(Archived) Stacks - I just don't get it.

[jschnur 4]

I've tentatively moved to 4.1 from 3.1, partly because I was interested in the new notebook "stacks" feature. But now having tried it, I just don't understand the advantage of stacks for anyone who has already organized his/her notes using tags, which, unlike notebooks, can be deeply nested and cross-referenced. The only advantage I can think of is that notebooks may help to narrow searches. But they don't appear to help organize notes any better than assigning one or more tags to them. What am I missing?

[CalS 5,280]

The only advantage I can think of is that notebooks may help to narrow searches.

IMO, you hit the nail on the head with the above. I have multiple Work notebooks and with Stacks I can now search across them, which was a minor pain prior to Stacks (had to search each notebook). I believe this topic has been discussed in other threads where other uses have been presented.

[jbenson2 2,147]

I'm in the same boat. I tried Stacks and didn't find any benefit using them.

I believe the users who will enjoy Stacks most are the new users who do not want to use tags and prefer the concept of folders.

Also the people who want a clearly defined separation between their job notes and their personal notes will benefit.

Stacks also help reduce the clutter for the users who have dozens of notebooks.

I guess some folks might want to put their confidential stuff in a separate stack. I find the non-sync'd notebooks better suited for that feature.

[engberg 89]

Previously, we permitted you to have a flat list of 100 notebooks and a hierarchical set of 10,000 tags to organize your notes. People said that they needed to organize their notebooks and didn't want to use tags, so we added Stacks and increased the notebook limit to 250 so that you can have more notebooks and hide the ones you're not interested in viewing.

So I have a "Work" stack with things like "Operations" and "Product Planning" notebooks, and a "Personal" stack with "Recipes" an "Video Games" notebooks. On my home machine, I usually only have the Personal stack open, which keeps the interface tidy. At work, it's the opposite.

This isn't an earth shattering change, but can be handy if you are the type of person who prefers to organize with notebooks, and you have a lot of notebooks that fall into separate domains of your life.

[jschnur 4]

I have multiple Work notebooks and with Stacks I can now search across them, which was a minor pain prior to Stacks (had to search each notebook).

Which, to me, begs the question, 'Then why do you keep separate notebooks?' I'm not being facetious; I'm really interested. Thanks.

[CalS 5,280]

The simple answer is to separate confidential work and home notes while sharing non-confidential notes.

This is my set up. I have 4 local notebooks plus an import notebook at work, 2 local notebooks plus an import notebook at home, and 2 synced notebooks. One synced notebook is my INBOX which is empty most of the time. The second synced notebook is for notes that I want to access from work/home/web - mostly non-confidential home stuff with a little work mixed in.

This structure enables me to see what I need at work and home while keeping confidential data local. I use a stack at work for those three notebooks for searching.

From time to time I'll create a temporary notebook for a project, but at the end of it I'll tag and merge the notes into one of the above notebooks. Hope this makes sense. Works for me anyway.

[jschnur 4]

The simple answer is to separate confidential work and home notes while sharing non-confidential notes . . .

Yes, thanks, it does make sense. And notebooks for active projects is something I may adopt. For new projects, I may experiment using more general tags that I can use across projects, instead of subordinating every tag within a project and using the project name as a tag prefix. But by creating project notebooks, I do run the risk of not being able to organize subcategories and sub-subcategories specific to a project. The problem is that I prefer to organize my notes rather than relying on the search function. I don't get concerned about not finding what I'm looking for; rather, I worry about missing something I didn't think to look for. So I tend not to use the EN search function at all, particularly given its limitations, such as not being able to use a wildcard at the beginning of a string. TMI, I know. Thanks.

[CalS 5,280]

The problem is that I prefer to organize my notes rather than relying on the search function.

No problem, not TMI at all. Interesting to learn how others do things. Always something to be learned.

[engberg 89]

I think that notebooks are generally appropriate if you have completely separate domains of information that you will always want to browse separately from each other. Having each of them completely contained within its own notebook with no overlap is both appropriate and helpful.

My recipes and my "SQL queries" will never have any overlap, so putting them in separate notebooks is useful. I can just click on the "recipes" notebook to see all of my recipes (and only my recipes) for easy casual browsing.

Tags are more freeform, since notes can have multiple tags applied to them. So a "Japanese" tag might be applied to both recipes and SQL queries to count Japanese web clips...

[Don Reba 32]

There are two types of people: pilers and filers. Pilers tag everything and put it into a single notebook, relying on search to find notes. Filers organize notes in notebooks and stacks.

[engberg 89]

"... people who believe in dichotomies and people who don't."

I generally advise people to start out as "pilers" until they really get too much stuff to easily browser and search, and then you can spend 30 minutes organizing stuff. It's hard to visualize the exact right filing scheme on the day you start using Evernote, so it can be easier to just skip filing for the first week or two until you get a better sense of how things work.

[CalS 5,280]

But by creating project notebooks, I do run the risk of not being able to organize subcategories and sub-subcategories specific to a project.

Second thought, should have posted the first time. Maybe you can create your sub-cat tags when you move the notes into your main notebook. That way you get the benefit of quick, no search access through the notebook with the ability to establish your final tag structure when done. Beauty of the product is you can try either approach and change relatively easily.

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

There are two types of people: pilers and filers. Pilers tag everything and put it into a single notebook, relying on search to find notes. Filers organize notes in notebooks and stacks.

And then there is my girlfriend's husband who has stacks of piles.

Or is it piles of stacks?

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

IME, any organizing scheme must be adaptable. As the user delves into it, they realize one thing works well & another does not. Evernote is no different. Start out slow & taper on. You'll realize what works for you & what doesn't.

[vanessajo 0]

I have just downloaded EN and have a notebook for my work. I have read that I can put files in this notebook by adding STACKS. Where do I find the option to do this? I have a desk computer that I use at work, a laptop that I use at home and my Android. I think this is going to be wonderful to keep me all together.

Thanks

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

I have just downloaded EN and have a notebook for my work. I have read that I can put files in this notebook by adding STACKS.

You can put files (file types are limited for free accounts) and notes into the notebook.

Stacks are comprised of notebooks.