darioangelo

I am a massive EN fanboy and advocate, and confess that I have also tried adapting a GTD orientated task management system within my EN ecosystem. There are superior tools which integrate with EN such as Things 3 that are tactile and enable quick entry. For power users and for those with complexity around task deliverables you cannot beat; Todist, Omnifocus or Things 3. At least for now - I look forward to the further development of EN Tasks and the day when I can streamline my apps.

Exactly my view - same goes with pdf editing and handwriting - EN's efforts in these areas seems to be token at best - business card scanning is now best dealt by Cardhop by flexibits - EN should focus on doing fewer things better than anyone else and partner with market leaders to enhance the workflow experience.

The question then is why would EN bother to create Tasks? Why not encourage and facilitate a tighter integration with the likes of Omnifocus, Todist and Things ?

@PinkElephant I entirely agree with you. At least EN is recognising the needs of the EN community and moving in the right direction. The most widely respected task management apps are well known-EN should look to calibrate against these. Then we will have a game changer.

I would be keen to understand how to implement a smooth GTD methodology using Tasks. To optimise my workflow, I have been using Things 3 - I worked hard to create an intra EN GTD system, and tried all the various setups. In the end I found myself spending too much time on the system itself rather than the system delivering me Task Managment support. I use Taskclone; to connect my EN notes to actions in Things 3. For emails, within my Outlook Email client with EN add-in, I can tag a note and it goes straight to EN with a link to Things 3; alternatively, in Sparkmail which integrates directly to EN and Things 3 it’s a simple swipe action.

@PinkElephant agree - however, it exemplified a time when EN was at the leading edge. I am a big supporter of EN but find that it has now evolved to being just a convenient bulk store and retrieval system. You cannot - as far as I can determine effectively annotate a PDF within the app- the Skitch type features are too simplistic-so I end up exporting a PDF to another app like PDF Expert or GoodNotes 5 and then re-importing it back in?

The simple workaround is to use Scannable to scan the business card to EN and automatically export the details to your Contacts app. I am trying the new flexibits (makers of Fantastical) Cardhop a contacts data base and which has just rolled out Cardhop 2 with a business card and letterhead scanning feature. The previous EN business card scanning feature also integrated it with LinkedIn which made it a very powerful feature; following a meeting to scan a business card once and; 1. digitise it into Evernote; 2. extract it’s details and export them into contacts, and; 3. invite the person to join your LinkedIn network. I am of the view that we have lost many invaluable features which made the old EN a powerhouse, I am finding that I am adding other smart apps to my workflow to make up for EN’s deficiencies and lost features.

@Horace_NYCagree, we all need to be patient. I feel that we are in for a treat with future updates that ship a credible task management functionality that is baked into our Home dashboard. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

Airmail in my experience a great looking client with tons of features but it is very buggy. I strongly recommend Sparkmail if you are looking for a robust client with a smooth integration with EN. Outlook has also come a long way.

I think that we have witnessed an accidental leak, or a teaser, of what is to come. It looks like a sweet reward and vindication for all of us EN true believers ＼（^０＾）／

Agree @jeanmieleand @Phargraves2, I miss this once great EN feature which also had a cool integration with LinkedIn. The only work around that I have found is to use Scannable which recognises business card scans and sends data to contacts and saves the card scan to a EN notebook.

😀@MvdH

I completely understand and support where @Oberdada is coming from and his particular needs. A task management approach should resonate not only with your thinking process, the type of work that you do, your level of responsibility and also your personal and community obligations. A trusted system enables a healthy detachment. For a long time EN was my go to GTD system (I have previously written about it in this Forum); it is now my capture (and reference storage) tool. I also use apps such as GoodNotes 5 for note taking and pdf annotation as Skitch just doesn't cut it. So out if necessity, I am somewhat used to venturing out of the EN ecosystem to gain the sharpest tools. My work has many interfaces, and is high in its intensity- my particular setup helps me to deal with all it's moving parts. I look forward to the day when EN gains and regains sufficient features and capabily, so that I may once again rely on it exclusively for my GTD, and also save a bundle of money on other app subscriptions.

@MvdH You seem to be on a similar journey that many of us who are passionate about Evernote (EN) and GTD have been on. From my own experience, our quest for an efficient and effective workflow, invariably drives us to; minimising the number of tools (or apps), and making the most of our much loved EN which is the best for capture (and retrieval.) The challenge is the GTD piece. It is important that any system does not, consume inordinate time and gamify task management. Whatever investment is made in terms of learning, subscribing to and administering a system, the system should deliver a tangible return. I have tried all the various techniques that singularly deploy EN (and even developed my own); for me they all fell short in providing the agility and flexibility, and review of my work and personal deliverables. My research and trials; finally led me to settle on Omnifocus which integrates well with EN and my email client; Sparkmail. Omnifocus, allows me to ”slice and dice” my tasks by any vector (perspective, in Omnifocus parlance) such as; contexts (tags)- people, agenda’s, place, projects, and even a return on effort (eisenhower), errands, etc. It is feature rich and includes a cool geo fencing capability. Realistically, EN, cannot be expected to cater for GTD power users , so we should deploy it's power to capture and clarify, and then organise, reflect and engage using Omnifocus or another similar specialised app. Most GTD systems singularly using EN, can become time consuming hacks, at least with the current EN version. Your task management needs are quite heavy; hence I would strongly recommend that you adopt a specialist app to work in concert with EN. Expecting EN to manage a power users task management needs, is no different to expecting say Apple to have a leading edge email client or calendar app, and satisfisfy it's broad user demographic at the same time; an impossible expectation - hence why , Fantastical, and Spark (and a few others) are popular for power users. EN future versions I suspect will better address task management. I hope this helps. In the meantime, let's hope for a better set (and reinstatement) of EN core features such as handwriting, pdf annotation and business card scanning.🤞

Thank you, I will give Dropbox Paper a try.