(Archived) REQUEST: floating, minimalist notes

[lawliss 11]

I've noticed various other users requesting additional features to allow for a more rich text-editing experience. However, I'm here to request something a little against the flow: a more minimalist, floating note-taker.

Minimalist --> because I find that writing on the current Android app is a pain; there's constant lag during typing, and my notes tend to take anywhere from 3-5 secs to load when switching to them. A more minimalist approach to the UI (not the entire UI; this could be a separate component designed for mobile devices) would allow less use of resources (something which a note-taking app shouldn't use much of)

Floating --> because it would allow for note-taking alongside the use of other apps (browsers, pdf readers, etc). A resizable window that can be minimized would be great, as well.

Currently, I use FLoating Notes 2; which although it fulfills majority of these needs, it doesn't integrate with EN well, aside from exporting notes. I'm sure the EN geniuses could come up with something brilliant.

Looking forward to your new releases, and I hope my suggestions helped.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,314]

I've noticed various other users requesting additional features to allow for a more rich text-editing experience. However, I'm here to request something a little against the flow: a more minimalist, floating note-taker.

Minimalist --> because I find that writing on the current Android app is a pain; there's constant lag during typing, and my notes tend to take anywhere from 3-5 secs to load when switching to them. A more minimalist approach to the UI (not the entire UI; this could be a separate component designed for mobile devices) would allow less use of resources (something which a note-taking app shouldn't use much of)

Floating --> because it would allow for note-taking alongside the use of other apps (browsers, pdf readers, etc). A resizable window that can be minimized would be great, as well.

Currently, I use FLoating Notes 2; which although it fulfills majority of these needs, it doesn't integrate with EN well, aside from exporting notes. I'm sure the EN geniuses could come up with something brilliant.

Looking forward to your new releases, and I hope my suggestions helped.

A brilliant suggestion! I didn't know about that app, and I will be sure to give it a try.

My opinion for Android and iOS is that we ought to have a bare bones version (call it Evernote Simple, Eversimple, or whatever) that just does basic stuff: plain text notes, notebooks, tags, and that is about it. No cameras, no microphones, no sharing with Twitter, etc. Just the basic stuff that works (kind of like Fastever for iOS, except that it allows for navigation of your notes and editing as well). The idea here is that it would launch quickly, wouldn't need to get updated all of the time, and (especially important on mobile) we would have somewhere to go if an update to the main app had trouble for some reason. I am just like you -- I only want something minimalistic for most of my work (though I completely understand why Evernote would be constantly adding all of these other features).

I kind of doubt Evernote will want to make this! However, if there are any third-party Android developers out there reading these forums, I hope they will pick up on your suggestion. I would certainly be interested in it, especially if it floats

[Xavier_ 132]

Thanks for the suggestion.

I'll note the issue (loading time and lag) and the solution you proposed.

[GrumpyMonkey 4,314]

Thanks for the suggestion.

I'll note the issue (loading time and lag) and the solution you proposed.

I'd like to also say that the lag is pretty bad on Android. Using the latest beta, for some notes it takes several seconds to load a note on my Nexus 7 (the app itself does OK), and at times (in meetings) it takes so long that I just give up, open up something else to type in, and copy/paste later. It would be nice if it was snappier. I should say that I do not have my notebooks offline, so it is possible that having them downloaded onto the device would make things faster. I'll give it a try.

[CaptainTime 94]

I can certainly see the benefit of a fast way to create an Evernote from any application on my Android phone. There are times you just want to capture something quickly.

[lawliss 11]

I would like to paint you EN guys/gals a better picture:

• I'm currently using a AT100 Toshiba Thrive tablet w/ Tegra 2 processor & 1gb of ram
  
• I'm also using offline notebooks for the majority of my notes. Strangely, this doesn't seem to make any difference relative to the lag & loading time
  
• I typically only have 3-4 other processes running while reading and taking notes
  
• Nearly every other minimalist note-taking app I've used (Note Everything, Write, etc) have none of these issues when switching back and forth
  
• I've also tried creating a note shortcut and launching it from there, as that seems to only load the note (vs the entire app...not sure if this is true, but it does seem that way)
  

All in all, I've experienced the same issues regardless of changing any and all parameters. Hope this helps!