Text Editor in Windows Client is Buggy and Lacks Real Undo Capability

[Tone Engel 8]

I'm perpetually frustrated by the text editor in the Windows client.

Too often an inadvertent change can't be undone. Typically its as simple as pasting something into a note and then realizing that I didn't want the formatting. It invariably proves to be impossible to undo the paste action which leaves me with a hunk of formatted text that bleeds undesired and invisible format changes into the note even after the visible content of the paste operation is deleted.

Working with multi-level numerical outlines is also broken. When things get a bit complicated weird things start happening that are frustrating to work around. In a list I just created in a note, changing the indent level of a numbered line left spurious numbered blank line behind. The line can't be deleted. Only by merging and re-separating adjacent numbered lines can I cause the odd line to bubble down to an area of matching indent level whereupon I can finally get rid of it.

These are just two examples.

Just about every time I create a note with any kind of non-trivial formatting - something breaks and I spend a frustrating amount of time just trying to maintain my formatting.

This is NOT conducive to staying focused on note taking.

This is a long running issue with the Evernote client that I keep hoping will improve with each new revision.

To date I don't have the feeling that any significant progress is being made in this direction.

PLEASE put more time into testing the text editor.

It feels very much like there's an underlying markup document schema that isn't being consistency checked across client induced operations.

-Tone Engel

[chodorowicz 9]

2nd it! Undo function which quite often is not functioning (after pasting content with some formatting) is so annoying! I might also add almost complete lacking of table editing functions - please, add at least possibility to easily merge two tables with the same number of columns.

[dlu 628]

Thanks for posting. The undo after paste issue has come up before and it's on the list. (As well as some of the other things you've listed)

[J Sin 0]

+1

Every time I use the desktop editor on Windows, I consider ditching evernote entirely. It's that bad!

In fact I found this topic by Googling "evernote editor ***** OR broken OR *****" :-(

One of my main use cases is copying content from a web page or some other window (eg command prompt).

Invariably the content is mangled (for example, with a background color I can't then get rid off)

A "clear all formatting from selection" command would help a lot (similar to Word).

thanks in anticipation...

[jefito 5,589]

A "clear all formatting from selection" command would help a lot (similar to Word).

Have you tried making a selection, right-clicking, and selecting "Simplify Formatting"?

[J Sin 0]

Thanks for the suggestion.

I selected three contiguous paragraphs with a coloured font and grey background. It corrects the last 2, but leaves the first unchanged.

If I select a single paragraph (as I've probably tried in the past), it doesn't do anything. Version 4.5.6.6884

[vineetw 21]

Tone Engel,

Thanks for the report - ticket #5230 has been filed for this issue.

[CGiven 1]

I have to agree, the editor is really buggy. Not only in the Windows client, but also the web and iPad versions. You'd think a product this long on the market would have stabilized such basic functionality.

[pchainz 0]

For what it's worth, same problem here.

[jefito 5,589]

I think at this point, we may be waiting for the promised "common editor" (already in use in the Mac client) to be added into the Windows client. I don't think that there's any published timeframe; hopefully they work out any kinks in the Mac world first...