Tags in Shared Notebooks

[lykoz 147]

How exactly do tags work in shared notebooks?

 

I am working collaboratively quite often with new users (Who I often make download and use Evernote). Suffice to say I am ussually doing most of the organisation of notes for them, to have some kind of order...

 

The setting are users can: view and edit.

 

I know I can tag notebooks any way I like...

 

1) Do they see/have access to my tags? Or Am I only one who can see the things I tag?

2) Can they add tags on a shared notebook? And if they add tags on my shared notebooks... Is it only for their eyes? Or do we all have the shared tags they decide to add?

 

Thanks.

Need to know this before I give advice for  them  on using tags to help me organise things systematically... 

[jefito 5,589]

* Users in shared notebooks see the tags that you have put on notes in the shared notebooks.

 

* Users can add tags to notes in shared notebooks; they cannot create new tags in a shared notebook. The tags must already exist in the owner's account (not the user's account). These tags are visible to the notebook owner.

[lykoz 147]

* Users in shared notebooks see the tags that you have put on notes in the shared notebooks.

 

* Users can add tags to notes in shared notebooks; they cannot create new tags in a shared notebook. The tags must already exist in the owner's account (not the user's account). These tags are visible to the notebook owner.

 

Thank you so much for clearing that up for me.... That helps a lot. I get it now.

[Jo.Seawright 0]

I am still having problems. I have 2 shared notebooks and am happy with the fact that the individuals I have shared my notebooks with can't create new ones but they don't seem to be able to see the ones that I have already created. They can see the tags on the individual note but if they have a note that does not have a tag there is no easy way for them to see where they need to file this item. So I am somewhat confused as to what my collaborators are supposed to be able to see...?

[AlexB4 11]

The most limiting frustration I have with Evernote is that my collaborators (those I share notebooks with) are not able to add any tags.  I sort of understand the logic of this and why Evernote has limited this -- owners of notes and notebooks dictate what tags should be there, perhaps.  And in Evernote for Business, all the company users there can add new tags.  However, I am certain that I am not the minority -- millions of us use Evernote as freelance consultants and collaborate with other consultants or contractors -- and they are not part of the same company and they need to add certain tags to help us all organize.   Is there any way to handle this situation?

[Giles Birch 1]

The other limitation is that the organization of the tags does not seem to carry over.   We use mini tag hierarchies to keep the interface to a manageable list.  But those hierarchies seem to disappear when the notebook is shared?

[Mark47777 0]

I have the same issue. @evernote, pls respond if/when this is going to be solved. Totally agree that this seems solvable, important for powerusers (wih many notes you will need taggging!) and we already know it is a feature in business.

 

Am paying $40 a year to support you (I can live with the free version), would like to see basics like this sorted out!

[gazumped 11,661]

I gave up on tags - see here for more details:

 

[jbenson2 2,147]

Because tags are so important to my data, I took a different perspective - I eliminated all Shared Notebooks.

[DTLow 5,736]

2 hours ago, gazumped said:

I gave up on tags - see here for more details:

 

21 minutes ago, jbenson2 said:

Because tags are so important to my data, I took a different perspective - I eliminated all Shared Notebooks.

Another approach is, I'm the owner of the shared notebook and I've spent time constructing a tag hierarchy
If you want to create new tags, let me know and I'll follow up.

I also make sure the first note in the notebook (title, creation/mod date) describes the notebook and has all the tags expected for the notebook.

 

[chirmer 567]

On 6/18/2016 at 0:36 PM, DTLow said:

 

Another approach is, I'm the owner of the shared notebook and I've spent time constructing a tag hierarchy
If you want to create new tags, let me know and I'll follow up.

I also make sure the first note in the notebook (title, creation/mod date) describes the notebook and has all the tags expected for the notebook.

 

The issue with this is that we can't change notebook ownership. I'm the creator of a notebook because I was the first to download Evernote. But I'm not my department's supervisor. So my supervisor has to submit tag requests to me because we dumped everything in the notebook and now want to make her the notebook owner. We have to create a new notebook and swap everything over to that just so SHE can be the one people request tags to.

It'd be really nice if Evernote used the permissions it has in place. IMHO, if someone has "Edit" permissions on a notebook, they should be able to add tags and have them show up. If someone will really ***** up the organization of the notebook, give them "View" permissions.

We are three people who are really struggling to coordinate our junk in Evernote.

Edited August 15, 2016 by chirmer
SMH at the forum censor...

[jefito 5,589]

3 hours ago, chirmer said:

Edited 3 hours ago by chirmer 
SMH at the forum censor...

I don't disagree with your plight (I have a work account, and I share notebooks back and forth with that and my personal accout, so tag creation is sometimes an issue), in fact, I think that tags in shared notebooks are not well handled in other cases, in particular, my favorite: duplicate tags. But that's another rant, and one I've ranted about before. In any case, you might want to post this as a feature request in one of the device-specific Product Feedback forums, where it can be voted on by other users (I'd vote for it).

But no worries about the forum censor -- it's just a mindless routine, and though it seems silly, it allows us to fill in our own substitute terms in our minds.

[chirmer 567]

12 hours ago, jefito said:

I don't disagree with your plight (I have a work account, and I share notebooks back and forth with that and my personal accout, so tag creation is sometimes an issue), in fact, I think that tags in shared notebooks are not well handled in other cases, in particular, my favorite: duplicate tags. But that's another rant, and one I've ranted about before. In any case, you might want to post this as a feature request in one of the device-specific Product Feedback forums, where it can be voted on by other users (I'd vote for it).

But no worries about the forum censor -- it's just a mindless routine, and though it seems silly, it allows us to fill in our own substitute terms in our minds.

Ah yes, the duplicate tags. IIRC, there's a setting in Evernote (I believe it to be under Help, if you hold down the Control key, and then Delete Unused Linked Tags) that got rid of my duplicates (where my tag, say "SRC", has 112 notes, but my coworker's tag "SRC" has 0). I still am not sure how we ended up with duplicates. Oh, well. 

The forum censor is our own little Mad Libs game, I guess!

[Quezion 0]

This thread is a duplicate of:

I've chimed in there, but as the payor of 3 accounts, this feature is a must-have for me... much more than contextual note searching or Google Chrome widgets. Those are not things I would switch note-taking services over, but this is.

[APAJYM 0]

Hi, in relation with this topic: is this normal that the tags don't work when a co-worker open a share notebook (he isn't the owner)? When he click on a tag, nothing happen and the tag don't appear in his list.

Thank's for your response.

NB: We work with the free version.

[gazumped 11,661]

On 21/09/2016 at 4:58 PM, APAJYM said:

When he click on a tag, nothing happen and the tag don't appear in his list.

Hi.  Where is your co-worker clicking on a tag?  Where does he see them?  In the left panel of Evernote Desktop or in the web page version?

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

I have found an issue with tagging with shared notebooks.

1) I have multiple notebooks.  Some are owned by me, some are owned by others.  I want to use the same tag for all of my notebooks.

2) I have tag called "Processed" in all my notebooks.

3) The owner of the other notebooks has added the tag that I want "Processed" to his notebooks.  

4) I cannot add "Processed" tag to any of the notes inside his notebooks.

5) I asked him to add "Process" tag to his notebook, which I do not have in my notebooks.

6) I am able to add "Process" tag to any of the notes in his notebook.

 

Conclusion:

When there are same tags being used in different notebooks by different owners, it will not allow the "other" person to add that tag to the notes.  In this case, I cannot add "Processed" tag to any of the notes inside his notebook.

 

Please help as this is critical to my using of Evernote.

Thanks

[gazumped 11,661]

7 hours ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

I am able to add "Process" tag to any of the notes in his notebook.

 

7 hours ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

I cannot add "Processed" tag to any of the notes inside his notebook

Hi.  As you presumably know,  only the direct owner of a notebook can create a new tag.  Even if someone to whom the notebook is shared has edit rights for that notebook,  they will be unable to create a new tag.  However you should be able to apply a tag in a shared notebook once it has been created and used in that notebook by the owner.

The easy way to manage this if to have a shared note in each notebook to allow users to suggest new tags.  If the owner then attaches a new tag to that note,  it will be confirmation that the tag has been created and used.

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

2 hours ago, gazumped said:

 

Hi.  As you presumably know,  only the direct owner of a notebook can create a new tag.  Even if someone to whom the notebook is shared has edit rights for that notebook,  they will be unable to create a new tag.  However you should be able to apply a tag in a shared notebook once it has been created and used in that notebook by the owner.

The easy way to manage this if to have a shared note in each notebook to allow users to suggest new tags.  If the owner then attaches a new tag to that note,  it will be confirmation that the tag has been created and used.

Sorry, I don't think you understand my question properly. 

Both Processed and Process tags are in the notebook that is shared with me.  The only difference is that I ALSO have Processed tag in my notebooks but not Process tag. 

I believe this is a bug in Evernote where if you use a tag in your own notebook, and then someone else who shares their notebook with you has the same tag name, you cannot tag any notes with that tag name because it gets confused as if you are trying to use your own tag, even though that same tag name exists in their notebook.

 

[gazumped 11,661]

Hmmn.  Has the owner actually applied that tag to any notes in the notebook?

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

30 minutes ago, gazumped said:

Hmmn.  Has the owner actually applied that tag to any notes in the notebook?

Yes. I can see notes with that exact tag in it

[DTLow 5,736]

19 hours ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

I have found an issue with tagging with shared notebooks.

I can see a problem with everyone using the same tagname
Multiple tags with the same name ("Processed")

As a work around, use unique tagnames 
If you change your tag name, you will be able to work in the shared notetbook

You can create a shortcut that searches for both tagnames

 

[gazumped 11,661]

That was my thought - might even be useful to show Processed(Me) and Processed(You) tags as separate items...

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

2 hours ago, gazumped said:

That was my thought - might even be useful to show Processed(Me) and Processed(You) tags as separate items...

That isn't really workable as I have 30 different notebooks owned by different people and we want to use the same tags for standardization.  This is a bug in Evernote, not by design.

[DTLow 5,736]

4 minutes ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

That isn't really workable as I have 30 different notebooks owned by different people and we want to use the same tags for standardization.  This is a bug in Evernote, not by design.

I would only make the rename for your personal "Processed" tag.  
This is what's causing the problem for you

The shared "Processed" tag should work ok

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

1 minute ago, DTLow said:

I would only make the rename for your personal "Processed" tag.  
This is what's causing the problem for you

But everyone's notebooks has Processed tag.  It's not just my problem, it's everyone's problem.  We are in the same company working together.

[DTLow 5,736]

3 minutes ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

But everyone's notebooks has Processed tag.  It's not just my problem, it's everyone's problem.  We are in the same company working together.

I updated my post

The shared "Processed" tag is not the problem
Its only become a problem because you want to use a personal tag and you want to call it "Processed"

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

1 minute ago, DTLow said:

I updated my post

The shared "Processed" tag is not the problem
Its only become a problem because you want to use a personal "Processed" tag

Let me restate the problem.

We are a company of 40 people.  We each have our own set of notebooks.  Each of us need to have a "Processed" tag as a corporate standardization.  We cannot have separate names for our own "Processed" tags. 

 

[DTLow 5,736]

1 minute ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

Let me restate the problem.

We are a company of 40 people.  We each have our own set of notebooks.  Each of us need to have a "Processed" tag as a corporate standardization.  We cannot have separate names for our own "Processed" tags. 

I understand, but I also know each tagname must be unique

You're talking about creating multiple tags, each having the same name
This becomes a problem when you share notebooks

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

5 minutes ago, DTLow said:

I understand, but I also know each tagname must be unique

You're talking about creating multiple tags, each having the same name
This becomes a problem when you share notebooks

I understand the problem. However I don't feel this is a problem that should exist.  I am a software developer and I can see how this problem exists, however I see it as a design flaw. 

[DTLow 5,736]

5 minutes ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

I see it as a design flaw.

OK    Design flaw, logic flaw.... whatever

I'm more interested in how to make it work

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

As long as the tag is unique in one notebook why should it care if I have the same tag in other notebooks?

[DTLow 5,736]

4 minutes ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

As long as the tag is unique in one notebook why should it care if I have the same tag in other notebooks?

We're not talking about the same tag in shared notebooks.  
They are different tags - each has an owner
The problem is, you want them all to have the same name

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

So you are saying the "Processed" tag in my notebook is conflicting with the "Processed" tag in someone else's notebook?

 

[DTLow 5,736]

2 minutes ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

So you are saying the "Processed" tag in my notebook is conflicting with the "Processed" tag in someone else's notebook?

Yes - they are different tags
I could go into the database and see they have different tag ids

[Annoyed Evernote User 0]

30 minutes ago, DTLow said:

Yes - they are different tags
I could go into the database and see they have different tag ids

Ok, if they are different, then why does it matter that I have the same tag in a different notebook?  In any case, the tag should be only unique per notebook, not across the entire evernote database. 

For example, when I tag a specific notebook, it should only pull from the tags available for that particular notebook, and should not care about the tags in my other notebooks.  If someone else shared a notebook with me, when I tag in that notebook, it should only look up the tags available for that notebook, regardless if I have a million other tags in my own notebooks, as those don't matter and should be ignored.

Make sense?

 

[DTLow 5,736]

1 hour ago, Annoyed Evernote User said:

For example, when I tag a specific notebook, it should only pull from the tags available for that particular notebook

Sounds like a good idea for shared notebooks, since you are restricted to the tags of that shared Notebook 

[jefito 5,589]

On 2/4/2017 at 0:25 PM, Annoyed Evernote User said:

I understand the problem. However I don't feel this is a problem that should exist.  I am a software developer and I can see how this problem exists, however I see it as a design flaw. 

I've always felt that this behavior is pretty funky. It's not fatal for my use case, though (I share between a personal and a work account", but it is occasionally annoying, and I never figured out the rationale behind it. So I have some duplicate tags in the various tag lists; fortunately, a search for a particular tag will pick up notes that have that tag in both accounts, which is what I want anyhow.

If you think it's a design flaw, then you should make a feature request in one of the forums dedicated to such (there's one in the main forum, and one for each individual Evernote client OS).

On 2/4/2017 at 1:12 PM, Annoyed Evernote User said:

In any case, the tag should be only unique per notebook, not across the entire evernote database.

Tags are certainly useful across different notebooks in a single account, if that's the context you referring to. Tags are unique inside an Evernote account, period. Since you can't prevent different accounts from having the same tag names, uniqueness across an account and any notebooks shared to it cannot possibly be enforced.

On 2/4/2017 at 1:12 PM, Annoyed Evernote User said:

For example, when I tag a specific notebook, it should only pull from the tags available for that particular notebook, and should not care about the tags in my other notebooks.  If someone else shared a notebook with me, when I tag in that notebook, it should only look up the tags available for that notebook, regardless if I have a million other tags in my own notebooks, as those don't matter and should be ignored.

You cannot tag a notebook; you can only tag notes in a notebook. When you attempt to tag a note that's in a notebook that's shared to you, you may only choose from the set of tags that the notes in the notebook contains. Otherwise, the tag will be rejected, since you cannot add tags to someone else's notebook.

 

[CalS 5,280]

On 2/4/2017 at 11:12 AM, Annoyed Evernote User said:

Ok, if they are different, then why does it matter that I have the same tag in a different notebook?  In any case, the tag should be only unique per notebook, not across the entire evernote database. 

For example, when I tag a specific notebook, it should only pull from the tags available for that particular notebook, and should not care about the tags in my other notebooks.  If someone else shared a notebook with me, when I tag in that notebook, it should only look up the tags available for that notebook, regardless if I have a million other tags in my own notebooks, as those don't matter and should be ignored.

Make sense?

 

Tags across notebooks make sense to me.  I think of EN as being structured wherein notebooks are vertical and tags are horizontal.  The same statement tag can be applied to notes in any notebook in this context.  And why would I want to duplicate the same tag across multiple notebooks, GTD tags for instance?

Relative to sharing tags this could be an issue assuming the sharee inherits the tag of the same name and the sharer changes the tag name.  Then the tag in the sharee DB would get get changed which could be disruptive..

[persistentone 11]

I am the user of a Shared Notebook created by another Evernote user.   I understand that only the creator of the Notebook can create tags.  But I have a more basic problem:  how do I even discover which tags already exist?

I think it is a horrible design to suggest that these can be documented in a manually created Note.   News alert:  

a) Notebook creators can make spelling errors;

b) Creators can forget to make updates to the Note;

c) It's just really inconvenient to the user to take them outside of the interface for editing a Note to go hunting down tags

Isn't there some way for me to pull up the list of tags created in that Notebook?

If that feature doesn't exist, someone needs to add it.  It's incredibly basic to the function and usability of the product.

[DTLow 5,736]

13 minutes ago, persistentone said:

how do I even discover which tags already exist?

My practice when I share a Notebook is to create an introductory note. I assign all the allowed tags to the note.

Otherwise, it's not obvious.  

>>Isn't there some way for me to pull up the list of tags created in that Notebook?

On my Mac, I could write a script to produce a list.

[tjeef 3]

On 15/8/2016 at 11:03 PM, chirmer said:

The issue with this is that we can't change notebook ownership. I'm the creator of a notebook because I was the first to download Evernote. But I'm not my department's supervisor. So my supervisor has to submit tag requests to me because we dumped everything in the notebook and now want to make her the notebook owner. We have to create a new notebook and swap everything over to that just so SHE can be the one people request tags to.

This brings up another question here: how does it work if moving notes from a shared notebook to a person notebook (at the receiving end - the "sharee's" if you will).

Will the tags created at the source be created in the receiving account, or disappear?

If they get created, this would probably be a way to transfer notebook ownership to the right party.

I have another usage scenario where this also has interest. I have a main account that I am mostly logged on to. On PC and mobile devices. This is also the one my web clipper is pointing at. Then I have a couple of other more specialized ones. (One specifically for freelance consulting, one specifically for personal studies with lots of material captured).

Since it is easiest to capture via the main account (I bump into lots of things relevant to the specialized accounts while living life), I would like to set it up so I can "hand over" notes from the main account to one of the others. Then pick them up in my "inbox" there, once I get around to it. Which means moving them out and to another notebook there.

Sometimes I already decide what to do with it, and assign some tags accordingly. E.g. if it is an action item, a reference item, a project support item etc..   It will be nice if those tags can carry over easily.

 

[jefito 5,589]

1 hour ago, tjeef said:

This brings up another question here: how does it work if moving notes from a shared notebook to a person notebook (at the receiving end - the "sharee's" if you will).

Will the tags created at the source be created in the receiving account, or disappear?

If they get created, this would probably be a way to transfer notebook ownership to the right party.

Unsurprisingly, the tags will be deleted, since you cannot create new tags in someone else's notebook.

1 hour ago, tjeef said:

Sometimes I already decide what to do with it, and assign some tags accordingly. E.g. if it is an action item, a reference item, a project support item etc..   It will be nice if those tags can carry over easily.

If I understand what you're asking for, if you have a tag that exists in your account, then moving a note with that tag to someone else's notebook that has at least one note with that tag will preserve the tag in the note. Only the tag name matters; it doesn't matter where it came from. 

 

[DTLow 5,736]

3 hours ago, tjeef said:

his brings up another question here: how does it work if moving notes from a shared notebook to a person notebook (at the receiving end - the "sharee's" if you will).

Will the tags created at the source be created in the receiving account, or disappear?

I tested this with my accounts on my Mac

When moving the note from the shared notebook, the tags are retained on the note
edited: New tags are created in the personal tag list

[jefito 5,589]

2 hours ago, DTLow said:

I tested this with my accounts on my Mac

When moving the note from the shared notebook, the tags are retained on the note
edited: New tags are created in the personal tag list

Curious. I'm wondering whether we're talking about the same situation here. Here's my scenario:

Notebook N is in my account. I have notebook S that's shared to this account. I have a note that has tag T in N. If I move that to S, and S doesn't contain a note tagged with T, then T is removed from the note when I move it to S. This makes sense to me, since you can't create a new tag in a notebook that's shared to you. If,  on the other hand,T does exist on a note in S, then the note is still tagged with T when I move it to S.

I tested these with my accounts on my Windows machine.

[DTLow 5,736]

1 hour ago, jefito said:

Notebook N is in my account. I have notebook S that's shared to this account. I have a note that has tag T in N. If I move that to S, and S doesn't contain a note tagged with T, then T is removed from the note when I move it to S. This makes sense to me, since you can't create a new tag in a notebook that's shared to you. If,  on the other hand,T does exist on a note in S, then the note is still tagged with T when I move it to S.

We were actually moving the other way; from the shared notebook to the account notebook

In your example, where the tag exists both in the shared notebook and the account notebook. there are actually two tags with the same name (verified by viewing the database)
When I moved the note to the shared notebook, I could see the note tag switching to the shared tag. Actually the old note is trashed and a new note is created
I also verified this by changing the tag name
- this impacted the shared notebook, but not the sharee account (N)

This shared tags with the same name gets me confused
I try to keep my tagnames unique by adding a prefix

[jefito 5,589]

55 minutes ago, DTLow said:

We were actually moving the other way; from the shared notebook to the account notebook

Should work the same way, I believe: if the tag exists in the notebook you're moving to, then it's preserved; if it doesn't exist, then the tag is not created. In the former case, yes, it's true that there are two tags (one from the local account and one from the shared account), and you can see them in the tag tree, but functionally they are the same in my experience (with the Windows client, of course): tag searches only use the tag name, not the account they come from. Also, in the Windows client, both tags appear in the tag tree (one labelled with the name of the shared account), but selecting one selects them both.

I used to find that confusing, but I hardly use the tag tree at all at this point, and because the duplicated tags apply equally well to both of my accounts, and with the same meaning, I just let them do what they want.

[Cantelope 0]

Just want to agree with everyone here that not being able to add tags is very annoying. I work with my PhD supervisor on evernote, and although he is the supervisor I am the initiator of most of the content and there is no way for me to organize my files with tag.