Flier

I'm gone. I have used and paid for EN for maybe ten years mostly as a file drawer with minimal organization due to the lack of hierarchical folders. At the same time I've been monitoring the years-long thread of users begging for this basic feature. No longer. This appears to be a classic "harvesting" of a brand. Bending Spoons probably got a pretty good price buying EN's user base. So now they are substantially raising prices knowing that switching costs (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/switchingcosts.asp) for some users are high enough that they will be somewhat sticky. Along with the price increase comes a bunch of BS about their wonderful plans for the brand plus a reduction of investment in the brand to near zero. Then they simply ride the dying horse, probably collecting unearned revenue for years. So, for example, the probability of seeing nested folders has gone from almost zero to almost exactly zero. See you all at https://nimbusweb.me/ . The import process is somewhat tedious and clumsy, but it works. I have a few hundred notes imported already.

I think it's game-over for EN. The code is apparently such a poorly documented mess that for years they have been terrified of touching it with a major improvement like folders. The company has now been sold to an Italian company called "Bending Spoons." There has been the usual chest-thumping but my guess is that it was a desperation sale and Bending Spoons will simply harvest the EN revenue for as long as it is attractive. Then RIP Evernote. There will never be an EN folder system.

I use EN minimally, waiting without hope for nested folders. My guess is that to implement such a feature they would have to rip up and re-do some old code that no one understands and management is afraid to touch. This is not a unique problem here. Many applications were originally written based on expectations that did not materialize and the original code is not well-suited to the market they have found.

The Dunning Kruger effect, synopsized: Those who know the least about a subject are the most certain of their opinions. To an extent, @PinkElephant is probably right. The underlying code is old and Evernote has probably evolved away from it's original design features. It's always a little scary to contemplate major changes to old code. But that said, EN is going to have to bite the bullet some day and slide an SQL database under the UI. When? How? No way of knowing.

So you're not very good with nested folders, hence EN should not offer the option? I have literally hundreds of tools, some of which I use very seldom (Posidrv ***** drivers and Whitworth wrenches, for example.) That does not mean that I think they should not be sold. I am just not that arrogant.

And users are somehow obligated to convince you? You are the Grand Poobah? Perhaps you are simply not smart enough to understand. That would be my conjecture.

Oh, wise one, please enlighten us about these simple facts. Possibly you can save the world from its abysmal ignorance. Also, please tell us how you manage to remain so humble given your obvious superiority to mere users.

It must be quite a burden to be smarter than everyone else. But being so smart, it is a little surprising that you didn't notice that @Bluamasyu didn't actually ask for opinions on whether he needs hierarchical folders or not. But that is the way it goes here. Newbie says he needs hierarchical folders, one or two fanboys* jump in to tell him he does not, then one of them offers an ugly workaround that he believes solves the problem. Then the fanboys lay in wait until the next person requests the feature. Silly, really, that I have been subscribed to this thread for years. Childlike faith, I guess, that EN product architects will finally recognize the marketing value of offering a product that is not as crippled as this one is. *Second fanboy, the irrepressible DTLow jumped in as I was typing. ROFL.

@denysoft, Evernote has been refusing to implement this feature for over a decade. Apparently they sell enough software into their niche that they don't care about attracting a wider user base. We are wasting out time even asking, as the response from EN zealots is always the same: a workaround using tags. I continue to subscribe to this thread just in case lightning strikes, but without hierarchical folders EN will continue, for me, to be just a handy place for web clips.

No need to worry about him. I think he the basic three or four of his posts on speed dial. (1) Although I don't know anything about your situation, I am sure that you do not need nested folders. (2) Here is an ugly and clumsy workaround for the lack of nested folders. (3) .... and so on.

Pictures I don't want. "Widgets" I don't want. And if I want to un-***** my screen I have to pay for the privilege? That is a creatively obnoxious way to drive users away. Including me and my $/year. For now, I am going for an older version: https://help.evernote.com/hc/en-us/articles/360052560314-Install-an-older-version-of-Evernote Longer term, if this egregious marketing gouge is not fixed, I am history.

EN: How do I regress to an "update" that works?

Were you reminded of that attitude when you looked in the mirror? It's really tedious monitoring this thread (for years) to see the fan-boys explain over and over why those of us who need folders actually don't, then present baroque workarounds. Keep your tags and eschew folders. Fine with me. There's no reason to ditch tags but these is ample reason to add folders. It's been discussed before but my guess is that the oft-patched EN legacy code never anticipated how EN would be used but that the company is afraid to march into that swamp and try to make major changes. The owners of EN are not stupid; they probably wish that the had folders for marketing reasons alone and regret the constraints keeping them from doing it. So, I use EN primarily as a repository for web clips and maintain a weak hope that it will be made more useful to me someday.

This new release is really a train wreck. In addition to the egregious "update" pop-up: every time my Microsoft Surface wakes up, Evernote muscles its way in and takes the full screen. This regardless of whether it was running at the time or not. Even simple stuff, like the right click no longer brings up options for a notebook, is broken. There is a concept in software development called "regression testing." I guess the developers are having so much fun writing new code that they are leaving this to users. Where/how do I regress to a version that actually works?

Well I have the problem but have not found a way to turn it off either. I have disabled Evernote from the startup file. No joy. It does not seem to have anything running as a service, so how does it even wake up? Another annoying problem is that when my Microsoft Surface 6 Win10 wakes, there is Evernote occupying the full screen. Every time! ?!!!?! %##&#^# Ver 10.5.7 build 2171

I don't think anyone in this endless thread has advocated ditching the tags. Certainly not me. Having a folder structure is an additional capability not an either/or. I would expect to use both, but if a tagaholic wanted to stick with tags that should certainly be possible. Actually, it's requirement due to the size of the installed base. Confession here: I actually don't use tags in EN. My usage is small enough (due to the absence of folders) that simple full-text searches work just fine.

I've been following this inadequacy for years; a few years ago there was discussion/speculation that implementing a folder system might require a rip-up and re-do in an old and often-patched bunch of code. IOW, risky and expensvie. Then about two (?) years ago an EN employee intimated that folders were coming, driven by their aspirations of bigger corporate business. I have seen nothing since, however. Maybe this big re-write they are currently engaged in will also provide this missing capability. (@dtlow, please don't bother to comment on my view that this is a "missing capability." I have seen all your posts. Over. And over. And over.) So I continue to use EN as a sort of secondary tool in my box. I keep looking at Nimbus Notes but the Russian ownership puts me off a little bit. And I monitor here as the debate flares every month or so. Someday I hope to see the announcement that the problem is solved.

Quite funny, actually. DTLow has spent years on this thread, which I monitor in the forlorn hope that EN will mature someday to the point of giving us the MS-DOS state of the art in data organization. The pattern is always the same. A user posts that they need hierarchical folders. DTLow immediately jumps in to explain to the benighted user why said user doesn't actually need what they need. Sometimes a little dialog ensues, then DTLow posts some kind of tag workaround that makes EN pretend to be something it isn't. Then the user goes away. I use EN only as a sort of ragbag, mostly containing web page clips. I find things mostly with text searches. My serious data is organized seriously, elsewhere. There was a post a year or two from an EN employee developer who intimated that they were working on catching up with MS-DOS. But nothing since.

Ian, I am very happy to hear that this shortcoming of EN will be dealt with. I have been monitoring this thread for literally years because a folder hierarchy is critical to my using it as a mainstream app. I am just not interested in the tag workarounds repeatedly proposed by the fanboys. As far a a use case, here is one of mine: I travel quite a bit. Root folder would be <travel> with multiple children <trip>. Each <trip> would have children like <accommodations>, <flight info>, <itineraries>, <expense receipts>, etc. Right now my use of EN is limited. Essentially it is a junk box full of notes that do not have logical homes plus notes that are sort of one-off reminders for things I want to go back to. An example s a folder <interesting restaurants> that contains mostly web pages. That kind of use would probably not change as the trees are shallow. Please keep us posted on your progress.

Well, "if it is what it is," then why in the world would they set up a forum to collect enhancement requests? Your selection of a quotation to back up your position is either ignorant or duplicitous. Either way I think it's quite funny. Then next sentence following the one you cherry-picked is: "Therefore all progress depends on the unreasonable man." https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/George_Bernard_Shaw

Please keep us posted on this. I looked at Nimbus and it seems attractive, but as we all know the best software in the world is the stuff we just bought and have not yet installed. Nimbus claims an Evernote import function, too. I'd be interested to hear from anyone that has tried it. I like the Evernote concept but the lack of a folder hierarchy has kept it out of my mainstream work. I just use it as a sort of trash can for random things that I might want to find some day. These elaborate workarounds for its architectural deficiency have no attraction to me, no matter how many times DTlow tries to tell others what they need and what they don't need. Related comment: I too have been watching this thread for years. My theory on EN's reluctance to implement nested folders is that the underlying code was written years ago with a totally different view of what the app would do. Since then it has probably been patched, scabbed, and gumballed into what it is today and they are terrified to touch it any more than absolutely necessary. It is unlikely that they dumb guys, but rather guys that see the certain market reward as too risky and costly to chase. IOW they will just ride this horse into the ground as more capable applications replace it as the tools of choice. I will be interested to see how Nimbus Notes does. I believe that its ownership is Russian, which has its own uncertainties. Good for them, anyway, they are not owned by Huawei.

@TonyMontanaSlot, it is important that you understand that @DTLow must approve your need or it does not exist. He is the self-appointed guardian of Truth and Light. His position is that if a use case can be met by workarounds using tags, no matter how complicated and baroque, then the problem is with the user and not with Evernote. I've been watching this thread for years, waiting for the announcement that Evernote has finally grasped the obvious. No luck so far.

Having watched this thread for literally years, there is always the same scenario: Someone (like me) comes in asking for nested folders, a paradigm that has been common in computing for decades. Basically a no-brainer. Responses are of two types: (1) Explanations of why the user shouldn't want nested folders or doesn't need them. (2) Elaborate and somewhat opaque workarounds where the tagging system can be bent to serve the need. Maybe 6 months ago there was a post by an Evernote guy that implied that nested folders were in the works for at least the premium business version of EN. So I continue to monitor the thread. Someday I would like to use EN as a mainstream app and not as a sideshow where getting real work done is significantly impeded by a bad design decision.

Yeah. Agreed. I don't know which is more impressive, his arrogance or the amount of free time he has available to spend on posting the same comments, over and over. and over. and over. Re "I am not interested in boohoo posts." Is that also a requirement , that your highness be interested in every post? Or that someone cares whether you are interested or not? ROFL.

Maybe I missed reading the rule book. Are others required to prove to you that their viewpoints are valid? FWIW I am not seeing any proof here that your endlessly repeated tag workarounds to the folder problem are anything but that: workarounds. And clumsy ones at that.