What does everyone think of Evernote 8.0?

tapdogs

tapdogs

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Evernote 8.0 just came out recently and I'm trying to choose the best tool as a GTD newbie. I'm not liking the product in general because of the price (I want to use it on four devices - personal laptop, work laptop, iphone and ipad). Any thoughts on 8.0?
 
I love Evernote for GTD (work Windows laptop, personal MacBook Pro, iPhone, iPad), but I can't currently recommend the Evernote 8 iOS version for GTD if you use tags. You might want to look at Omnifocus or wait a few weeks to see if the Evernote team addresses the tag issue.

I use tags for contexts (@Store, @Home, @Online, etc.) and currently, if I try to look at a certain tag, it shows me all notes with that tag including the ones in the Trash. Thus, I can't tell which Next Actions are current and which ones were deleted days, weeks, months, or even years ago. GTD Contexts are now near useless for me on my iPhone and iPad

I may try to revert to a previous version of Evernote for my iPhone and iPad.
 
There is no single "best tool" for GTD, regardless of whether you're a newbie, a veteran or something in between. It's going to depend a lot on what tools you have available and are comfortable with, and also personal preference.

I use Evernote for GTD and it works well for me. I use the setup suggested in the GTD Evernote For Windows guide offered by the David Allen Company. They also have a guide for the Mac version. You can find them at https://gtdconnect.com/store/home.php?cat=263.

Evernote 8.0 is the latest version for iOS, BTW; the Windows client is still on version 6.x and has been for some time (I don't know what's up with the Mac versions nor Android as I don't use those platforms). Evernote redesigned the iOS app rather dramatically to make it simpler and easier to use. They released it just a few days ago. I'm still getting used to the new UI. I am sure there will be glitches like the one vutpakdi reports, and it will take a bit of time to iron them out. That's always the way with redesigns.

I understand your concerns about price. There are similar note management apps that are free, such as OneNote from Microsoft (and the David Allen Company offers a setup guide for that as well). Be aware that with free apps, you sacrifice a bit of privacy. Purveyors of free apps mine your data in order to make money with targeted advertising and marketing. A lot of people are OK with that, but I think it's worth knowing so you can make an informed decision.

Evernote is definitely a workable option, but there are a plethora of alternatives. The nice thing is that people are happy to share their favorites in this forum if you ask, which will give you a nice list of options to explore if that's what you want. You can also do a Google search and find a lot of options that way.

Don't get hung up on finding the "perfect" tool. The question is what's the right tool for you. And as David Allen says, any tool can work if you work it.
 
I use it quite a bit for reference materials. I use OneNote for content I generate and Evernote for reference material. As I can't really stand the editor in Evernote.

I like the new 8.0 mobile interface for Evernote. They went back to a much simpler UI and I find it much faster to find notes that the previous version.
 
Are you thinking of using this as your primary GTD tool, or as a place to store project support material? And are your computers Mac or PC?

If they're Mac, I would absolutely recommend that you have a long, detailed look at OmniFocus.
 
Gardener said:
Are you thinking of using this as your primary GTD tool, or as a place to store project support material? And are your computers Mac or PC?

If they're Mac, I would absolutely recommend that you have a long, detailed look at OmniFocus.
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I planned on using this tool as my primary GTD tool both project and non-project. I'm using a PC. I haven't really explored OmniFocus but will take a look at. Since Evernote seemed to be the most popular tool, I was wondering if 8.0 resolved a lot of issues that GTDers had with the product in the past.
 
I use Evernote for everything except for Next Actions, Agendas and some Checklists, because I prefer Todoist for that. I <3 Evernote.
 
tapdogs said:
I planned on using this tool as my primary GTD tool both project and non-project. I'm using a PC. I haven't really explored OmniFocus but will take a look at. Since Evernote seemed to be the most popular tool, I was wondering if 8.0 resolved a lot of issues that GTDers had with the product in the past.
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Unfortunately, OmniFocus isn't available on the PC. You could use it on the iPhone and iPad, but the inability to use it on your PCs would eliminate most of the advantage of its dandy syncing capabilities.
 
tapdogs said:
I planned on using this tool as my primary GTD tool both project and non-project. I'm using a PC. I haven't really explored OmniFocus but will take a look at. Since Evernote seemed to be the most popular tool, I was wondering if 8.0 resolved a lot of issues that GTDers had with the product in the past.
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I'm not sure what you mean by "a lot of issues that GTDers had with the product in the past." Some people like Evernote for GTD (like me), some others don't, and still others have never used it in the first place. Opinions will run all over the map. I think the best thing I can tell you is that it can work for you, but whether it will work for you depends on your personal preferences.

Again, Evernote 8.0 is the newest version on iOS. The Windows and web clients remain unchanged. So if someone didn't like Evernote for GTD before, I doubt the iOS redesign would do much to sway their opinion. After all, people are unlikely to use an iPhone or iPad alone to manage their system.

I like Evernote because it meets what I believe are the key criteria for a GTD list manager: it enables organizing of lists into buckets (I use notebooks for next actions, projects, waiting for and someday/maybe lists); it is portable since it syncs easily and is available on my PC, iPhone, and iPad (there are also Mac, Android and web clients although I don't use the first two platforms and rarely use the web client); it allows due dates via reminders; and it's easy enough to use that I don't have to think about it. And finally, I find it to be a versatile tool that I really enjoy using.

Some people don't like the fact that Evernote does not provide an easy way to link projects to next actions, which is not a necessity for practicing GTD but for many it's a strong preference. Some people don't like Evernote because it's not designed for GTD like some software applications, which means you do have to do some set-up (although it only took me about 10 mintes). That's not an exhaustive list but those are a couple of the big reasons why some people don't like Evernote for GTD.

Only you can decide whether Evernote's benefits outweigh the disadvantages. If you want to try Evernote for GTD, the David Allen Company setup guides would be a good place to start. Assuming you decide to stick with Evernote, you'll likely make tweaks and develop a system that's uniquely yours (although mine still largely resembles what's in the setup guide -- I like to keep things simple). If you end up not liking Evernote, nothing's stopping you from switching. It's not like a marriage. If you decide to leave your tool, you won't have to consult any lawyers. And to paraphrase Thomas Edison, your time won't have been wasted because you'll have ruled out Evernote as one thing that didn't work for you.
 
@ bcmyers2112 Thanks for the great review about Evernote!!! I also downloaded all of the GTD setup guides for the various software packages. Again, I'm a newbie (both GTD, Evernote and list managers in general). I've been surfing all the forum discussions to make an informed decision. I hadn't realized that the windows version had not been updated - I just assumed it was. Based on reviews, the product does make a great list manager but I'm trying to figure out if it's worth $70/yr (inexpensive but wasteful if I really don't like it - I have 4 devices and like the extreme search capability).

Since my first posting, I'm leaning toward OneNote just because it came with MicroSoft office (free on my work laptop) and they may integrate it tighter into Outlook someday. I'll still have to customize it and if I don't like it, I can check out Evernote again.

Thanks again everyone!
 
tapdogs said:
Based on reviews, the product does make a great list manager but I'm trying to figure out if it's worth $70/yr (inexpensive but wasteful if I really don't like it - I have 4 devices and like the extreme search capability).

Since my first posting, I'm leaning toward OneNote just because it came with MicroSoft office (free on my work laptop) and they may integrate it tighter into Outlook someday. I'll still have to customize it and if I don't like it, I can check out Evernote again.
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I believe Evernote has a monthly subscription option if you decide to try it out but don't want to commit to a full year. I haven't used OneNote in years -- when I did try it I found it not to my liking -- so I can't vouch for it. On the other hand, there are a number of people who use it for GTD and are quite happy with it, and there's a GTD guide for OneNote as well. I'm guessing if you try that product, you probably won't go wrong.

Good luck with your new GTD practice. It's an adjustment, so don't feel bad if you stumble a bit with it. If you stick with it, though, I'm confident you'll reap some great benefits.
 
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