EVERNOTE: THE GENEALOGIST'S WORKHORSE -- SUMMARY
©2015 by Donald R. Snow -- Last updated 2015-04-05. This 2-page Summary Handout and the full notes are both posted on http://uvtagg.org/classes/dons/dons-classes.html . The numbering here is as on the full notes.
WELCOME AND INTRODUCTION
1. Instructor is Donald R. Snow ( snowd@math.byu.edu
) of Provo and St. George, Utah.
2. This Summary Handout and the full notes are posted on http://uvtagg.org/classes/dons/dons-classes.html . A Freeware Corner article I wrote about EVERNOTE is also posted there.
3. Tips: (1) Icon on your desktop for the URL - drag-and-drop icon; (2) To open a
link but keep your place here,
hold down Control key
4. The problem for today: How to write and save notes, articles,
websites, audio clips, pdf's, etc., in EVERNOTE
USES OF EVERNOTE
5. Set up a free account and download the program from http://www.evernote.com/
-- free version is enough for most people; premium version has more
features, but costs $45/year
6. EVERNOTE stores your notes in the cloud, i.e. online, so you can get to them from any computer connected to the Internet; can
save text, images, pdf's, URL's, clips of websites, audio files, and
more; can store PowerPoints and any other type file in premium version
7. Ideas for using EVERNOTE in family history -- save website information; store articles and documents for a conference; save instructions about research, technology, programs, databases,
hardware, etc.; ToDo lists, e.g. research logs, contacts, phones, email; save collections of letters, emails, recipes; save photo collections, but other free programs are better for
this; photos taken with the camera in EVERNOTE are saved in synchronized notes, i.e. copied to your other computers
TYPES OF NOTEBOOKS IN EVERNOTE
12. (1) Synchronized notebooks -- Stored in the cloud; when offline, you can work on any notes and notebooks
and as soon as your computer detects an Internet connection, it uploads and downloads all synchronized notes and notebooks; can use these wherever you are, e.g. in a FHC, at church, on your
SmartPhone or tablet, etc.; can share synchronized notes or notebooks with anyone you want; synchronized notebooks are backed up online on the EVERNOTE
servers
13. (2) Non-synchronized (local) notebooks -- Private and stored only on your computer; they don't go over the
Internet; to transfer or back them up you copy them to flash drives and/or other computers; can use non-synchronized (private) notebooks to save
passwords, bank data, medical and personal data, etc.
GETTING INFORMATION INTO NOTES
14. Type text or copy-and-paste text, images, URLs, etc., into notes
16. Can drag-and-drop pdf's into notes -- free accounts only allow
drag-and-dropping a few types of files, including pdf's, and are
limited in size allowed; premium accounts can take any type of file
17. pdf's in notes are OCR'd (Optical Character Recognition) by
EVERNOTE, so they are every-word searchable
19. EVERNOTE accounts have an email address so anything sent to that address is automatically put into a note
20. URLs in notes are active links when you are connected to the Internet so clicking on one opens the default
browser to that website
21. Can save parts of a website by highlighting, clipping, and pasting; can improve the format of clips by
using freeware programs such as Evernote
Web Clipper , Evernote
Clearly , Print
Friendly , and Clarify
22. To save a collection of files with each one going into a separate note, open a notebook in EVERNOTE, highlight the files in Windows Explorer, right-click, and click Send To > EVERNOTE -- puts them all into notes in the open notebook
23. ToDo lists with check boxes To Do
> Check Box
26. Camera in EVERNOTE stores photos in notes
28. Notes are saved automatically when entered, so
you don't have to worry about accidentally leaving the program without saving
29. Can attach tags
to help in searching later; can use an unlimited number of tags
EDITING NOTES
31. Edit on any computer and, if synchronized, will be changed on all your other computers
32. Good for writing articles since you can see and edit them from any
computer
33. Undo feature so deleting part of a note is recoverable, but
deleting an entire note is not recoverable
34. Premium version keeps track of all earlier versions of notes so you can recover even deleted notes by going to your web account
35. Has spell checker to show misspelled words
36. Copy or move notes to other notebooks by copy-and-paste or drag-and-drop
37. Set up shortcuts to notes by dragging to Shortcuts Panel (top left)
SEARCHING NOTES
39. Search all notebooks or only selected ones
40. Search tools include: space means AND; "+term" (leave off quote marks) means [term]
has to be there; "-term" (no quotes) means [term] must not be there;
"terms" (include quote marks) means you want exactly those terms in
that order -- Search terms are highlighted in results
41. Searching for "win" (no quotes) brings up results with "Win",
"Windows", "wind", etc.
42. Searching tag:[tag] brings up all notes with that tag; can use other search terms to select from that set
44. Searching ToDo lists: "todo:" finds all ToDo lists, whether completed items or not; "todo:true" finds all completed
checkboxes; "todo:false" finds all uncompleted checkboxes
45. Has a search-and-replace feature within a note, but not globally --
To replace something globally in all notes use the global search
feature and then replace each hit individually
MISCELLANEOUS FEATURES OF EVERNOTE
46. Atlas (lower left side) show a Google map of where you
were when you entered the notes
47. For web version go to http://www.evernote.com/
and
log in with your user name and password -- web version looks almost
the same as desktop version; mobile versions look different, but all
do the same things
48. Exporting notes or notebooks -- highlight the notes or notebook to
export -- export in EVERNOTE format for backup or transfer with flash drive; export in text format for text; export in html format for web format
49. The Usage button (top right)
50. Reminder on a note puts that note at the top of the list at the Reminder time
CONCLUSIONS
51. EVERNOTE has many more features and there are many
third party programs to help
52. Many online tutorials on YouTube, etc. -- search for things like
"evernote tutorials" (without the quotes) on Google
53. EVERNOTE is a very useful and free program for family history and
many other things