This has been one of our most requested episodes. We talk all about information managers. These are applications that handle all those random bits of information that don’t seem to fit in any other type of organizational system. We’ll give you a general overview of some of the options available on the Mac and Katie and David go more in depth on the systems we use.
Links of note
Devon Think
Devon Academy
Notebook
Mac Journal
Curio
Papers
Bento
Shovebox
Together
Evernote
Yojimbo
Dont’ forget to send us in your questions for Macworld’s Paul Kent on our next episode. Send any questions to feedback@macpowerusers.com
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It is amazing how many of these programs exist for the Mac – and as you admitted, you haven’t even covered them all!
Great podcast as well. While I have settled on, and paid for, Yojimbo, I am still highly addicted to this software category. It’s like a drug – I find myself craving my next hit of Mac shoebox software!
I love and use Journler. Price is right. Ease of entry.
Love your show.
I was surprised that you didn’t cover the biggest weakness of Evernote – the inability of the app to get basic text processing right. Check out this thread in their forum:
http://forum.evernote.com/phpbb/viewtopic.php?f=38&t=9094&p=42306&hilit=bryan#p42306
(Note: I was the original poster).
I have *never* had such high hopes for a program and been so disappointed. Text editing on the Mac is broken. Full stop. Broken. I just wanted the ability to enter text and use some formatting and I cannot. The thread has example after example of people having a variety of problems with this.
IMHO, Evernote has gone completely off the rails in two ways. First, they are trying to support too many platforms. Every other month, it seems, they announce another cell phone they will support. Second, they are trying to do too much. OCR, indexing, text editing, attachments, etc. etc. Any type of object all in one container, on a dozen platforms….it simply doesn’t work. It CAN work – I use Lotus Notes and they do a good job at this, but that is mature product that is not aimed at end users.
I somehow missed your bit on Together, which is my tool of choice. It is such a nice program. I like that it doesn’t have a database per se (your docs are all stored in the finder) but you get this great iTunes like interface in which to manage your documents. I throw tons of stuff in there, and what is really nice is that I can put in URLS, word docs, PDFs, notes, etc and they are all saved in their native format in the finder, BUT I can create smart groups to organize my data objects in a variety of ways. So I have a smart group that shows all manuals (I tag them as manuals when I import them) and a smart group for anything dealing with photography, for example, so I can pick up all manuals or look at all objects dealing with photography, whether they are word docs, ULRs, PDFs, etc. Very useful.
My only wish is that there were a web and/or iPhone version. Maybe someday.
Bryan Schmiedeler
Thank’s for that very very cool episode, I just about tried them all! Yojimbo and Together are my faves. At last the nested folder option of Together won it for me. And Together has a great pricepoint! Evernote? bleh! Exporting should be one of the most important features of an information manager. Evernote sucks in that department.
I use Together also for my scanned documents (Fujitsu S300M). Works great for me. Cheers from the Netherlands!
Good show. Nice to hear some negatives (Evernote) as well as the positives.
You could use NoteBook for many projects inside one notebook. The thing against doing it this way is because of the file size, but it’s a great app.
I use OmniFocus as my information manager because I spend so much time in it running my life via GTD. I have a project called Reference and contexts called Computer, Excel Advanced, Minimal Packing List, Normal Packing List, Collecting, Misc etc. etc.
I forget to mention that Together works really well with secure diskimages. My whole library is in a secure sparsebundle diskimage. I pointed Together to it and if you start the app it’s asks you the password…
Cheers!
Yet another interesting show! There seem to be so many information managers it makes the head swim. I’m always glad to learn more about applications available for the Mac. You never know when a new one might fill a need.
After looking at through the list above, I have to say that Things/Scrivener takes care of 99% of what I’m seeing on the list above. I would love to have Bento as a mailing list manager – but it is incredible overkill for the amount of use it would get on my system.
Here’s something that puzzled me upon listening to the show. I know Katie is a Things user. As Things is my todo list manager of choice after your earlier smackdown show, I was curious to see what these other apps would give me that went over and above Things (or Omnifocus – for those who use that instead)
This is in regard to the example in the show of her grandfather’s emergency surgery. Evernote was used to organize the events and data. From what I heard, all of the events listed could have been created as a project in Things very easily. Saving links to emails, adding documents, pdfs, etc.
Was I missing something in regard to syncing or sharing of info that made Evernote better? Perhaps you can clarify where they are different and Evernote gives functionality Things does not. Any type of example will do to showcase the differences. I would have the same question with regard to Yojimbo. With these 2 apps in particular I am just not seeing extra functionality that I don’t already have. I know many people use these and love them. In my own case, I wanted to see if they would give me anything extra I am currently missing on my system.
BTW – my desktop on my Mac is clear. Even my desktop on my PC is clear. I find desktop clutter to be more of a distraction that a help.
Great show guys. I use have used nearly all of these.
You mentioned Papers during the show, and I agree its a great app. But those who need a scientific reference manager should also check out Sente – just brilliant and knocks spots off EndNote (the standard app). Papers is OK for organising but lacks the word processor integration for all round reference management. The companion iphone app is cool though – and would be handy. …..but I can’t start yet another program, its good advice to choose one or two and stick to them. (dare I say that many of them are attempting to copy some of the functionality of OneNote on MS office PC – the only thing that kept me in the other camp for so long!)
I originally used Journler which is unfortunately dead.
When looking for a replacement I stumbled first over Yojimbo, which seemed to be good.
But noticed that it took them quite a while to release their recent update. So I wanted to make sure they are actively developing the app and wrote them an email. The answer was like “We don’t tell”. That was not the answer I was expecting.
I’m glad that I than found out about Together which is kind of a “Yojimbo Pro”. (It even provides an app to get your Yojimbo stuff over to Together)
The developer is really responsive and he is doing a nice job with the app.
I don’t care so much about syncing (though the Dropbox thing should work with it). I just want to have my stuff together on my Mac … similar to what I’m used to from Journler. This is the perfect fit for me.
It uses Quicklook so I can even through in and preview my Mindnode Mindmaps.
If you like how Yojimbo works but missing features you definitely should check out Together. You might find what you are looking for.
Hats off for another great show, Katie and David!
I’m partial to using Evernote for certain types of information – especially information that I’m likely to need when I’m on the go. I like the convenience of being able to pull it up on my iPhone and access it through the web interface. I agree that the Mac client does need some polish – especially around text formatting. Though, having witnessed Evernote’s evolution for over two years I have no doubt that these improvements are coming.
A couple of Evernote corrections (maybe the first will help swing you over David
. If you right/control-click on the content of the PDF you’ll see a Save As menu item that allows you to extract the PDF. If it’s a PDF of scanned text you’ll also have a “Save Searchable PDF As…” which saves a version of the PDF that contains selectable/searchable text (I just discovered this one – very cool). I’m using the paid version – I’m not sure if this functionality is available through the free service.
Also, Katie you mentioned that you don’t want all of your information synced to the cloud. You can set any Evernote note book to be local by right/control-clicking on the notebook and choosing Notebook Settings. This will allow you to keep private data in Evernote without worrying about having it being seen by the Evernote elephants (or anyone else). The downside is that, since image processing is done in the cloud, your images and PDFs won’t get OCR’d.
I simply use the Finder as a repository for many types of information. I store sensitive information, such as bank statements, in a secure disk image and files that I want to access on-the-go or sync between multiple computers goes into my DropBox folder. This is especially handy now that there’s an iPhone app for DropBox.
Great show: love the overview of the different applications and acknowledged that it is best to stand by one and learn to incorporate it into your daily life.
Question: did anyone catch the iPhone App David mentioned?
Thanks,
Scott
@Scott
Sorry, I misspoke. The app is FileMagnet. There are several other alternatives but I’ve been using File Magnet since the App Store opened. It allows you to put documents and PDF on your phone.
Just discovered your podcast! Glad you’re out there.
In a show titled “information managers, ” it’s hard to understand why you chose to discuss Papers in lieu of Together. Could you explain your rationale?
I’ve tried most of these programs (some, I’ve tried multiple times). As you mention, there’s no silver bullet that does everything exceptionally.
I’m slowly settling into Together as my default uber-library where everything eventually ends up. Currently, it’s the best at that. Things is the best for To Dos and GTD. And after several failed attempts, I think I’m settling on Evernote as a catch-all inbox where a small-ish number of things will live until they’re sorted properly.
I despise that Evernote will not allow me to manually re-order my notes (something that even a super light-weight app like MyNotes has always done.)
And at work, I’m stuck behind a draconian firewall/proxy server combo that makes mobileme and Evernote syncing all but impossible. Argh.
I really love this kind of review format, where you compare and discuss pros and cons of similar apps. This service is INVALUABLE to we normal-folk end users!!! I keep hoping that one mac site will rise up and specialize at that. That’s what MacApper should have been. Oh, well.
So please keep comparing apps! I’d love to listen to a review of mind mapping apps. And even after this podcast, I think there’s room for a side discussion of journaling apps vs. note taking apps. I’m not sure MacJournal should be considered an information manager… not in the same way that Evernote is.
Great little programs like ViJournal are in a different niche category than Yojimbo. I wonder if the forthcoming Thoughts (still in beta) will be a decent journal app?
ANYWHO, please keep up the great work! I’m looking forward to catching up on the podcasts I’ve missed. I’ve been a Scrivener fan for years, so I’m going to listen to that one next!
best wishes in the New Year!
I agree that exporting from Evernote is not where it should be. It is problematic enough that I choose other options occassionally because of this issue. However, I think it is in Evernote’s interest to make exporting better. Keeping it tough to keep people in the environment is an anti-customer position that will ultimately hurt the company. Evernote would create goodwill and positive press by making it easier to expert from the program.
Another great and helpful podcast, guys. Thanks very much.
Don’t overlook SOHONotes if you’re looking for a fully featured info manager (http://www.chronosnet.com/Products/sohonotes.html). This app has had its glitches in the past, but present versions are impressive and the new iPhone app, NoteLife, is very slick indeed, with the fastest syncing I’ve yet come across. SOHONotes has everything that Yojimbo, for example, has and very much more. It has both hierarchical folders and tagging, encryptment for individual notes, individual icons for folders (a not unimportant feature for many), audio and iSight notetaking, direct scanning into the app, quicknote and search features for when the app itself isn’t open, and far more ways of getting notes and files into it than any of its competitors (including a sidebar dock and individual hotkeys customizable for all folders). It has MobileMe syncing (though this can be problematic with large databases, as so often happens with MobileMe). It recognizes all main formats and opens stored docs in others in their original apps. The only thing it lacks compared with the others is Evernote’s cloud storage. And all for the same price as Yojimbo.
I’ve been a ranter in the past about the app’s glitches, and poor support by the dev (they’ve just sacked the main guy responsible for this, supposedly, so this will hopefully improve) and have tried literally (I mean literally!!) all the others, but have always come back to SOHONotes. Its features are just so much richer than them all, and now finally it is working seamlessly. NoteLife is really very good. I’m a heavy user of these apps (DEVONthink Pro Office for research databases, Tinderbox for information mapping, etc), but find that for routine stuff – “everything else“ – SOHONotes has by far proved best.
I emailed Katy and Dave about this, but for some reason they still didn’t mention it in the follow-up in the current podcast. It’d be a shame for the app to go unmentioned as it really is at the top of field – a serious omission in a Poweruser’s survey, IMO.
Oops, Katie, sorry about spelling your name wrong. No edit function, so do feel free to change it…
I should check out Evernote again since it sounds like there is a new/improved version. I’ve been using Simplenote rather than Evernote on my iPhone since at the time I liked how I could search for partial words in my notes.
htt[://simplenoteapp.com
great overview, thanks for this.
but if you have mentioned papers, so you should mentioned zotero too. zotero can also be verry usefull as information manager and ist’s opensource …
I find that I prefer to use DEVONthink Office Pro (DT). The built-in OCR is handy for any scans you import and the built-in web server is useful for remote access to your reference library. Plus, the web server allows you to make use of LaunchBar Search Templates (see the DT forums for the templates) to quickly search your database without having to switch to DT.
I find that by storing all my references in DT the See Also feature can suggest similar items that you might not think are relevant. The only caveat is that storing large references such as complete books may cause them to get suggested often. Breaking things into individual chapters helps keep things focused.
I used to use a mix of EagleFiler for web references and DT for everything else and I’m looking at switching to an all DT system now that it supports tags which was the main advantage for EagleFiler. Tags I find is the natural way to categorize web references.
Both EagleFiler and DEVONthink Pro Office support archiving e-mail which I find is very useful and isn’t a common feature of most programs of this type.