(Archived) What's this beta all about? (Discussion of Sticky)

[marcclarke 0]

Folks,

Welcome to the Evernote 3 beta forum. This is my first day posting on the forums, so please be at least somewhat nice to me.

Hi, Phil,

Welcome aboard the EverNote User Forum (ENUF).

We are mostly pretty well-behaved here. When the hissing, scratching, and yowling gets too loud Grand Mistress Crane threatens to bring out her paddle and restore order (really, run a forum search). None of us have dared find out what that really means, so we (mostly) behave ourselves.

I think it is great fun to have the CEO chime in to the ENUF. I am trying to imagine Bill Gates chiming in on the OneNote 2007 User Forum, on a Sunday even, and despite my vivid imagination I am not succeeding. 8)

[crane 40]

:oops:

Now there's someone really remembers *everything*.

:twisted:

[salgud 12]

:oops:

Now there's someone really remembers *everything*.

:twisted:

UH OH, Marc, the Grandmistress is mad at you! Better hope she uses the paddle rather than the helium bottle on you. In either case, can I watch? :wink:

[glinkot 0]

Hi Phil, great to see a CEO getting on the forums- it's your own 'focus group' of passionate EN fans!

I've requested my beta key and will be very keen to have a look at this when it arrives. Having read the forum I'd just make one plea to the EN team:

Please concentrate on enriching core functionality in preference as a priority over 'gee gaws'!

What do I mean by that? Well, there are many really basic things (like my personal favourites: ability to use tables and proper bulleted lists in notes...) that would really enrich the user experience more than some of the more fancy features one could think of. A program we use here at work died a death because they kept adding partially complete new modules to it, when the old modules still hadn't been refined in line with common user requests.

I realise it's always a competition between doing those 'boring' enhancements to basic functionality versus the things that are more visibly linked to revenue growth (moving to service based model, key features that stand out in the 'what's new!' list, etc) but I believe core functionality changes drive revenue also by encouraging higher trial to conversion rates.

Anyway, I'm looking forward to trying the beta, and indeed the new features. To Phil and the team, good luck! EN will change the world!

PS. Could I suggest an online bug tracking/feature request list, where users can suggest a change or add their vote to an existing request.

[geogray 0]

Sigh...I just found this beta (I've been out of the loop) and downloaded and installed v3. Alas, when it starts up, it asks for a user name and password. I quickly discovered the whole applying for beta access thing. Am I correct in the assumption that is to be a connected application beginning with v3? This is a far cry from the product I purchased and want. I do not want to have to be connected in order to use the application. If I choose to connect and put my notes up somewhere in the cloud, then fine, but I don't want to be forced into connecting everytime I want to use the application.

If this is all documented somewhere, then my apologies for the whine. As stated, I just found this.

Thanks

[crane 40]

Shake your head geogray Yes, it's been covered. Perhaps not to everyone's satisfaction, but it's been covered. I recommend that you read all the posts in the Evernote 3 Beta forum. We've been over this.

[geogray 0]

Shake your head geogray Yes, it's been covered. Perhaps not to everyone's satisfaction, but it's been covered. I recommend that you read all the posts in the Evernote 3 Beta forum. We've been over this.

Understood, and will do.

[schady 0]

I have read through all the posts in the Evernote 3 Beta forum but did not see that these questions have been answered. Could someone possibly point me to a specific post where this is addressed? I am also concerned about EN becoming a web only application.

[crane 40]

You might have to read a bit between the lines.

For instance, this thread (viewtopic.php?f=30&t=5623&st=0&sk=t&sd=a&hilit=local#p20506 ) is discussing encryption/local databases. Basically, we will (soon?) have the option to have local databases. These will not be synced to the cloud. Instead, they will be on a local machine, and it will be up to the user to take care of them (with respect to bringing back and forth between machines, backing them up, etc.) These will most definitely not require online access, since by definition, the data will not be online.

Phil (new CEO) has also made it clear that EN2.2 is still going strong. I don't know if or when support for 2.2 will disappear, but trust me in that us power users will keep using it until 3 actual delivers all of the same functionality. (And we're not sure that we'll actually get all the functionality that we'll need.). Anyway, you can still use 2.2 the way you want, for some time in the future.

Now, I agree, it can be offputting that you need to "log in" to start the desktop version of 3b. I figure that the interface will change when they bring out support for the local only notebooks. After all, why would we need to log in to use local data?

Anyway, I figure things will shake out in the near future. You should be able to keep all of you data, if you so desire, on your own machine. The concept of EN as a connected application is part of a new paradigm - all of you information always available, whereever you are. But, we've already been quite clear in our demand to have our data on our own machines, only, and EN has been pretty responsive in this respect.

[dice1976 0]

Hello,

Very excited long term user here... I was wondering if this new evernote 3 beta or final version will be able to sync to the my.evernote.com online evernote which I am using sometimes for backup of my evernote when I forget my usb key.

Thanks evernote!

-Dice

[geogray 0]

Greetings!

Ok, I got my invite (thanks) and have been playing around with all three versions-desktop, web and mobile. I get it now. Being able to check my notes from anywhere is a definite plus. HOWEVER...let's not forget the disconnected desktop or mobilephone. I still want the ability to work primarily offline. I'd also like the ability to OPEN a database rather than having to import it (like I had to do to get my current 2.2 notes into the version.) I also appreciate the revamped gui for Smartphone--though I would like to be able to read what I've put with out having to go to the web client. In this regard, the old beta fo smartphones was far and away better than this new one. I also like the light green touches...I'm a bit tired of all the blue we've been given in this web 2 world. I'm still perusing the three clients, but, so far, I am relatively impressed. Again, PLEASE don't ignore offline.

Thanks!

[WeyrleaderZor 0]

What will happen to the beta accounts at the end of the beta test?

Sorry if I missed this somewhere, but I did a search, but the strings "beta test" and "end of beta test" showed a LOT of threads and none seemed to be what I am asking about above.

[bdesilva 4]

I'm also eager to know what will happen to us at the end of the beta.

[iafanasyev 1]

From what I know, all beta accounts and data in there will be preserved.

[bushtick 0]

First post here, so apologies if I say something obvious. Noticed the lack of templates in the Beta. Can't say I was a massive user of templates but maybe that's because I never found the right templates to use in EN 2.2. My request for templates would be for a 'meeting notes' template which allows you to assign responsibilities, to-do by dates and ideally, a reminder (dare I say, the ability to generate a task in Outlook???). Just an idea - shoot it down if you like, but that's what I would find useful. Otherwise, I like the look and feel of EN 3.

Cheers, Colin

[goggin 10]

What about links between notes, links to external documents, and external links into the EN database? These are critical features.

[andyrawlins 0]

I think that the biggest surprise for me was the website. I called up the home page as I do regularly and everything except the beta had gone! Where was all the 2.2 stuff, the how to's, the useful videos, the forums - had they simply abandoned their whole commercial product and changed their public face to that of a start up with only a beta product?

Once I'd calmed down and found the forums I was able to read a bit more I can now see that there could certainly be uses for being able to upload things to the web. However, I would want to be able to pick and choose which things these were. I don't want personal/confidential/commercial information wandering around the cloud. Plus I'm not always connected. It needs a check box and only notes with the checkbox checked get uploaded.

What I really want is to be able to use EN2.2 on my Mac and PC with a single database. This is what I do with PersonalBrain (see my post elsewhere on the forums). The database lives on my Mac laptop and I either open it locally on that or over the network on my PC. Fantastic. What we have here isn't really the same. Plus, everyone and their dog does an on-line data repository/office tool, etc. You're not going to beat Google. Concentrate on the uniqueness of EverNote I say - you have a niche there with only really OneNote (that no one knows about) as serious competition.

As far as the beta actually goes, I can't seem to get clipping working on the Mac. The video shows an icon on the menu bar but I don't get that. Plus, if I use the web clipper, it sticks it on the on-line account and I have to download it. I want it the other way round (synchronizing to the web would be an exception for me). Early days I guess. I'll persevere with it on the Mac but I'm not jeopardizing 2.2 on my PC. That stays as it is.

Best wishes anyway

Andy

[goggin 10]

I don't want personal/confidential/commercial information wandering around the cloud. Plus I'm not always connected.

I echo this concern. I loved Evernote 2.2 because it allowed (a) secure data storage; yet ( would sync across my personal platforms easily and securely; and © allowed cross referencing information (links between notes, links to external doc's, and external links into EverNote).

Obviously, the top concern is security. If I can't feel safe about the info I store in EverNote then what's the point of using it? If I store info that's important to me, then it's important to me that the data be secure...and yet still portable...just like...well...EverNote 2.2!

[engberg 89]

We absolutely agree that security is very important. That's why we aim to exceed the level of security that you get from your email provider. I.e. not only do we manage a secure service in a controlled data center, but we also offer options such as encryption within notes and local-only notebooks.

http://forum.evernote.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=5667&p=20633#p20633

This means that you can access your memories from anywhere you need, but you also have some options for managing private data like passwords, credit card numbers, etc.

Thanks for the feedback.

[fasimkins 0]

Hi, new to the forums. You speak about security and the option for encryption. Where can you enable this? I have found that EN3 synchronizes in plain text that is easily sniffed on the lan. It would be nice to secure this from eavesdropping coworkers.

-Frank

[engberg 89]

In the Windows client, you can encrypt some text in your notes by selecting the text and then "right clicking" to Encrypt the text. Once you do this, you can only read that text on a client by decrypting it. This same feature will be release on the Mac in the next month, and it will be cross-platform (so you can encrypt on Mac and decrypt on Win32).

The clients and the web UI already use SSL to encrypt all authentication information ... so when you log in, your password is never sent in the clear. In a couple of months, you will be able to upgrade from a Free account to a Premium account for a few dollars a month, and this may use SSL for all communications between the clients and the service. When we do this, Premium accounts will have the option to enable or disable SSL.

[goggin 10]

we aim to exceed the level of security that you get from your email provider.

And how many times a day are we admonished not to send sensitive information over e-mail because it's not secure? Several times a day at least for me. If I relegate Evernote to that category, then I can use it to store amusing stuff (wine lists, funny jokes); but I'll still need an app to store and synch information that I don't want sent in plain text...which is the information I really care about.

Maybe you're targeting the masses that don't much care or understand the jeapordy they put themselves in by putting info out on the wide open net that can contribute to identity theft etc. by using plain text connections, but I think you guys are gonna be like a moth to the flame for the bad guys. I don't need that in my life!

[engberg 89]

We hope that you find a useful set of things to do with Evernote based on your requirements and our security and privacy options (e.g. text encryption, local notebooks, etc.). While no one tool is going to solve every problem for everyone, we think that most Internet users will find that our security options exceed their expectations from comparable services.