Uneven spacing between bullet list, even after "Simplify Formatting"?

[ebruin 4]

I've had this nagging problem for years where I can't get bullets to space properly. What I've noticed is uneven spacing within a single bullet list object (although I'm unaware of a "reveal codes" to be sure these are really one object). I'm not trying to modify the spacing globally - I'm fine with the default line-by-line, but I'd also be fine with 1.5x or double-spacing.

 

Check out this image with a single bullet list (whole list in yellow, there's some pre- and post- text in there to make nice clean bounds for the list). The spacing seems to be "regular" in this case (not doubled or anything like that). I would expect the same spacing between bullets of the same depth and ones of different depth, which is generally the case. The expected behavior when going from Indent Level 1 back to Indent Level 0 is a match amount of space after the IL1 line as from any other IL1->IL1 or IL0->IL0. See the orange box to show an example of correct, usual, and generally expected behavior.

 

Unfortunately I quite frequently find what happens highlighted by the pink arrow, where a step down from IL1->IL0 causes something akin to 1.5x line spacing. When attempting to fix this I often get the double-bullet behavior shown in blue. The green sections are "everything all good, captain!".

 

I've obviously already tried Simply Formatting to clean up any unseen cruft, but that doesn't work. My only workaround to-date is to flatten the list then manually go through and re-indent everything (which is a terrible solution, especially since EN doesn't have a mass-indent command like Word does).

 

Thoughts on what's wrong and how to fix it? Thanks!

 

[gazumped 11,652]

Hi - Although bullet list formatting has been improved (in some clients?) it's still not exactly presentation quality.  Where content matters I always use an external app for layout and attach the file to my note.  The content goes in there as a copy/ paste to give me search keywords.  I'm not bothered about the appearance then.

[ebruin 4]

Yeah, I've thought about that. Frankly I don't use Evernote for anything other eyeballs see. For a company (Evernote) that's trying so hard to provide "business tools" as their premium value proposition, I think they are falling woefully short! I'm a paid business user and I actively espouse the product to many people for various reasons, however, I specifically tell them it is *not* a useful tool for presentations and/or anything other than personal note taking. Don't even get me started on the differences in UX between the iOS and Android native apps! Ha...

 

Thanks for your idea, though. =]

[gazumped 11,652]

You're very welcome  

[lhb 65]

The representation on different clients (Windows vs MAC) is different, wrt bullet spacing.

 

Also, there are other cross-platform inconsistencies: Some platforms have the indent/outdent buttons,

• Mac (latest version) doesn't.
• On Windows and web, do but
  • on web, the minuscule buttons are "indent", then "outdent"
  • on Windows, they are "outdent", then "indent".

The functionality indenting/outdenting from the keyboard with highlighting text, then using "tab" or "shift tab", is different in the various clients.

 

This cross-platform inconsistencies make Evernote difficult to use for outlining, not to speak of formatting text for consumption by others.

 

Another useful thing for outlining: Most office tools switch automatically to "bulleted" mode once you start typing a line with "*", but Evernote doesn't. Unfortunately I got used to that convenience.

 

 

 

Some other annoying things, regarding consistency and formatting:

 

• "simplify formatting" has different effects on different clients (eg, web vs Windows/MAC). 
• (and, notes clipped with "Clearly" can never be really simplified anymore, since the "clearly" formatting is hardcoded in the note and unaffected by simplify)