(Archived) Multiple Items In A Note ... HOWTO?

BRRABill · January 25, 2012

I was curious as to how everyone does this...

I have a note, say DELL SERVICE CALL

I want to keep a record of all my correspondence through the entire process. Online chats. E-mail back and forth. Pictures of parts. Whatever.

Right now, all the info has to go in the same note, with the separator line dividing each sections.

Is there a better way to divide and differentiate these topics? Or does it all have to go into one note.

If it does ... is there a better way to "divide" the info?

Thanks ... I know EN is a great program ... just trying to figure it all out.

P.S. I searched for "tabs" thinking it would be good to have tabs in each note, but that did not bring up the search results I was expecting.

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

hi, and welcome!

if it were me, i'd start by using consistent naming with yymmdd keyword keyword in the title. something like: "120124 dell online chat" in one note, "120125 dell part," etc. then, i'd tag them with something like "record" to indicate it is something i want to archive. most people would probably prefer something like "computer" if you don't mind using general tags, and add something more specific like "claim" as a second tag.

https://support.evernote.com/link/portal/16051/16058/Article/623/An-Introduction-to-Tags

how does this work? put "tag:claim" in the search field and you'll see a list of every claim you have ever made in order. add "tag:computer" and you can further refine it to filter out everything but computers. in my case "tag:record dell" would pull up all the relevant notes.

http://lamebox.net/post/6247670244/evernote-search-grammar

you could merge the notes after the claim process is done, but if it were me, i wouldn't bother. i'm fairly radical i guess, because i eschew notebooks and massive notes. but, i still think that however you do it, consistent naming and tags will go a long ways towards organizing this kind of info. Here is a link that covers a lot of your options in more depth.

http://www.thesolopreneurlife.com/10-tips-on-how-to-use-evernote-to-its-fullest/

jbenson2 · January 25, 2012

P.S. I searched for "tabs" thinking it would be good to have tabs in each note, but that did not bring up the search results I was expecting.

I use the same method as GrumpyMonkey. I would not want to merge the individual notes either.

If you want an easy way to find all the notes that apply, you could create a unique tag that is only used for this single project.

Then add the tag to all the pertinent notes. Just be sure not to use it on any other notes.

.

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

i've done the unique tag thing, and it is not a bad idea, but i find having a good title covers all of that, and reduces the number of tags i need. in other words, if i have a really broad tag like "record" that covers everything from receipts to w-2 forms, i can still easily find this case, because it will pretty much be the only thing titled "dell." obviously, the dates will also help me to find it quickly. personally, i find lots of tags to be distracting, and more and more i have focused on giving things good titles.

anyhow, what jbenson says is an easy way to get started. you can always delete the tag and consolidate the notes into another tag in the future.

BRRABill · January 25, 2012

Do you guys find this level of tagging/organization is needed for a project that only lasts a day or two?

Just trying to figure this all out!

I will look through those links right now.

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

definitely not. that's why i don't like unique tags. i'd be generating new tags everyday!

in my opinion, organization is fun when you don't do it. consistent naming with keywords (i usually go general to specific and try to include a least three) along with some broad tagging categories, and mastery of the search options is the best solution for me. thousands of notes and i can always find what i am looking for. if i were you, i'd have just that one tag and the naming i suggested. that gives you lots and lots of avenues for finding / sorting / filtering the notes later.

anyhow, when you are getting started i'd say you can splurge on the tagging. just keep other possibilities in mind

BRRABill · January 25, 2012

So, since the user is named "Sue" ... adding that is even better...

Sue dell laptop online chart

sue dell laptop UPS tracking code

sue dell laptop tech discussion

Something like that?

I guess my next NOOB question is ... how do you remember what "three keywords" you use when you do many things each day/week?

Again ... thanks for the insight. I am just trying to set up my system as good as possible at the onset.

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

no worries. in my experience, i can almost always remember when something happens (one of the reason the date goes first) and the broad category of the event (dell would seem to be the most important keyword, unless you have lots of dell computers, in which case i might go with "claim" or "service" in the title first). sue (just a name, unless you know the person well) might go at the end.

i think it would be pretty tough not to find it with all of these possibilities (date in title, keywords, tag(s), date created, date updated, and even the note content). if you were still unsure, you could make an "index" note (i have a separate tag for these) and at the end of the process drag all of the notes into it. this will create note links to all of the separate notes (like a table of contents). now you have all of those dates and keywords (the titles are used as links) all in one note.

this is just a suggestion, of course. many people have much more elaborate schemes. this seems to work for me, though.

jbenson2 · January 25, 2012

Do you guys find this level of tagging/organization is needed for a project that only lasts a day or two?
Just trying to figure this all out!
I will look through those links right now.

No, I would not do this personally. I have a different method which is simpler but most people would not bother.

For example, last year, I bought a new oven. I compared prices and specs and put the different models into Evernote. I also needed a quote from a carpenter to install it and cut some of the woodwork for a new drawer underneath. There also was the manufacturer's warranty, the invoice and the instruction manual which all went into Evernote. When I started entering some of the information, I created a random 8 alpha/numeric reference code and made sure to paste the same reference code into all the related notes.

Of course I can't remember the code, but all I have to do is search for the word oven and I can find it relatively quickly. Then I run a new search with the code to get a complete time-line of all the activity associated with the new oven. As I said - not something most people would bother with, but it works for me.

By the way, I also use a very structured title for all my notes.

yyyy mm dd State City person/item/task

2010 03 24 USA MN StM new convection oven / microwave installed photo

The reference code, installed oven photo, model # and serial # with comments:

http://www.evernote....70bc4a8912611c4

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

interesting system. like my index note suggestion, it provides a way to make sure you pull together all of the eelated notes. what i like about it is the random code. no hassle trying to think of unique phrases or words needed. i am not sure how well it would work with the kind of stuff i do. i will give this a think.

C6REW · January 25, 2012

As another newbie I am struggling to understand why you would want to create separate notes for the same job/task.

Surely it would be easier to keep all the relevant information against that one note? How else would you do it and keep the information together apart from ending up with the information spread over separate notes that may or may not be in separate notebooks. Seems to me, by keeping it in the same note it is the same as keeping all the information in the same folder in a drawer in your filing cabinet.

Keen to understand if I am seeing the solution to this problem incorrectly.

Best regards

Chris

jbenson2 · January 25, 2012

As with many things in Evernote, it is not black and white.

Some people prefer to have lots of notebooks. I prefer to only have a few.

Some people prefer to have a few general tags. I prefer many very specific tags.

For simple stuff, putting all the info into one single note is sufficient. The vast majority of my notes are single notes.

But it becomes more complicated when you get into more complex tasks. Think about buying a car. Would you want the bank address, loan office name, phone number, and loan terms to be included with the various auto dealers quotes along with the magazine reviews of the different cars you are considering all in one note?

For more complex projects, it is helpful to have multiple notes with date stamps and specific titles (as GrumpyMonkey mentioned)

I find the mulitiple note format easier to enter. I don't have to search for the master record and then scroll down to the bottom to add more info. I just create a new note. This is especially helpful if you are keying in a note on a mobile device. Searching is more difficult on these smaller devices.

Another example of a complex project over several months using multiple notes - I keep track of each of the Evernote upgrades. Here is what the screen capture looks like in the list view with multiple individual notes. I could add them all into one single note, but this format is easier to quickly review.

http://www.evernote....5932d570dbcbe58

Here are the notes that pertained to my oven purchase. One click and I have the information I need.

http://www.evernote....c40e500172a47c0

You can put everything into one single note if you wish with a horizontal rule dividing the entries followed with a date code for the new entry.

I think the best suggestion I could offer is try a project and give it a try.

If the single note format works, great. If not, then try out the multiple note format on the next project or task.

.

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

As another newbie I am struggling to understand why you would want to create separate notes for the same job/task.

It depends on the situation. My basic rule of thumb is that I don't want to be scrolling around looking through dense clumps of text. If everything is connected, like notes I take on a book, then it stays in one note. If it is notes on a book + notes about the author + the receipt from my purchase, etc. then I split them up. I suppose it just depends on how you like to see your information: in bite-sized chunks or whale-sized portions.

Surely it would be easier to keep all the relevant information against that one note? How else would you do it and keep the information together apart from ending up with the information spread over separate notes that may or may not be in separate notebooks. Seems to me, by keeping it in the same note it is the same as keeping all the information in the same folder in a drawer in your filing cabinet.

I only have one notebook. I use consistent naming. And, I tag things. But, I also make index notes (see above). jbenson has unique codes. I just don't lose notes. I don't remember the last time I couldn't find what I was looking for.

Keen to understand if I am seeing the solution to this problem incorrectly.

Different strokes for different folks. My approach is to churn out as many notes as I can and not waste time "organizing." With consistent naming conventions and tagging, you pretty much insure that nothing will ever get lost, so what's the point of squirreling everything away into folders? At least, that's how I see it.

C6REW · January 25, 2012

Thanks guys for taking the effort to explain. I will look deeper into this later on.

I currently have the following Notebooks and sub Notebooks

CCC (Calne Camera Club)

CCC General - With various notes for events diary, spreadsheet on competitions etc

Diary

2012 Diary

2012 Completed Diary

2011 Completed Diary

etc

Evernote here I have notes with links that you have kindly given to me.

RPS (Royal Photographic Society)

RPS General - With notes on meeting and excel diaries

RPS Emails - For important emails.

Side Notes - This is a hangover from my OneNote database. Lots of notes in here that need to be processed properly.

Work

So I guess from you what you are saying that this might be a typical new user layout, but moving over to less Notebooks and having lots of notes in one Notebook with correct tagging?

Best regards

Chris

gazumped · January 25, 2012

This business of one note -vs- many notes seems to fox a lot of new starters.. I certainly had mental double vision for a while; but if you use the paper folder comparison, in the Real World you'd be putting brochures, receipts, guarantees and whatnot as separate documents into a paper folder labelled "New Fridge" or some such. In Evernote each one of those documents is properly an individual note, and the "folder" is now a virtual link between the notes by way of a tag, a title, or just the EN search function. Searches, when you get used to the syntax, are pretty powerful. We bought a new Beko fridge recently, and while I used a constant title and tag across all the notes connected with that, a search for 'Beko' turns up all the notes anyway, since even the phone pics I took of some possible models have the manufacturers logo highlighted.

Dating is also helpful - most projects occupy a small(ish) time interval, so if you forget to do the consistent thing on your notes, a search for all notes within a certain period will generate a list that is longer than it should be, but not impossible to scan through note by note until you find the individual cases. If necessary you can tag each note as you find it, then re-search for that tag to clean up your listing and change tags or titles as necessary.

My normal best advice is "get stuck in and learn from experience" - it's often easier than you think . . . .

Owyn · January 25, 2012

I tend to view my use of Evernote as living and evolutionary.

The living aspect means that I collect information voraciously. In most cases this is via clips from the web.

The evolutionary aspect is how I eventually work out how I want to organize the information. My usual approach is to:

Create a new notebook for a specific research topic or project
Move relevant notes to that notebook
Decide how I want to organize when I have enough related items to make a reasonably good decision, e.g.
- Structure/clean up titles
- Assign unique tag if appropriate. This usually occurs when I foresee a future need to see all the relevant notes again.
- Apply common tags
[*]Do a final cleanup when the task is complete
[*]Move the notes to an archival notebook
[*]Delete the notebook I created for the task

I have evolved a set of standard procedures I use for naming notes and assigning tags. I refine these as required for new use cases.

The details of those procedures are similar to what GM & JB have suggested.

C6REW · January 25, 2012

Thanks guys for the additional comments.

gazumped, indeed I do look at Evernote and in the past OneNote as my filing cabinet. But this has always been about keeping all documents inside a folder for a specific task. So at home I have a folder in the filing cabinet for all my RPS work. In the same manner I am keeping documents or should I say 'notes' inside the relevant folder or again in Evernote terms 'Notebook'.

I need to get my head around always searching for information whereas in the past I have just clicked on a 'Notebook' and opened a document up.

Owyn, you seem to be operating in a similar fashion to me. Perhaps it is just about tweaking as I go along.

It is very good to hear and see how others are using Evernote, after all I have no interest in re-inventing the wheel if you have already been through the heartache of doing this.

Best regards

Chris

C6REW · January 25, 2012

jbenson, I have just had a chance to look at your link regarding the 'oven' purchase.

So am I correct in saying you have one 'notebook' with lots of 'notes' in and all of those 'notes' you show in your link are scattered around the notebook? Each note is then identified by it's date code, your random code and various tags, which I guess include 'oven'. So when you search for the tag 'oven' this is what you get?

Best regards

Chris

Owyn · January 25, 2012

Owyn, you seem to be operating in a similar fashion to me. Perhaps it is just about tweaking as I go along.

The procedure I detailed applies to current active tasks. The key point is to think about how I would find the information in the future. Notebooks are a convenient way to collect that information in one easily located place. i.e. Very simple search.

I have a small number of permanent archival notebooks. Effective search on titles, tags and contents is key to finding a small number of relevant notes in the future. Good note titles are key to identifying the exact note(s) I need.

And yeah, tweak as you go along, but be consistent with prior practice if possible.

e.g. Your business with the RPS (meetings, contacts, projects, etc.) probably needs a different information view from your personal photography notes (equipment inventory, manuals, settings, shoot plans, etc.).

Martin Packer · January 25, 2012

For expenses I have 1 note for each scanned receipt / note. I prefix the note title with a trip number I generate: For example on the trip I'm on now I have a note called "7 Taxi to Heathrow". That way it's obvious which are from the same trip.

A tiny bit more detail: For once I keep expense receipts and related in an "Expenses" notebook. When I've got the money back I move the lot to a "Receipts / Expenses Archive" notebook. I continue to regard them as valuable - even if only to remind me what I've done when. (Annual and now Quarterly appraisals require me to know this stuff.)

(I also have a notebook for Travel itineraries.)

Martin

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

Thanks guys for taking the effort to explain. I will look deeper into this later on. I currently have the following Notebooks and sub Notebooks.... So I guess from you what you are saying that this might be a typical new user layout, but moving over to less Notebooks and having lots of notes in one Notebook with correct tagging?

I would say that your system works fine, but I don't know if it is typical of just new users. I would guess it is typical for just about any user. There is nothing wrong with it, of course. Whatever works best for you.

My anti-organizational approach is grounded in a certain philosophy about how we work, and it seems to fit me quite well (or I have grown over the years to fit it). I think the key is to just get started (as you have) and be on the lookout (as you seem to be) for different strategies that might help you (like jbenson's ubc-like labelification of his stuff).

http://www.princeton...teresearch.html

C6REW · January 25, 2012

Hi GrumpyMonkey,

Thanks for that link, I don't think I have seen it and have of course Evernoted the link. Nice term that, I wonder how long before it makes it to the Oxford Dictionary!!

I seem to be spending too much time looking at the benefits of Evernote and how everyone uses it! I must get on and do some work!

Latest thing is reading about scanning. Whilst I have a top end Epson flatbed for photography I can see it will not be very good for documents and the speed that the ScanSnaps appear to give. The S1500 looks a good device, but I cannot see the point as I will rarely have larger than A4 and as it does not connect to Mac, that would restrict my operation. I have Windows as well, but like the idea of scanning to either.

So the S1300 looks a good choice. I cannot get my head around the S1100 which seems good value for money and can scan A3 which seems amazing, but without checking the specs I am assuming it is not the same quality as the S1300.

Best regards

Chris

BurgersNFries · January 25, 2012

My usual approach is to:
Create a new notebook for a specific research topic or project
Move relevant notes to that notebook
Decide how I want to organize when I have enough related items to make a reasonably good decision, e.g.
Structure/clean up titles
Assign unique tag if appropriate. This usually occurs when I foresee a future need to see all the relevant notes again.
Apply common tags
[*]Do a final cleanup when the task is complete
[*]Move the notes to an archival notebook
[*]Delete the notebook I created for the task

I do this as well. IE, when researching something to buy, I'll put everything in one (temporary) notebook. When I've decided which one to get, I'll tag it "shopping - item description". Then the notes are moved into a more general notebook & the temporary notebook is now deleted. I like to retain all the notes I made while doing my research. This way, I can go back & look later & remind myself why I bought which item I bought. This is helpful when someone else is looking into the item & asking me why I bought the one I did.

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

So the S1300 looks a good choice. I cannot get my head around the S1100 which seems good value for money and can scan A3 which seems amazing, but without checking the specs I am assuming it is not the same quality as the S1300.

Hopefully someone will chime in with advice for you about scanners. I am still chugging along with my S300. I thought it would have died by now, but it looks and works like it's brand new. ScanSnap geeks who know I am an Apple user will be scratching their heads over that, because Fujitsu rigged it to only work with Windows machines. Only the geekiest of geeks know that there is a hack (http://techenvy.com/hack/mac-osx-drivers-for-windows-scansnap) to make it compatible (I think this is the correct link). Annoying that Fujitsu inexplicably nerfed their own product, but cool that someone found a workaround!

BurgersNFries · January 25, 2012

Also, when I create the temporary notebooks, I preface the name with an underscore. This puts them at the top of the notebook list (on my Windows client) so it's easy to switch to that notebook, when I'm doing the research or the work. (Because I also do this when working on a project for work.)

gazumped · January 25, 2012

I seem to be spending too much time looking at the benefits of Evernote and how everyone uses it! I must get on and do some work!

I refer to the answer I gave earlier - lots of things are clearer when you're actually trying out a new system, especially "is this practical for me" and "my sanity won't stand this". It's OK to experiment and fail a couple of times - just don't do anything vital while you're still testing. Plus I'm still (after several months) going back and changing titles and tags in light of what my searches turn up. I want a search to give me a short list of relevant items, not Google-style multiple hits. We're all very different in temperament and the tasks we're using Evernote for. Once you've got a few suggestions, just try them out and use what works for you.

The S1500 looks a good device, but I cannot see the point as I will rarely have larger than A4 and as it does not connect to Mac, that would restrict my operation. I have Windows as well, but like the idea of scanning to either.

I've noted before that I sold a family member to get my S1500 (one of the small ones*) but I don't regret the sacrifice for a moment. It's quick, accurate and takes many different thicknesses of paper and card in its stride. It scans up to A4 one or both sides and knows to ignore blank pages. There's a magic interface to scan to Evernote / File / Printer / Email in various formats, and there's a special carrier that scans both sides and then stitches the scans together so you have an A3 result from a folded A3 original. There are moments when I miss a flatbed, but then I use CanScanner on Android.

[There ought to be a shortform for I Have No Business Connection With Any Of The Above (I don't by the way) - IHNBCWAOTA?]

*that's the family member, not the scanner

jbenson2 · January 25, 2012

jbenson, I have just had a chance to look at your link regarding the 'oven' purchase.
So am I correct in saying you have one 'notebook' with lots of 'notes' in and all of those 'notes' you show in your link are scattered around the notebook? Each note is then identified by it's date code, your random code and various tags, which I guess include 'oven'. So when you search for the tag 'oven' this is what you get?

I only use the random code mehtod of a few large multiple note subjects.

I do not have any tags named oven. I simply search for the word oven. (see my final comment below)

I have 8 broad notebooks. Some folks use only two notebooks.

a-local [not sync'd confidential private stuff, bills, payments]
Aquaintences [business & friends, address book type info]
JBenson2's notebook [my default notebook]
Leisure [hobbies, vacations, computer stuff, software, Evenote]
Offline [for my mobile devices - due to the sluggish respone, I have only a dozen offline notes]
Personal [family, home, tasks, reminders, employment present and past]
Politics [web clippings of city, state, national and international politics]
Misc and Trivia [humor, advertisements, interesting stuff]

My Personal notebook contains 3,800 individual notes, including the oven purchase related notes.

My Politics notebook is the biggest notebook with 7,200 notes.

Additional tip: Evernote allows your searches to hide a tag or a word, but not to hide an entire Notebook. And I have a ton of information in the Political notebook which could mess up my search for common words. So I added the tag name X to all of my 7,200 notes. It is much easier to do that it sounds.

So when I search for oven or some other common word, I enhance the search with the following technique.

oven -tag:X

This will find all notes with the word oven that are not in my Politics notebook. An alternate solution would be to move the Politics notebook into a Stack.

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

gazumped's correct. just get in there and start making notes. i feel like you really can't go "wrong" with my system, because it is minimalist (it relies almost entirely on proper naming: yymmdd keyword keyword keyword). jbenson's using a similar format, and i think we both agree that skillful use of searches obviates the need for lots of notebooks or tags. it is pretty straightforward.

then again, it may not be "right" for you, because you need more tags, notebooks, stacks, etc. all of that can always be added later, though. or, i suppose you could start off with a couple hundred notebooks. it doesn't really matter. i figure that if you get the names right, everything else will sort itself out.

as for fujitsu, my scanner cost nearly 400 dollars when i bought it, and i agonized over the decision. years later, after having recycled (literally) hundreds of pounds of paper, getting rid of many, many bookshelves, and going paperless, i don't regret the decision a bit

C6REW · January 25, 2012

Ah, I can only 'Like This' so many times!

So a personal thanks once again for all of the information you have kindly passed on.

I have spotted that the S1100 is no good as it only scans one side according to the Fujitsu website: http://scanners.fcpa.fujitsu.com/scansnapit/?gclid=CLCD0NKr660CFe4htAodYk-y6A

So for portability and cross platform it is looking like the S1300 may be the answer.

I ought to start a new thread really as I have a few questions as well.

Best regards

Chris

jbenson2 · January 25, 2012

The simplex (single sided) and duplex (2 sided) is the way to go. Take a look at all the legalese that is printed on the back side of some monthly bills. No sense scanning and storiing all that mind-numbing info every month.

Another similarity to GrumpyMonky - I also bought a ScanSnap S300 from Amazaon back in July 2009. It still works like a charm.

BRRABill · January 25, 2012

Wow, what a lot of comments!

The original reason I wanted some other system was to put all aspects of a task on separate pages. Like maybe separate tabs in the same note.

But it looks like (especially from the oven example) tat you just make a ton of notes, and then just search for them.

I guess it is all about how one is used to doing something.

GrumpyMonkey · January 25, 2012

Wow, what a lot of comments!
The original reason I wanted some other system was to put all aspects of a task on separate pages. Like maybe separate tabs in the same note.
But it looks like (especially from the oven example) tat you just make a ton of notes, and then just search for them.
I guess it is all about how one is used to doing something.

note links in notes (see my "index" page comments) would do these. several notes all tied togther with a green-linked bow.

BurgersNFries · January 26, 2012

(I also have a notebook for Travel itineraries.)

My husband travels a lot. His admin assistant, who makes the reservations, emails me his itineraries. I file them as notes under the title YYYYMMDD - XXX - destination where YYYYMMDD is the outgoing travel date & XXX are his initials and destination is well, the destination. I don't have a separate notebook for this info. I do apply a tag (XXX itineraries).

Martin Packer · January 26, 2012

@BurgersNFries presumably "XXX Itineraries" is for "XXX Tourism". :-)

Martin

BurgersNFries · January 26, 2012

@BurgersNFries presumably "XXX Itineraries" is for "XXX Tourism". :-)

I guess XXX probably wasn't the best example to use.

Martin Packer · January 26, 2012

@BurgersNFries it depends on whether "comedy value" is your metric of goodness or not. :-)

Martin

BurgersNFries · January 26, 2012

Let's just say, Mr. Fries better not be doing anything XXX when he's not with me.

peterfmartin · January 28, 2012

Wow, what a lot of comments!
The original reason I wanted some other system was to put all aspects of a task on separate pages. Like maybe separate tabs in the same note.
But it looks like (especially from the oven example) tat you just make a ton of notes, and then just search for them.
I guess it is all about how one is used to doing something.

My strategy for this and what you originally asked about is just to make a tag, add that tag to all related notes (which in my case are usually small and correspond to what you wanted note sections to be), and then "tab through" those notes (as you wanted to do between sections within individual notes) by scrolling through the notes grouped within the tag. I think that's exactly what you're looking for. No?

gazumped · January 28, 2012

I think I'll make a small change in how I Evernote things from comments earlier - notes that might form part of a bigger whole will temporarily go into a notebook of their own, or at least a special 'pending' notebook, so it's easier to make sure they're all named consistently and to find and tag all the child notes. Once the project is AFAIK over they'll go into my default notebook, linked by the titles and tags.

Although I allegedly have a standard naming template like others here, it's easy sometimes to forget exactly what terms I used last time and come up with a very similar but sufficiently different title to drop out of a search, and exactly which tags I used. Keeping stuff closer together saves me some time and mental amperage I can abuse for other things.

C6REW · January 28, 2012

Hi Gazumped,

I have been going over some threads to fully understand what others have said and this one is particularly useful.

I think my strategy of having separate 'Notebooks' for individual things, like my photography. With sub 'Notebooks' for RPS (Royal Photographic Society) and CCC (Calne Camera Club) will still be the way I go. This would solve your problem of trying to remember what your naming strategy was. A quick look in the respective folder would give you the information you needed. I am in the same boat of course as a newbie trying to make sure my 'Note' naming is consistent.

My Diary is simple as the 'Note' name is the date code, as suggested I think by GrumpyMonkey. So a new 'Note' is created for each day and today's would be called 120128. Simples!

However, I am beginning to understand the benefit of having separate notes as has also been suggested.

It is fun using this amazing tool. How come it took so long for someone to come up with the idea! As an avid note taker and collector it is manna from heaven for me.

Best regards

Chris

ps Where in South Wales?

gazumped · January 28, 2012

Too many notebooks gives me another problem - where do I put the next note? Did I put the others in Projects, or Photographs (assuming this is a note with a picture) or Trains (assuming this is a note with a picture of a chuff-chuff*).. again I'd rather avoid the -increasingly likely- possibility of burn-out and just throw it all in one notebook with those options as tags. The nice thing about that is it breaks this "piece of paper in one folder" paradigm (and puts a dent in the copier market) where one note can actually be part of several virtual folders without even trying.

..and (Jewel of the South West) Newport - I'll wave out the bedroom window a bit later, you might see me across the river.

G

* something to confuse a US audience

C6REW · January 28, 2012

Hi Gazumped,

At the moment all my folders are clear cut so I am not suffering that dilemma. But as time moves on, I may be in the same boat!

As to Newport, I know it well! My company supplies the UK Water Industry so I am often in South Wales and visit Nelson the regional head office.

Best regards

Chris

gazumped · January 28, 2012

Maybe we should look at a South Wales/ South West meet-up. Anyone else out there within staggering distance of Bristol?

GrumpyMonkey · January 28, 2012

This is off topic, now that we have moved on to plans for the creation of Evernote Drink

One thing I have found useful is to have a "style sheet" for Evernote. This is a single note that has all of my naming conventions. If you are making notes every day, you don't really need this, but if you take a day or two off and come back to it, you might wonder if you should tag a note one way or another. because my own system relies a lot on consistent naming, i like to keep all of this straight.

gazumped · January 28, 2012

One thing I have found useful is to have a "style sheet" for Evernote.

You're right - and thinking back, I also tend to use a "search before edit" policy to look up past editions on related notes, and quite often copy one of the previous notes to steal (and update) the subject line to aim for that elusive consistency. These are all useful tactics to have available, but I guess it boils down to doing what you have to in order to get stuff into the database and (hopefully) find it later. It's good to know that all things are possible - but if I'm up against a deadline there's likely to be a degree of pushing and shoving up front, and some careful gardening after the event.

And just to get off topic again - Evernote Drink! That's a spinoff I could get behind - I'll start setting up my tags now!

GrumpyMonkey · January 28, 2012

"there's likely to be a degree of pushing and shoving up front, and some careful gardening after the event."

This pretty accurately describes every day for me. I just digitized several hundred pages (maybe 30 or 40 pdfs total), and there is no way I am going to have time to go through and sort them out. They're OCR'd, so it is OK, but I really need to go through them a little bit at a time over the weekend to see what is in there. I've given them appropriate names, of course, but some of them are a mix of notes on my own work, other people's work, lectures, etc. Yuck. The point, though, is to get them in there.

I'm a teetotaler myself, but I imagine a bit of alcohol would make the process more pleasurable

grissom · January 28, 2012

I'm been using Evernote since I bought my second generation iPod, and I use Awesome note to sync my daily job duties and tasks. But recently I lost a whole lot of information. I didn't lose it because of Awesome Note, it's not that exstensive. I am a little put off that you identify multiple folders with just a line by the title of the folder. I would sync and my Awesome Note would come back with multiple folders with the same title, and in this frustration I went through and deleted them, I figured out the "line" thing, I don't know why you guys couldn't just put parentheses and a number in them....that's kinda universal, well at least more alerting than a line that gets longer with the number of folders with the same title. I don't think there is a way to recover all that important information. Also using Evernote on my laptop is sooooo slow, my mobile device load up faster...and whats with all the features? I know you want to stay relevant but you guys threw simplicity out the window.

Owyn · January 28, 2012

I'm been using Evernote since I bought my second generation iPod, and I use Awesome note to sync my daily job duties and tasks. But recently I lost a whole lot of information. I didn't lose it because of Awesome Note, it's not that exstensive. I am a little put off that you identify multiple folders with just a line by the title of the folder. I would sync and my Awesome Note would come back with multiple folders with the same title, and in this frustration I went through and deleted them, I figured out the "line" thing, I don't know why you guys couldn't just put parentheses and a number in them....that's kinda universal, well at least more alerting than a line that gets longer with the number of folders with the same title. I don't think there is a way to recover all that important information. Also using Evernote on my laptop is sooooo slow, my mobile device load up faster...and whats with all the features? I know you want to stay relevant but you guys threw simplicity out the window.

Totally confused. Are you talking about "Awesome Note" or "Evernote"? They are completely different products.

GrumpyMonkey · January 28, 2012

I'm been using Evernote since I bought my second generation iPod, and I use Awesome note to sync my daily job duties and tasks. But recently I lost a whole lot of information. I didn't lose it because of Awesome Note, it's not that exstensive. I am a little put off that you identify multiple folders with just a line by the title of the folder. I would sync and my Awesome Note would come back with multiple folders with the same title, and in this frustration I went through and deleted them, I figured out the "line" thing, I don't know why you guys couldn't just put parentheses and a number in them....that's kinda universal, well at least more alerting than a line that gets longer with the number of folders with the same title. I don't think there is a way to recover all that important information. Also using Evernote on my laptop is sooooo slow, my mobile device load up faster...and whats with all the features? I know you want to stay relevant but you guys threw simplicity out the window.

hi. just to clarify, this is a user forum, so "we" are just like "you" without any control over how evernote works. i am a little bit unclear about your problem, or how it relates to the topic of this thread. could you give us more information? it might help evernote developers (who sometimes drop in and join discussions) to improve the product.

1. how did you lose your information. you say it wasn't awesome note. what was it? did you delete them in frustration?

2. i don't understand this folder identification thing that puts you off. i don't use folders much, and i don't use awesome note. could you send a screen shot?

3. the sync problem sounds like one with awesome note, not evernote.

4. i don't think parenthesis are ever universal in file names/titles, but maybe i just don't understand what you are referencing.

5. evernote on my laptop isn't slow. it does take a few seconds to start up (so does word, excel, etc.) but once it is going, it is quite snappy. as for the features, there aren't nearly enough. the interface seems pretty simple to me, but at least for mac, evernote has a beta in the works that ought to simplify it more.

(Archived) Multiple Items In A Note ... HOWTO?

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