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Goodbye Evernote 2.2
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Posted by dan7000
Aug 26, 2010 at 06:28 PM
JasonE wrote:
>Evernote2.2 is a screw driver. CintaNotes is a
>screw driver. Evernote3 is a swiss army knife with a screwdriver blade.
...
>CintaNotes is eloquent, quick, and easy at what I use it
>for.
>So was EverNote2.2. It really worked well at what I needed it for.
>
Great analogy - I totally get it. It’s always great to find software that is focused on doing one thing well. Sadly, it seems like as software matures, developers are always tempted to make the same software do more than one thing, and in the process, the software loses the usability that comes from a narrow focus. ... and then the field is ripe for a new startup to come in and make a smaller, more focused product again.
This cycle is discussed in a great book called the Innovator’s Dilemma. I recommend it highly for those interested in this kind of thing.
Posted by Stephen Zeoli
Aug 26, 2010 at 07:59 PM
I wonder if Evernote made the right decision focussing simply on being a “cloud” application. At first, this seemed smart. But now there are so many ways to float your data back and forth across the digital void. On my PC at work I use a simple application called ResophNotes—which I learned about from Manfred Kuhn’s blog. It syncs with Simple Note, then Tinderbox on my Macbook syncs with Simple Note and I can share basic notes that way. Also, PersonalBrain syncs Brains via the cloud. I also have Dropbox available.
By sacrificing some of its original functionality, Evernote has made itself less useful and now it doesn’t have cloud syncing as a major point of difference anymore. Just a thought. Time will tell.
Steve Z.
Posted by Daly de Gagne
Aug 27, 2010 at 01:26 PM
From a marketing perspective, I think time has shown EN made the right decision going to the cloud, and becoming a multi-platform product. Its market share has rocketed, and it has a developed a lot of loyalty.
Unfortunately, it has dumbed the product down in terms of original functionality, and become increasingly irritable when that is pointed out. At one point the company line was it the functionality would be restored.
This last version is perhaps the best yet - if one is not in need of the lost functionality.
One beautiful thing about EN is that you can have more than one window open, so you can a notes window, a first draft window, and be rewriting in a third window.
But its tagging is weak - especially compared to a program such as Surfulater. And Surfulater allows both a folders and tag structuring.
I very much wish Surfulater would enable multiple windows. If Surfulater did that, and had cloud capability, I think it is poised to eat some of Evernote’s market share.
One of the things that concerns me about EN is that its marketing folk play a little loose with the truth - such as when they talk about the product’s second anniversary.
Two years since the big changes began, maybe.
But the program is a lot older than two years. When the marketing boffins say two years, it kinds of rubs the noses of its original loyal users in the trash heap of lost functionality.
An EN plus - its Chrome extension for clipping is probably the fastest and best such extension I have ever used. In fact, even though EN is locally loaded on my computer, I prefer to clip first to the cloud and synch later because the extension makes it easier to add the tags.
Again, my hope is that Surfulater develops a Chrome extension, in addition to the multiple open windows, and cloud syncing - at that point I could switch everything over to Surfulater.
Even now, Surfulater is a better product if you have large amounts of data, related to many different subjects.
Daly
Stephen Zeoli wrote:
>I wonder if Evernote made the right decision focussing simply on being a “cloud”
>application. At first, this seemed smart. But now there are so many ways to float your
>data back and forth across the digital void. On my PC at work I use a simple application
>called ResophNotes—which I learned about from Manfred Kuhn’s blog. It syncs with
>Simple Note, then Tinderbox on my Macbook syncs with Simple Note and I can share basic
>notes that way. Also, PersonalBrain syncs Brains via the cloud. I also have Dropbox
>available.
>
>By sacrificing some of its original functionality, Evernote has made
>itself less useful and now it doesn’t have cloud syncing as a major point of difference
>anymore. Just a thought. Time will tell.
>
>Steve Z.
Posted by Alexander Deliyannis
Aug 27, 2010 at 10:01 PM
Daly de Gagne wrote:
>But its tagging is weak - especially compared to a program such as
>Surfulater.
I am not sure I understand what you mean. For me the tagging functionality in these two applications is more or less equivalent, and more powerful than the majority of applications I have worked with. Tags are not my preferred way of working, but I use them extensively in Evernote as there are no hierarchical notebooks or folders. I have found the EN tagging system very capable and flexible with hierarchical organisation, autosuggest, multiselection (especially in filtering) and similar intuitive features.
The only tagging feature I haven’t found in Evernote is clones in the tag tree, i.e. possibility for a tag to exist in more than one positions in the hierarchy concurrently—one could argue however that classification-wise this makes no sense. I don’t know whether Surfulater has this feature.
> And Surfulater allows both a folders and tag structuring.
Yes indeed; I thought it was overkill to support both folders and tags (and clones, which means that items may exist in several folders concurrently), but it is great for users to be able to choose whichever system suits them best.
Posted by JasonE
Aug 27, 2010 at 10:35 PM
Alexander Deliyannis wrote:
>Yes indeed; I thought it was overkill to support both folders and tags
>(and clones, which means that items may exist in several folders concurrently), but
>it is great for users to be able to choose whichever system suits them best.
What an interesting discussion we have going here!
I just want to add a counter-point regarding tags and folders.
For the way I conduct research on the web, and utilize that information later, the tags/folders combo fits very well.
I am certainly not arguing that this is the best way in any objective sense. It is just the most intuitive way for me.
I could even image throwing clones into the mix.
If I had some temporary side-project, I could see making a folder for it, then cloning in the articles I needed. When the project wrapped up, I would move the folder to a “completed side-projects” folder.
JasonE