(Archived) req:fine-grained index control

[patanne 5]

This request, probably it's more than one, surrounds the use of indexing and how to reduce the amount of "noise" that accumulates over time with a system such as Evernote. The request aids and enhances the filtering of search results.

I want to begin by saying that I love and live by this product. It is because of how essential the product is to me that I believe some features should be added. And it is because of the diverse ways in which i use the product that I feel such changes are critical. i touch upon a fraction of the

THE REQUEST(S):

• 
  [*:21sx6o4b]allow indexing to be tuned per-notebook and/or per-entry, from here forth referred to as per-scope.
  [*:21sx6o4b]indexing has a mode applied to the scope: either on, off, or header-only.
  [*:21sx6o4b]scopes are hierarchal and can be inherited.
  [*:21sx6o4b]custom stop-words are allowed to be added, or ignored globally or per-scope. by ignore i mean you can explicitly exclude a stop-word defined in a parent scope.
  [*:21sx6o4b]indexing settings: mode, stop-words, etc. can be saved as a configuration to be applied to other scopes (another notebook or entry) with ease. we'll call these index profiles.
  [*:21sx6o4b]index profiles can be imported/exported for use by others.
  [*:21sx6o4b]changing a profile on a scope causes a reindex of that scope, and possibly the immediate super-scope, depending on how you have implemented the code.
  [*:21sx6o4b]allow the option to store the index of a notebook separate from others and provide the user the option to choose the alternate index when searching.

THE REASONS:

• 
  [*:21sx6o4b]one of my uses for this product is a journal. another is to store research notes and steps i used to solve problems. i refer to the latter as tracelogs. often i have to sit with a client to go through efforts and searches on topics turn up journal entries, results that i don't want turning up in front of the client.
  [*:21sx6o4b]i'd like to use this tool as a primitive diary and again don't want the content to necessarily turn up so easily, though the content doesn't warrant encryption either.
  [*:21sx6o4b]often in my tracelogs i copy and paste dumps from computer logs and other sources. it leads to a lot of noise coming back on certain search words. god help me if i was researching what windows to buy to replace certain ones in my house. i'll get back every entry i made fighting every issue M$ Windows throws at you.
  [*:21sx6o4b]tagging can help, but can't cover it all.

thanks.

patrick

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

It seems to me you're attempting to over complicate something that's already very simple & straightforward.

god help me if i was researching what windows to buy to replace certain ones in my house. i'll get back every entry i made fighting every issue M$ Windows throws at you.

[*]tagging can help, but can't cover it all.

This statement indicates you do not understand fully, how powerful EN's search engine is when you use notebooks, tags, saved searches, accurate titles & keywords. I suggest you search the board on the topic of tags & read how powerful they are & how the search parameters allow you to quickly & easily either refine or expand the results.

[patanne 5]

Quite the contrary. I understand all too well how simple and straightforward this is. I am trying to solve the complications involved in extensive and heavy use of the product, without the proliferation of a huge tag list. In addition I have been quite closely involved in the design and implementation of one of the top 50 (most heavily traffic'd) search sites on the internet., nearly from scratch; taxonomy included. I understand search power, and certainly beyond what is here. I also understand the complexities of volume though. Sometimes you want things off the grid. It's that simple.

[jefito 5,589]

I think that the Evernote philosophy is to keep things simple and clean, as much as possible. Tags are simple, flexible, and powerful; most people don't need a huge tag list, by and large. They've resisted adding folders (an easily understandable and common UI metaphor); I'd guess that they'd not be much in favor of a complicated system like the one you've suggested (such as I understand it), particularly if its usage would be limited to a small percentage of its users. That being said, your system might be ripe for a 3rd-party solution.

~Jeff

[patanne 5]

Considering the popularity of the product, its adoption rate, and the new ways people are finding to use it, I expect the list of those whose stuff is hitting "critical mass" to grow in kind. The implementation of such a request may be sound involved for good reason, but that shouldn't be confused with the want. It's simple -> Just because you want to store things doesn't mean you want it all indexed. Too many answers make a product as impotent as too few.

patrick

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

Too many answers make a product as impotent as too few.

Indeed. But in the windows example you provided, I would solve that easily by using a tag such as "shopping research - windows". NBD. I have quite a few notes & rarely have a problem finding the one(s) I'm looking for.

[CalS 5,280]

THE REASONS:

one of my uses for this product is a journal. another is to store research notes and steps i used to solve problems. i refer to the latter as tracelogs. often i have to sit with a client to go through efforts and searches on topics turn up journal entries, results that i don't want turning up in front of the client.

i'd like to use this tool as a primitive diary and again don't want the content to necessarily turn up so easily, though the content doesn't warrant encryption either.

often in my tracelogs i copy and paste dumps from computer logs and other sources. it leads to a lot of noise coming back on certain search words. god help me if i was researching what windows to buy to replace certain ones in my house. i'll get back every entry i made fighting every issue M$ Windows throws at you.

tagging can help, but can't cover it all.

Primitive, but:

1. Put your journal notes in a separate notebook and/or encrypt the text if you don't want someone to see it.

2. Put your tracelogs in a separate notebook, only search that notebook when problem solving with clients.

3. Another notebook for everything else so you can find your windows.

Still will be a lot of indexing going on, but your search results will be cleaner.

[Metrodon 2,184]

EN has about 18k new users every day - how many do you think need this kind of indexing?

I'd assume it's a tiny tiny tiny percentage and as such an extremely unlikely path for EN to undertake.

[engberg 89]

We try to index meta-data separately from the contents of the note, so you can specifically search for things like "words in a title". The search grammar is fairly powerful for narrowing down your searches:

http://www.evernote.com/about/developer ... c277181469

But we don't plan to change how the actual index is created on a user-by-user basis, because we perform the search indexing on multiple different platforms (Mac, Windows, web, iPhone, etc.).

Trying to tweak each platform on the fly based on personal preferences would be a lot uglier than just indexing things cleanly with the right meta-data so that advanced users can usually find what they want relatively easily.

Thanks

[patanne 5]

What about this then...

As mentioned previously I am aware of the power of the search syntax. I would need to go past 'saved search', though, to something like a 'saved search profile' or 'search template'. To me a profile is a search fragment in proper syntax that would be appended to whatever your type in the search box. In this way I could set a profile (i.e. -tag:technote -notebook:journal) and only have to type in the phrases I am looking for. The big thing would be for me to apply a specific profile as the default when the tool opens. In this way a mask would be set until I want to open up access to all the content.

On any given day I save quite a bit of information. But for 90% of my searches I only want to see 10% of the data. I want to have the 'filters' set from the moment the program opens.

[CalS 5,280]

As far as I can tell,

1) If you specify a notebook/stack as you create a search, then save it, the saved search will always be limited to that notebook/stack.

2) If you do not specify a notebook/stack as you create the search, then save it, the saved search will search the currently selected notebook/stack.

So if you only want to search a given notebook or notebooks, create a stack if need be, and specify the notebook/stack when you create/save the search.

[jefito 5,589]

What about this then...

As mentioned previously I am aware of the power of the search syntax. I would need to go past 'saved search', though, to something like a 'saved search profile' or 'search template'. To me a profile is a search fragment in proper syntax that would be appended to whatever your type in the search box. In this way I could set a profile (i.e. -tag:technote -notebook:journal) and only have to type in the phrases I am looking for. The big thing would be for me to apply a specific profile as the default when the tool opens. In this way a mask would be set until I want to open up access to all the content.

On any given day I save quite a bit of information. But for 90% of my searches I only want to see 10% of the data. I want to have the 'filters' set from the moment the program opens.

If you set up a saved search with a notebook/tag/stack/whatever specification. that should work fine for what you're describing, except for the bit where you want it autoloaded when you start up (though you could use ENScript to set up a shortcut that does exactly that). Anyways, run your saved search, then to narrow things down, type in additional search terms. Have you tried it?

~Jeff

[patanne 5]

Yes I have tried. There are a few problems...

• [*:2q6b8ca7]Autoload. You already mentioned it. Autoload is critical.
  [*:2q6b8ca7]The additional criteria is not working.

For point #2 here are the details...

• 
  [*:2q6b8ca7]I can't save the search. To employ my 80/20 rule, or what I've been referring to as 90/10, I want to exclude two notebooks as my search fragment. So I try to entrer the following sytax to save, -notebook:"journal" -notebook:"technotes". EN won't let me save it unless I add a search term, which defeats the purpose since I want this search fragment to be applied to every search I enter.
  [*:2q6b8ca7]Notebook exclusion does not appear to work. Even though I am using the dash '-' a search for a term I know exists within the 'journal' notebook still returns results from that notebook. The syntax I entered above should not allow those results through. In fact the first notebook mentioned in the fragment shown above is always selected rather than all mentioned being excluded.
  [*:2q6b8ca7]I am using EN 2.0.116546 on the Mac.