(Archived) Tags, notebooks and their counter. I don't get it.

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UPDATE 1:

My problem seems (for me) to be a bug. CMD-SHIFT-A still shows tags from a selected notebook which aren't related to any notes. Check my screenshots further down.

UPDATE 2:

Support Ticket # 16051-125444

Hi together,

I don't get the logic behind the numbering/counting displayed next to notebooks and tags.

Selecting a notebook I would presume that this would filter all my notes down to the ones in this notebook, right? Ok. So now - after selecting a notebook - I select a tag below the notebook list with a counter at 42 for example. Why do I get an empty list?

I know why. Because the pre-selected notebook doesn't contain any notes with this tag. But why is this tag labeled with (in my example) 42 although it doesn't contain anything? Why is this tag shown at all?

I mean its ok to show all tags at all times since the logic behind tags is to access notes system-wide over all notebooks. But this feature(?) is something in between that I don't get. And it annoys me every time!

Is my sense of logic wrong or have I set something wrong in the display settings? I've tried shift-cmd-a but without any effect.

Thanks a million in advance!!

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

Hi. I guess I never thought about navigation like that. In my mind, notebooks, tags, and saved searches are completely different ways to navigate your account, and they have no connection to one another. Our accounts are set up this way as well, and tags exist entirely independent from notebooks.

However, because all of these navigational icons are in the same left-hand pane, I can see how they would appear to have a relationship with one another. I can see how you would be expecting the navigation pane to be a bit "smarter" and recognize that you are now in notebook X and are no longer interested in seeing tags associated with notes that don't exist in notebook X. Then again, another user might go into notebook X in order to apply new tags to some notes there and be dismayed to find the tags disappearing from the left-hand pane

I don't know what the best solution would be. The current interface might be the best compromise between predicting what users will do and not closing off activities due to assumptions about user behavior.

As another point on the graph, I usually close the navigation pane entirely. This makes sense, because I have very few notebooks (http://www.princeton.edu/~cmayo/evernote-notebook.html).

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Then again, another user might go into notebook X in order to apply new tags to some notes there and be dismayed to find the tags disappearing from the left-hand pane

Thanks for your insight. I never thought about it that way! I think it would be ok to not let the tags (in the list) disappear when selecting a notebook. But it would be more legit to at least decrease the counter next to the tags to the number of notes containing it. Which would mean zero, if no notes are available.

I don't want to compare myself with everyone else but this drives me nuts

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

Then again, another user might go into notebook X in order to apply new tags to some notes there and be dismayed to find the tags disappearing from the left-hand pane

Thanks for your insight. I never thought about it that way! I think it would be ok to not let the tags (in the list) disappear when selecting a notebook. But it would be more legit to at least decrease the counter next to the tags to the number of notes containing it. Which would mean zero, if no notes are available.

I don't want to compare myself with everyone else but this drives me nuts

If it is driving you nuts, it is driving you nuts. You and I only have anecdotal use cases to go on (only Evernote can quantify usage patterns), but we are users, and so our opinions count for something!

As for me, I think if I saw my note counters decreasing, I'd be a bit surprised. Again, that's because I treat each type of navigation independent of the others, and wouldn't expect to see them interacting, since they have no connection to one another (in my mind). However, I can definitely see your point!

How about this?

tag one 20/39

tag two 5/42

The first number would be notes with that tag in the current notebook, and the second one would be the total number. Would something like this be more along the lines of what you want to see?

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I think that would be a great solution since it would fit both of our needs!

To be honest I can't see how you can completely separate both navigations (notebooks and tags) from each other :-)

Don't you always have to be sure to select "all notebooks" before navigating through your tag list to truly receive all notes containing that one tag you clicked on?

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

I think that would be a great solution since it would fit both of our needs!

To be honest I can't see how you can completely separate both navigations (notebooks and tags) from each other :-)

Don't you always have to be sure to select "all notebooks" before navigating through your tag list to truly receive all notes containing that one tag you clicked on?

Glad to hear you liked my solution. Now, let's see if the developers do

I use an analogy with Russian stacking dolls to explain the relationship between notes, notebooks, stacks, and your account (http://www.princeton...-notebook.html. If you think of things this way, technically speaking, notes are contained in notebooks, and because tags are attached to notes, you are correct in saying that they have a relationship to the notebooks.Good point! However, it is more guilt by association, though, because the tags can exist in multiple notebooks simultaneously (this is where that stacking doll analogy crumbles apart).

Maybe, I can explain what I see another way. You are not really "navigating" your notes in the left pane. You click on "All Notebooks" or "All Notes" because you are removing all of the search filters (we used to be able to see these, but cannot now, so you will have to go to the Windows or Web client to see what I mean). It isn't exactly "navigation" in the sense of wandering through the folders in your hard drive on your computer, or something like that. Instead, it is like covering up one eye so that you cannot see other stuff. You never actually go anywhere, but just choose how much you want to see.

So, when I say I close my left pane, it isn't really because I have so few notebooks and don't need it. I could have 249 and I would still do the same thing. Rather, I am just typing in my filters directly into the search field instead of clicking on the notebook icons. For example: "notebook:evernote tag:forums june" would (if such things actually existed in my account) show me all of the notes in the "evernote" notebook with "june" in them with the "forums" tag. Does this make sense? I'll try to dig up some screenshots if it doesn't.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

Egg on my face, foot in my mouth, and crow in my tummy! I think I was wrong about how the left-pane is working and I totally misunderstood what was happening. Sorry about leading the conversation astray.

I had no idea about this until now, but you can select a notebook, then right-click on the tags and hide unassigned tags (shift + cmd + a), and see only tags attached to notes in that notebook. The number displayed next to the tag shows the number of notes associated with the tag, not the number of notes in the notebook that have that tag. In other words, if you have two notes with a tag, and only one is in the notebook you are viewing, the tag list will still display two, even after using shift+cmd+a.

So, whether I am "right" or "wrong" about the relationship between tags and notebooks, it is irrelevant. The left-pane of the user interface is establishing a relationship between the two, but only partially, and now the OP's frustration in the first post makes a lot more sense to me. The "solution" I proposed above not only seems valid, but necessary, because the current user interface only "kind-of" displays the connection. Yes, it shows the tags in the notebook (as expected), but the number next to it is misleading/meaningless at that point (someone who knows to hide the unassigned tags in a notebook is presumably looking to see how many notes have the tag as well).

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I'm quite sure (only my?) CMD-SHIFT-A function is buggy. Check my attached screen shot.

I've only got one note with one tag. Although my "_Inbox" is selected I still get a bunch of other (older) tags shown in my tags-list. They are all empty except for "0-täglich".

I just created two example notebooks and played around with this issue but never could repeat it. Is there any chance of "refreshing" the tags list somehow?

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

I don't know if you can reset this. Shift + CMD + A ought to be working, but maybe we are doing something wrong. Does right-click -> select "Hide unassigned tags" change anything?

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No chance GrumpyMonkey but thanks for sticking with me on this.

I think I'll try to delete Evernote and give it a new sync. This can't be a solid solution for future work with Evernote though (if it works at all).

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

No chance GrumpyMonkey but thanks for sticking with me on this.

I think I'll try to delete Evernote and give it a new sync. This can't be a solid solution for future work with Evernote though (if it works at all).

You're welcome! You might also want to get with support (see link in my signature below) to see if they can help out. Good luck with it -- make sure to sync and backup too!

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Ok I narrowed down the problem:

SHIFT-CMD-A hides all unused tags (which is ok) + shows all other tags*, that are in use in the notes that contain the selected tag (ok) + all nested tags of tags*.

And thats the issue that confuses me in three points: These (unnecessary displayed) nested tags

- are not related to the selected tag,

- don't contain any notes

- display a wrong number (sum) if the tag is in use somewhere else

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

Thanks for the great screenshots. I'll give it a try on my end as well, but I suspect we'll come up with similar results. Have you reported this in a customer support ticket? If so, please post the ticket number here, because that will enable other employees to flag the issue if they come across this thread. We are headed into the weekend in the US, so it might take a couple of days, but please be patient. Keep us updated!

I'll update the thread later when I have played around a little bit with the same setup. Other users may have already encountered the issue too, and hopefully they'll share their thoughts here too!

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Just reported this to the customer support

Ticket # 16051-125444

I'll keep you up to date here. Have a nice weekend.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,319]

Just reported this to the customer support

Ticket # 16051-125444

I'll keep you up to date here. Have a nice weekend.

Thanks! I'll keep an eye out for your updates. Enjoy the weekend

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Thanks for flagging for us. We're aware of the issue, and this shouldn't be a problem in a forthcoming release, though I don't have any ETAs on that issue. Again, thank you for flagging!

So I suppose we just have to wait for the next few updates.