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Prioritize To Do Lists?


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Hi and welcome,

This is not currently possible. You'd have to manually move list items around based on your needs. A bit labour intensive. I have opted to not keep very active "to-do" lists in Evernote for this reason, using Wunderlist for this type of things instead. (For less frequently changed lists, I may use Evernote, but for things I might move, check, un-check, add to multiple times a day, I find Evernote cumbersome). 
 

You aren't the first to request this feature, and Evernote does read these forums, so you can count your request as added to the pile. It's up to Evernote as to whether they intend to, or are able to, implement something like this. 

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Is there anyway to prioritize a do list built with the checkbox button? If not, there should be.

Well, Evernote is not a task manager, nor are they trying to be. There are many good ones out there. Similarly, you can add tables to a note, but EN is not a spreadsheet.

Pass. For "true" to do/task list management, I use a, well, true task list/to do list manager.  When I use checkboxes in Evernote, it's for things like an "intermediate" series of tasks.  IE, I'm working on a project that may take only a few hours (say, less than four).  But I will be multi tasking & the list is to simply keep track of what's been done & what the next step is.

 

Or for other things that are not tasks, such as sending out invitations to a party.  I make a list of invitees & then tick the box when that person has been sent an invitation.

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I keep my old archived documents in Evernote, DropBox, and OneDrive.

 

But for current action items, I use Google Keep to manage my To Do list.

  • Items checked are automatically moved from the To Do area to the Checked area.
  • Able to view and edit the same tasks on my desktop computer, my laptop, and my smart phone.
  • Items can be moved around as my priorities change.
  • Plus it instantly syncs immediately (unlike Evernote)
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While you can use Evernote for todos, and many do, I eventually stopped since I spent a lot of time fiddling to make it fit my needs and it felt like I was trying to get a square peg into a round hole.  I shopped around, tried many and settled on Todoist and have not looked back.  Multi-platform, fast sync and organized in a way that works with my brain.  It maintains a list of completed items but I also use Zapier to copy completed items to Evernote.  I have no affiliation with Todoist, I'm just a very satisfied user.

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While you can use Evernote for todos, and many do, I eventually stopped since I spent a lot of time fiddling to make it fit my needs and it felt like I was trying to get a square peg into a round hole.  I shopped around, tried many and settled on Todoist and have not looked back.  Multi-platform, fast sync and organized in a way that works with my brain.  It maintains a list of completed items but I also use Zapier to copy completed items to Evernote.  I have no affiliation with Todoist, I'm just a very satisfied user.

 

Are you a premium user or a free user? I gave Todoist a try, but when I tried to employ a few very basic features (reminders/notes), it said those were premium options. I'm all for paying for software - it's not that, it's just....seems like reminders should be included. It would be like Microsoft giving away Word for free and then the minute you write more than one sentence it says "anything > 1 sentence is a premium feature". 

 

Sorry - don't mean to sound negative. It does sound like a cool app and from the little I've used it, it is.

 

I'm on Any.Do myself right now, but I've been bouncing between apps like, well, I don't know....but it's bouncy.

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Hey everyone!

 

As BurgersNFries said, Evernote is not trying to be a task manager, but there are some task management applications that have natively integrated Evernote into their product so that Evernote users can create task lists from their Notes. Take for example Azendoo. They have integrated an automatic synchronization between Evernote and their application. Plus, they even let you create a task list directly from the checkboxes in your Note. Here's the link to a user case if you're interested: Evernote Checkboxes to Azendoo Tasks

Hope it helps. 

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While you can use Evernote for todos, and many do, I eventually stopped since I spent a lot of time fiddling to make it fit my needs and it felt like I was trying to get a square peg into a round hole.  I shopped around, tried many and settled on Todoist and have not looked back.  Multi-platform, fast sync and organized in a way that works with my brain.  It maintains a list of completed items but I also use Zapier to copy completed items to Evernote.  I have no affiliation with Todoist, I'm just a very satisfied user.

 

Are you a premium user or a free user? I gave Todoist a try, but when I tried to employ a few very basic features (reminders/notes), it said those were premium options. I'm all for paying for software - it's not that, it's just....seems like reminders should be included. It would be like Microsoft giving away Word for free and then the minute you write more than one sentence it says "anything > 1 sentence is a premium feature". 

 

Sorry - don't mean to sound negative. It does sound like a cool app and from the little I've used it, it is.

 

I'm on Any.Do myself right now, but I've been bouncing between apps like, well, I don't know....but it's bouncy.

 

I started as a free user and quickly switched to premium not because of what premium added but because I found the software valuable to me and worth supporting.  I was an early EN premium member for the same reason.  To this day I still don't come close to the additional upload limits provided by premium and could easily live off the free version.  We each have to decide what is worth paying for, but I do find the focus on free software by many to be a bit puzzling.  Aren't programmers deserving of a paycheck? :-)

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"Well, Evernote is not a task manager, nor are they trying to be. There are many good ones out there. Similarly, you can add tables to a note, but EN is not a spreadsheet."

 

Sorry, but I find this to be such a strange response, especially from an "evangelist".

 

The original poster suggests something he thinks would make Evernote better. The quote above is pretty much just a dismissal of that suggestion - Evernote isn't a task manager, so there is no need to improve how it handles tasks.

 

Yet Evernote has Reminders, it lets you manually order them, it allows you to set a due date and time for them, it will send you an email to remind you to do them - all things that help you manage tasks. Evernote may not bill itself as a task manager, but it does have features that help you manage tasks. So why be dismissive of a suggestion for improvement? 

 

I've noticed this attitude before - when someone suggests an improvement to text editing, they get a response back that Evernote isn't a text editor. I may misunderstand the role of Evangelist - I would think it is someone who helps users, not someone who simply defends the status quo. If you don't think a suggestion is a good one, you could always not say anything.

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The original poster suggests something he thinks would make Evernote better. The quote above is pretty much just a dismissal of that suggestion - Evernote isn't a task manager, so there is no need to improve how it handles tasks.

 

 

The post you are referring to (from BurgersNFries) in no way suggests that Evernote has no need to improve. BnF's point was that evernote is not explicitly a task manager and as such some key task management features aren't up to the task of task management. Someone who needs serious task management might consider various other options. BnF's post does not address the second part of the original post, which was the request. Since it doesn't address the request itself (It only addresses the first part, the question about whether it is possible), we can't really tell what BnF thinks can we?

 

To me, BnF's post sounds like:

"Evernote doesn't do what you want, so you might look elsewhere"

NOT

"Your idea is bad and Evernote is perfect". 

 

At no point did BnF say that reordering list items is a bad idea or shouldn't be implemented. If you think that is what she said you are putting words in her mouth. 

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@kencoach

one thing you might try is having a notebook stack called "todos" and then prioritize on sub-notebooks, you can then see your reminders broke down on these "priority notebooks" -> you can then, if necessary, sort the individual notes. But I believe this flow together with todo dates might help you organize things better.

on a sidenote, it's a bit sad how many threads in the en community turn out into flame wars on topics not relevant to the OP.

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Hi Bob,

I don't believe BNF wasn't trying to dismiss the poster. She was acknowledging their feature request by replying. While doing so, she also let OP know that despite the current basic To Do functions we do have, and despite the many requests for more (from myself included ☺), that Evernote keeps saying it never wants to become a task management software in the sense that dedicated apps like Azendoo, etc. are.

I know that sometimes the Evangalists can come across a bit abrasive or short, but I also try to remember they just users like ourselves and recieve no compensation of any kind for the long hours they put in here on the forum. I don't think they are ever *trying* to be rude or dismissive, but they all have families, full-time jobs and full lives outside of Evernote.

It must get a little tiring to answer the same questions, or respond to the same feature requests, a few dozen times a day... I think the brief answers are just faster and less of headache for them than trying to couch every single post response in a "happy voice," for lack of a better term.

Anyway, that's just my take on posts like the one BNF left here.

Cheers!

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on a sidenote, it's a bit sad how many threads in the en community turn out into flame wars on topics not relevant to the OP.

Because people have opinions that differ from other people's opinions, and also because what someone writes is not always interpreted as what they meant. This is common phenomenon on the Internet, and in life in general, and not unique to this user forum.
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Evernote gets a bad rap when it comes to task management, I do not think its justified - personally I love it for managing tasks, and it delivers according to my needs. I have tried many dedicated task managers, but have come back to Evernote for the following reasons:


 

- I use evernote for everything in business, from meeting notes to contacts to starred emails in gmail to business ideas, to product details, I like to keep things simple and usable and Evernote delivers for me on task management too- I  use their reminders feature in a "2do" stack where I break down business & personal 2do's - it works very well, sorry for those who think otherwise..

 

Other reasons it works for me:

 

- meeting notes can make reminders if contain actionable items quickly and easily

- I really enjoy working within evernote

- syncs very well (after learning the hard way with Wunderlist which lost all my subtasks a while back )

- one place not switching between systems

- one system on Evernote makes everything a lot more visible

- presentation mode is awesome  :)
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Evernote gets a bad rap when it comes to task management, I do not think its justified - personally I love it for managing tasks, and it delivers according to my needs. I have tried many dedicated task managers, but have come back to Evernote for the following reasons:

 
- I use evernote for everything in business, from meeting notes to contacts to starred emails in gmail to business ideas, to product details, I like to keep things simple and usable and Evernote delivers for me on task management too- I  use their reminders feature in a "2do" stack where I break down business & personal 2do's - it works very well, sorry for those who think otherwise..
 
Other reasons it works for me:
 
- meeting notes can make reminders if contain actionable items quickly and easily
- I really enjoy working within evernote
- syncs very well (after learning the hard way with Wunderlist which lost all my subtasks a while back )
- one place not switching between systems
- one system on Evernote makes everything a lot more visible
- presentation mode is awesome  :)

 

I really wanted to use Evernote for many of the reasons you mentioned and tried hard to use it for todos, but FWIW the main deal breakers for me were:

 

- reminders not visible in list view (I'm not a big fan of snippets and I hate card view)

- no recurring reminders (I use this feature a lot and rescheduling requires a lot of fiddling)

- no easy way to bump todos from one day to the next (happens more than I care to admit)

 

I'm not knocking it, it just doesn't fill my needs.  I will admit to being a little bit let down when this was rolled out after Phil's early "Do App" comments.  I was hoping for something special and different and EN's implementation is really neither and there hasn't been any new development on it as far as I can tell.

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(I haven't heard much from the CEO lately.)

Here is an excerpt from Phil Libin's "Do App" comment:

 

 
Dec 8, 2011 - Evernote - What's coming next?
We asked Evernote CEO Phil Libin point-blank if to-do lists, which are a popular use for Evernote, are coming. 
"To-do lists are coming," he said after taking a deep breath.

<snip>
Libin also took pains to stress that it wouldn't look and feel like traditional to-do list apps.

"I don't want a to-do app, I want a DO app. I don't want a list," Libin said.

Search Code 47ER92

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Reminders are visible in list view. I too work exclusively in list view. See screenshot below:Screen%20Shot%202014-07-09%20at%204.17.5

Hmmm ... not in Windows, unless I'm missing something obvious (and it wouldn't be the first time).

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Hmmm ... not in Windows, unless I'm missing something obvious (and it wouldn't be the first time).

That's correct, unfortunately. Fortunately for me, I use snippet view almost exclusively (note more room for my note content!).

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Reminders are visible in list view. I too work exclusively in list view. See screenshot below:Screen%20Shot%202014-07-09%20at%204.17.5

 

 

There are two versions of the List View

 

The standard List View as shown by ScottLougheed

and

The new and improved Vertical List View (Ctrl + Shift +F5)

http://www.evernote.com/shard/s2/sh/1a494a7a-60d6-42fe-8ca3-9e36ced9df5b/3f67daf3f29d432a98ac66c63f1a6e60

 

I am not able to view any reminders in the Vertical List View.  Due to the massive amount of additional real estate available for my note titles and actual note content, I use the VLV 100% of the time.

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Reminders are visible in list view. I too work exclusively in list view. See screenshot below:Screen%20Shot%202014-07-09%20at%204.17.5

 

 

There are two versions of the List View

 

The standard List View as shown by ScottLougheed

and

The new and improved Vertical List View (Ctrl + Shift +F5)

http://www.evernote.com/shard/s2/sh/1a494a7a-60d6-42fe-8ca3-9e36ced9df5b/3f67daf3f29d432a98ac66c63f1a6e60

 

I am not able to view any reminders in the Vertical List View.  Due to the massive amount of additional real estate available for my content, I use the VLV 100% of the time.

 

I prefer vertical list view as well but did check horizontal before posting and didn't see them there either.  Do you?

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I prefer vertical list view as well but did check horizontal before posting and didn't see them there either.  Do you?

 

 

I just checked the Evernote Knowledgebase.

It doesn't look like reminders are supported in the Windows Client.

http://www.evernote.com/shard/s2/sh/43fd3ff8-8f6f-4d85-b9f0-ac44479990b4/e2cd3eb638bacb86781e333250ed49eb

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I prefer vertical list view as well but did check horizontal before posting and didn't see them there either.  Do you?

 

I just checked the Evernote Knowledgebase.

It doesn't look like reminders are supported in the Windows Client.

http://www.evernote.com/shard/s2/sh/43fd3ff8-8f6f-4d85-b9f0-ac44479990b4/e2cd3eb638bacb86781e333250ed49eb

Very odd...

 

But unfortunately not very surprising.  Documentation has never been a strong point with Evernote (IMO).

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The Windows client definitely DOES support reminders - they display in the Snippet and Card views, but not (for some reason) in the List views.

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The Windows client definitely DOES support reminders - they display in the Snippet and Card views, but not (for some reason) in the List views.

Yes it definitely does.  I was just commenting that it was not surprising to me that the documentation was not accurate.

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