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Introduction
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| In today's electronic world, organizing information can be quite a challenge. This freeware category is designed to help you organize all those random bits of information hanging around your PC: bookmarks, articles, bits of text, interesting web links, shopping lists, to-do lists, recipes, tips, etc. It's a common problem but a difficult one to solve as the information is so disparate. Some folks have tried to solve the problem by using free form databases while others use beefed up text editors or multi-media snippet managers. |
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Discussion
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Evernote approaches the problem by allowing you to store your notes on an endless "roll" of virtual paper. You can create notes on the roll, drag and drop them or cut and paste them. Images can be stored as well as text. You can access the stored information several different ways: by searching for keywords, by using a category classification such as "recipes", by the date it was created or any combination of these. Toolbars for Internet Explorer and Firefox allow web site information to be highlighted and moved directly to Evernote together with a hyperlink back to the web site. A similar capability is provided for Outlook email. Sure, all this sounds nice but does it work? I evaluated Evernote for a month by using it to collect information for this newsletter. In this demanding task, I found it effective in doing the job and to work just about as well as anything else I've tried including Microsoft's OneNote. It's got a few annoying weaknesses though. The category system is weak. What is needed is the ability to assign tags not categories and to be able to search using those tags in the same manner as you can at del.icio.us and similar sites. That said, Evernote is an outstanding free product and will provide many folks with an excellent solution to note, snippet and general information management problems. With the release of version 3, Evernote is now offering a mix of an application and web services. Other freeware products to be reviewed:
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Related Products and Links
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3.0.0.981 
Restricted Freeware (full commercial version available) 
Windows XP, Vista, Mac OS X
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Editor
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This software category is maintained by volunteer editor sandeepw |
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Tags
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Notes taker, notes organizer, organize notes, notes keeper. |
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New Flashnote is out - go grab it!
http://softvoile.com/flashnote/
My pick is SEO Note. I was using TreeDBNote until it crashed and I lost all the data I had on it. Even when I uninstall and reinstall, it still won't work. Either way, my trust in that one has been lost. I had a lot of data on there that I had meticulously put together and I don't want to go through that experience again. So I was looking for an alternative and tried out a number of suggestions here, but ended up opting for SEO Note, which IMHO is as good as TreeBD. Worth a look at if you are searching for a comprehensive program.
what about UberNote?
Try also KeepNote or CintaNotes.
Ubernote is the best online notepad I've tried.
There should be another category for online services like Ubernote and Zoho notepad etc.
Yes, Evernote is nice, and I use it to save material from the Internet. But the very feature of it being like a "virtual roll of paper" is what makes it less than desirable. It's sometimes very difficult (or requires a lot of fiddling) to get anything organized. Great as a scrapbook, not useful as an organizer. Try Keynote. No longer under development, and I can't vouch for its viability under Vista, but it supports two different encryption systems, full rich text formatting, third-party plugins, and the ability to organize individual notes in a tree format, a tabbed cardfile format, or a combination of both.
I used Keynote before, and encountered just the opposite problem you are noticing with Evernote. keynote helps you to get organized by using trees of nodes, but when your collection grow, I found it hard to find what I want or find it quickly (the search in Keynote is not that great).
Currently I migrated to Evernote and usually can find everything much more quickly by using search or tags. I also found that using trees of nodes is not really necessary, and the information in my head are not stored in trees, anyway. What I would appreciate is some lightweight text-only Evernote-like app.
Using Keynote NF 1.7.6.1 for personal research/journalling under Vista Home Premium, runs fine. I also use it at work on XP.
A new version of Keynote called Keynote NF is available and being developed again. It is available here: http://code.google.com/p/keynote-nf/
I haven't used these other note organizers that are mentioned but I do use treepad lite. I like it a lot. Not a lot of features, but if does the job for me and that is all I ever use.
There are so many notes organizers - how can there be only one listed here - that really doesn't make any sense...
I use TreeDBNotes for my ebooks. Everyone likes their own program. The ideal program does not exist :)
Well, there is some mixup here. I kind of think the article you guys (me for sure) is actually here:
http://www.techsupportalert.com/best-free-outliner.htm
It seems a bit oldish though - there is old Keynote there, no NF. I really can't see the difference between Notes Organizer and Outliner... Anybody care to explain? Seriously...
Bests,
Wirza
An Outliner is a means of producing an outline, a summary of the main points of an argument or theory, or structuring a document.
A Notes Organiser is a means of capturing and classifying notes on a variety of topics.
My reply broken into three to avoid Gizmo's spam filter. This is the third and last which Gizmo also thinks may be spam!
I'm about to use Evernote for a web clipping exercise, and I'm wondering about WikidPad for collating notes and reviews of classical music.
iDailyDiary is worth a look if you want to record plans and notes on a daily basis.
I find QuotePad convenient for everday use, docked to the top of the screen, replacing sticky notes and jottings on paper. It has a filter for people like me who can't be bothered with tags and categories most of the time.
Obviously Evernote is the best notes organiser is the author's opinion. Why not become a reviewer yourself if you feel the article could be improved
keynote-nf
KeyNote NF (New Features)
version 1.17.6.1
Tabbed notebook with RichText editor, multi-level notes and strong encryption.
This project is an evolution of Tranglos Keynote (of Marek Jedlinski), with new features like:
*Checkboxes on children of selected nodes
*Selecting checkboxes for all nodes (View/Tree Checkboxes — now View/All nodes Checkboxes) is still posible. Besides, checkboxes can be shown only on children of selected nodes (Children Checkbox)
*Hidden nodes
*Capacity to work with hidden nodes. Nodes can be hidden in two ways:
*Activating a mode wich automatically hides checked nodes (Show or Hide checked nodes)
*Filtering one note’s nodes or all notes under a searching criterion (Filter Tree Note)
*Alarms on nodes
*Better treatment of tables
*Improved treatment of links
*Multilanguage support
*New kind of virtual nodes: links to other nodes (Mirror nodes)
*Allow to organize the information in different ways, because nodes can be simultaneously in different notes. It will be possible to sort, rank and structuring in a free tree hierarchy, independent of the hierarchy in wich ‘real’ nodes reside.
KeyNote NF version 1.17.6.1
http://code.google.com/p/keynote-nf/
Have tried several organizers including EverNote. Then tried KeyNote. It's the best I can find just for organizing all kinds of date. I and now use it all the time. Learning curve is very low and many good options. One way Evernote was better it its ability to print from that program. With KeyNote you cut and paste onto a word processor. - Jim
No need to "cut and paste" with KeyNote. You can export all the nodes into one *.rtf file and open it in a wordprocessor.
Andrew
Evernote is crapware! If you want a real notes app with a lite footprint, try TreedbNotes Free or Pro, http://www.mytreedb.com/downloads.html
Sadly, as of its latest release, Evernote has morphed into adware.
had the same concerns at first. After installing and playing around with the program however, I realised that you never actually have to upload anything to their server. In fact you only need to supply a username, email address and password for registration.
You can turn off auto-sync, and if you don't supply your password when you sign into the desktop software (you stay logged in regardless of connectivity) you can't sync anything anyway, so if you accidentally press sync you will be prompted to enter your password.
I guess you could also configure your firewall to block the program's internet access also!
Evernote is head and shoulders above other "note organiser" programs I've used. It's simplicity and the "cut and paste more or less anything all to one place" are what make it great to me.
Keynote is still the best. I also tried SEONote which is an updated version of the basic Keynote program but they give no credit to the Keynote author so I went back to Keynote.
So much better if this article can list more candidates and rate them :)
Keynote is alive and kicking and can be found at Sourceforge.
A new developer has taken up the mantle.
What's all this talk about keynote...? It isn't near as good as TreeDBNotes...
Alive and kicking is yet to been seen, but it is @ http://sourceforge.net/projects/keynote/ , alright !
It's alive alwright: http://code.google.com/p/keynote-nf/ !
TechSupportAlert is Great!
I just wanted to mention a great note taking / lists management free program.
http://www.tranglos.com/free/keynote_download.html
KeyNote by Tranglos
It's no longer being developed but if you want something that isn't as bulky as evernote then this is the program for you.
IMO, better than all the rest is TreedbNotes. Incredibly powerful without all the Evernote bloat. http://www.mytreedb.com
Good, but 60 day free trial period only?
No, free version without time limit.
+1
I've been reluctant to use Evernote since the database moved to the web (security concerns). I just installed Evernote portable and my security issue has been resolved.
The portable version runs on a SanDisk Cruzer, but has 2 wonderful features:
1) it can be run on any Windows PC without having to install the Evernote software
2) you can create notebooks (read note collections) and only synchronize the notebooks you choose. thus, you can keep selected notebooks with private information as "local" on the USB drive.
Interesting item: during installation, my desktop McAfee software automatically installed a USB scan version. apparently, there is no charge for the USB version if you have a McAfee license.
I had the same concerns at first. After installing and playing around with the program however, I realised that you never actually have to upload anything to their server. In fact you only need to supply a username, email address and password for registration.
You can turn off auto-sync, and if you don't supply your password when you sign into the desktop software (you stay logged in regardless of connectivity) you can't sync anything anyway, so if you accidentally press sync you will be prompted to enter your password.
I guess you could also configure your firewall to block the program's internet access also!
Evernote is head and shoulders above other "note organiser" programs I've used. It's simplicity and the "cut and paste more or less anything all to one place" are what make it great to me.
Try NotesHolderLite freeware version 1.65... It works on Vista ... Note taking software comes in so many guises ... from heavy-duty ones like Evernote to Post- It-Stickies on the other end of the spectrum ...
I use Evernote for research work which requires clipping a lot of info from web pages ... For quick, on the fly snippets of information, I like to have a software that sits on the system tray at startup which allows me to enter or paste information quickly with just one or two clicks. Other things I look out for in a quick note-taking program are notes that auto-save, notes that do not require me to create a filename, the ability to see a few sentences of each note at a glance in a all-notes view - somewhat like that of a clipboard manager, and the option to choose my own directory to save the database of notes in... NotesHolder Lite does all these things ... One function that it lacks and which I wish it had .. is the ability to drag notes out as sticky notes and to attach them to files, folders, etc ... Now that would be .. awesome...
I just found out that (oddly) evernote portable is not freeware.
However I've been using evernote since they started out (thanks Gizmo!) and it is by far the most life-changing piece of software I've seen.
I particularly recommend it to academics as a lab book...
I use post-it notes but he is to much simple, i prefer it to post on slow computers
Upvise is good. It´s basically Google Notebook but it also offers java app for mobile sync. Peak Notes is web sticky notes that also comes with mobile client.
www.upvise.com
http://www.olivepeak.com/peaknotes/
I use a combination of Evernote (I bought the commercial version) and Google's Notebook (Both integrate into Firefox). I like them both.
I use Flashnote, but it's not as extensive over Evernote, which I find it more interesting than Flashnote. http://softvoile.com/flashnote/
What about the scrapbook add-in for firefox? I have replaced evernote with that now - it's simple and integrated into the browser in a bookmarks fashion with search capabilities.
If Scrapbook did IE (still 80+% market share), and it did OL 2007 like Evernote does, and it allowed me clip from my news group reader, and I could a clip screen scrape from a PDF, and I could copy paste from my media manager, and I could use it on my 3G phone - then I might use Scrapbook
I do all those things and more with Evernote - scrapbook is OK, if your only app is firefox (which I am using right now).
The latest free Evernote is too limited for me, I also vote for Scrpabook.
I find ScrapBook 2.20 which needs no instalation very handy on the desktop
http://www.scrapbook.enware.info/
I have been using Quicknote for the last month or so and it has changed my life. One downside is that you can't store images, but other than that I have been able to keep all those scraps of information I want in a very organised and easy manner!
Evernote is terrific.
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