RTF 0 Posted November 22, 2012 Share Posted November 22, 2012 Hi there, I would like some advice/help on how to use evernote the best way possible for me.As a projectmanager, Student and familyman i’v got lots of things I can put into Evernote.In your opinion: Does the format below covers most of the needs I could have to put things in Evernote?What changes would you make to make it easier for me to put notes in evernote? And more important being able to maintain them.I’m not (very) familiar with GTD, but also interested in that subject too. Setup concept:!Inbox (primary notebook)!Todo (this one is new for me)1. Private: Home&Family- Holidays (planning&information) (stacked)- Network information (stacked)- Other Scanned Mail (stacked)- General Family Notes (Stacked)- Compare and information (stacked)- 2. Private: Finance&Insurance- General (stacked)- Mortgage (stacked)- Pension (stacked)- Health Insurance Me (stacked)- Health Insurance Partner (stacked)- Insurance Home&Family (stacked)- Invoices &Warranties (stacked)- Pet Insurance (stacked)- Home Improvement (stacked)- 3. Work General Program Office- Manager meetings (stacked)- Department Meetings (stacked)- General Company Information (stacked)- Company Presentations (given) (stacked)- My presentations (stacked)- Declarations (stacked)- 4. Project X- X Plan (stacked)- X Designs (stacked)- X Issues&Risks (stacked)- X Finance (stacked)- X General (stacked)- X Projectteam (stacked)- 5. Project Y- Y Plan (stacked)- Y Designs (stacked)- Y Issues&Risks (stacked)- Y Finance (stacked)- Y General (stacked)- Y Projectteam (stacked)- 6. Project Z- Z Plan (stacked)- Z Designs (stacked)- Z Issues&Risks (stacked)- Z Finance (stacked)- Z General (stacked)- Z Projectteam (stacked)- 7. School- Year - Course 1 (stacked)- Year - Course 2 (stacked)- Progress (stacked)- General Information (stacked)- 8. Helpfull Notes/Reference?- Tips? (stacked)- GTD? (stacked)- Skitch? (stacked)- Webclippings (stacked)- General Notes There is only one problem: WorkThe network settings are very strict at my company. I am one of the few people allowed to have a laptop, but at work I can’t sync notes to and from Evernote (nor use the fantastic Outlook functionality).So I now most oftenly mail notes to my evernote account.Also note that i’m not planning to have all my financial products and information in Evernote, only basic information and information when I have an appointment with our financial advisor. (I have faith in Evernote, but not THAT much fate ;-) ) I use Evernote at:- Work laptop (windows 7)- Personal laptop (Windows 8)- Ipad 2 wifi+mobile data- iPhone 4I'm planning on buying an HP7520 multifunctional with the capability to mail to Evernote for private use.Any tips on how to keep my live on track? :-) Link to comment
Level 5 jbenson2 2,147 Posted November 23, 2012 Level 5 Share Posted November 23, 2012 Not sure what you mean by "stacked".If the list you posted is made up of Stacks, in my opinion that is way, way too many for such precise and narrow subjects.It might even be too much for Notebooks.Tags - OK. Link to comment
Gem 6 Posted November 24, 2012 Share Posted November 24, 2012 Personally, I would consider replacing your stacks with notebooks and your individual notebooks with tags. Of course whatever works for you would work best, but that's something I learned after a few months of using Evernote. For example, I'm doing a PhD, and I used to have different notebooks for each chapter. I found myself getting irritated when I'd think of an idea and have to decide whether to tag it as literature review or discussion. Similarly I found myself wondering what to do when having meetings about multiple projects at work - I really didn't want to have to create separate notes for each project!Here's my system now, if it helps:!Inbox - this also functions as my to-do list. I'd consider amalgamating yours, too unless you use your inbox differently than me. My inbox is basically where things go until I have a few minutes to consider where to save them. Or things I'm waiting on, for example an email cofirmation of a purchase will go there until I can see the correct amount has appeared on my bank balance and the item has arrived.Phd - Everything that is even vaguely to do with the PhD. It's tagged per thesis chapter and overarching themes as well.Home - Everything non-sensitive for home. Also a few sensitive documents when I know their loss (i.e. fire) would be a huuuuuuuuuge hassle to replace without any kind of copy. Sensitive (local, saved just to laptop) - Everything sensitive for home, e.g. credit card statements.Recipes - Pretty specific, but I clip a LOT of recipes and it was getting impossible to see anything non-recipe related in the 'Home' notebook so it got its own.Work - Self-explanatory. Boss, colleagues and projects get their own tags. Notebook (original, I know) - everything else. This basically serves the same function as your 8th stack. I'd definitely look at turning this into one notebook - for example, what happens if you have a tip on gtd? Or a webclip that's also a tip?Ultimately your system is pretty awesome and the kind of thing that you'd have in a filing cabinet, and it still works for a lot of people. Personally my issue with filing cabinets was that I could never decide what drawer to put things in, which is why Evernote and its tags work so well for me. Link to comment
Level 5* GrumpyMonkey 4,319 Posted November 24, 2012 Level 5* Share Posted November 24, 2012 I've only got one notebook for my stuff (99%). I have a couple shared notebooks for a few notes I share with others. http://www.princeton.edu/~cmayo/evernote-organization.htmlIf this doesn't work for you, I'd recommend more tags, as suggested above. http://www.princeton.edu/~cmayo/evernote-tag.html Link to comment
RTF 0 Posted November 24, 2012 Author Share Posted November 24, 2012 Thx for the replies!I think I'll give the tags a try. Within the two (I'll keep them separated so I can make one local) private notebooks and the reference notebook I'll give the tags a try. If that works for me, then I can do the same with the work en school notebooks. The Project I'm working on do get separate notebooks. There are lots of simular named notes, emails and documents that are used in projects.The thing i'm worried about with tags is that is make too many of them. Therefore they become useless I guess? Link to comment
Level 5* GrumpyMonkey 4,319 Posted November 24, 2012 Level 5* Share Posted November 24, 2012 Thx for the replies!I think I'll give the tags a try. Within the two (I'll keep them separated so I can make one local) private notebooks and the reference notebook I'll give the tags a try. If that works for me, then I can do the same with the work en school notebooks. The Project I'm working on do get separate notebooks. There are lots of simular named notes, emails and documents that are used in projects.The thing i'm worried about with tags is that is make too many of them. Therefore they become useless I guess?Tags function like notebooks, so there is always the danger of making too many. My recommendation with tags would be to keep them to a minimum, and to keep them relatively organized. As you'll see in the link that I posted, jbenson2 has a nice system using subdivisions of tag categories. In your case, it might look something like:privatepri-generalpri-vacationpri-financial Link to comment
Level 5 jbenson2 2,147 Posted November 24, 2012 Level 5 Share Posted November 24, 2012 The thing i'm worried about with tags is that is make too many of them. Therefore they become useless I guess?Thanks GM,I have 1,083 tags. The TagHunter option in the BitQwik program helps manage the tags.I use a 3 character prefix to manage themCompany tags begin with Com-Family members begin with Fam-Personal tags begin with Per-Insurance tags (medican, dental, car, home) begin with Ins-Government tags (city, state, Fed) begin with Gov- Link to comment
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