(Archived) REQUEST: Better date editor

[huladaddy 24]

Before the update to 3.0.6, I thought editing dates was cumbersome, but had hoped for improvement in future updates. I never expected editing dates would actually get worse, but it has. Why has Evernote done this? It doesn't make sense.

Why can't clicking on the "Created" date or "Updated" date bring up a calendar widget, where you can click on any day within the current month, or click forward or backward through months and years. This seems pretty standard in other apps.

The current solution is a giant step backward.

[dlu 628]

as i am fond of saying, to dlu's eternal delight...

eternal delight... I'm going to start using that phrase

i never thought of it that way. the author is the author of the content, right? so, if you clip something, the author field is supposed to indicate when someone else created the content besides you. the document created date (i don't know why you would want this) is the date the attached file is created, and is presumably already contained in the properties. i suppose you could have a "Date added" field. but, i don't see the point. this is where that catch-all comments metadata field would come in handy.

Yeah it gets pretty meta. And if you have multiple documents though, you'd need multiple date created or date added fields. And I guess multiple Author fields. (Imaginary situations like this is what make me say things like "endless amounts of metadata")

[dlu 628]

That sounds like a great solution: "Document Created Date" ...

Bah! I was trying to say that it would be like the Author field, unused and mostly empty. Perhaps this is why I'm not a lawyer

[JMichaelTX 4,118]

Sorry, I'm confused. How does the "Author" field relate to alternate ways of capturing dates, or in some way reduce the need to change the Created date?

Author field is analogous to a Document Created Date field. Both are trying to describe not the information about note itself, but content within the note. Author is about the Author of the article (and not you the user who entered/clipped/imported the content. Document Created Date would be the date not of when the note was created, but when the document inside the note was created.

That sounds like a great solution: "Document Created Date", as long as we can:

• Search/filter on it
  
• Sort on it
  
• Show it in the Note List view
  
• Expose it to AppleScript (for import purposes) [EDIT: Add]
  

If you provide "Document Created Date" (or I might prefer to call it "Source Date") AND the long awaited "Due Date", then I would expect we might have little need to change the Note Created Date.

Until then, all we have to work with is Note Created date.

With respect to "Due Date", I have to be from Missouri for that: "I'll believe it when I see it."

EDIT: Add the bullet for AppleScript

[dlu 628]

Firstly, I would be really interested in how he came to that conclusion. It doesn't sound like he has any hard data, as he said that it is his personal opinion ("I think ..."). It sounded to me as though he was speaking to his own usage pattern. I don't think users should be told what to do and what not to do with their software.

I don't have any data that I've pulled specifically for this discussion. I'm drawing from data I've seen in the past, more qualitative studies such as surveys & user tests, etc. Since I'm just pulling it off the top of my head I'm hedging. I'm pretty confident (else I wouldn't say anything at all), but the usual caveats of random sampling and statistical significance apply, as well as human error.

I'm sure I do a little of it subconsciously, but I try not to assume I'm the average user. How much I know about the software implies that I'm not.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

as i am fond of saying, to dlu's eternal delight, if you give users options then you won't hear so much whining if we could just change a setting (like in the old days in january) and make it all visible and editable, or change the setting to hide it, then the problem would be solved. popups, in my opinion, are really annoying...

Sorry, but I do understand the philosophy behind keeping things simple, option-wise -- having done a depth-first search on many an options dialog (MS Word, can you hear me now?), I can testify that it doesn't necessarily make it any easier for the user. Of course it's wonderful for the "XX for Dummies" authors (more information to plow through), and it's no picnic for the developers and support staff either (keeping track of which options are available in which versions, watching out for and keeping track of side-effects). The urge for simplicity (something that developers are actually accused of *not* having) is actually a good thing; That doesn't mean that all options are bad, just that you need to be judicious about what options to expose.

Trust me, you'll still hear the whining

ok. without whining, how would i keep myself busy all day?

i am not saying endless lists of options are what evernote needs. but, a persistant option to hide/show all of the metadata like we had last month, so that you don't have to click it for every single note? that seems like a fairly nice option to have. besides, i've never met a popup i liked

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

hmm

Sorry, I'm confused. How does the "Author" field relate to alternate ways of capturing dates, or in some way reduce the need to change the Created date?

Author field is analogous to a Document Created Date field. Both are trying to describe not the information about note itself, but content within the note. Author is about the Author of the article (and not you the user who entered/clipped/imported the content. Document Created Date would be the date not of when the note was created, but when the document inside the note was created.

i never thought of it that way. the author is the author of the content, right? so, if you clip something, the author field is supposed to indicate when someone else created the content besides you. the document created date (i don't know why you would want this) is the date the attached file is created, and is presumably already contained in the properties. i suppose you could have a "Date added" field. but, i don't see the point. this is where that catch-all comments metadata field would come in handy.

by the way, since when can we "like" ourselves. lol. that makes very little sense to me, but i guess if you want to like yourself you ought to at least get notified.

[jefito 5,598]

as i am fond of saying, to dlu's eternal delight, if you give users options then you won't hear so much whining if we could just change a setting (like in the old days in january) and make it all visible and editable, or change the setting to hide it, then the problem would be solved. popups, in my opinion, are really annoying...

Sorry, but I do understand the philosophy behind keeping things simple, option-wise -- having done a depth-first search on many an options dialog (MS Word, can you hear me now?), I can testify that it doesn't necessarily make it any easier for the user. Of course it's wonderful for the "XX for Dummies" authors (more information to plow through), and it's no picnic for the developers and support staff either (keeping track of which options are available in which versions, watching out for and keeping track of side-effects). The urge for simplicity (something that developers are actually accused of *not* having) is actually a good thing; That doesn't mean that all options are bad, just that you need to be judicious about what options to expose.

Trust me, you'll still hear the whining

[dlu 628]

Sorry, I'm confused. How does the "Author" field relate to alternate ways of capturing dates, or in some way reduce the need to change the Created date?

Author field is analogous to a Document Created Date field. Both are trying to describe not the information about note itself, but content within the note. Author is about the Author of the article (and not you the user who entered/clipped/imported the content. Document Created Date would be the date not of when the note was created, but when the document inside the note was created.

[huladaddy 24]

Regarding the popover, I guess I don't quite get why EN didn't consider the normal Mac UI component for this kind of thing - an Inspector panel. Most other mac apps I use will have an Inspector for viewing and editing info that could be considered "meta-data" for the document or item you are viewing. These panels usually can be hidden or shown, but when they are shown, they persist (rather than disappearing as the popover does.) It would certainly seem like a more mac-like way of doing it.

This is exactly what I was suggesting with the slide-out pane. The idea that it would persist and not obscure the note is vital. The popover really needs to be abandoned.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

Regarding the popover, I guess I don't quite get why EN didn't consider the normal Mac UI component for this kind of thing - an Inspector panel. Most other mac apps I use will have an Inspector for viewing and editing info that could be considered "meta-data" for the document or item you are viewing. These panels usually can be hidden or shown, but when they are shown, they persist (rather than disappearing as the popover does.) It would certainly seem like a more mac-like way of doing it.

good points sschertz. my own predilection is to put dates in the title. this is a practice i started decades ago when i first started computing as a kid, and it is something that has definitely stood the test of time. for me. maybe not for everyone else, and more importantly:

why is evernote developing all of these wonderful attributes and then hiding them away, making them difficult to use, and discouraging users from using them?

as i am fond of saying, to dlu's eternal delight, if you give users options then you won't hear so much whining if we could just change a setting (like in the old days in january) and make it all visible and editable, or change the setting to hide it, then the problem would be solved. popups, in my opinion, are really annoying...

[huladaddy 24]

I know that dlu said "most".

I don't know what your point or argument is here.

My point is exactly this:

Next, after I change the date of a scanned document to the date of a document, I anticipate changing it exactly zero more times. Once the document has the correct created date, there is no more need to change it.

Hence, the word "most"...

OK. Using your logic, most of the time people shouldn't be editing the note title, folder or tags as well!?

I still don't understand what point you were trying to make.

[sschertz 29]

Just throwing a few things out there - I also change the created date on my scans. No, I don't change the date on one note more than once, but I might be working on numerous notes at the same time (scanning in a big stack of bills as I'm paying them for instance). And not just scans; for bills I get electronically, I also put the pdfs into EN. Again, this is rarely on the same day that I received them.

I sometime handwrite items in my journal and later scan them into EN into my Journal notebook. Again, the important date is the date I wrote the entry, not the date I scanned it.

I see a lot of suggestions for putting date info in the title of the note. I have to say, I don't like this idea. Mostly because it seems like the date IS in fact META DATA and should therefore be stored in the slot provided for it in the note's meta data. That is, the Created Date. Plus, having it as meta data would mean you could search on it (well, if it weren't broken in the mac right now - nudge, nudge )

I would guess there are many, many people who find the need to edit the Created Date for many perfectly good, valid reasons.

Regarding the popover, I guess I don't quite get why EN didn't consider the normal Mac UI component for this kind of thing - an Inspector panel. Most other mac apps I use will have an Inspector for viewing and editing info that could be considered "meta-data" for the document or item you are viewing. These panels usually can be hidden or shown, but when they are shown, they persist (rather than disappearing as the popover does.) It would certainly seem like a more mac-like way of doing it.

Finally, if we absolutely can't have a calendar control for setting the date, what about adding more text shortcuts, similar to what Remember the Milk does? I don't use RtM anymore, but when I did, I really like the way you could enter dates. Something like "friday" would become the next Friday date automatically. Typing "tom" would insert tomorrow's date. It was really easy to quickly get dates in there without worrying about format.

Just a thought.

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

I know that dlu said "most".

I don't know what your point or argument is here.

My point is exactly this:

Next, after I change the date of a scanned document to the date of a document, I anticipate changing it exactly zero more times. Once the document has the correct created date, there is no more need to change it.

Hence, the word "most"...

[huladaddy 24]

Personally, I think most of the time people shouldn't be editing the created date.

You do, huh? That may a valid philosophy in some cases, such as creating a text note. But when I scan a paper document, I could care less about the date when I scanned it, I am only interested in when the paper version was created.

Please note dlu said "most". So if you change the date of your scanned document from the date you scanned it to the date of the document, how many more times do you anticipate changing the created date?

I know that dlu said "most".

Firstly, I would be really interested in how he came to that conclusion. It doesn't sound like he has any hard data, as he said that it is his personal opinion ("I think ..."). It sounded to me as though he was speaking to his own usage pattern. I don't think users should be told what to do and what not to do with their software.

Secondly, if there was one date that was not likely needing to be changed by the user, it would be the updated date. That date gets changed automatically by the system, but i am sure there is some use case out there where someone finds a good reason to change it manually.

Next, after I change the date of a scanned document to the date of a document, I anticipate changing it exactly zero more times. Once the document has the correct created date, there is no more need to change it. I don't know what your point or argument is here. The fact remains that for scanned documents, I would like to change the created date once. I never stated that I needed to change it more than once.

[jbenson2 2,149]

Events that need reminders go in my calendar.

For future events I do just leave the created date alone.

A calendar.

I understand now. Thank you.

[JMichaelTX 4,118]

dlu, thanks for sharing about your personal usage of Evernote.

It's tough. The Author field, I believe (perhaps some sort of Evernote Historian will correct me on this) was meant for articles/notes/content you clipped, but you didn't author yourself. So you could put in a PDF of Common Sense and the note author would be Thomas Paine. It doesn't get used much and I think it more or less wasn't the right way of addressing the issue.

Sorry, I'm confused. How does the "Author" field relate to alternate ways of capturing dates, or in some way reduce the need to change the Created date?

[dlu 628]

Oh, and for smaller events, sometimes I'll keep everything in a single note. Then the updated date ends up being pretty much the day of or day before the event. I can also look for it by title.

Some future events/trips end up with one main note that has notes, photos and a table of contents that is basically a series of note links to other notes containing flight info, hotel confirmations etc (these are largely emailed in and it is easier to use note links than append to the same note).

[dlu 628]

You think we "shouldn't be editing the created date"? Is there some law or rule we are breaking??

What I should have said what "Shouldn't need to edit the created date." I think a lot of the editing is a way of ordering certain things and we could do better in that area.

Thanks for clarifying. Those two little words make a big difference. I understand your point now.

I'd be interested in hearing how else the recording of these dates could be done.

In a number of the cases, "Creation" date seems the most appropriate name for the date field:

• Source doc date
  
• Personal history date
  
• Web article date
  
• Event date
  

The actual Note Creation date is only valuable when I create a note from scratch. IOW, the source info date is the actual date created in EN.

EDIT: Corrected typo: "source info data" should be "source info date".

It's tough. The Author field, I believe (perhaps some sort of Evernote Historian will correct me on this) was meant for articles/notes/content you clipped, but you didn't author yourself. So you could put in a PDF of Common Sense and the note author would be Thomas Paine. It doesn't get used much and I think it more or less wasn't the right way of addressing the issue.

DLU - I would be interested in finding out how you manage your Evernote. Is it only stuff that has already happened?

Specifically, what do you do for a business flight next month or a hotel confirmation? (assume you get these details in the mail from a travel agent)

How about a dentist appointment 6 months from today?

For all these future tasks, do you use today's date in the Created Date field?

If yes, do you ignore the Created Date field when using Evernote?

I'm probably less organized than most of you power users are. I also want to preface that I don't think Evernote should be built for my preferences cuz I don't think I'm the average user. (It isn't easy, but I do try).

Anyways, I throw all sorts of stuff into Evernote, a huge amount of it ends up in my default notebook without any tags. Events that need reminders go in my calendar. Notes about those events go in Evernote (I haven't found a need to link the two other than being able to match up dates manually on occasion)

Trips etc get their own tag. I travel infrequently enough where that's feasible. Confirmations, itineraries etc all get tagged that way while planning. Notes & photos I take during the trip should get tagged, but that doesn't always happen. The different created dates sort out the planning from the actual happening.

For future events I do just leave the created date alone. If there's a future date I need to reference I put it in the body of the note, but I tend to find things semantically. E.g. via a tag or a project name in the title. Like BnF, documents from outside of Evernote usually get the date put in the title of the document or in the title of the note. Along with a short description and other notes if it is important. I think that is leftover from dealing with file systems.

One random plus side of leaving the created date alone is that if I can't find something right away, I'll remember that I scanned/emailed it in along with XXX document or with a certain batch of documents. If i can find that batch then I'll scroll around until I find the one I'm looking for. Something like, "Oh I dealt with that when I was obsessed with that car stuff." So I'll go type in "Aston Martin" and find out, oh that was back in October. Then I'll just look through October 2011 until I find it.

It can be very fast and loose, but the upside is that I actually throw things into a central repository. Things used to be way messier

[jbenson2 2,149]

Yes, sorry I didn't mean to imply any editing of the created date is complete craziness. I just meant to say I think most people won't need to do it. I think having things scanned in might be the big exception. Perhaps I'm not organized enough to do that for each specific document. Personally I try to get things into Evernote in the order I receive them and that's sorta good enough for me.

Whew! I'm glad it is not complete craziness. Dave Engberg made a similar comment a couple years ago about us locos who use future dates in the Created Date field. (kind of screws up the Evernote search grammar)

Fortunately Evernote is very flexible. I change the Created Date field on almost every one of my scans. I'm going on a trip next month and have changed the Created Date & Time for the itinerary note several times already, along with other task notes scheduled in the same time frame.

I seldom scan a bill on the exact due date, but that is what I end up using for the Created Date.

Last month, I scanned in some ancient stuff from my very first job when I was in High School. Putting 2012 as the Created Date would be silly.

DLU - I would be interested in finding out how you manage your Evernote. Is it only stuff that has already happened?

Specifically, what do you do for a business flight next month or a hotel confirmation? (assume you get these details in the mail from a travel agent)

How about a dentist appointment 6 months from today?

For all these future tasks, do you use today's date in the Created Date field?

If yes, do you ignore the Created Date field when using Evernote?

.

[JMichaelTX 4,118]

You think we "shouldn't be editing the created date"? Is there some law or rule we are breaking??

What I should have said what "Shouldn't need to edit the created date." I think a lot of the editing is a way of ordering certain things and we could do better in that area.

Thanks for clarifying. Those two little words make a big difference. I understand your point now.

I'd be interested in hearing how else the recording of these dates could be done.

In a number of the cases, "Creation" date seems the most appropriate name for the date field:

• Source doc date
  
• Personal history date
  
• Web article date
  
• Event date
  

The actual Note Creation date is only valuable when I create a note from scratch. IOW, the source info date is the actual date created in EN.

EDIT: Corrected typo: "source info data" should be "source info date".

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

i actually dislike google calendar's date ediing

but, as you said, i don't see this aspect of the current ui to be an improvement. dlu is correct about it being possible to edit metadata in the popover. but, i doubt i'll ever see popovers as efficient or enjoyable tools, because thy are neither!

i really like a lot about the current ui (good job evernote!), but sorely miss:

1. metadata that is visible and editable

2. search info, because it is really important to see what attributes and so forth are selected. i don't know where it went. and, now a lot of my searches are failing. i must have bad habits left over, and now that i cannot see anything, i have to make sure and get all search info cleared (still not entirely sure how to do this).

i brin up the loss of search info because it is another example of sacrificing useful info for aesthetic simplicity. i must repeat my mantra: please give us options

[learned 1]

I have to add my voice to those that hate the popover field. Ideally I'd love a keyboard shortcut that would take me straight to date editing. I have no issue with keying the date vs. a widget, and I like the concept of 1/1 keeping the other metadata. As a workaround, I've created a series of applescripts to do things like clean up the year. I'm using them where I'm scanning old documents and want to get them sorted into the correct year. An example is below. Note that for this example, my notebooks are named by year (i.e. 2000, 2001).

tell application "Evernote"

set theSelection to (selection)

repeat with theNote in theSelection

set notebookYear to name of notebook of theNote as integer

set creationDate to creation date of theNote

set creationYear to year of creationDate

if creationYear is not equal to notebookYear then

set year of creationDate to notebookYear

set creation date of theNote to creationDate

end if

end repeat

end tell

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

Sorry to come in so late, but although I've been using Evernote for some years now (and it's wonderful) I've only just noticed that the Created date can't be edited without going into the popup, I would like to add my voice in favour of being able to edit the Created date directly in the note header rather than having to open the popup.

Not going to the barricades over this, but this would be my preference.

hi. welcome to the forums!

i like how you put that: not going over barricades over this. it's enough to be annoying, but not enough for me to uninstall it and go back to pen and paper, or anything like that

if i could have my druthers, it would be simple: keep the current streamlined view -- heck, you could even get rid of the metadata if you'd like, but give us the ability to customize (as we had in the past) with a search explanation bar (sorely missed on a daily basis), show/hide editable metadata (used to apply globally so that i didn't have to click on each note to see it), etc., etc.

i am all for simplification of the interface and making it so that new users aren't overwhelmed with features they never use, but i am very much against removing functionality in the process, and taking away the ability to customize our experience.

[jbarnabasl 7]

Sorry to come in so late, but although I've been using Evernote for some years now (and it's wonderful) I've only just noticed that the Created date can't be edited without going into the popup, I would like to add my voice in favour of being able to edit the Created date directly in the note header rather than having to open the popup.

Not going to the barricades over this, but this would be my preference.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

lol. procrustean does look kind of prehistoric, doesn't it.

that definition is not nearly as colorful as the greek myth from which it comes. i'm sure some googling around for procrustes and theseus will turn up some interesting versions. makes dexter (our lovable serial killer) look tame in comparison

anyhow, i don't like evernote hiding information whether it is the new lack of search terms displayed (where did that information go!?) or metadata. options and customizability are my keywords this year!

well, i guess i was whining about this last year too, even before this most recent assault on my toggles.

[deverill 54]

Thanks for clarifying. Those two little words make a big difference. I understand your point now.

I'd be interested in hearing how else the recording of these dates could be done.

In a number of the cases, "Creation" date seems the most appropriate name for the date field:

• Source doc date
  
• Personal history date
  
• Web article date
  
• Event date
  

The actual Note Creation date is only valuable when I create a note from scratch. IOW, the source info date is the actual date created in EN.

EDIT: Corrected typo: "source info data" should be "source info date".

(blank lines removed to save space.)

My method of recording the dates is this:

Creation date is just that. It is when the note was created.

Tags for info about the note. My March electric bill is tagged with Utilities, Bill, 3-March, 2012. This tells me when the bill is about regardless of when it was scanned.

This is also true of personal history dates, web article dates, or event dates. If I need to record more than one of these 'categories' then I'll do it within the note itself:

The receipt from the family reunion park reservation: Creation date is when it was scanned. The date of the event is the tags 3-Mar, 2012. The contents of the note has when it was paid (it's a receipt after all) and at the top I may put "2012-02-21: Talked to Suzy who said we were all set."

I realize this won't help everyone but it's how I handle it and I have no worries storing/finding things.

To everyone thinking Evernote doesn't listen to their customers, consider that there are around 28,000 registered forum users, the vast majority of them are silent. There are very few people vocally in favor of this or that issue. Now think about this... Evernote has 23 million users. The next time anyone is tempted to say "Everyone wants this, just look at the forums" (not just this thread but others) consider "Everyone" is about 0.1% of all Evernote users even if everyone registered in the forums says they want it.

[deverill 54]

First, let me thank GM for the word of the day: Procrustean

From Merrian-Webster dictionary:

marked by arbitrary often ruthless disregard of individual differences or special circumstances

Lol, I just thought it was one of those prehistoric dinosaur eras. Thanks for the definition JMichael, I wouldn't have looked it up.

I don't mind the popover now that I am used to it -- it was weird at first but ok now. One thing I would like you guys to add, dlu, is yet another format. 1/1 becomes January 1, but I have so many workflows that don't like slashes (/) that I have macros set to do dates like: 2012-03-10. It would be good if you can reasonably easily expand the translation to handle - in addition to /.

Thanks!

[peterfmartin 221]

I also hate the popover and still pine for the old UI. In the current UI, we can click on title, notebook, and tags to change each of those. But clicking on the dates does nothing. Is there a reason why dates can't be editable from the standard view, as title, notebook, and tags are?

[huladaddy 24]

Compare the following workflow to yours above:

1. tab

2. assign date

To be fair, your workflow is summarized very briefly while you've added a lot of details to mine.

Anyways, moving along... I'm assuming if you want to edit the title, tags etc. You can hit cmd+shift+i and and then tab to focus on the title field. Tab again for tags, tab again for date. This would be instead of clicking into the Title, tabbing to tags and then entering the note info popover.

Not exactly what you want, but a little bit smoother. Just brought this up with the team and we'll set some time next week to ponder it

I don't know how much more clearly I can state my dislike for the popover. Please do not continue to tell me to use it. I know how to use it. I am not asking you how best to edit the date, title and tags by using the current method of three-key-shortcuts, multiple presses of the tab button, all within a large window-like thing that obscures a large portion of my note and presents me with way too much metadata for the purposes of simply wanting to edit the date. I am asking you to change the way it is currently being done. To be constructive, let's discuss that, not how and why I should be using the popover. You won't convince me. I don't like it.

Have you run a poll? Focus group? What positive feedback are you getting with the popover? Really... come on. I haven't seen anyone support it. Please listen to your users.

[dlu 628]

Compare the following workflow to yours above:

1. tab

2. assign date

To be fair, your workflow is summarized very briefly while you've added a lot of details to mine.

Anyways, moving along... I'm assuming if you want to edit the title, tags etc. You can hit cmd+shift+i and and then tab to focus on the title field. Tab again for tags, tab again for date. This would be instead of clicking into the Title, tabbing to tags and then entering the note info popover.

Not exactly what you want, but a little bit smoother. Just brought this up with the team and we'll set some time next week to ponder it

[dlu 628]

Please note dlu said "most". So if you change the date of your scanned document from the date you scanned it to the date of the document, how many more times do you anticipate changing the created date?

Yeah, thanks BnF, I had meant to bring that up too. Even if you change the date on a note, you usually won't change it multiple times per note. Glad you're around :-)

I know if you scan in a bunch of documents, you'll still be going around editing a bunch of dates.

[huladaddy 24]

Previously, being able to edit the date quickly tabbing to that field made editing a bunch of documents quickly. Also, it was nice that I could change individual parts of the date by simply tabbing to that field and using the arrow keys.

Might I suggest using:

[additional comments by huladaddy]

1. cmd+shift+i to bring up the note info popover (which may or may not obscure the date on the document that one wants to copy into metadata; on financial statements - which is the case where I usually modify the created date to match the statement date - the popover almost always obscures the date)

2. tabbing (three times) through those fields

3. "quickly" assign dates by tying 4/15 for example if you just want to change the day and month. We'll retain the year and time that was in there before if you don't provide one. You can also type in April 15th instead of 4/15

4. hit escape to close the popover

Really? How is this an improvement over the previous version? How is this good UI design? Please get rid of the popover. I don't think I have heard one person support it.

Why can't we just hit Tab after entering the tags to jump to the Created date immediately below and edit the date?

Compare the following workflow to yours above:

1. tab

2. assign date

Also, at one point you asked me "Is there an app that has a great date editing method that I should be looking at?" I think a very good example is in Google Calendar. When editing a calendar event, tabbing into the date field highlights the entire date, and also drops down a date picker widget. The user is able to either: 1) quickly type a date, or 2) use the widget to select a date. I would like to see Evernote add the drop-down date picker widget to offer the user two choices. Sometimes typing the date is preferable, sometimes one has to scroll around to find a specific date within the calendar.

Thanks for your continued consideration.

[dlu 628]

Previously, being able to edit the date quickly tabbing to that field made editing a bunch of documents quickly. Also, it was nice that I could change individual parts of the date by simply tabbing to that field and using the arrow keys.

M

Might I suggest using cmd+shift+i to bring up the note info popover and then tabbing through those fields. You can quickly assign dates by tying 4/15 for example if you just want to change the day and month. We'll retain the year and time that was in there before if you don't provide one. You can also type in April 15th instead of 4/15.

But as always, thanks for posting. Will continue to think about this

[Squarelover 1]

I have to chime in here. This change is a huge hurdle to me. I can't tell you how horrible this new date interface is for me to use.

One of the things that I heavily use Evernote for is going paperless. I have a Fujitsu page scanner in which I scan all my important mail, receipts, and other documents. The scanner has a nice workflow to turn the scans into PDFs and then upload them to Evernote. After they are scanned, backed up and uploaded, I shred all those pieces of paper.

While I understand an argument why dates shouldn't be editable, this was actually a desired and nessessary feature for me and this workflow. I need to have the original date of the document in the created date field. This is important for me to be able to put that context for the document, and find them when I need to do taxes, expenses, etc... Previously, being able to edit the date quickly tabbing to that field made editing a bunch of documents quickly. Also, it was nice that I could change individual parts of the date by simply tabbing to that field and using the arrow keys.

The new interface completely disrupts and slows down this flow. I can no longer edit the dates by only using the keyboard. I can edit the title and tags, but then I have to switch to the mouse move over, click on the 'i' then click on the date field, then I have to type out the whole date (even if part of the date is correct).

Please turn this off or give us an option to bring the edit field on the main document editing interface.

Otherwise, this will be a deal breaker for me. I'll have to use something else.

[kerosin 1]

Hi

First of all I would like to say that I really like Evernote and I appreciate the efforts of the team to integrate all the features and satisfy as most users as possible.

I'm jumping in the discussion quite late, I've read the all previous posts and I fully agree that the new method to edit dates is quite complicate with the new release. I'm also using Evernote to archive all bills, contracts or any paper I get by mail (scans) or email (PDFs). => paperless office.

When I started to scan these 1000 documents beginning of this year, I really appreciated the easy way to set the create date to the date of the original document (back to the 80's). I went even further and used the Author-field to put in the name of the company who send me the bill, contract or whatever.

The new interface with the popover is definetely a step backwards in usability. I really liked the previous way to hide/unhide the metadata when I need them.

As the OP, allow me to summarize some of the discussion:

1. Having dates that are editable are important. They get used for a variety of things and should not just be automatically generated system metadata.
   
2. If Evernote wishes to define the created date as the date when the note is created, then don't allow it to be edited, and provide a new metadata field, such as "Historical Date", or "Original Date".
   
3. The redesign of the note header and the introduction of the information popover as the methods to view and edit metadata are not well received. Consider either a return to the expanding header or a mac-like inspector panel.
   

I fully agree to this summary and still hope that the Evernote team listens to the needs of their customers.

Regards, Eric

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

That sounds like a great solution: "Document Created Date" ...

Bah! I was trying to say that it would be like the Author field, unused and mostly empty. Perhaps this is why I'm not a lawyer

lol. i would like your posts, but i am told by the forum that i have been too positive, and i cannot hand them out anymore, so where is my "dislike this" button?

anyhow, the metadata is simple, isn't it? the author refers to the content (presumably, it could also be helpful in a shared, collaborative environment) and the document created date is unnecessary, because that should be in the attachment properties. the date of note creation is obviously useful to some of us.

my problem is that the new design makes it more difficult for us to actually use the features you (evernote developers) spent so many years developing. how are you going to distinguish between the following?

1. feature unused because it is unnecessary

2. feature unused because it doesn't work (see my thread about broken searches)

3. feature unused because design changes hid it

my guess is that if people are posting so much on these forums (seemingly endless posts) about things they do with the metadata, and you spent all of this time developing the features that distinguish you from other products, then there is a demand somewhere for them. just because the "average" user (they are participating on every side of every argument) doesn't use it, doesn't mean it isn't useful. again, i will bring up the "export" feature to support this point.

[JMichaelTX 4,118]

Bah! I was trying to say that it would be like the Author field, unused and mostly empty. Perhaps this is why I'm not a lawyer

haha!

That's funny!

But I think this is not a legal issue, rather a requirements articulation issue -- always a challenge.

[dlu 628]

Firstly, I would be really interested in how he came to that conclusion. It doesn't sound like he has any hard data, as he said that it is his personal opinion ("I think ..."). It sounded to me as though he was speaking to his own usage pattern. I don't think users should be told what to do and what not to do with their software.

I don't have any data that I've pulled specifically for this discussion. I'm drawing from data I've seen in the past, more qualitative studies such as surveys & user tests, etc. Since I'm just pulling it off the top of my head I'm hedging. I'm pretty confident (else I wouldn't say anything at all), but the usual caveats of random sampling and statistical significance apply, as well as human error.

I'm sure I do a little of it subconsciously, but I try not to assume I'm the average user. How much I know about the software implies that I'm not.

Well, if nothing else, this discussion should add to your qualitative data regarding the importance of being able to edit dates.

As the OP, allow me to summarize some of the discussion:

1. Having dates that are editable are important. They get used for a variety of things and should not just be automatically generated system metadata.
   
2. If Evernote wishes to define the created date as the date when the note is created, then don't allow it to be edited, and provide a new metadata field, such as "Historical Date", or "Original Date".
   
3. The redesign of the note header and the introduction of the information popover as the methods to view and edit metadata are not well received. Consider either a return to the expanding header or a mac-like inspector panel.
   

Yep, and noted. Thanks for the summary

[dlu 628]

I see a lot of suggestions for putting date info in the title of the note. I have to say, I don't like this idea. Mostly because it seems like the date IS in fact META DATA and should therefore be stored in the slot provided for it in the note's meta data. That is, the Created Date. Plus, having it as meta data would mean you could search on it (well, if it weren't broken in the mac right now - nudge, nudge )

I would guess there are many, many people who find the need to edit the Created Date for many perfectly good, valid reasons.

...

Finally, if we absolutely can't have a calendar control for setting the date, what about adding more text shortcuts, similar to what Remember the Milk does? I don't use RtM anymore, but when I did, I really like the way you could enter dates. Something like "friday" would become the next Friday date automatically. Typing "tom" would insert tomorrow's date. It was really easy to quickly get dates in there without worrying about format.

Just a thought.

Nudge received.

Also, I like the idea of those shortcuts. Localization will be a huge pain though. They'll go on the list to look into

[huladaddy 24]

Firstly, I would be really interested in how he came to that conclusion. It doesn't sound like he has any hard data, as he said that it is his personal opinion ("I think ..."). It sounded to me as though he was speaking to his own usage pattern. I don't think users should be told what to do and what not to do with their software.

I don't have any data that I've pulled specifically for this discussion. I'm drawing from data I've seen in the past, more qualitative studies such as surveys & user tests, etc. Since I'm just pulling it off the top of my head I'm hedging. I'm pretty confident (else I wouldn't say anything at all), but the usual caveats of random sampling and statistical significance apply, as well as human error.

I'm sure I do a little of it subconsciously, but I try not to assume I'm the average user. How much I know about the software implies that I'm not.

Well, if nothing else, this discussion should add to your qualitative data regarding the importance of being able to edit dates.

As the OP, allow me to summarize some of the discussion:

1. Having dates that are editable are important. They get used for a variety of things and should not just be automatically generated system metadata.
   
2. If Evernote wishes to define the created date as the date when the note is created, then don't allow it to be edited, and provide a new metadata field, such as "Historical Date", or "Original Date".
   
3. The redesign of the note header and the introduction of the information popover as the methods to view and edit metadata are not well received. Consider either a return to the expanding header or a mac-like inspector panel.
   

[dlu 628]

I did say as few exceptions as possible right? Ok good, covered my bases

I think Title, Notebook & Tags are notably more important (and more widely used) than the created/updated dates.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

Maybe you guys think the popover is cool and cute, but good design dictates form follows function.

That's a low blow. If you disagree with a design decision that's one thing, but surely you don't mean to imply that we're incompetent...

Hi dlu. I know your comment wasn't directed at me, but I just wanted to clarify that I am pleased with a lot of Evernote features, and don't question the skill or committment of the Evernote developers.

However, I do disagree with some of your posts. I do not think that simplicity and options are mutually exclusive. I posted at length in another thread about this (my one using your Google analogy).

Back to this thread, I am OK with the popover. If I had my dithers, though, I would put an option of displaying all of that metadata, and having it editable (basically, the old view with a few things included as well). This could conceivably be squirreled away in the menu with some checkboxes for what we want to see (sort of like the Word option to view all of the hidden stuff--a crucial feature for editors that regular people probably never know about).

Just a thought. Please keep up the good work of improving the product. And, I do hope you will consider modifying your position to take into account the very real needs of "power" users. More broadly, consider the options as a way for people to feel like they "can" customize it for their use, even if they "don't," because the illusion of choice is quite comforting to many users.

[huladaddy 24]

I like the idea of one location for editing all of the metadata, but the popover is not the right solution. I would rather see a panel that slides out to the right with all of that data. That way, if the user decides, it could be displayed always, and it wouldn't obscure half of the note. Oh, and you could get rid of the transparency.

[Martin Packer 162]

@dlu You're missing a :-) from your last. :-)

Martin

[JMichaelTX 4,118]

Maybe you guys think the popover is cool and cute, but good design dictates form follows function.

That's a low blow. If you disagree with a design decision that's one thing, but surely you don't mean to imply that we're incompetent...

No. Never said, and didn't mean that you are incompetent.

But you guys wouldn't be the first design team to become so enamored with a cool appearance that you let it out-weigh the function it is designed to perform.

You received many posts from many users advising you how hard it is to use the popover.

[dlu 628]

Maybe you guys think the popover is cool and cute, but good design dictates form follows function.

That's a low blow. If you disagree with a design decision that's one thing, but surely you don't mean to imply that we're incompetent...

[JMichaelTX 4,118]

I'm a big fan of simplicity, but I have never included popovers in that category, so I am not really keen on the direction this has gone. More specifically, I don't agree with the philosophy of stripping away options and forcing users into a Procrustean bed. It may not be good for Evernote to "nudge" users. I don't know. But, it certainly isn't good for me.

For me, the icons and sharing options are totally useless. For someone else, they might be crucial. Why not provide us with customizability? Of course, there may be a streamlined default view, but advanced users who do want to edit all of these categories could choose to make them visible and editable.

First, let me thank GM for the word of the day: Procrustean

From Merrian-Webster dictionary:

marked by arbitrary often ruthless disregard of individual differences or special circumstances

Second, I agree with GM that EN needs to provide us with more options. I just posted this in another thread.

Third, I also agree with several posters that the new Note Info Popover may not be the best solution.

IMO, popovers are designed for small popup windows that provide a small amount of info.

They are NOT good tools for extensive data entry.

In fact, I know of no other Mac app or web site that uses popovers in this manner.

The most commonly used method (which means intuitive for most) for entering extra data is a Tab.

Maybe you guys think the popover is cool and cute, but good design dictates form follows function.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

I'm a big fan of simplicity, but I have never included popovers in that category, so I am not really keen on the direction this has gone. More specifically, I don't agree with the philosophy of stripping away options and forcing users into a Procrustean bed. It may not be good for Evernote to "nudge" users. I don't know. But, it certainly isn't good for me.

For me, the icons and sharing options are totally useless. For someone else, they might be crucial. Why not provide us with customizability? Of course, there may be a streamlined default view, but advanced users who do want to edit all of these categories could choose to make them visible and editable.

Anyhow, the interface is looking better and better. Please re-consider giving us options, though.

[Martin Packer 162]

I stumbled (accidentally) upon the ability to edit the date in the information popover. Not tried it but is it possible to type garbage in there? I notice I could type a created date later than the updated date. :-)

Martin

[huladaddy 24]

I'll leave it with you. You've heard my argument.

(How about a keyboard shortcut to open the info popover, and select the created date?)

[dlu 628]

Hi dlu. I know your comment wasn't directed at me, but I just wanted to clarify that I am pleased with a lot of Evernote features, and don't question the skill or committment of the Evernote developers.

However, I do disagree with some of your posts. I do not think that simplicity and options are mutually exclusive. I posted at length in another thread about this (my one using your Google analogy).

Back to this thread, I am OK with the popover. If I had my dithers, though, I would put an option of displaying all of that metadata, and having it editable (basically, the old view with a few things included as well). This could conceivably be squirreled away in the menu with some checkboxes for what we want to see (sort of like the Word option to view all of the hidden stuff--a crucial feature for editors that regular people probably never know about).

Just a thought. Please keep up the good work of improving the product. And, I do hope you will consider modifying your position to take into account the very real needs of "power" users. More broadly, consider the options as a way for people to feel like they "can" customize it for their use, even if they "don't," because the illusion of choice is quite comforting to many users.

We do try to take into account the needs of power users. It's a fine balancing act, I think the trick is to not really forget that its a balancing act. I don't particularly like squirreling things away in some menu, so we'll keep disagreeing on stuff like that.

[huladaddy 24]

Will you be moving editing of note name, notebook and tags exclusively into the info popover? ;-)

[dlu 628]

Oh, before I forget, a shortcut that might help you out is cmd+shift+i to open the note info popover.

Anyways, that idea's been brought up but it seems messy. From a still visual point of view, it's hidden, but it sorta makes that area a minefield of functionality. We already have bits of meta data scattered about in the snippets, note info panel and into info popover. We're really trying to keep editing in one main place with as few exceptions possible. I'm happy to go ponder on it again, but we're currently trying to show restraint and error on that side of things.

[huladaddy 24]

I understand your rationale. For the average user, in most cases, what you have done is fine. Dates are usually expected to be automatically assigned.

The one area where this doesn't work for me is when I scan paper documents (bank/credit card statements, letters, receipts, contracts, agreements, certificates, etc.), and want the created date to be the date on the document and not today's date. Changing the created date on many notes is now much more work.

What would be the harm in adding a popup calendar date-picker gadget without having to open the info popover? (Persistant buggar, aren't i?)

[dlu 628]

It is for simplicity's sake. The dates and URL are read only (read/click I suppose). We didn't make them editable fields or have them initiate calendars for simplicity and to nudge people towards the note info popover for editing meta data. Ok perhaps by not allowing you to edit at all is more than a nudge.

For most users, I think that created and updated dates are supposed to be changed by the system anyways. Sorry it seems to have added to your flow on occasion, but it is an area we decided to edit and simplify.

[huladaddy 24]

I understand where you are coming from with your answer, but I think the current popover implementation is flawed.

The popover should be limited to showing additional information regarding a note, but not be used to actually edit info. It is frustrating to see the Created and Updated dates while viewing a note, but not be able to edit those dates there. Instead, the user has to bring up the information popover first, then click on and select the date to be edited, then manually type in the new date. Too many steps. Also, sometimes I want to edit the date of a scanned statement, and I want to use the date that appears on the statement itself which is usually in the upper right corner of the statement and is therefore covered over with the large info popover.

The dates should be editable while viewing the note, without having to bring up the info popover. That would avoid the popover in the a popover problem. This is where the calendar widget should be used.

The note info popover is designed to contain all of the metadata of a note. If you want to edit meta data, you can change the note, tags, created date, all in one place. We didn't want to make you go open then close and then open it again if you were editing various pieces of metadata.

The dates & URL where the rich text toolbar usually is, is meant to give you a glimpse of that data while you're browsing.

These changes make it an extra step to edit dates, but we made that tradeoff for a simpler, more streamlined design.

It's fine to have one place to edit all of the metadata, but why did you take away the feature of being able to edit the dates while viewing the note. Some of the metadata is shown and editable while viewing the note (name, notebook, tag), without bringing up the popover, but not the date? Why did you remove that ability? I can't see the logic. It didn't make editing the dates more streamlined.

So my request: bring back the ability to edit the dates in-place, without having to use the popover.

[dlu 628]

I understand where you are coming from with your answer, but I think the current popover implementation is flawed.

The popover should be limited to showing additional information regarding a note, but not be used to actually edit info. It is frustrating to see the Created and Updated dates while viewing a note, but not be able to edit those dates there. Instead, the user has to bring up the information popover first, then click on and select the date to be edited, then manually type in the new date. Too many steps. Also, sometimes I want to edit the date of a scanned statement, and I want to use the date that appears on the statement itself which is usually in the upper right corner of the statement and is therefore covered over with the large info popover.

The dates should be editable while viewing the note, without having to bring up the info popover. That would avoid the popover in the a popover problem. This is where the calendar widget should be used.

The note info popover is designed to contain all of the metadata of a note. If you want to edit meta data, you can change the note, tags, created date, all in one place. We didn't want to make you go open then close and then open it again if you were editing various pieces of metadata.

The dates & URL where the rich text toolbar usually is, is meant to give you a glimpse of that data while you're browsing.

These changes make it an extra step to edit dates, but we made that tradeoff for a simpler, more streamlined design.

[huladaddy 24]

Is there an app that has a great date editing method that I should be looking at?

Part of the reason is a design limitation of popovers not being able to launch another popover (or another popover like element). Popovers within popovers are pretty frowned upon. The current input accepts a variety of date formats. For example, if I type in 1/1 it will change the date/month to January 1st and keep the year and time.

That should help a little bit

I understand where you are coming from with your answer, but I think the current popover implementation is flawed.

The popover should be limited to showing additional information regarding a note, but not be used to actually edit info. It is frustrating to see the Created and Updated dates while viewing a note, but not be able to edit those dates there. Instead, the user has to bring up the information popover first, then click on and select the date to be edited, then manually type in the new date. Too many steps. Also, sometimes I want to edit the date of a scanned statement, and I want to use the date that appears on the statement itself which is usually in the upper right corner of the statement and is therefore covered over with the large info popover.

The dates should be editable while viewing the note, without having to bring up the info popover. That would avoid the popover in the a popover problem. This is where the calendar widget should be used.

[dlu 628]

Is there an app that has a great date editing method that I should be looking at?

Part of the reason is a design limitation of popovers not being able to launch another popover (or another popover like element). Popovers within popovers are pretty frowned upon. The current input accepts a variety of date formats. For example, if I type in 1/1 it will change the date/month to January 1st and keep the year and time.

That should help a little bit

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

i dislike the calendar widgets myself. i admit, editing dates never seemed cumbersome to me, and i haven't messed around with the new version enough to say off the top of my head how i feel about the changes (i'm on the ipad now). could you tell us what got worse?

[anjoschu 67]

I think the creation date is great (and meant) for this.

Personally, I think most of the time people shouldn't be editing the created date. Before we had the favorites bar, editing the created date was a way to keep notes pinned to the top of your list. I think there's a lot of other things people edit the created date for, but we could address in a better way.

Editing the creation date to pin something to the top is indeed a strange use case. But IMO this doesn't mean that it's a bad idea in all other cases. It's not a technical creation date, after all. I take from your comment that I must not alter the date. But if you must not use the date to give your content a meaningful date of origination/creation -- huh yeah -- what is it good for?

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

Personally, I think most of the time people shouldn't be editing the created date.

You do, huh? That may a valid philosophy in some cases, such as creating a text note. But when I scan a paper document, I could care less about the date when I scanned it, I am only interested in when the paper version was created.

Please note dlu said "most". So if you change the date of your scanned document from the date you scanned it to the date of the document, how many more times do you anticipate changing the created date?

[dlu 628]

You think we "shouldn't be editing the created date"? Is there some law or rule we are breaking??

What I should have said what "Shouldn't need to edit the created date." I think a lot of the editing is a way of ordering certain things and we could do better in that area.

endless is a bit extreme

due date was already mentioned by your boss, right? creation date is already there. i think the only other serious suggestion i have seen for a metadata field is a comment one for users to put in information as needed. this would seem particularly useful for some use cases.

i don't use the metadata much because it is unavailable on mobile platforms for editing, and it is somewhat laborious now to view it. i have to admit that the inability to select "show note info" in the menu and have it apply to all notes (as it was in the previous versions), instead of just the one you are looking at (as it is now), is a huge step backwards in my opinion. it seems yet another barrier to taking advantage of the rich set of attributes evernote has developed to distinguish itself from other products.

the inability to edit dates is only the most visible casualty of an "improvement" process that has hindered a lot of functionality

just my two cents (assuming, every post i make whining about this issue is equivalent to a tiny piece of a coin)

you're right, endless is a bit extreme...

And yeah due dates have been mentioned already, so there's no putting that genie back in the bottle

[jefito 5,598]

Personally, I think most of the time people shouldn't be editing the created date. Before we had the favorites bar, editing the created date was a way to keep notes pinned to the top of your list. I think there's a lot of other things people edit the created date for, but we could address in a better way.

You think we "shouldn't be editing the created date"? Is there some law or rule we are breaking??

Repeating until understood...

Yes, sorry I didn't mean to imply any editing of the created date is complete craziness. I just meant to say I think most people won't need to do it. I think having things scanned in might be the big exception. Perhaps I'm not organized enough to do that for each specific document. Personally I try to get things into Evernote in the order I receive them and that's sorta good enough for me.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

endless is a bit extreme

due date was already mentioned by your boss, right? creation date is already there. i think the only other serious suggestion i have seen for a metadata field is a comment one for users to put in information as needed. this would seem particularly useful for some use cases.

i don't use the metadata much because it is unavailable on mobile platforms for editing, and it is somewhat laborious now to view it. i have to admit that the inability to select "show note info" in the menu and have it apply to all notes (as it was in the previous versions), instead of just the one you are looking at (as it is now), is a huge step backwards in my opinion. it seems yet another barrier to taking advantage of the rich set of attributes evernote has developed to distinguish itself from other products.

the inability to edit dates is only the most visible casualty of an "improvement" process that has hindered a lot of functionality

just my two cents (assuming, every post i make whining about this issue is equivalent to a tiny piece of a coin)

[JMichaelTX 4,118]

Personally, I think most of the time people shouldn't be editing the created date. Before we had the favorites bar, editing the created date was a way to keep notes pinned to the top of your list. I think there's a lot of other things people edit the created date for, but we could address in a better way.

You think we "shouldn't be editing the created date"? Is there some law or rule we are breaking??

Perhaps you personally don't have much need to change the Creation date, but there are many of us that do.

In addition to the two use cases I gave you above, here are some more:

1. Recording our personal and family history
   
   • This has the potential of being a huge number of notes
     
   • As a new user fully adopts EN they may very want to put a lot of historical data into EN
     
   • So, as one goes through those old boxes of memories, photographs, records, we want to put them into EN with the date the memory occurred.
     

• Future Travel Arrangements
  
  • When I make travel reservations, I always change the Created date to the travel date
    
  • I can easily have multiple reservations per trip, and multiple future trips, so this means lots of Notes
    
  • Changing the Creation date to travel date allow me to quickly list/sort my future travel in proper order
    

  [*]Due Dates

  [*]Expiration Dates

  [*]GTD

  • There are quite a few GTD schemes that rely on setting Creation date
    
  • I think there are probable lots of users, but don't really know.
    

  Please remember that with 60M users and growing rapidly, even a small percent of Evernote users means lots of users that are impacted by your restrictive design solutions.

  If only 10% are affected, that is 6,000,000 users.

[jefito 5,598]

Sure -- I understand the dynamic. I wasn't promoting any changes, just commenting on what I think has happened...

[dlu 628]

If there were plentiful date fields (note creation date, document creation date, update date, due date), then folks could use them in a more straightforward manner. As it is, people who want due date functionality are pretty much forced into overloading the currently existing creation date field, as that is the date field that doesn't get touched by Evernote once the note is created (unlike the updated date).

Yeah I have a love/hate relationship with that idea. On the one hand, it'd be nice if the created date would actually be only touched by the system. But on the other hand, I don't want to end up with endless amounts of metadata. Though in this case I guess its just one extra field

[jefito 5,598]

If there were plentiful date fields (note creation date, document creation date, update date, due date), then folks could use them in a more straightforward manner. As it is, people who want due date functionality are pretty much forced into overloading the currently existing creation date field, as that is the date field that doesn't get touched by Evernote once the note is created (unlike the updated date).

[dlu 628]

Yes, sorry I didn't mean to imply any editing of the created date is complete craziness. I just meant to say I think most people won't need to do it. I think having things scanned in might be the big exception. Perhaps I'm not organized enough to do that for each specific document. Personally I try to get things into Evernote in the order I receive them and that's sorta good enough for me.

[BurgersNFries 2,407]

Perhaps I'm not organized enough to do that for each specific document. Personally I try to get things into Evernote in the order I receive them and that's sorta good enough for me.

FWIW, I don't always get things into Evernote on a timely basis. Plus, I'm a lot older & have a lot of older documents I want to get into Evernote. BUT...since I'm also basically lazy, what I do is give the document a meaningful file name such as "YYYYMMDD article from newspaper on local coffee shops" where YYYYMMDD is the date of the publication/letter. Then I copy it to an import folder where it gets imported into Evernote & the note title defaulted to the file name. That way I don't have to change the created date. Sometimes I do, when I have the time or when I'm retroactively entering journal/diary entries from my older systems. But I do make it a point to include the date of the document in most, if not all my scans. Then I can easily do an intitle search on the YYYY or YYYYMM or YYYYMMDD to find what I'm looking for.

[huladaddy 24]

I think the creation date is great (and meant) for this.

Personally, I think most of the time people shouldn't be editing the created date.

You do, huh? That may a valid philosophy in some cases, such as creating a text note. But when I scan a paper document, I could care less about the date when I scanned it, I am only interested in when the paper version was created.

[JMichaelTX 4,118]

With the sliding pane, you'd end up with 4 panes on the screen? That definitely seems like too many panes. It also starts to feel like editing metadata is equally important and frequent as creating the note in the first place.

I don't like the sliding pane approach either. I would prefer either a normal, movable popup window, or a Tab with only the extra metadata fields.

There are at least two use cases where Created date is as important and frequent as the Title and other metadata on the main note panel:

1. Import/attach file where the Created date needs to be that which is associated with the file (like Statement date, Contract date, Correspondence date, etc)
   
2. Web Clip -- Created date needs to be the Web article date.
   

I do a lot of both of these. I have seen posts by other users that seem to also do a lot of these. jbenson2 is one good example.

[dlu 628]

I think the creation date is great (and meant) for this.

Personally, I think most of the time people shouldn't be editing the created date. Before we had the favorites bar, editing the created date was a way to keep notes pinned to the top of your list. I think there's a lot of other things people edit the created date for, but we could address in a better way.

[dlu 628]

Joining in here to express my dislike at the new way to edit dates. Cumbersome, unpractical, convoluted. A step backwards.

Cumbersome and unpractical, I can see some argument there given some work flows. Convoluted? There's a text field and you type dates out in all of the acceptable formats that Mac OS X allows. I'm going to flat out reject convoluted.

[dlu 628]

Hi dlu,

Any comments on my idea of replacing the translucent info popover with an opaque pane that slides out to the right (same trigger button)?

It would seem to be more consistent with the overall UI, it wouldn't obscure part of the current note like the popover does, and it could be hidden for the casual user or remain open for the power user.

Thoughts?

With the sliding pane, you'd end up with 4 panes on the screen? That definitely seems like too many panes. It also starts to feel like editing metadata is equally important and frequent as creating the note in the first place.

[anjoschu 67]

I'm a bit late to the party, but I too think that editing dates was easier before the update. I put the creation date to use when I scan in my documents from the month: to assign the date received. Many people seem to use a prefix to the title field for this, but I think the creation date is great (and meant) for this. Works like a charm. But I need to perform more steps to do this now. Maybe provide a shortcut to jump directly to the creation date field, pretty please?

I'm pretty much neutral towards the popover. It's as good or bad as any other modal UI element (with the advantage that it shows where it comes from).

A bad drawback is that it obscures the note content. This must not be!

Edit: anjoschu and anjoschu liked this.

Edit 2: Something sliding out somewhere seems like an ok solution. Kind of like it was before (view/hide details).

[cfibanez 10]

Joining in here to express my dislike at the new way to edit dates. Cumbersome, unpractical, convoluted. A step backwards.

[huladaddy 24]

Hi dlu,

Any comments on my idea of replacing the translucent info popover with an opaque pane that slides out to the right (same trigger button)?

It would seem to be more consistent with the overall UI, it wouldn't obscure part of the current note like the popover does, and it could be hidden for the casual user or remain open for the power user.

Thoughts?

[GrumpyMonkey 4,320]

thanks for sharing your thoughts about the development at Evernote. i guess we will keep disagreeing on this issue