Higher limit on nested bullet points

[allamericanbreakfast 0]

I take carefully structured, many-level-nested notes in Evernote. It's essential to my note-taking approach. Many of the bullet points are just a few words long, but they can be quite a few layers deep. Sometimes, I run into a limit on the number of nested bullet points and it causes me to have to do an annoying restructuring. Don't see why it can't just have that limitation lifted?

[PinkElephant 8,748]

Depends on how it is coded. If it is similar to the new headers, there seems to be a limit to the number of levels.

Outlining in general is not the strongest point with EN. I found software for mindmapping quite strong as outliners - basically any mindmap can be displayed as a linear outline as well, the depth measuring the distance in nodes from the mindmaps center. 

[shadowmoses 16]

Very annoying relative to the absent limits in the legacy versions. By my count the limit is 8, which doesn't even make it a third of the way across the page. I get having some sort of limit given its lukewarm editing skills Evernote, but 8?  16 would be perfect. 12 would be doable. 8 is a little sad.

In fact, I already have a number of preexisting notes which would go well beyond this limit. Guess I'll have to start working on them outside of Evernote, then bring them back in.

[PinkElephant 8,748]

Nobody had that problem for more than 2 years now. Doesn’t seem this is relevant for a significant number of users.

Better avoid extreme forms of formatting in notes. If you think you need it, use an app that supports it, like a word processor, authoring app or page layouter.

[shadowmoses 16]

Yeah, I realize I'm not going to move the needle on anything happening on that front. It is what it is.

[Mike P 2,962]

Just tested this in Word and it has almost exactly the same number of bullet levels. I think 16 levels of bullet points is definitely a specialist need and is therefore probably not going to be available in a generalist note taking app. Personally, if I had a need for something like this, I would use some combination of headings, tables and bullet points. It might even be better structured in a spreadsheet and then attached to a note.

[Boot17 1,532]

Yeah - specialist need is a good way to phrase it. I think Evernote is a good generalist tool, but it doesn't do mind mapping, journaling, kanbanning, word processing, or spreadsheeting. Even it's task implementation (which I find super handy) doesn't replace a full on task manager system. For many levels of bullet nesting it seems like a more specialized tool for that -- like Workflowy -- would be a good use case. I know some that have great success using Workflowy and Evernote in tandem.

Edit: I'm up to 25 levels of nesting in Workflowy on a test note and can keep going. I have an account, but don't use it much.

[shadowmoses 16]

On 12/21/2023 at 1:14 PM, Boot17 said:

Yeah - specialist need is a good way to phrase it. I think Evernote is a good generalist tool, but it doesn't do mind mapping, journaling, kanbanning, word processing, or spreadsheeting. Even it's task implementation (which I find super handy) doesn't replace a full on task manager system. For many levels of bullet nesting it seems like a more specialized tool for that -- like Workflowy -- would be a good use case. I know some that have great success using Workflowy and Evernote in tandem.

Edit: I'm up to 25 levels of nesting in Workflowy on a test note and can keep going. I have an account, but don't use it much.

I do get that, of course. At the same time, I can't imagine a 4-8 nested bullet level increase would be nearly as complicated nor financially irresponsible as making Evernote into a mind mapping powerhouse. Not complaining, just sayin' 🙂. Clearly, I'm in the very, very, very small minority on this.

In any event, I already have a workaround for the times I might need a few extra bullets: copy and paste a set of nested bullets beneath the final bullet level, then delete off the first pasted row (since it pastes directly below the final bullet level and can't be indented). Not the prettiest workaround, but it works in a pinch. I think. Haven't tested its use thoroughly enough to ensure there would be no resulting issues.

[Boot17 1,532]

19 hours ago, shadowmoses said:

In any event, I already have a workaround for the times I might need a few extra bullets: copy and paste a set of nested bullets beneath the final bullet level, then delete off the first pasted row (since it pastes directly below the final bullet level and can't be indented). Not the prettiest workaround, but it works in a pinch. I think. Haven't tested its use thoroughly enough to ensure there would be no resulting issues.

That's a good find and a nice work-around. I did a test just now to see what it would look like on mobile and after about 9 levels, it makes the display on mobile (in portrait) pretty poor. If I put it in a single cell table, then I can control the wrapping a bit and make it look a little better on mobile (or go landscape).

Wonder if they imposed that limit to minimize the formatting weirdness(?) on mobile maybe? But if mobile isn't really used for a note like that then it obviously wouldn't matter.

Anyway -- nice find!