Google Notebook v. Diigo Update

Well, it didn’t take long to decide whether I preferred Google Notebook or Diigo. As I said when I started the comparison, the real test was which of the programs I would end up using.

There’s no doubt which program has won. I’m still using Diigo and not using Google Notes at all. In fact I’ve transferred all the bookmarks I made with Google Notes into Diigo.

What were the factors that led to this?

I found Google Notes a bit slower to use, especially when entering tags (called labels in Google Notebook). Tags are the key to both programs, so the ease by which they can be used is crucial.

Since I often use Diigo as a way of summarising long documents and keeping my place in them, I was irritated that I could only highlight one passage per entry in Google Notebook. In Diigo you can highlight as many excerpts as you want and also add your own comments as sticky notes. It is much more flexible.

I also missed the filtered drop-down bookmark list, which is a real time saver in Diigo for frequently used bookmarks.

The plus for Google Notes is that you can enter your own separate notes as bookmarks. But then do you really want to keep your personal notes on-line? I use EverNote for that purpose and there is no clash at all between it and Diigo. To my way of thinking they are different functions and there is no problem having different programs for them.

As I am not interested in the social sharing side of either program, I have not compared them at all from that point of view.

Google Notes v. Diigo

I wrote on November 22nd that Diigo was a really useful program, which I was finding worked very well. Since then I’ve been using it a lot and have found it invaluable.

Its main disadvantage is that sometimes it slows right down and becomes difficult to access - it’s only an occasional problem though.

However a couple of people commented that they found Google Notes just as good and faster to use. So I’m going to have a go at Google Notes myself to see how they compare.

One can draw up huge comparison lists between different programs, but the real test for me is which one do I end up using?

Evernote 2.0 Beta

I'm just in the process of downloading the Beta of Evernote 2.0. It appears to have several important enhancements to Evernote 1.5. These include a note list, a way of searching category names (badly needed), a screen clipper (very useful), but still no reminder facility (see my previous post).

I'll report back once I've had a chance to assess it.

Using Outlook as an Alarm for Evernote

One of the disadvantages of the otherwise excellent Evernote note-taking software is that it does not have an alarm function. However you can work around this because it does produce an individual hyperlink for each of its notes. This link can then be dragged or copied to a variety of programs which do have alarms. The most obvious of these is Microsoft Outlook. I've already described here and here some of the ways in which links can be used in Outlook Tasks. This is another.

If you are an Evernote user, try dragging a note heading into the Task icon in the Outlook left-hand margin. What happens?

You will see that a Task box opens up with the link to the Evernote note shown as an icon. Click on the icon and you will be taken directly to the note (it will be the last note shown on the Evernote page).

You can now use the alarm function on the task box to bring the note link up whenever you wish.

Note Taking Software Progress Report

Here’s an update on the note-taking programs I have been trying out.

Evernote is definitely the clear winner so far. For ease of use it is far the best, and therefore it’s the one I go to naturally. I’ve been exploring what I can do with it and it’s impressing me more and more.

Of the other programs, Tiddlywiki is very interesting, but just that little bit too difficult to use. It’s one great advantage over Evernote is that you can easily arrange the information you retrieve into the order you want. Evernote’s hyperlink function is a bit less flexible than Tiddlywiki’s, but not so much that the ease of use of the rest of the program doesn’t give it the advantage.

Online programs may be great for sharing information, but are just too slow and cumbersome for individual use even with a high speed connection. So that rules out Backpack and Stikkit. I was able to produce a very pretty page with Backpack, but it took me a long time and I feel no incentive to go back and keep it up to date. As for Stikkit, I usually reckon myself pretty good at getting into a new program but so far I have no idea how this is supposed to work. I’ve visited the site three times and still haven’t been able to fathom out even the basic step of how to enter information. For a program which claims to be extremely intuitive and easy to use that can’t be a good sign!

Update on Friday, December 12, 2008 at 11:05 by Mark Forster

It’s just been announced that Stikkit is being discontinued on December 19th.

Note Taking Software

Evernote is still proving its worth, but there are some limitations of the program which I find irritating. I've decided therefore to try out various other note taking programs at the same time. I will judge the winner on the purely pragmatic grounds of which program I find I actually end up using.

The programs which I have on my list at the moment are:

• Evernote (off-line)
• Tiddlywiki (off-line)
• Stikkit (on-line)
• Backpack (on-line)

If you have a favourite program which you would like to see added to this, please put it in the comments section. I can't promise to use it, but I will have a look to see if it's suitable.