(Archived) How do I organize folders in notebooks A to Z??

[davidduty 2]

IN my EN program I have several notebooks. I need to organize (list in order) the folders form A to Z as an example, really it's 1 to 100 but just as an example I am using A to Z.

I can create folders in and EN notebook but then they don't show in either the order they were create or even A to Z. They just show in some random order that has nothing to do with when they were created or A to Z either. However they do show up A to Z (or date they were created on the Web EN site. I have created the notebooks from A to Z from the very start.

Is there anyway to have folders in the notebooks show up from A to Z or from a numbered list like 1. Lesson on MACD, 2. Lesson on Trends, 3. Lesson on Blah, Blah.

Now the individual notes in each folder can be sorted under the view menu. So I guess I need to know how to organize folders. I can't seem to drag a folder in between folders like I can on OneNote which is a great feature for organizing stuff. Maye I have a lesson on MACD and then later find something on the WEB that I clipped and want to put "under" the lesson on MACD. Doesn't seem like there is a way to do that.

SOS,

David

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

Notebooks are sorted alphabetically. You may need to close & reopen EN, after creating new notebooks.

You may find this thread helpful.

[davidduty 2]

I did close and reopen EN but still no luck.

David

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

Hi. You may need to select a different sorting order, but it is entirely possible to organize alphabetically. In fact, I think that is the default. The only other option is by number of notes contained within the folders. Right click on a folder to play with this.

More broadly speaking, though, EN is simply not as robust with organizational options as OneNote. OneNote is designed for people who love to stick things in folders, create hierarchies, and tame their information. If you are an organizational junkie (I used to be), then EN may not be a good solution for you.

EN takes a more laissez faire approach then One Note. Notes cannot ordinarily be re-ordered without renaming them, for example. Sometimes this is a weakness. As a writer, I use EN to collect research, but I write using different apps, because other programs enable me to re-order elements of an essay without having to rename everything.

But, this weakness of EN is due, at least in part, to how EN is setup. It is supposed to rely on tags instead of folders to organize information. I think you'll find that exploring the potential of tags will in many cases result in a far more elegant solution to common folder problems. Once you let go of the folder mindset, you realize that you rarely actually need folders at all. I recommend thumbing through Brett Kelly's book, or surfing around the net for ideas on using tags more effectively.

[jbenson2 2,147]

I was able to create both Notes and Notebooks in an alphanumerical sort.

[jefito 5,589]

I can create folders in and EN notebook but then they don't show in either the order they were create or even A to Z. They just show in some random order that has nothing to do with when they were created or A to Z either. However they do show up A to Z (or date they were created on the Web EN site. I have created the notebooks from A to Z from the very start.

Is there anyway to have folders in the notebooks show up from A to Z or from a numbered list like 1. Lesson on MACD, 2. Lesson on Trends, 3. Lesson on Blah, Blah.

There are no folders in an Evernote notebook (in fact, there are no folders in Evernote at all). There are only notes in a notebook, and those, as you noted, are sortable under the current view.

You can create a stack of notebooks. The notebooks are sorted alphabetically under their containing stack. Non-shared notebooks that are not in any stack, plus all stacks, are sorted alphabetically under the Notebooks root.

There are no folders in Evernote. It might be useful to screen-clip and include a picture of what you are referring to.

[gazumped 11,667]

Shooting in the dark here, but why do you need folders (notebooks?) in a certain order that they don't easily appear on screen?

If it's so you can easily move notes into the correct notebook, have you considered sending motes* by email? You can specify the notebook and tags for a note individually.

Another option could be to abandon notebooks and concentrate on tags - probably a lot quicker to tag a series of notes with letters or numbers than it is to find the correct notebook and drag the note into it.

NB I haven't tested whether 1-character tags/ searches in Evernote work effectively; you might have to tag notes 00A or 001 to make this work. (Some search options need a minimum number of characters to be effective.) Try it out before you commit!

EDIT: *motes = notes in the real world. Sorry..

[jefito 5,589]

As far as I can tell, there's no problem with using one-letter tag names. The relevant search option (tag:) works fine with this.

[davidduty 2]

Hi. You may need to select a different sorting order, but it is entirely possible to organize alphabetically. In fact, I think that is the default. The only other option is by number of notes contained within the folders. Right click on a folder to play with this.

More broadly speaking, though, EN is simply not as robust with organizational options as OneNote. OneNote is designed for people who love to stick things in folders, create hierarchies, and tame their information. If you are an organizational junkie (I used to be), then EN may not be a good solution for you.

EN takes a more laissez faire approach then One Note. Notes cannot ordinarily be re-ordered without renaming them, for example. Sometimes this is a weakness. As a writer, I use EN to collect research, but I write using different apps, because other programs enable me to re-order elements of an essay without having to rename everything.

But, this weakness of EN is due, at least in part, to how EN is setup. It is supposed to rely on tags instead of folders to organize information. I think you'll find that exploring the potential of tags will in many cases result in a far more elegant solution to common folder problems. Once you let go of the folder mindset, you realize that you rarely actually need folders at all. I recommend thumbing through Brett Kelly's book, or surfing around the net for ideas on using tags more effectively.

Thanks for the detailed post. Here is my problem. I write courses on trading commodities. One course Common Sense Commodities I have a "Stack" called CSC eLearning Edition. In that stack I have Introduction (5 pages), 1. Lesson One (10) pages, 2. Lesson Two (9 pages), 3. Lesson Three (15 pages) etc. all the way through Lesson Ten. So the course will have one stack, ten notebooks consisting of about 450 pages.

Then I will do the same thing for my Common Sense Options course. I want the students who have purchased these courses to be able to access them online and within there own PC based EN program if they choose to install it.

I would like for them to be able to see the course material via their EN Web program and then add these lessons to their own EN (pc) program.

Then, I will also have a subscription based "Bonus" area where I will do updates, market analysis, etc. and post this in CSC Bonus or SCO Bonus notebooks. Each of these new notebooks will have new "pages" or notes added daily.

So here is why I'm pulling my hair out, what's left anyway, over this project.

1. I have thousands of students in the past that I need to allow access to these EN courses. I can't see how to do that except by individually adding their names one at a time (and having to type them in every time since EN won't allow me to cut and paste) and then clicking invite. I would love to be able to email all the students and tell them that my courses are now in EN and go to XXXX site and view them and then add them to thier own EN program. Is that possible.

2. Making Notebooks Public. Isn't their someway that I can make my notebooks public where people can just "subscribe" to them and they show up in their own EN PC based application? I know that their are some notebooks on the EN Trunk site that I just click on and walla, they are in my EN program. If that's the case when someone that I have subscribed to their notebook makes an addition or a change to their notebook does that automatically update in my EN program on my PC?

3. I would be happy to pay some EN expert to show me how to do all this. I'm wasting far too much time trying to figure it all out than I should.

If this is clear as mud, I apologize. If not anyone that knows how to do this PLEASE let me know.

And thanks to each and all that have been kind enough to post here about this issue. Seems like the EN forum is alive and doing very well. I'm certainly glad to see that.

BTW, does EN have a tech support phone number. I'm a Premium member and sent them a a message on the support area last week but no answer as of yet.

David

Boquete, Panama

[davidduty 2]

I can create folders in and EN notebook but then they don't show in either the order they were create or even A to Z. They just show in some random order that has nothing to do with when they were created or A to Z either. However they do show up A to Z (or date they were created on the Web EN site. I have created the notebooks from A to Z from the very start.

Is there anyway to have folders in the notebooks show up from A to Z or from a numbered list like 1. Lesson on MACD, 2. Lesson on Trends, 3. Lesson on Blah, Blah.

There are no folders in an Evernote notebook (in fact, there are no folders in Evernote at all). There are only notes in a notebook, and those, as you noted, are sortable under the current view.

You can create a stack of notebooks. The notebooks are sorted alphabetically under their containing stack. Non-shared notebooks that are not in any stack, plus all stacks, are sorted alphabetically under the Notebooks root.

There are no folders in Evernote. It might be useful to screen-clip and include a picture of what you are referring to.

Thanks for the info. I will check the links you suggested.

David

[davidduty 2]

Shooting in the dark here, but why do you need folders (notebooks?) in a certain order that they don't easily appear on screen?

If it's so you can easily move notes into the correct notebook, have you considered sending motes* by email? You can specify the notebook and tags for a note individually.

Another option could be to abandon notebooks and concentrate on tags - probably a lot quicker to tag a series of notes with letters or numbers than it is to find the correct notebook and drag the note into it.

NB I haven't tested whether 1-character tags/ searches in Evernote work effectively; you might have to tag notes 00A or 001 to make this work. (Some search options need a minimum number of characters to be effective.) Try it out before you commit!

EDIT: *motes = notes in the real world. Sorry..

I could not very easily send 200+ pages"note" by email and that is not what I'm looking for. What I would "kill for" is to someway have each of my students have EN on their computer and then have my Stack in their EN and have it show up and look just like it does in my own EN program. And then be able to update my EN lessons, add notes, etc. and then have it automatically sync with each of the students EN program automatically.

Another example would be if I have a notebook that people have synced with that has say 20 pages in it and then I add page 51 and 52 today. Would I have to then "invite" the same 2,000+ students who have subscribed to that notebook to lesson note #51 and note #52? This would be crazy especially since you have to type in ONE AT A TIME into the invite box. Might not be as bad if I could cut and paste a list into the invite box but seems like EN does not allow that.

Help needed, brain not working, frustration setting in quickly ;-)

David

Do any of you EN experts know if this is possible and if it is then how in the heck do I do it?

David

[gazumped 11,667]

What I would "kill for" is to someway have each of my students have EN on their computer and then have my Stack in their EN and have it show up and look just like it does in my own EN program. And then be able to update my EN lessons, add notes, etc. and then have it automatically sync with each of the students EN program automatically.

Ah. I suggest you have an in depth look at "notebooks" and "notes" as defined in Evernote. What you want is sort of possible with two or three killer caveats.

You'd need to create a shared notebook which would contain notes into which you've embedded your lessons as single or multiple files of any supported type. Anyone with whom you've shared the notebook can read the notes and open the files. You can edit or add files to your notes in that notebook and add new notes which will be available to all authorised users at next sync.

They would need to be Premium users to edit the content, but NB all edits are being made on the "same" file - ie once evernote synced, you'd get a whole slew of errors because multiple users have made conflicting changes to your lesson file(s). Plus everyone syncs at different times, so whenever an edit is made, that copy of the file gets out of sync with everyone else's version.

No. I withdraw my earlier statement - chaos ensues. Evernote is great for sharing OUT information, and for collaborating in a one or two user environment. It's not true online collaboration software however.

As an alternative you would be able to share your notebook as above to let students download assignments only; if they all had their own separate Evernote account they could presumably move lesson files across into their account to make their own individual changes, and post the finished work into a folder in their accounts which they shared with you... but then everyone needs a personal premium Evernote account. (Mind you everyone does need a personal premium Evernote account...)

You might want to engage in some careful trials with one or two others to see how practical any of the above might be.. I don't claim to be an Evernote specialist, just a user!

[davidduty 2]

I was able to create both Notes and Notebooks in an alphanumerical sort.

Thanks for taking the time do explain this. Still don't have a good handle on using tags yet. maybe I could have a tag for Lesson 1 - Trailing Stops, Lesson 1 - Trendlines, Lesson 2 - Limit Orders, etc. but this sure seems confusing especially if each student has to learn to do this also.

David

ps: Dumb question.......... How do you use Tags to organize stuff anyway. I see how to tag items and have done so. Now what do I do to find stuff that's tagged?

[jefito 5,589]

ps: Dumb question.......... How do you use Tags to organize stuff anyway. I see how to tag items and have done so. Now what do I do to find stuff that's tagged?

Tags are just labels -- I think of them as adjectives -- that describe or categorize my note content. I make mine fairly generic, so that I don't need a lot of them: ~100 or so at last count. Note: mine is not the only system.

To search for notes tagged with tag "X", you can either find "X" in the tag tree (it's in the left panel in the Windows client), and click on it (and all notes that have that tag will appear in the note list) or you can type "tag:X" in the search control.

You combine tag search with text (or date, or other attribute) searches to refine your results. For example, I might use a "tag"C++ STL" search string to search for notes that are related to the C++ Standard Template Library.

[davidduty 2]

[attachment=0]EN Example.png[/attachment]

What I would "kill for" is to someway have each of my students have EN on their computer and then have my Stack in their EN and have it show up and look just like it does in my own EN program. And then be able to update my EN lessons, add notes, etc. and then have it automatically sync with each of the students EN program automatically.

Ah. I suggest you have an in depth look at "notebooks" and "notes" as defined in Evernote. What you want is sort of possible with two or three killer caveats.

You'd need to create a shared notebook which would contain notes into which you've embedded your lessons as single or multiple files of any supported type. Anyone with whom you've shared the notebook can read the notes and open the files. You can edit or add files to your notes in that notebook and add new notes which will be available to all authorised users at next sync.

They would need to be Premium users to edit the content, but NB all edits are being made on the "same" file - ie once evernote synced, you'd get a whole slew of errors because multiple users have made conflicting changes to your lesson file(s). Plus everyone syncs at different times, so whenever an edit is made, that copy of the file gets out of sync with everyone else's version.

Sorry I was not more clear. My students do not need to edit anything. They just need to be able to view "read" my notes in each of my notebooks. So it's read only for them.

I've attached a screen shot of my notebook. It's not done as I only have five notebooks in the stack. But it gives you an idea of what I'm doing, or trying to do. As you can see, I've subscribed to Ron's Evernote notebook. I got all his notes. I don't know if I get any updates automatically from him or not. This is basically what I want my students to be able to do. I want them to "subscribe" to each one of my lessons in that stack. So they will have to subscriber to about 20 or more notes that will be in that stack when I finish. Isn't it some easy way for my students to just subscribe to my note book without me having to invite each one (over 2,000) via the invite box in EN. I would have to do this for all 20+ notebooks and then type in each email adddress (over 2,000) each time I added a new notebook to this stack. Would be so nice to be able to just email all my students at once and tell them that there is a new notebook available and go "here" to this link and add it to their own EN app on their computer or at least be able to see and read it on the EN site. So how do I do something like Ron did so that someone could just "subscribe" to my notebook like I subscribed to Ron's notebook?

David

[gazumped 11,667]

Hi David - OK you can't share a stack, AFAIK you can only share individual notebooks; so you would have to share each individual notebook with your student list. Good news - the dialogue box on my desktop client says "separate email addresses with a comma" so you should be able to paste an email@address1, email@addres2 style list, which is just a csv output from your spreadsheet or database of choice.

Your subscribed notebook will update when you go online (unless you disable something in the options) so whatever changes you make to your notebooks as sharer, or whatever you see as sharee of another's notebook will be kept up to date.

The dialogue you complete when sharing a notebook can send an email to all the addresses you have pasted inviting them to check it out - content at your discretion. So when you add your new notebooks, all students with access can be notified.

So as a "one to many" share exercise, this seems feasible.. If you're seeing anything substantially different from what I describe in your own desktop client, please let me know what version you're up to via the ~Help ~About popup.

[davidduty 2]

Thanks. The problem I have is that when I got to "share a notebook" it will not let me paste into that field. I have to enter each email address separately. Of course I could do a CSV file of my students and paste it into the invite "box". It won't let me do what. No paste feature available. Can you do this in your EN on your computer?

[gazumped 11,667]

Well, darn. I prepared a list of test emails -

test1@notebook.com, test2@notebook.com, test3@notebook.com, test4@notebook.com, test5@notebook.com, test6@notebook.com, test7@notebook.com, test8@notebook.com, test9@notebook.com, test10@notebook.com, test11@notebook.com

Started to share a notebook and saw a box that said "email invitations to: (comma separated)" and then tried to copy and paste the list of emails into that box. Zip / zilch / zero / nada. I can type data in, but there seems to be no way to copy or cut and paste into that field, which is contrary to normal Windows operations, generally counter-intuitive and a serious pain in the fundament.

(You may gather I haven't felt the need to share my database with more than one person - yet.)

Dear Evernote; this looks like a glitch rather than a considered omission - please can we have a fix as soon as possible?

Dear David - still not a deal breaker as such; there's also a "share this with the world" option which doesn't require email details. It would give your students access but would also leave the content open to anyone who found that URL. (Make sure you have your copyright notices in place)

And I hope Evernote will be fixing this box pretty soon so you can limit access to students only.

[davidduty 2]

Thanks. But I did find a way to do it. You can cut and paste into the invite field if you do it on your Web version of EN. You just can't do it from your desktop version of EN. Very strange indeed.

Still not sure about sharing with the world yet and how you would let people know where to find your notebook. Also there are notebooks that show up at the EN Shared Notebooks link. https://www.evernote.com/pub/closetgeek ... e1b5ba8a80

So if I had a particular notebook that I want to share with anyone in the world and don't really care who "subscribes" to it, how do I get that notebook to show up at the above link or how does the "world" find it?

[gazumped 11,667]

So if I had a particular notebook that I want to share with anyone in the world and don't really care who "subscribes" to it, how do I get that notebook to show up at the above link or how does the "world" find it?

That's a big question - there has been some discussion on the board here about whether or not shared notes/ notebooks are searchable via your search engine of choice; there's still no definitive answer, but broadly it seems that the stuff hosted in Evernote's cloud is not available unless you know its URL.

Getting people to your notes becomes a website promotion issue - put the url in tweets / blogs / printing / talks / email signatures / advertising etc to widen your audience. S'why I called it a "big question" - lots of books devoted to the overall promotion of websites. Don't get carried away though with the idea of a public set of notes for extra revenue - Evernote isn't a content management system either! If you're looking to generate income a "proper" website can have more bells and whistles than you can (currently) get in a Note. Not to mention stats so you know what's working and what's not, and can make some reasonable guesses why.

The semi-invisibility angle is why I suggested you could use the public availability option to avoid the need to enter 2,000+ email addresses in one way or another. You could mail out the URL to your students as part of your normal email/ mail signature and they would be able to access notes immediately.

Good catch by the way on the "works on the web, not on the desktop" pasting - I still want that fixed though. (Pretty please, Evernote)

[davidduty 2]

I wasn't trying to make money with a public notebook. It would just be nice if people could find notebooks of others that would be of interest in their line of work or hobbies, etc.

Yea, I got lucky on the catch that you can enter a list of emails into the web version of EN. It would be nice if they would fix it so you can do that from the computer version also.

I'm still trying to find out how to search my darn notes by tags that I created. Can't seem to figure that one out.

[jbenson2 2,147]

I'm still trying to find out how to search my darn notes by tags that I created. Can't seem to figure that one out.

Let's say you have a tag called Investments

To search for it, put the following into the search field

• tag:Investments

If you have a tag with multiple words - let's say Poor Investments
To search for it, use quotes and put the following into the search field

• tag:"Poor Investments"

[jefito 5,589]

I'm still trying to find out how to search my darn notes by tags that I created. Can't seem to figure that one out.

https://support.evernote.com/link/portal/16051/16058/Article/535/Using-Evernote-s-advanced-search-operators

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

I'm still trying to find out how to search my darn notes by tags that I created. Can't seem to figure that one out.

https://support.evernote.com/link/portal/16051/16058/Article/535/Using-Evernote-s-advanced-search-operators

The above is the most efficient way of searching on tags. However, you can also click the tag in the left pane & ctrl-click for multiple tags - at least in the Windows desktop.

[davidduty 2]

I'm still trying to find out how to search my darn notes by tags that I created. Can't seem to figure that one out.

https://support.evernote.com/link/portal/16051/16058/Article/535/Using-Evernote-s-advanced-search-operators

Thanks. Now I know how to do that and I bet EN even let's me save the searches. Great program!

David

Boquete, Panama

[Owyn 457]

I bet EN even let's me save the searches

Yep. You win the bet.