The current implementation of Note Syncing in Evernote is equal parts briliant and scary-as-heck! Here's a few recent experiences and requests to improve this VITAL area of the product!
1) Sync/Search Titles First, then Content -- Not sure how many times I've logged into Evernote and used Search to look for a Note that I cannot find. Its usually either a note I created on another device, or one my wife made in a shared notebook. I can understand why it might take a while to appear (ie hasn't synced yet), but do not understand why it takes *that* long. Most modern cloud apps are way better at this!
Solution: In most cloud apps (think Gmail for example), some form of light/quick syncing is used (think LDAP) to sync the titles of emails/content, and then a heavier sync is done once the actual email/content is accessed. And background syncing makes sure the list of titles is always as current as possible. In short, one should NEVER log into Evernote and not be able to find all of their notes listed by titles in the order they expect. That window of time should be minimized at all costs. In addition, if a Note exists, Search should always find it. Period! Or at the very least have a flag that says "Some of your Notes have not synced yet, would you like to start that")? In summary, the list of Notes should always be current, and searchable, that should be your goal. Research Gmail for a better way to implement sync via LDAP style headers.
2) Manage Conflicting Changes directly -- I had a freak out moment today when an entire page worth of notes I typed on the train could not be found. The Note I was editing had conflicting changes (ie I had accessed it on multiple devices, and offline on the train), but the way that Evernote resolved these conflicts was "interesting" to say the least. When I viewed my note in the office on my laptop after connecting to Wifi I saw a version from Dec-12th as the primary content (content from a week ago), with a section at the bottom flagged with Dec-15th Conflicting Changes (a few days ago). In the note history I could see changes from Dec 18th (yesterday), but the content from today / Dec 19th was nowhere to be found! So I researched this on Evernote.com and realized that on occasion Evernote will create a separate notebook called "Conflicting Changes" that will contain other changes not placed directly into the note itself. WTF?
Solution: Why do you have so many methods for managing conflicting changes? You really only need one. And why on earth don't you have a feature IN THE NOTE itself that allows you to manage all of the conflicts in a centralized way. Why spread this out into a bunch of different places and hope the user figures it out? Not to mention the layering problems with Paid vs. Free users, or Mac vs. PC, who each get a different experience. Please add a single feature in the note that says "This note has conflicting changes, please click here to manage". Simple.
Lastly, I love Evernote. Use it every single day. So please take this feedback as constructive. As mentioned above, I know multi-device / offline syncing is hard (I was a PM for a desktop database app), but many modern apps have this stuff nailed. There are better ways, and I'd love you more for adding them!!
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Smitter 1
The current implementation of Note Syncing in Evernote is equal parts briliant and scary-as-heck! Here's a few recent experiences and requests to improve this VITAL area of the product!
1) Sync/Search Titles First, then Content -- Not sure how many times I've logged into Evernote and used Search to look for a Note that I cannot find. Its usually either a note I created on another device, or one my wife made in a shared notebook. I can understand why it might take a while to appear (ie hasn't synced yet), but do not understand why it takes *that* long. Most modern cloud apps are way better at this!
Solution: In most cloud apps (think Gmail for example), some form of light/quick syncing is used (think LDAP) to sync the titles of emails/content, and then a heavier sync is done once the actual email/content is accessed. And background syncing makes sure the list of titles is always as current as possible. In short, one should NEVER log into Evernote and not be able to find all of their notes listed by titles in the order they expect. That window of time should be minimized at all costs. In addition, if a Note exists, Search should always find it. Period! Or at the very least have a flag that says "Some of your Notes have not synced yet, would you like to start that")? In summary, the list of Notes should always be current, and searchable, that should be your goal. Research Gmail for a better way to implement sync via LDAP style headers.
2) Manage Conflicting Changes directly -- I had a freak out moment today when an entire page worth of notes I typed on the train could not be found. The Note I was editing had conflicting changes (ie I had accessed it on multiple devices, and offline on the train), but the way that Evernote resolved these conflicts was "interesting" to say the least. When I viewed my note in the office on my laptop after connecting to Wifi I saw a version from Dec-12th as the primary content (content from a week ago), with a section at the bottom flagged with Dec-15th Conflicting Changes (a few days ago). In the note history I could see changes from Dec 18th (yesterday), but the content from today / Dec 19th was nowhere to be found! So I researched this on Evernote.com and realized that on occasion Evernote will create a separate notebook called "Conflicting Changes" that will contain other changes not placed directly into the note itself. WTF?
Solution: Why do you have so many methods for managing conflicting changes? You really only need one. And why on earth don't you have a feature IN THE NOTE itself that allows you to manage all of the conflicts in a centralized way. Why spread this out into a bunch of different places and hope the user figures it out? Not to mention the layering problems with Paid vs. Free users, or Mac vs. PC, who each get a different experience. Please add a single feature in the note that says "This note has conflicting changes, please click here to manage". Simple.
btw This Support Note from your website says it all: https://help.evernote.com/hc/en-us/articles/208314448-How-to-recover-missing-notes ("If you are this...", "If you can't...", "If you are on a Mac", etc, etc) This is a nightmare. You could reduce this page to a single paragraph with a better implemented feature.
Lastly, I love Evernote. Use it every single day. So please take this feedback as constructive. As mentioned above, I know multi-device / offline syncing is hard (I was a PM for a desktop database app), but many modern apps have this stuff nailed. There are better ways, and I'd love you more for adding them!!
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