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Suggestion - Global "Action Item" Tags


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A feature suggestion...i can put check boxes into notes to indicate action items for follow up.  but wouldn't it be great would if these (or some other symbol) were like tags with global significance so that all my actions from all notes could be viewed in one place.  then i would have a consolidated action list without having to peruse through individual notes.

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  • Level 5*

You might want to give Swipes a look.  It is a companion app that will do what you are looking for.  There may be other apps out there that provide a similar function but this is one that I checked out recently and looks promising.

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Great tip.  Thanks!   Sync with Evernote is apparently available for Apple IOS and beta for Android.  Not yet for Web.   I haven't yet found a way to treat individual check box items in an Evernote as individual action items to be synced with Swipes, but it does sync an entire note as a single action item, with check box items listed as "sub steps".   Not perfect for me, but a step in the right direction.

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As far as I know, in Evernote, notes are the smallest syncable item. It's possible that they sync parts of notes separately (attachments would be a natural candidate), but that's not user-visible. It's the note.

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Great tip.  Thanks!   Sync with Evernote is apparently available for Apple IOS and beta for Android.  Not yet for Web.   I haven't yet found a way to treat individual check box items in an Evernote as individual action items to be synced with Swipes, but it does sync an entire note as a single action item, with check box items listed as "sub steps".   Not perfect for me, but a step in the right direction.

The other limitation I noticed is that sync appears to be in only one direction.  Tasks created in Swipes do not show up in EN, but like you said, it is a step in the right direction.

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Good point.   So, here is a suggestion for the great developers at Evernote to keep in mind...

 

It would be helpful to have the capability to tag items within a note in a global, two-way-syncable way so that Evernote or a third party can pull those items and similar items from other notes into a single, sortable view of all action items.

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  • Level 5*

You could just use one note per item. I make them into reminder notes; that way they have dates attached to them. And tag them so that they can be organized by category.

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Interesting approach.   Personally, what I really want is to create actions within a note (for example during a meeting).   For my purposes it would not work to pop out and create a new individual notes each time there was an action item.  If I had to pop out of Evernote to create to-do's like that, I would probably prefer just go to Outlook or Swipes or some other task list and enter them there.

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  • Level 5*

@Tempster:

 

Unfortunately, Evernote is far from the best tool to manage Action Items (or Take-aways).  

 

I have used many Action Item apps, and designed one myself, over the years, and there are just too many fields and features one needs to easily and properly track Action Items.  I'd suggest you find an app dedicated to Project Mgt, Task Mgt, or Action Tracking.  There might be some that would link to Evernote for support (like recording research, and progress notes for a Task/Action).

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Interesting approach.   Personally, what I really want is to create actions within a note (for example during a meeting).   For my purposes it would not work to pop out and create a new individual notes each time there was an action item.  If I had to pop out of Evernote to create to-do's like that, I would probably prefer just go to Outlook or Swipes or some other task list and enter them there.

In Evernote, I just take notes during a meeting, and create actual task notes afterwards. You could create the action items in your meeting summary, then later on, create the notes, and tie any task note to the meeting summary using a note link. That is, create the detailed task note, copy the note link for that note to the clipboard, and then copy the note link to the appropriate place in the meeting summary action item list (or just replace the action item with the note link). That way, you can jump from the action item list directly to the task.

 

Automating this would be swell, but Evernote's not there yet, and it's not clear that they will be any time soon, or if they want to even go in that direction.

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Well, we'll see. For light duty use (like mine), my system works pretty well. I don't tend to have a large number of action items at any one time. 

 

Also, one tip for my method: on the desktop clients, you can keep the main task list (or meeting summary) open in a separate window while you create the separate task notes.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I'm looking for the same functionality and just found Swipes but the note/sub-tasks thing really doesn't work for me. I can have 10 or so meetings a week with associated actions and I'm looking for something that will automate that process for me, otherwise I may as well stick to a notepad with asterisks in the margins...

I've found a separate app called ActionNotes that lets you write notes and highlight (in the margin) when points are actions to create your own action lists. It's ok, but a bit gimmicky (funny colours and graphics, trying too hard to look like paper and pen), and doesn't have a web interface.

But I just found TaskClone, which might do exactly what I want. It seems to take actions from evernote notes and transfer them into my Wunderlist to do app, both of which I can use from the web or from the ipad. I'm going to start a free trial and test it out, but it looks perfect....apart from the £12 a year price tag.

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  • 1 month later...

I'm looking for the same functionality and just found Swipes but the note/sub-tasks thing really doesn't work for me. I can have 10 or so meetings a week with associated actions and I'm looking for something that will automate that process for me, otherwise I may as well stick to a notepad with asterisks in the margins...

I've found a separate app called ActionNotes that lets you write notes and highlight (in the margin) when points are actions to create your own action lists. It's ok, but a bit gimmicky (funny colours and graphics, trying too hard to look like paper and pen), and doesn't have a web interface.

But I just found TaskClone, which might do exactly what I want. It seems to take actions from evernote notes and transfer them into my Wunderlist to do app, both of which I can use from the web or from the ipad. I'm going to start a free trial and test it out, but it looks perfect....apart from the £12 a year price tag.

I've set-up TaskClone. Will need to work with it further to ensure that it works well for my needs without a lot of overhead, but so far so good. Thank you for sharing!!

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Gneo for iOS may be a good fit for many, either synced with Evernote or not. It works brilliantly in a 2-way sync, borrowing Evernote's notebook, note, tag and Reminders setup. At it's core, it has the best Eisenhower Matrix setup I have seen... besides being able to integrate with your Calendar app, a unique "smart notebook" concept with tailor-made filtering options and full-on task/ note taking capabilities. You can also mail tasks in to Gneo if you direct emails to a notebook within the Gneo Stack in Evernote. Gneo is a very well-rounded and complete app, which is a great find. They have already worked through their sync issues with Evernote - so the present is as good a time as any. I have found them to be very reliable. A Mac app is on the way in due course. 

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  • 10 months later...

OneNote does exactly what you're looking for. Its key feature is around the consolidation of tags / tasks globally across all Notes. I wish Evernote could do this - its the key missing feature. A Task List without the ability to consolidate Actions across multiple notes - is not a Task List at all.  

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