation:

i re-read an old note and see a typographical error. I fix the mistake. Evernote updates the record of course.

With the new "updated" date field, it shows at the top of list when maybe it was 6  months old.

In Legacy Evernote, I could alter the update date field and put it back to the original date, when it was created.

I have many another use-cases I could share. I have many examples of how this is treated in other database applications. I do believe this is a minor oversight and I still feel it should be corrected. It is not wide-used but it will make us very happy.

 

Thank you for your time,

Blake

 

 

 

[mynameisnotebody 1]

Hey everybody who likes this … there's an 'up arrow' on the topic header that we're supposed to upvote. I'm guessing Evernote staff might not take notice unless this is upvoted.

[caipiao 7]

On 3/31/2021 at 12:01 AM, mynameisnotebody said:

Hey everybody who likes this … there's an 'up arrow' on the topic header that we're supposed to upvote. I'm guessing Evernote staff might not take notice unless this is upvoted.

Upvoted - thanks! need more people though... 

[Sönke Luck 10]

This is mainly a philosophical question, and it may affect not that much people.

BUT: If you organized your work around sorting by updated date, it could be very annoying, that changing meta data touches the timestamp.

Example: By the end of the year, I move all notes from the inbox notebook to an notebook Archive_<year>. Since Evernote 10.x, this touches all update date, which makes it no longer possible to see, when I really worked on a note last time.

Example: I forgot to tag a note from a journey in 2018. Adding the appropriate tag today, moves the note out of its time context to the top of the list.

Workaround for me is using Evernote Legacy on Windows, but this will end in future, I guess.

 

Using Evernote since 2011, 13,000 notes, 40 notebooks

 

[ayearofholidays 3]

I also just made an account to ask for this feature request. I only sort my notes every once and awhile, and look at my notes sorted by last changed. After I spend some time to organize my notes, it feels more of a mess than if I had never done it at all. It's very annoying. 

[OBrien 11]

I need this option too. This is one of the things I hate about new evernote v10. 

I have the same  kind of issue when I organize many notes. after that update date means nothing to me. it's very confusing.

Why did they change how it works??

On 1/5/2022 at 5:31 PM, Sönke Luck said:

This is mainly a philosophical question, and it may affect not that much people.

BUT: If you organized your work around sorting by updated date, it could be very annoying, that changing meta data touches the timestamp.

Example: By the end of the year, I move all notes from the inbox notebook to an notebook Archive_<year>. Since Evernote 10.x, this touches all update date, which makes it no longer possible to see, when I really worked on a note last time.

Example: I forgot to tag a note from a journey in 2018. Adding the appropriate tag today, moves the note out of its time context to the top of the list.

Workaround for me is using Evernote Legacy on Windows, but this will end in future, I guess.

 

Using Evernote since 2011, 13,000 notes, 40 notebooks

 

 

[PinkElephant 6,803]

You may do what you want to do - but editing any field that is originally written and later modified by a program itself is never a good idea.

The devs don’t need to care about user activity in a field that always have been written by EN - it probably is just a tiny fraction of users who do this sort of intervention anyhow.

Most accept that the created and modified fields are under system control. For me it looks natural that when I interact with a note, the timestamp is updated.

[CalS 5,132]

Point is EN will change the modified date when the note is changed.  Pre V10 tag changes did not cause such an update.  EN did to want to change modified date with a tag change back in the day.  Which was a PITA should one accidentally delete a tag from a group of notes.  Try finding them without a modified date update.  .Different philosophy now I suppose.  Sympathies if your use case got hammered.  V10 did that to quite a few of my use cases and unfortunately I had to leave EN.

When I used EN I would change the created date to get a past document in the right place.  I did so at my own peril but knew EN wasn't going to change the created date once the note was created.  So low risk.

[humanengr 52]

24 minutes ago, CalS said:

Sympathies if your use case got hammered.  V10 did that to quite a few of my use cases and unfortunately I had to leave EN.

When I used EN I would change the created date to get a past document in the right place.

Appreciate the sympathy on the different use cases — ergo, my proposal as a settings option.

(FWIW, I also used 'date created' "to get a past document in the right place"; I didn't include 'date created' in my list b/c I imagined greater objections to that — but am willing to include if more express support.)

Edited May 8, 2022 by humanengr
flexible

[humanengr 52]

You're still wrong.

On 5/7/2022 at 3:14 PM, PinkElephant said:

My opinion is not to use fields under system control to store any information relevant to me.

Pre-v10 they could be modified by users. So they were not "under system control".

You're not helping the discussion.

[Boot17 1,062]

The main reason I kept legacy around was so that I could update the modify date and time but it became a hassle so I had to stop caring.

I get having a modify date time and having the program do whatever it needs to do with those dates whenever it feels that a note has been modified.

One of the nice things about Evernote though is that I can view all my most recently updated notes -- like on a Monday to go back and see what I changed or added over the last week. However, if I were to rename a tag and that tag had hundreds of old notes, all those old notes would now push down the "real" updated notes from last week. Kind of a bummer - but oh well.

[OBrien 11]

 

>> We see a tendency to ask for settings for each personal method of using EN.

Actully I understand what you are trying to say. generally the system should be simple without any complex customization. However, this is not that kind of thing. In my point of view, this is not even an additional function. It's the basic specification which has been changed with v10.

In any platform Mac/Linux/windows, moving a file to another directory doesn’t count as an update. Because the content of a file never change. It is a common behavier of the system.

It's the same in the real world too, when you moving a book from a shelf to another dosen't change its content.

So tagging and moving a note is the change outside of its contents, and those should not be count as "updated".

After all, here is "General Feature Requests" which is exactly the place to make these demands. I'm not sure what bothers you so much.

[Aggressively Sensitive 3]

For the way I use evernote, I really need this change. I move notes around and re-tag regularly and this kills my flow. If it can't be changed wholesale, it should at least be an option.

[AlbertR 318]

5 minutes ago, DTLow said:

Note title is not part of notes.  It's stored in an index database

THX - just verified how Windows (and I'm sure other OS, too) work with file names:

• If you change the name, the updated date is NOT changed
• If you change the folder, the update date is NOT changed

@EN: It is a design fail of V10 to change updated time when changing tags, notebooks, note title. (even if @PinkElephant might not go with this 😉)

[Paddy Paddy 19]

@EN: It is a design fail to change the modified date when changing tags, moving a note to a new notebooks, changing the note title. 

Note that in Windows, moving a file or changing the file name does not change the modified date.

Only changing the content should result in a update to the modification date.

[AlbertR 318]

41 minutes ago, Sönke Luck said:

am still curios if this forum still makes sense, or if it is ignored by the new owner.

It's read but seldomly commented by new owners. And I hope that keeping discussions around such annoying behaviour alive will help to get it fixed anytime in future.

• At least changes on Tags should not change note's update date.
• Tagging is often used temporarily to shrink down search result. 

[meingraham 4]

Can I add that when you reveal encrypted text (for viewing only), this is not a note update.

You just want to view the encrypted text and are not changing the content of the note. The argument could be made that if one permanently decrypts some text, that's a content update. It could be argued both ways. But when just revealing the encrypted text, the update date should not be touched.

10.60.4-win

[DTLow 5,728]

10 minutes ago, humanengr said:

'date updated' be changed when changing tags, notebooks, note title

No objection to options   
imho  The default should be any update be reflected in the "date updated"

[humanengr 52]

On Mac, convention is to not update for any of those — so default of 'none' would be consistent there.

UPDATE: At this point (2018/05/08) it looks like, of those who expressed an opinion, those who favor having "change 'date updated' only when note content is changed" as the default outnumber those in favor of having "change 'date updated' when either note content or note metadata (tags, notebook, title) are changed" as default by 8:2 (7:2 at least for tags) w/ 1 'no objection', if I count right.

Edited May 15, 2022 by humanengr
Correcting

[Mike P 2,238]

34 minutes ago, caipiao said:

Upvoted - thanks! need more people though... 

Is there a mechanism to downvote? Happy to have it as an option of course but really don't want it personally.

[PinkElephant 6,803]

I understand your use of these fields, and that it is working differently at the moment. I understand as well that you want to mold EN into what you would like it to be.

My opinion is not to use fields under system control to store any information relevant to me. You can continue to think it is a brilliant idea of "experienced" users.

To reach out to EN to get anything changed, use the feedback function build into the clients, or issue a support ticket.

 

 

[PinkElephant 6,803]

A discussion is not helped by insisting on things must be the way one wants them to be.

A field that is written by a program is always a bad idea to store own data. If there was proof needed for that fact, this thread just shows it.

But anybody go ahead, nobody needs to listen. Just don't come back and complain about lost work and data.

[PinkElephant 6,803]

We see a tendency to ask for settings for each personal method of using EN. The argument is always the same: „Oh, I know only a fraction of users do as I do, but with a setting we could be fine.“

What this does not take into account is that each additional setting drives complexity and makes the app in total less usable. Users need to understand settings, if they configure them badly, they often have problems to analyze the interaction between settings and reconfigure. This is my experience here on the forum.

My opinion in this respect is simple: As little settings as possible, and no settings on core functions like updating a „changed“ date. When I touch a note in any respect, the „changed“ date is updated, without a need to think about it. This is simple, reflects what has happened - and works free of settings.

[DTLow 5,728]

4 minutes ago, AlbertR said:

Tags are not part of notes. They are stored in an index database

Note title is not part of notes.  It's stored in an index database

[PinkElephant 6,803]

@AlbertR You know how tuskers do: They ask you "Which way" - and then walk down the other trail 😉

[Sönke Luck 10]

I am wondering if somebody from Evernote is reading all these discussions. Maybe I do not understand how this feature request forum works …

AlbertR calls it a design fail. I would not take these hard words - but in principle he is totally right! Even if Evernote isn‘t willing to change this, they should be so fair and share their arguments.

[PinkElephant 6,803]

@Paddy Paddy No @EN here, just other users.

You put a very high evaluation on your very personal opinion. If others do it fine - doing it yourself …

Using boldface does not change the truth behind a statement, it just enhances the impression of noise without value to me.

Currently there are 15 votes in as many months for this thread - it seems the issue is much less popular than you try to make people think.

[CalS 5,132]

Ever try to find a note after accidentally changing a tag?  In old EN , good luck.

[Pere 27]

I have been using folders to organize my notes for almost 10 years. Now, I need to change to tags, because I want to determine the context with the tag and the team/person with whom I share the note with the folder.

This means I have to tag more than 10k notes, and then move them to the new folders.

This would mess all updated dates and create great havock. I'm blocked. I cannot apply this change due to this design decision which breaks with the behaviour of legacy Evernote.

What should I do?

p.s. Furthermore, I cannot edit tags to more than 50 notes at a time, which is also a huge pain.

[CalS 5,132]

Make the changes using legacy?

[Boot17 1,062]

I made quite a few changes to some Task due dates today --from the Task slide-out menu-- and I was pleasantly surprised to find that it didn't change the modify date of the note that they were attached to.

Then -- I went to a note itself and changed a Task due date in it and it *did* then change the modify date of the note.

So it looks like you can change any Task data from the slide-out menu and it won't update the modify date of the note, but any changes from in the note to a task will update the modify date.

Anyway, thought it was semi-related to this discussion and wanted to share.

Also kind of funny when I was searching for this thread to comment on, I ran across this older one where the OP was wanting Evernote Legacy to update the modify date.

[Pere 27]

15 hours ago, Boot17 said:

Anyway, thought it was semi-related to this discussion and wanted to share.

 

I think it is very related and it shows that the system is not coherent now. Probably tasks live in a separat database, that's why the behaviour is different when you work from the pane or from a note.

[Pere 27]

On 11/9/2022 at 4:52 PM, CalS said:

Make the changes using legacy?

Is there any risk? I fear it will mess with my tasks, which are not supported by legacy. I use tasks a lot and I depend on them for my work.

[CalS 5,132]

5 hours ago, Pere said:

Is there any risk? I fear it will mess with my tasks, which are not supported by legacy. I use tasks a lot and I depend on them for my work.

Don't know the answer to that.  You could query support re potential issues or make a small change followed by other incremental changes if things seem okay.  Rumor has it you can have new and old open at the same time.

[Pere 27]

On 11/11/2022 at 8:46 PM, CalS said:

Don't know the answer to that.  You could query support re potential issues or make a small change followed by other incremental changes if things seem okay.  Rumor has it you can have new and old open at the same time.

I have 20k notes. A lot of potential for messy changes.

[CalS 5,132]

1 hour ago, Pere said:

I have 20k notes. A lot of potential for messy changes.

For sure.  Hence the do it in small batches.  You could copy a subset of notes to a new notebook and run your tests there.  Less likely to do damage.

[Boot17 1,062]

On 11/11/2022 at 7:35 AM, Pere said:

Is there any risk? I fear it will mess with my tasks, which are not supported by legacy.

I doubt it. Changing the tag doesn't change the note content. On Legacy, the modify/update date on the note doesn't even change when you modify tags.

But if I were you, regardless of anyone's assurances (even if Support were to weigh-in on it), I'd do like CalS suggests and make a copy of one of your notebooks and test it out for yourself.

[blakesphere 12]

I support this request.

I raised it with support and in the discussion forums.

I regularly change tags and book/folder for notes and the UPDATED date is revised. This is a new behaviour in Evernote 10; the legacy versions did not do this.

I've argued that moving a note from one book to another should not change the date - a primary use-case is MISFILED notes. If I create a note in the wrong folder, and a month later discover this, I do not want it showing as edited today.

This irks me so much I keep Legacy Evernote 6 on a different computer to correct the improperly dated notes...

Blake

 

 

[boneycur 16]

On 11/17/2022 at 10:07 AM, blakesphere said:

This irks me so much I keep Legacy Evernote 6 on a different computer to correct the improperly dated notes...

Not to veer from the subject of this post, but I run Legacy and V10 on the same (Windows) computer at the same time. It can be a lifesaver.

[PinkElephant 6,803]

The legacy client (the one with the grey icon) was designed to be installed side by side. The only thing to remember is that each brings its own copy of the database. This doubles the amount of storage needed. And for me it mixed up all the right click sharing, print to xxx, save here or there options, because everything showed up twice. So I decided to get rid of the old warrior.

I still feel quite alive and ticking ...

[davebenz 2]

It’s 2023, and apparently this still hasn’t been fixed.

I changed a bunch of tags today just to subdivide a tag (to make them more specific) and now all of those old Notes show up at the top of my sort on date last updated. Yuck. 

[Sönke Luck 10]

I am curious whether the new owner will solve this. Whether he even takes note of this forum.

SInce a couple of versions, this is not the only issue. When I open an old note on the mobile client, the content is loaded from the server, this touches the modufication date, and the old note appears on the top of the list. Without doing any change, actually.

[Mike P 2,238]

19 minutes ago, Sönke Luck said:

SInce a couple of versions, this is not the only issue. When I open an old note on the mobile client, the content is loaded from the server, this touches the modufication date, and the old note appears on the top of the list. Without doing any change, actually.

I think this is a bug. See

The topic of this post is "Do not change 'date updated' when changing tags, notebooks, note title" and relates to a design choice made by the developers. It does not need "fixing" because it isn't broken - it does what they intended. Whether they made the right decision is a matter of opinion and people can lobby for a change back to the original legacy behaviour if that is important to them.

[Sönke Luck 10]

You are right. I am still curios if this forum still makes sense, or if it is ignored by the new owner. Any ideas?

[PinkElephant 6,803]

In general I agree that depending on a use case it can be overdone to always update the update date. It is for sure overdone when it updates just after a note was viewed !

To keep an issue on the agenda, I think sending them support tickets is the more direct approach. It may change with BS management now, but up to this year feature requests in the forum didn't move much, if anything.

[AlbertR 318]

On 5/8/2022 at 12:14 AM, PinkElephant said:

To reach out to EN to get anything changed, use the feedback function build into the clients, or issue a support ticket.

Done. They told me that "this is currently an expected behavior" for EN10 😞
But my request has been moved to their product team "including all our feedback towards the current behavior".

Keep fingers crossed to get an option to configure the behavior 🙏
I'll come back to this later...

[Sönke Luck 10]

Great thanks for this!

[AlbertR 318]

Just found: Removing a tag does NOT touch the Updated Date as it is done by adding a tag to note.

==> Functionality is buggy. They should repair it to never change the Updated Date whilst modifying tags of a note 😉

[Mike P 2,238]

28 minutes ago, AlbertR said:

Just found: Removing a tag does NOT touch the Updated Date as it is done by adding a tag to note.

Not my experience in 10.59.5.

[p1154 5]

It's been a couple months.  Has anyone heard if there are any plans to add the Legacy ability to modify the "updated" date?  There are many Legacy users who depend on that feature.  Thanks!  

[meingraham 4]

12 minutes ago, p1154 said:

It's been a couple months.  Has anyone heard if there are any plans to add the Legacy ability to modify the "updated" date?  There are many Legacy users who depend on that feature.  Thanks!  

Crickets!

[s2sailor 1,536]

58 minutes ago, p1154 said:

It's been a couple months.  Has anyone heard if there are any plans to add the Legacy ability to modify the "updated" date?  There are many Legacy users who depend on that feature.  Thanks!  

There has been no word but since it has been discussed at length in the forum, I have to believe they are aware of the request.  My guess is that they are using this field internally and are unlikely to make this change.  We may be better off requesting they add an additional, customizable, sortable field, that we can use as we want.  As it is now, sort by updated date, which I use all the time, is not very useful.

[p1154 5]

2 hours ago, s2sailor said:

There has been no word but since it has been discussed at length in the forum, I have to believe they are aware of the request.  My guess is that they are using this field internally and are unlikely to make this change.  We may be better off requesting they add an additional, customizable, sortable field, that we can use as we want.  As it is now, sort by updated date, which I use all the time, is not very useful.

The sort by updated date is very very useful for some people.  In particular if you have a note that is very old and infrequently used, and you want to keep the updated date five or ten years in the past then you need the ability to edit the updated field.  I really really hope they add this ability ASAP as quite a few people are still using Legacy because they need to edit the updated field.