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I've been an Evernote user for a long time, but it's been ages since I've felt that they're actually user-focused by way of improving holes like poor functional

I've been an Evernote user for a long time, but it's been ages since I've felt that they're actually user-focused by way of improving holes like poor functional parity across their apps(1). As a outsider, a huge amount of energy felt squandered on a shotgun-strategy of special-purpose apps while a stream of core app rebuilds launched, none of which significantly moved the functional needle. I've been exploring alternatives, but so far nothing has stuck. Last time I looked at OneNote it seemed promising, but the lack of tags (seriously?) was a showstopper. DevonThink Pro was interesting, but the Mac experience and UI is archaic to the point of being unusable IMO. Esp. the way that DT bakes a really terrible styling onto imported Evernote notes. I'd love to hear migration success stories from those of you who've moved on. (1) One example: Want to create or modify a table on the iPad app? Nope. Baffling.

icc97 8y ago
I'm still writing some notes in Evernote on my mobile, but on desktop I've just switched to markdown notes in a Dropbox folder. I have a vim plugin now that generates a html preview as I type. I think markdown is the most future proof technology for the moment because you can just use pandoc to convert it or most note systems will accept markdown as an input format. I'm not sure how tags would work in markdown, I guess you can create links manually but that's not really what you want.
- saidajigumi 8y ago
  I suppose the set of features I need covered include: - Web clipping. Evernotes browser plugins are pretty darn good here. - Notes with attachments (images, PDFs, etc.). Some of these are mixed-media notes, where text, images, and/or file attachments are mixed to create a comprehensive document about some topic. Others are "pure" attachments, e.g. "store this PDF where I can retrieve it by search". - Note taking. This, in isolation, is the easiest. - Note syncing, mobile and desktop. This gets a bit harder. - Search. Let's be clear, this was the first and biggest killer feature of Evernote. Notebook and tag organization are important, but rather than just providing direct hierarchical/taxonomic organization, they're largely there to support search with user-defined search facets. I'd also love good Markdown support – that's one of my most-wanted features from Evernote in the first place.
  - irrational 8y ago
    So, you feel search in Evernote is good? Personally I've found it severely lacking. I can't tell you how many times I've searched for something that I know is there (and that I do find after manually looking for it), but search comes up empty.
    - the6threplicant 8y ago
      I think you have found most people's problems, not just with Evernote, but with all other clipping services: it's write often, read once (if at all).
    - icc97 8y ago
      Yeah I prefer ripgrep with a bunch of markdown files.
    - saidajigumi 8y ago
      That's interesting, and absolutely not my experience. Search has been robust, finds what I need, and absolutely worth having. Might be worth a support request -- maybe there's some undetected lossage in your account's search indices and they need a rebuild. (Or maybe you can kick that off self-service?)
  - icc97 8y ago
    > Note syncing, mobile and desktop. This gets a bit harder. The dropbox text editor works 'ok'. It's not great, but it's clean enough that I can edit my markdown notes and they'll be synced with dropbox.
- irrational 8y ago
  What vim plugin do you use?
  - icc97 8y ago
    https://github.com/euclio/vim-markdown-composer https://github.com/euclio/vim-markdown-composer Requires a rust compile of the code in the plugin, but once that's working it works well.
ArekDymalski 8y ago
>so far nothing has stuck. Have you tried diigo.com and it's apps? I highly reccomend it to everyone looking for Evernote alternative, especially for web clipping and organizing.
- saidajigumi 8y ago
  Not yet, but I'll definitely have a look. Thanks!
synaesthesisx 8y ago
Personally I use Ulysses which has been great on desktop & mobile (supports code blocks, markup & more). However I'm not sure how I feel after they switched over to the whole subscription-model thing...anyone else have any success with similar alternatives?
- Tecuane 8y ago
  I used Ulysses but I ended up moving to Bear[1]. It's still. a subscription fee, but much cheaper ($1.49/mo). It's lightweight and perfect for what I use it for - taking notes. If I was going to suggest something for longer-form writings (e.g., journaling, blog posts) and you find that inadequate, I've heard good things about iA Writer[2]. 1. http://www.bear-writer.com http://www.bear-writer.com 2. https://ia.net/writer https://ia.net/writer
- jiaweihli 8y ago
  If you live in the Apple ecosystem, I highly recommend mweb[1]. It ticks all the boxes I've been looking for: - intuitive UI: lets me see 1) raw markdown syntax or 2) formatted preview... no weird in-betweens - sync to/from mobile, with preview & edit support - markdown support with nice preview and support for code (similar to github style) - search - support for folders (and potentially tags, if I ever find a good use case for them) - pdf export - no subscription model Alternatives I've tried which haven't done as well for one reason or another: - Bear: confusing preview/editing mode - Evernote: no markdown - Ulysses: subscription model shift - Standard Notes: confusing/buggy UI - Quiver: poor mobile support [1] https://www.mweb.im/ https://www.mweb.im/
colechristensen 8y ago
I would be happy if Evernote was "done". I pay for a subscription, I am not interested in paying for new features, I would simply be happy if it went into eternal feature freeze and only did security and compatibility updates. Of course this kind of thing won't happen but maybe it says something about the optimization pitfalls of our economy.
- xur17 8y ago
  This would never happen for numerous reasons, but imagine if you could fork a company somehow. Take the existing state, but just take it in an entirely different direction. For companies that don't produce physical goods, this would actually be somewhat doable..
  - stinkytaco 8y ago
    Isn't this kind of what Alphabet did?
  - marktangotango 8y ago
    I once worked at a company that had a successful product ($40M in sales, $15M in arr via support plans). They did a rewrite, that of course went a year long and was poorly handled by sales and marketing ie it was talked about freely with customers and prospects; contributed to sales drying up while they all waited for the new hotness. I knew the rewrite was going take a lot longer than they were saying, both due to common sense and because there were conflicting goals from ceo and cto. I went to the ceo and made a case for a back up plan, myself and a few others could continue on the old busted version; bug fixes and minimal enhancements only, insurance if you will. I really thought about buying it but had no way to finance anything like that. CEO didn’t bite and was in process of selling the company to a PE firm. I left when the new version finally shipped with half the features and twice the bugs. The PE installed CEO wrecked the sales org and sales never recovered. As a side note, a foreign firm had pirated a much older version 10 years prior, rebranded and was #3 with it in that market.
  - bradleyjg 8y ago
    Netflix did something sort of like that when they split off shipping dvds into a completely different unit.
tolien 8y ago
> a huge amount of energy felt squandered on a shotgun-strategy of special-purpose apps Never mind random apps, what about socks? [1] 1: https://mashable.com/2013/09/26/evernote-market/ https://mashable.com/2013/09/26/evernote-market/
- luckydata 8y ago
  that was just a marketing gimmick, it's not like core engineers will be busy knitting the socks.
  - tolien 8y ago
    I doubt core engineers were working on Skitch either (for one, it was an acquisition), but GGP still points out that Evernote lacked (still lacks?) focus. Selling branded stuff (they also did business card holders and bags) is another piece of that.
matchagaucho 8y ago
Both Evernote and Quip were such great apps when they did "one thing well"... keep multiple devices synchronized on simple notes and checklists.
kstrauser 8y ago
I'm a happy DevonThink user (but not a super fanboy, so I won't lose sleep if you don't like it as much as I do). What did you think was archaic about its UI? It has several different layouts to choose from. Do you think they're all bad? I won't disagree, but maybe because I've been using it for so long I don't really notice it. Also, what does it do to the Evernote imports? I've never used that so I haven't seen that before. That said, it's really good at filing and searching. I'd highly recommend trying it long enough to look past the UI to its capabilities. I'd hate to be without it now.

icc97 8y ago

I'm still writing some notes in Evernote on my mobile, but on desktop I've just switched to markdown notes in a Dropbox folder. I have a vim plugin now that generates a html preview as I type. I think markdown is the most future proof technology for the moment because you can just use pandoc to convert it or most note systems will accept markdown as an input format. I'm not sure how tags would work in markdown, I guess you can create links manually but that's not really what you want.

saidajigumi 8y ago
I suppose the set of features I need covered include: - Web clipping. Evernotes browser plugins are pretty darn good here. - Notes with attachments (images, PDFs, etc.). Some of these are mixed-media notes, where text, images, and/or file attachments are mixed to create a comprehensive document about some topic. Others are "pure" attachments, e.g. "store this PDF where I can retrieve it by search". - Note taking. This, in isolation, is the easiest. - Note syncing, mobile and desktop. This gets a bit harder. - Search. Let's be clear, this was the first and biggest killer feature of Evernote. Notebook and tag organization are important, but rather than just providing direct hierarchical/taxonomic organization, they're largely there to support search with user-defined search facets. I'd also love good Markdown support – that's one of my most-wanted features from Evernote in the first place.
- irrational 8y ago
  So, you feel search in Evernote is good? Personally I've found it severely lacking. I can't tell you how many times I've searched for something that I know is there (and that I do find after manually looking for it), but search comes up empty.
  - the6threplicant 8y ago
    I think you have found most people's problems, not just with Evernote, but with all other clipping services: it's write often, read once (if at all).
  - icc97 8y ago
    Yeah I prefer ripgrep with a bunch of markdown files.
  - saidajigumi 8y ago
    That's interesting, and absolutely not my experience. Search has been robust, finds what I need, and absolutely worth having. Might be worth a support request -- maybe there's some undetected lossage in your account's search indices and they need a rebuild. (Or maybe you can kick that off self-service?)
- icc97 8y ago
  > Note syncing, mobile and desktop. This gets a bit harder. The dropbox text editor works 'ok'. It's not great, but it's clean enough that I can edit my markdown notes and they'll be synced with dropbox.
irrational 8y ago
What vim plugin do you use?
- icc97 8y ago
  https://github.com/euclio/vim-markdown-composer https://github.com/euclio/vim-markdown-composer Requires a rust compile of the code in the plugin, but once that's working it works well.

ArekDymalski 8y ago

>so far nothing has stuck. Have you tried diigo.com and it's apps? I highly reccomend it to everyone looking for Evernote alternative, especially for web clipping and organizing.

saidajigumi 8y ago
Not yet, but I'll definitely have a look. Thanks!

synaesthesisx 8y ago

Personally I use Ulysses which has been great on desktop & mobile (supports code blocks, markup & more). However I'm not sure how I feel after they switched over to the whole subscription-model thing...anyone else have any success with similar alternatives?

Tecuane 8y ago
I used Ulysses but I ended up moving to Bear[1]. It's still. a subscription fee, but much cheaper ($1.49/mo). It's lightweight and perfect for what I use it for - taking notes. If I was going to suggest something for longer-form writings (e.g., journaling, blog posts) and you find that inadequate, I've heard good things about iA Writer[2]. 1. http://www.bear-writer.com http://www.bear-writer.com 2. https://ia.net/writer https://ia.net/writer
jiaweihli 8y ago
If you live in the Apple ecosystem, I highly recommend mweb[1]. It ticks all the boxes I've been looking for: - intuitive UI: lets me see 1) raw markdown syntax or 2) formatted preview... no weird in-betweens - sync to/from mobile, with preview & edit support - markdown support with nice preview and support for code (similar to github style) - search - support for folders (and potentially tags, if I ever find a good use case for them) - pdf export - no subscription model Alternatives I've tried which haven't done as well for one reason or another: - Bear: confusing preview/editing mode - Evernote: no markdown - Ulysses: subscription model shift - Standard Notes: confusing/buggy UI - Quiver: poor mobile support [1] https://www.mweb.im/ https://www.mweb.im/

colechristensen 8y ago

I would be happy if Evernote was "done". I pay for a subscription, I am not interested in paying for new features, I would simply be happy if it went into eternal feature freeze and only did security and compatibility updates. Of course this kind of thing won't happen but maybe it says something about the optimization pitfalls of our economy.

xur17 8y ago
This would never happen for numerous reasons, but imagine if you could fork a company somehow. Take the existing state, but just take it in an entirely different direction. For companies that don't produce physical goods, this would actually be somewhat doable..
- stinkytaco 8y ago
  Isn't this kind of what Alphabet did?
- marktangotango 8y ago
  I once worked at a company that had a successful product ($40M in sales, $15M in arr via support plans). They did a rewrite, that of course went a year long and was poorly handled by sales and marketing ie it was talked about freely with customers and prospects; contributed to sales drying up while they all waited for the new hotness. I knew the rewrite was going take a lot longer than they were saying, both due to common sense and because there were conflicting goals from ceo and cto. I went to the ceo and made a case for a back up plan, myself and a few others could continue on the old busted version; bug fixes and minimal enhancements only, insurance if you will. I really thought about buying it but had no way to finance anything like that. CEO didn’t bite and was in process of selling the company to a PE firm. I left when the new version finally shipped with half the features and twice the bugs. The PE installed CEO wrecked the sales org and sales never recovered. As a side note, a foreign firm had pirated a much older version 10 years prior, rebranded and was #3 with it in that market.
- bradleyjg 8y ago
  Netflix did something sort of like that when they split off shipping dvds into a completely different unit.

tolien 8y ago

> a huge amount of energy felt squandered on a shotgun-strategy of special-purpose apps Never mind random apps, what about socks? [1] 1: https://mashable.com/2013/09/26/evernote-market/ https://mashable.com/2013/09/26/evernote-market/

luckydata 8y ago
that was just a marketing gimmick, it's not like core engineers will be busy knitting the socks.
- tolien 8y ago
  I doubt core engineers were working on Skitch either (for one, it was an acquisition), but GGP still points out that Evernote lacked (still lacks?) focus. Selling branded stuff (they also did business card holders and bags) is another piece of that.

matchagaucho 8y ago

Both Evernote and Quip were such great apps when they did "one thing well"... keep multiple devices synchronized on simple notes and checklists.

kstrauser 8y ago

I'm a happy DevonThink user (but not a super fanboy, so I won't lose sleep if you don't like it as much as I do). What did you think was archaic about its UI? It has several different layouts to choose from. Do you think they're all bad? I won't disagree, but maybe because I've been using it for so long I don't really notice it. Also, what does it do to the Evernote imports? I've never used that so I haven't seen that before. That said, it's really good at filing and searching. I'd highly recommend trying it long enough to look past the UI to its capabilities. I'd hate to be without it now.