Johnny McClung

I'm going to school online and becuase of this I am collecting a lot of digital information mostly in the form of Word documents. I'm also collecting some information from online sources. Once this information is in a Evernote note, what is the best way to take notes on this information. Let's say I've clipped an article into Evernote. Now I need to study and take notes on this article. What is the best way? A couple of ideas off the top of my head. 1. I can write me notes inline with the article. The biggest problem I see with this is differenciating my notes from the article. This would require some sort of formatting that might be tedious. 2. I can create a note link at the top of the article to my "notes" note. Then establish a kind of footnote system where I would put a number behind the sentance I want to make a comment on and then write the comment in the linked note, referencing that number. Depending on the number of notes taken in a single article, it may be tricky to quickly locate my comment. Any other thoughts? Thank you, Johnny McClung

I've used Skitch with some wonderful results recently. However, having the note read-only in Evernote is a big disadvantage for me. Why do I have to go back to Skitch to edit the note attributes? I'd love to be able to edit note title, tags notebook etc in Evernote, but still have the image sync with Skitch.

I've been thinking about starting a journal and I'm trying to decide whether to use Evernote or a program specifically made for writing a journal. I see a few options. - pen and paper - Evernote - blogging - program dedicated to writing a journal Evernote is nice, but it is a jack-of-all-traits kind of software. I was thinking that another program might give me some more functions that would be nice to have in a electronic journal. Does anyone use Evernote? Another program? Thank you.

Thanks for the responses. After a few weeks, I've got a more or less have a system down. I've been pasting all information given to me into Evernote this includes syllabi, reference materials and assignments. I've been turning the assignments into to-dos. When I receive a document that will need to be submitted, I upload to Google Docs and include the link in the appropriate assignment so that I have quick access to the document from my work flow (Evernote). I do not do a lot of research (for now), but took a look at Zotero. It looks pretty interesting and will have to take another look when it comes time. Taking notes will probably be a constant struggle for me. The instructor has supplied a list of "things to know." It appears that the Cornell system will work well with this as I can have the "things to know" on the left, then put the answers on the right side. Any system or trick to help me take notes would be greatly appreciated.

I just finished scanning in a text book for a college class that I am taking. It took awhile, but in the end, I think it is going to make me a lot more productive. I try to talk to other people and tell them how cool it is that I'm going paperless and I have all these digital record. It seems a lot of people do not share in my geekdom. But it's cool that I can come on here and read about how someone is all PDFs rock and I just put a bunch in Evernote! And I'm like SWEEET!... Hope Evernore continues to rock for you! p.s. I've thought about starting a blog about using Evernote in my collegiate life.

I'm happy to say and excited that I am working on scanning a college text book. I'm doing it by chapters as I have time, but have a question for you. I've scanned the first couple of chapters and if the file size stays the same throughout the chapters, I will be over the 50MB limit of note size. What would you guys suggest? The simplest option, I see, is to just split the book into two notes. With Evernote search, it should not be a problem. Thank you for any suggestions.

I do do have any experience with ScanDrop, but must second BurgerNFires suggestion on Paperport. It came with my printer, but I recently upgraded to version 14 standard. I could not be happier. I'm also working on becoming paperless and find the ability to manipulate the files incredible.

Thank you. What you mentioned is kind of the things that I was thinking. I wanted to see if there may have been something I was missing. The course information has already been imported into Evernote. I've copy and pasted the assignments into to dos so that I have the information at hand when I look at what needs done. I did have a question about note taking. When taking handwritten note, usually just the main ideas are jotted down to reduce what is needed to write. But with a digital system the amount is meaningless. If given a document to read, is it important to write or type my own notes? I could just as easily copy and paste the information into a new note. Is there something in reading and note taking to help you learn?

Wow! I will not be able to thank you enough for this offhanded comment, BurgerNFries. Paperport came with my printer/scanner/fax I just bought, but I did not know it also had the ability to scan. I was only using it for PDF manipulation. I was using some other software that came with my printer for the scanning. Version 12 came with my printer, but after this, I will upgrade to the latest edition (I was thinking about it anyway.) Thank you!!!

I'm beginning my first quarter of using Evernote to help me with college. I wanted to see if I could get a few ideas of the best ways to use Evernote in my situation. I am attending a college online which I think presents a complication to using Evernote. Typically, the teacher will post Word documents that contain each week's assignments. In the past, I have downloaded these and then uploaded to Google Docs to be able to easily access the documents on any device. I've thought about instead of uploading into Google Docs to just copy paste into a new note in Evernote. However, this does present an issue. I'm just a few days into this quarter, but in previous quarters the assignment documents I downloaded also had a worksheet that had to be completed and uploaded into my online class. If I copy/paste the Word documents into Evernote, I will have to copy/paste back into Word to upload, potentially loosing key formatting. I've also thought about just putting the Word document directly into Evernote, but if I'm on my Chromebook (and maybe Android) I will not be able to view, edit or save the document. I think right now, my best option is to continue using Google Docs. Does anyone have any ideas or suggestions? Thank you.

I looked over their products and would just love having one. I just can't justify spending that much money on a scanner that I really don't need.

@tiredofpaper Are you happy with the services at 1dollarscan? I was thinking about using them, but wanted to know what you thought of them first.

This intrigues me. I never would have thought of scanning in my books to become completely paperless. It would seem to me that it is a very tedious task. So the process would be basically cut of the binding, scan one side of all the papers, then the other side, merge all the PDFs into one and the make it a searchable PDF. What the biggest sized book you've done? How long does it take?

I have a brother mfc-j430w three-in-one printer/scanner/fax. I have the control panel to scan the document into a PDF. Then I must open Nuance Paper Port, right-click on the PDF and save as searchable PDF. I have yet to figure out how to do this straight from the scanning process. If I scan to an image and use Evernote's OCR then I do not have to open Nuanve Paper Port. After I scan, I just drag the PNG file into Evenote. I do understand about making a searchable PDF being "future proof" not relying on Evernote's OCR. I might start doing it even thought it involves an extra step. I'm not redoing all the PDFs already in Evernote.

As I am trying to go paperless, I was wondering what format would it be best to scan in. At first, I was scanning to PDF, but then realized that I when viewed on the web, I do not see the document. Instead I must open a new window to view the PDF. Also Evernote's OCR only does PDFs if you are a paid member. So I choose to scan my files into image format so that I can see the file on the web without opening a new window. I choose the PNG file format for its lower file size compared to the JPG. Recently, I learned about searchable PDF's which have a hidden text layer within the PDF which makes them searchable without Evernote's OCR. I can make these, but it takes more time and steps then just simply scanning the file. So, which should I scan my documents into: PDF, image, or searchable PDF? Thank you.