EVERNOTE, PHRASEEXPRESS, AND RESOPHNOTES:

FREEWARE NOTE PROGRAMS TO HELP WITH YOUR FAMILY HISTORY

©Copyright 2012 by Donald R. Snow
Sections of the Class Notes This page was last updated 2012-11-15.
Return to the Utah Valley Technology and Genealogy Group Home Page or Don's Class Listings Page .
    WELCOME AND INTRODUCTION

  1. Instructors are Donald R. Snow ( snowd@math.byu.edu ) of Provo and St. George and Jennifer Snow Jackson of West Valley City, Utah.
  2. These notes with the active Internet links are posted on http://uvtagg.org/classes/dons/dons-classes.html and are in the syllabus of the Family History Expo for St. George, 2013-02-22 & 23.
  3. Tips:  (1)  Easy to put an icon on your desktop for the URL to get to these notes.  (2)  To keep your place in these note while going to a link from them hold down the Control key while clicking the link.
  4. This class will show and discuss three freeware programs that help in family history -- Evernote, PhraseExpress, and Resoph Notes.

  5. EVERNOTE

  6. Excellent freeware program for notes and files; commercial version available with more features, but free version has enough features for most of us
  7. Program stores your notes online and between computers; can save text, images, pdf's, URL's, clips of websites, audio files, and more
  8. Download from   http://www.evernote.com/
  9. Helps and video tutorials at -- http://www.evernote.com/about/video/
  10. Features of Evernote
    1. Types of notebooks
      1. Synchronized notebooks - stored in your account online and on any computers you specify; can have up to 250 of these in the free account; examples would be a notebook for all FH notes, one for research logs, one for transcriptions of FH letters, one for pdf instruction manuals, etc.
      2. Non-synchronized (local) notebooks - stored only on your computer; can have any number of these; examples would be a notebook for passwords and personal info since this is not sent across the Internet
    2. Easy to copy or move notes from one notebook to another
    3. Sync'd notebooks are stored online at the Evernote website -- https://www.evernote.com/Registration.action -- so they are also available to you anywhere you can get to the Internet, including on mobile devices
    4. Local notebooks are stored only on your computer, so they are private and not sent over the Internet
    5. Any notebook or set of notes can be exported in several formats, e.g. Evernote format, text, html, etc., and thereby backed up to a flash drive or elsewhere; can use this to transfer a copy to any other computer, even it if is a local non-synchronized notebook; can also import Evernote format back into Evernote with a different name, if desired.
    6. Searching -- can show and/or search all notebooks or only selected ones; search terms are highlighted in results; searching for "win" (no quotes) brings up results with "Win", "Windows", "wind", etc.; searching for "Utah Valley" (in quotes) searches for that exact string; has global find and replace
    7. Can add tags to notes so clicking on a tag brings up all notes with that tag -- can use an unlimited number of tags
    8. Can edit notes and titles of notes at any time; also has an undo feature so deleting part of a note is recoverable, but not if you delete an entire note
    9. Has a spell checker for editing notes
    10. If you save a pdf as a note in a synchronized notebook, it OCR's it so the file becomes every-word searchable, but you only see the pdf, i.e. the index is stored online and not in your file
    11. Has easy way to clip parts of a website to save with the URL and can use freeware browser add-ons such as  Print Friendly and Clarify to save all or parts of websites
    12. Usage button shows you how much of your free space you have used in the 30-day cycle -- free version includes enough space for hundreds of notes, enough for most people
  11. Demo of Evernote

  12. PHRASEEXPRESS

  13. Freeware Windows text expander and clipboard extender, i.e. a program in which you set up shortcuts for frequently used words, phrases, paragraphs, documents, etc., so when you type the shortcut the entire phrase or paragraph is pasted in at the cursor
  14. Download from http://www.phraseexpress.com/  -- has both installed and portable versions
  15. For manual see http://www.phraseexpress.com/docs9/09/manual.htm
  16. Short tutorials at http://www.phraseexpress.com/demo.htm and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4SUaJboqWsA
  17. For review see http://www.pcworld.com/article/233746/resophnotes.html
  18. Comes with many common phrases and shortcuts already entered, e.g. Dear Mr., Dear Mrs., for your information, etc.; also has Auto-Correcting of spelling for many common English words
  19. Allows unlimited number of shortcuts and has folders for categories for ease of finding
  20. Helpful to keep things uniform in your FH and for text you always enter the same way, e.g. salutations, information about sources of genealogy data, information about individuals, URL's, paragraphs in letters, etc.
  21. Also has a Clipboard Cache to remember everything copied to clipboard; can set it to remember as many entries as you want
  22. When the program is running there is an icon in the System Tray (bottom right side of taskbar); to see all folders, phrases, and categories click on the icon > Settings; can edit any phrase and/or shortcut here
  23. For a shortcut don't use a a word that actually spells something or you will get the attached phrase spelled out whenever you type the word; to avoid this you can use a word preceded or followed by an unusual character, e.g. a left bracket or slash
  24. Demo of PhraseExpress

  25. RESOPHNOTES

  26. Simple freeware clipboard extender that sync's online with your other computers and mobile devices
  27. Download from http://resoph.com/ResophNotes/Welcome.html -- installed and portable versions
  28. Review and summary of features at http://lifehacker.com/5816187/the-best-syncing-note+taker-for-windows
  29. Many keyboard shortcuts -- see download website above
  30. To enter a note click on "+"; to delete a note click on "-"
  31. To edit a note click on it and edit it in the right-hand panel
  32. Allows unlimited number of notes which are automatically alphabetized and easy to find
  33. Sync's online with your other computers and mobile device using free accounts on http://simplenoteapp.com
  34. Demo of ResophNotes

    CONCLUSION

  35. These are three helpful freeware note programs with many uses in family history.
  36. See Don's Freeware Notes for many other freeware programs for family history.

Return to the Utah Valley Technology and Genealogy Group Home Page or Don's Class Listings Page .