Don Dz

Would be nice to have multi field sorting like some other programs, to really take advantage of that idea. Would not be surprised if someone has already requested the feature.

For what it's worth, I change the created date to accomplish my preferred sort order in certain views, as it normally never changes unless changed deliberately. If you are talking about a large number of notes, sorting by title and using a script to automatically edit the title would be the way to go, I think. Not that difficult to do in Windows with AutoHotkey.

I wonder if one could encrypt only part of the PDF, at least on a page basis if not smaller, like EN can do.

A feature of Evernote rather than PDF, forgot about it, thanks.

Is that a feature of free software like Adobe Reader or similar, on Windows? This suggestion is actually new to me.

There was a point when I really was much better off without computers. I was also fine without a car. Then I didn't think I needed a cel phone at all. Then I was just fine without color screens on any portable device. I also was fine without getting married. Did ok for a long while without the need for PDF files. I didn't really need to move away from Palm devices years after the company died and everyone else had moved on. I was actually a little happier without Evernote or any of my data on the cloud. 🌨️🌩️ Sometimes the Amish lifestyle looks really good to me. 🤣 >>If something works, it's a really REALLY bad idea to go on fixing it I much prefer how Evernote behaves with nothing but plain text in it, not even tables. Same with most programs I have used over the years. I visited my oldest daughter over Christmas, her apartment was nearly empty. I honestly was jealous. I miss my bike, didn't need anything else. 🚲

I am using the word rather loosely of course, just my impression based on reading many discussions, this data set just adds an angle I was less clear about before. Not the right solution, just how it works for others so I can determine if it can work for me, I gather that where I see a big problem, others see a small inconvenience, just hoped to learn what I can borrow for my use.

Thanks for the comments so far. Whether expressed or simply implied, the "consensus" (if I may call it that) appears to be: 1-For many people, search pollution is probably as bad as I think it is with a lot of PDF files, especially large ones, it's just that people have found ways to cope that works for them. 2-People that add many PDF files "probably" add a lot of scanned content from a paperless office approach, which tend to not be too large individually, much easier to handle. 3-People tend to rely heavily on tag & intitle searches, saved searches, and other types, plus searching for special text body tags, and are probably resigned to less frequent use of simple text content searches, as they consider this a fair trade for the value of having all their PDF files in one place, and available on multiple devices. 4-Date searches for everything is the mantra of at least a few people, especially on the title (observed in other discussions). 5-A fair number rely heavily on scripting and searches saved on the body of notes. All the above solutions I already use to different degrees, the only thing is that, using the GTD method, I tend to feel free to organize my notes after I collect them, whereas some discussions mention the importance of tagging, titling and dating everything while you collect them. This I do sometimes, but I tend to focus on what I am doing rather than organization in the moment.

That's why I started this topic, I see other people happy with a solution I am not satisfied with, so just trying to understand different perspectives.

Probably, I was also thinking it would be the size of the PDF files, the few PDF files I keep on EN are large reference files and some ebooks. Generally if the content is not too large, I tend to copy the content rather than the file, that way EN will highlight whatever I am searching for.

I am guessing you mean you tend to download PDF files directly to Evernote? I generally download them to either my Desktop or Downloads folders, then decide from there. >>General text search is a last resort for me. Most of my data is reference information, so I rely heavily on general text searches, though I use tags a lot as well as other things. From what I have read, I believe you rely heavily on dating every note on the title itself; currently I don't do that since Evernote handles dates well enough. I am not sure dates would make things any easier with PDF files, even some files that come named with dates I tend to remove the date since the description is what I need.

I was thinking more along the lines of how Evernote can be used to organize data, and the issue of organizational clutter rather than note clutter, because PDF files contain too much information, things like note links and tags are not terribly useful with a single large clump of information. Plus they get too many search results that are hard to narrow down in Evernote. Currently I store all my static data files on Windows folders in my main computer I usually handle them with Windows 10 search, Google Desktop, and Adobe Acrobat. Frequently requested features like links within notes would probably not work with PDF files even if implemented, and even though the PDF format itself supports that feature, most large PDF files I download don't appear to take advantage of it. >>PDFs are one format that have a native encryption feature I guess I would have to purchase that functionality, I am not seeing it in the free Windows tools I use.

Those of you with thousands of large PDF files in Evernote, what do you get out of it that you couldn't do more cleanly with Windows search and Adobe Acrobat or similar tools? Aside from moving files from one computer to another (what I do mostly), what is the benefit of attaching so many PDF files? I am trying to rethink how I use Evernote attachments, particularly PDF files. I find the clutter can get unwieldy in a hurry, especially with very large PDF files, searches become nearly useless since the information cannot be easily split and organized into separate notes. Plus a lot of PDF files contain confidential information with no way of encrypting. I exclude them from searches with a tag to help restore some sanity. The ones I have to add for work projects I ended up moving to a separate user name, but those are usually not too large (just too many). My main platform is Windows, it seems even more cluttered on Android and iOS.

Which platform? It is still present in Windows and iOS (probably on Macs too), but not in Android yet. You can only disable that behavior by editing the title directly, if you are not seeing this, did you try rebooting or signing out of Evernote and back in? Sometimes if you create a new note and remove all data in EN Win, the program will automatically create a tittle called "Untitled note" which used to remain but recent versions handle it better.

That's great if that's enough for your needs. The AH script below can add more automation, if you like: 1-It will copy any text in a text field in Evernote, if selected/highlighted, and will paste the clipboard into the search box as an intitle search. Or 2-it will change any text in the search box into an intitle search (uncheck "Clear context on Search" in Options, Search, otherwise the Seach box will be cleared without copying anything). I use Winkey+Z for the hotkey. #z:: IfWinActive ahk_class ENMainFrame { Send ^c Sleep 100 Send {F6} Sleep 200 Send ^a Sleep 100 Send ^x Sleep 200 Send intitle:^v Sleep 100 return } else return For exact matching, replace ^v with "^v". If anything other than a text field is selected, it might not work correctly. If script misbehaves, using higher numbers for "Sleep" should remove any errors.

True, something about the new editor they are using, I surmise it will not go back to the old behavior because of the new editor, though it would be nice if it did.

You can also drag text around in the same manner if you highlight it first.

Possible bug: While importing a bunch of old notes from another program (FlashNote) using Ctrl-Alt-V, I observed that many of them were imported with font size 10, instead of 14 which I have as default. I said possible, because it doesn't always happen, but it seems to have gone away when I set the title font from 10 to 14 also. If I am correct, then maybe the title setting maybe affecting the regular note setting in some way. It could be an issue unique to Flashnote, but Flashnote has no formatting for notes. I wonder whether anyone else observed this behavior.

Do you mean copy is automatic with that code?

Using AutoHotkey, entering two short characters (either qq or qv) gives me the desired search (after first copying the search string) . This is is the code I use: :*:qq::intitle:^v :*:qv::intitle:"^v"

Got it, though in that case there would be no editable content to view within Evernote. Which is what I usually use tables for.

True, creating the table first doesn't remove the first extra space, but it can remove the second under some circumstances.

Funny you mention Word, I have found pasting from Word can sometimes make my notes go quite crazy, get stuck, become uneditable, unexpected behaviors, etc. I only use it if I am confident I will not try to edit the result again, especially when cleaning up web data.

Have you tried the solutions shared by RavBoy? I find they do indeed allow for the removal of the extra space to remain. Per my picture example, the result is not a snug fit (at least not in Windows), but the extra space is reduced by a full line, by half basically. The result looks even better in iOS and Android. I am satisfied with both the result, and how easy it is to implement it, even if no one else is. Evernote sometimes takes years (literally) to fix some problems, so I welcome any partial solutions now.