(Archived) Tags in a particular notebook

[dennis2008 0]

This is extremely useful when you have accumulated a large number of tags over time.

Since most of the time a user has to select a notebook to work with, displaying only tags in this notebook which could possibly filter out 90% of irrelevant tags makes a lot of sense.

[jbenson2 2,147]

Interesting concept, but implementing inside the Evernote computer code could be a bear.

It would flip the whole concept of universal tags around.

If I need to narrow a search for a tag in a specific notebook, I add notebook:name to my search.

[dennis2008 0]

Thanks for your reply.

Maybe the concept of universal tags is more important to someone else than it is to me but when something that makes sense can not replace something already exists, I still wish it could be 'added' somewhere.

I think the power of tagging is that you can casually associate your note with some keywords that are off the top of your head when the note is created or reviewed. With this characteristic, the number of tags grows very quick to the extent that some day later you may need some help to 'know what to search for'. It would be nice if there is a way to filter out irrelevant tags.

[jbenson2 2,147]

I have about 800 tags now. I use a very structured Parent / Child format, so it is easy for me to remember the tag name.

Yes, universal tags is an important part of Evernote.

Another tip that might help (In Windows)

Have you tried turning off the tags with the right click "Hide Unassigned Tags"? It kicks in when you run a search.

[misterphil 0]

I've just started with Evernote, and have been cruising through the forums looking for tagging conventions (I don't mean social events )

I'm currently trying to use the same system as jbenson2.

Anyway, I started out OK, but I'm struggling a bit as I go on.

For example I've got some useful grouping, and I only use the parent tag if the note is really global for all child tags, otherwise I create another child. I noticed there's a lot of misunderstanding about tag hierarchy, but I like it the way it is.

I do it like so:

fitness
    fit-climbing
    fit-cycling
    fit-diving
    fit-running

food
    foo-allergy
    foo-nutrition
    foo-recipe

productivity
    pro-evernote
    pro-gtd
    pro-lifehacks
    pro-toodledo

but then I've also got tons of stuff like travel and places, how would you store that? Does this look sensible?

place
    pla-madrid
    pla-new.york   (I'm avoiding spaces as I'm still learning)
    pla-paris
    pla-usa

travel
    tra-booking
    tra-car
    tra-flight
    tra-train

I think that's OK, but I also have lots of tags that don't fit in any particular category like : fun, howto, free, economics. Should I keep them or should I try to bundle them? I think that as most don't have a common parent they shouldn't be bundled and given a 3 letter tag prefix, but I could put them in a parent tag called 'other'.

I'd like people's opinions. I've only seen jbenson2 discuss how to use a parent/child structure. what about all those miscellaneous tags though?

Cheers,

Phil

[jbenson2 2,147]

A couple suggestions:

1.) I originally only used the structured Parent / Child format for subjects I searched frequently. But there are some housekeeping benefits when you put miscellaneous stuff under one general tag. It will make the compressed list of tags considerably smaller. I capture a lot of political commentaries (local, national, and worldwide). All the tags for these political subjects are stored under Issues, but they do not have a common prefix. Here are a few issues that begin with the letter C.

• Issues
  
  • California-downfall
    Campaign-finance
    Cap-and-Trade
    Census
    Civility
    Climategate
    

2.) Due to a glitch in the Evernote search code, I do not recommend using the same prefix for the Parent and the Child. An alternative that will result is accurate searches would be to change to something like this:

• Location
  
  • pla-madrid
    pla-new.york
    pla-paris
    pla-usa
    

Trip

• tra-booking
  tra-car
  tra-flight
  tra-train
  

.

[misterphil 0]

Thanks for the quick response. I've now put everything else in a tag group '_other' that sits at the top of the list.

Regarding your second point, what is the actual problem with the search code, and is it documented somewhere?

I enjoying using it with the same prefix because that allows me to easily filter what I want. E.g, For the following books tags

books
    boo-Fiction
    boo-Technical

All parent & child books: (tag:boo*)

All child categorized: (tag:boo-*)

only parent categorized: (tag:books)

But if I use a different prefix that's not going to work.

Edit: I like how when I add a tag it (in the Windows version) auto-suggests the tags, but when searching that functionality is missing. I hope they add that soon.

Finally how do you indent your text in a forum post without using the Code tags?

Thanks,

Phil

[misterphil 0]

I think that tag prefix bug is discussed here:

http://forum.evernote.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=56&t=23944&p=102976&hilit=tag+prefix+bug#p102976

[jbenson2 2,147]

I indent in the forum using the List command

Example:

[*list]Parent

[*list]Child

Child

Child

[*/list][*/list]

Result:

• Parent
  
  • Child
    Child
    Child
    

[jbenson2 2,147]

After looking at your setup, I believe that you won't run into the same problem. Because they are slightly different spellings (books and boo-)

• books
  
  • boo-Fiction
    boo-Technical
    

The problem would kick in if you use:

• books
  
  • books-Fiction
    books-Technical
    

A work-around the search problem is to manually type the search parameters into Notepad first and then copy and paste it to the Evernote search field.

In other words:

• Type-in search terms = fail occasionally
  Paste-in search terms = success
  

The problem does not show up in Evernote Web, just Evernote Windows.

Crane submitted a similar problem in October of last year. The case # was 134873. She was told a bug was filed. Since then, the same problem has been brought up in the forum, but no solution.

Here is a link to one of the discussions:

http://forum.evernote.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=56&t=22679&p=98193

The Parent "Job" and Child "Job-xxx" creates the search problem.

Changing the Parent from "Job" to "Jobs" solves the search problem.

.

[misterphil 0]

Well I've just spent 10 minutes playing around with what you mentioned and I can't reproduce that bug in the latest Windows version.

I created the following tag structure:

• pet
  • pet-cat
    pet-dog

I tagged three notes pet-cat, and two notes pet-dog. I didn't tag anything pet.

tag:pet* returns all 5 notes

tag:pet-* returns all 5 notes

tag:pet-c* returns 3 cat notes

tag:pet-cat returns 3 cat notes

tag:pet-dog returns 2 dog notes.

Therefore, as far as I can tell I don't have that bug in version 4.4.2.4912

[jbenson2 2,147]

Misterphil - good call.

Merci beaucoup. You are correct.

Perhaps Evernote corrected the search problem in one of the previous releases.

The last I heard from Evernote was that they agreed with my conclusion and were going to investigate further. I guess it would be difficult for Evernote to notify the users who submitted support requests when a correction is made further down the road.

[misterphil 0]

Maybe there is a change log with each release? I'd hope so.

I found a slight problem on the EN Web search box using my parent tagging system.

whatever sub tag of pet you search for it always fills the text search box with: tag:pet

and whatever you actually wanted to search for. No big deal as you can remove the one you don't want.

Cheers,

Phil

[jefito 5,589]

I think that's OK, but I also have lots of tags that don't fit in any particular category like : fun, howto, free, economics. Should I keep them or should I try to bundle them? I think that as most don't have a common parent they shouldn't be bundled and given a 3 letter tag prefix, but I could put them in a parent tag called 'other'.

Sure, it's fine to do that; it helps to keep the tag tree's top level smaller.

I'd like people's opinions. I've only seen jbenson2 discuss how to use a parent/child structure. what about all those miscellaneous tags though?

jbenson has a system that works well for him, but not everyone needs the parent /child search features that he does. I have a loose hierarchical tree, but I don't really need to enforce the tree in searches; my tree is mainly to keep the clutter down. It's not just tags that have no obvious common parent either, it's also tags that could have multiple logical parents.