Evernote is Loosing? 🤔

[Danni P. 22]

Something that has been bothering me.. When performing a search on the Desktop application; search words are highlighted in the PDF preview inside a note. However, in the Evernote mobile app; search words are not highlighted (there are no PDF previews). You would think, upon opening the PDF file inside the Evernote Mobile App, that you should be able to perform a search (you are not..) Even Apple Notes can do this?

Is anyone else frustrated that the "Best Note and Archiving tool" on the market cannot do this? "Get what you need, when you need it with powerful, flexible search capabilities."

 

Personally, I use Evernote for Capturing, Archiving, and Retrieval of information - and I feel these were the pillars of Evernote's birth and existence. 

Lately, it seems like Evernote has been trying to play catch up with other new players on the market, with all kinds of new productivity features (i.e. task and team features). Imo, when trying to be - All Things to All People - you will most likely lose.

I hope Evernote will consider to simplify and re-focus its product towards its pillars of existence.

Anyways, while I'm at it, I'm wishing for a better search overview in files/attachments (both mobile and desktop), faster note retrieval, improved app reliability/stability, and proper automated back-up (offline) functionality. I will finish off by saying that I am excited about Evernote's announcement of AI Search functionality being in the works. 

Am I alone in thinking this? 

[PinkElephant 9,024]

Pretty simple: Before executing the search, copy the search term.

Once the note is found, open the pdf. Hit the magnifying glass on top, insert the search term.

It will now search the pdf (pretty fast), and will show a listing of all hits, with page number, a little preview and some text around the hit, to better find the searched position in its context.

It is basically the same in the desktop version - the only difference is that there a preview from the note search is available. To search in the note itself, there is the in-note-search. On desktop it allows to jumpt from hit to hit by the arrow keys.

[Danni P. 22]

7 minutes ago, PinkElephant said:

Hit the magnifying glass on top, insert the search term.

@PinkElephant I see no magnifying glass? only the open/share icon. I'm using the latest version of Evernote on my Android phone (google pixel 7). What device are you using? Are you sure you opened the PDF in the Evernote PDF viewer and not in another application?

 

11 minutes ago, PinkElephant said:

To search in the note itself, there is the in-note-search

Are you sure? The "Find in note" function on my mobile app will not search PDF files. I tested on multiple notes with multiple PDFs. It gives me 0 hits even though the search terms live in multiple places within the PDF file.

[PinkElephant 9,024]

Maybe it's another iOS special ...

 

 

 

[Danni P. 22]

Just now, PinkElephant said:

Maybe it's another iOS special ...

Oh my... 

[PinkElephant 9,024]

It always surprises me how different the "same" client can be.

Search in pdfs existed on iOS v10 practically from the beginning.

[Danni P. 22]

@PinkElephant Very sad to see the lack of platform consistency in the Evernote app..

[PinkElephant 9,024]

Probably it’s more an OS inconsistency …

[Neil Maxfield 155]

Hey @Danni P. you well? This is true. Though, when you perform a note search, filtering for PDFs, it WILL find the notes when the search term is in the PDF even when it isnt in the note text (I just tried this with search term "optometrist")....is that not sufficient for your search needs? Or do you absolutely need to be able to see the words highlighted in the PDF viewer?

[Danni P. 22]

Hey @Neil Maxfield all good, hope the same for you!

1 hour ago, Neil Maxfield said:

when you perform a note search, filtering for PDFs, it WILL find the notes when the search term is in the PDF even when it isnt in the note text

Yes, this is expected and works all fine - even without filtering for PDFs. But as mentioned, it will not highlight search terms in the PDF. Although it taking another step, it seems like you can do another search inside the Evernote PDF viewer for iOS. Though, this is not the same story for the android application. This leaves me forced to open another application to do a simple search - making the whole process of "Get what you need when you need it" not so powerful..