Docxmanager, looks nice

Posted by SmallDog
Oct 26, 2020 at 08:06 PM

1. I can confirm Edwin has been super responsive to user feedback. I have recently corresponded with him about an issue re: dragging the splitter and he fixed it within a matter of hours.

2. Also, many people are either not aware of this or haven’t thought through its implications, but Google has recently made it possible to edit docx files directly in GoogleDoc. For me, this has been an absolute game changer, because it allows me to completely dump Evernote in favor of a collection of docx files stored in my Google Drive (which I use DocXManager to manage). Among other things, this means

* you can edit your notes on your phone with GoogleDoc, and the changes sync in real time in the opened (!) file on your desktop. No more merge conflicts or doing manual syncs which have been one of the biggest pain points of Evernote
* GoogleDoc for Android is, I suspect, the single most optimized Android app there is. The editing experience is just superb, and it doesn’t slow down even when you have huge files that span hundreds of pages. It’s a much better experience than Evernote. A lot more options too. (Probably the feature I use/repurpose the most is Comments, which allows you to insert tangentially relevant material / digressions / note to selves without interrupting the main flow. Nothing like that in evernote)
* Zotero integration is a big plus for those who have need of this
* All of your notes are files. Not plain text files to be sure, but the fact that they are exposed as files as opposed to in a database as in Evernote means you can perform all kinds of operations that’s a pain to do in Evernote. For example you can use PowerGrep to do bulk search and replace in many docx files while preserving formating
* No more tinkering with Evernote notebooks, just do it the intuitive way, with folders
* And of course Google Drive search is just as good as Evernote’s if not better

The only downside is Evernote’s global incremental full-text search is really good and not easily replicable in this setup. But incremental project wide search is a new feature introduce in DocxManager. I haven’t been able to get it to work on my machine yet (could be because of the ancient Word version (2010) I’m still sticking with) but I have little doubt it can be made to work eventually.

Edwin Yip wrote:
Hi guys, I’m Edwin Yip, developer of DocxManager here.
> >Thanks @Amontillado for mentioning DocxManager here and thanks for all
>the input/comments by everybody.
> >The way I see it, getting feedback or from the actually user and
>prospects is the first step to getting a software being enhanced.
> >Thanks @Listerene for his criticism. I confirm what he said is true - I
>did receive bug reports from users about losing their data with the old
>WritingOutliner, I think it’s a result of the imperfectness and
>complexities of the design of the old WritingOutliner, I apologize to
>@Listerene and the others again for the inconvenience caused, I fully
>understand the feeling of losing work and I’m sorry for the old
>WritingOutliner wasn’t stable enough to prevent that happens.
> >While the old WritingOutliner worked for most other people, the
>imperfect design of it is the main reason why I’ve completely re-design
>it as the new DocxManager, as a result, DocxManager is very stable in
>terms of preventing data loss, because besides asking Word to save/load
>your documents it doesn’t alter your Word document at all.
> >Give it a try again, at least keep an eye on it - DocxManager will being
>enhanced constantly in the future - I must say I’m very proud of its new
>architecture which is very flexible and allowed me keep adding more and
>more new feature and enhancements to it.
> >Listerene wrote:
>After (repeated) bad experiences with Writing Outliner, I’m not trusting
>>anything that developer produces, ever again.
>>
>>He might be a “great guy” but ime he’s an incompetent programmer.
>Having
>>a Scrivener equivalent within Word is a great concept but having your
>>work vanish? Not so great. Not just with one version, but EVERY version
>>I tried. After #3, I finally got the message that the guy didn’t
>>actually know what he was doing.
>>
>>Perhaps he’s caught on to the whole programming thing since those early
>>days, but I’m not about to find out.