Comments on: How Long Can You Stay Loyal?

By: WSP

WSP — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 17:35:28 +0000

A very belated thanks for your excellent analysis of what happened at EN. I too was once an enthusiastic user and a frequent contributor to the EN forum, but I’ve since drifted off in other directions.

I continue to use EN 2.2 for a large project (a book) that is nearly finished and for a few specialized purposes, and I have done a lot of experiments with EN 3, but — like you — I find it inadequate for any serious note-taking. However, given the uncertainty of what direction EN will be taking in the future, I’m not willing to put any more notes into EN.

The best note-taking program I’ve found so far — after much experimentation — is MyInfo. It’s not as quick and intuitive and flexible as EN (but then what is?), but it does have tags (as well as a hierarchical tree), it handles links of all sorts very nicely, and it is much better than EN for organizing information and for exporting to other file formats. In some respects it’s not as good as EN, but in some instances it’s actually better. I think that’s about all one can hope for.

By: Evernote in the land of the Blue Shirts « Here’s the Thing

Evernote in the land of the Blue Shirts « Here’s the Thing — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 18:11:27 +0000

[...] ideas on ways to get things done in a more flexible, more efficient manner. There are a bunch of GTD-centric productivity sites out there, each with a collection of great tips and tricks to make you more [...]

By: Eric

Eric — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 16:58:38 +0000

I’ve been a long time user of Evernote (had moved all my notes over from KeyNote, if anyone else remembers that one) and was an enthusiastic supporter and evangelized to many of my friends and colleagues about the product. But, like many of you, I have been equally disappointed in the new version. I was initially excited with the “syncing features” and was encouraged at the renewed development that was going on at the company. I keep expecting the “promise” of the incorporation of all the original features to occur. But, it appears that may never happen :(.

Besides the loss of many of the features from the previous version, it seems to me that this newer version is putting them more in direct competition with other products.

I’m still keeping my fingers crossed they will be incorporating most of the original features.

By: Drew Vogel

Drew Vogel — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 15:42:55 +0000

I’ve spent some time with InfoHesive (http://www.2brightsparks.com/infohesive/index.html) and it’s pretty nice, too… So, for me, the two contenders are Ultra Recall and InfoHesive. I would like to hear opinions of others on how these two products compare to EverNote. Any comments about the communities around these two pieces of software would be welcome as well.

By: Marcin

Marcin — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 07:02:16 +0000

I’ve spent the entire evening yesterday playing with UR, discovering its features. It is powerful indeed. It can be overhelming initially, but it is really well thought-out when you understand how it works.

The only thing it is still lacking is decent documentation. It is very detailed, but very much focused on terminology of things, with very few practical, step-by-step examples.

I actually discovered most of its features but analyzing in great detail the provided samples.

By: Drew Vogel

Drew Vogel — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 20:11:53 +0000

@GTD Wannabe… Interesting observation that NEW users are requesting nested notebooks and the goto source link. I hadn’t noticed that, but find it highly amusing that we, the Gurus, aren’t so far off-base WRT what the unwashed masses want. Kind of makes me think that if Evernote (note: small “n”) had listened to us in the first place…

@Marcin… I’ve spent a little (very little, honestly) time with UltraRecall and like it for the templates (darned $99 Pro version!), but feel that it lacks the elegant simplicity of EverNote 2.2.1.

For me, so far in my limited testing, it seems like UltraRecall may be the brightest candidate for an EverNote 2.2.1 replacement.

By: Marcin

Marcin — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 09:09:46 +0000

I was really wondering what your (and other commenters’) opinion on Ultra Recall was. I downloaded it a few days ago and I’ve been playing with it for a while now. It seems like a pretty mature product albeit a rather complex one when you first use it.

What I don’t like is that it costs $99 for the Pro version :-). And the cheaper Standard version is of no use to me because it does not allow customized templates or attributes.

Anyway, any comments of long-time users would be welcome.

By: GTD Wannabe

GTD Wannabe — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 00:15:38 +0000

You know, I’m honestly boggled by how many (new) users are asking for: (1) the goto source link again and (2) nested notebooks. And EN just keeps saying nothing. (Which really translates to pooh pooh we know what’s good for you.) Makes me want to pull my hair out.

By: Drew Vogel

Drew Vogel — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 18:29:23 +0000

Damn the lowest common denominator! That drives me CRAZY.

Or, let them pander to the lowest. But LEAVE the power features in there for the POWER USERS!

By: GTD Wannabe

GTD Wannabe — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 23:12:44 +0000

It seems that I’ve struck a nerve here! Sigh. I was hoping someone would have secretly found a super replacement for all of us ;)

You know you’ve been on the EN forum too long when you have to explain to someone why the tag hierarchy as it is in EN3 is completely useless. I referred back to the philosophical debates about what a “category” was – a tag or a folder. I guess now that EN has decided to hedge its bets by separating the functionality (as well as that of attributes and saved searches). I think they’re doing that because it was “too hard” for users to figure out the old categories, since they were so flexible. Here’s to providing for the lowest common denominator! sigh.