ForumsQuestionsNotes Search isn't very useful
Notes Search isn't very useful
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Salgud |
Up until this week, I only kept a few special notes in TD's Notes, related to tasks in TD. I'm trying to streamline my life, and decided to move a bunch (~160) notes) from a standalone desktop app I've been using for work related notes into TD Notes to simplify my life a bit.
But the first time I really needed to use TD Notes, and had to do a search in a lengthy note for a keyword, I discovered that while TD can tell me that keyword is in which notes, it can't tell me exactly where. It doesn't highlight the word or in any way actually locate it, so I have to scroll and hunt trying to find it. Or do a Control F second search to find the work within the note. This is just not acceptable. This renders the Notes tab, the oldest of the add-ons in TD, virtually useless for my, and most, purposes. How many requests have there been, that I didn't notice because until now, it didn't effect me, asking for this? Can anyone name one other Notes app out there that doesn't have this basic functionality? This is very disappointing. I had just decided to stop my search for a new task manager that was still under development and still getting new, useful features and stick with TD. But now I feel let-down yet again. Adding new top level "features", like Outlines and Lists, which have very limited functionality, like Notes, while almost entirely ignoring the fact that many of the existing features don't even have basic functionality like this. I'm afraid that my search for a still under-development task management app continues. Not to mention I have to move the first few notes I moved to TD Notes back to a searchable app. I understand the business strategy of adding these high level features to attract new customers by having a nice long checklist of features to offer. However, I suspect that many of the new customers will be very disappointed when they discover that you can't do an effective search in those Notes, and that Lists and Outlines are similarly crippled, and may not stick around very long. |
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Jake Toodledo Founder |
Thanks for your feedback. We are working hard to add functionality to all parts of Toodledo, including notes, lists and outlines. I am sorry that we are unable to add functionality faster, but we are a small team and we are working as hard as we can.
You can use Toodledo's search to find the Note that you want and then you can use the browser's search to find the keyword inside that note. So, its possible to do what you want, it just takes a few extra keystrokes. We plan to overhaul the notes section soon, and this will likely be an included feature. |
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Salgud |
Thanks for your reply, Jake. However, I have to take exception to some of it.
1. You're the one who overloaded that "small team" that is now spread so thin. Before Outlines and Lists were added, they were spread thin. Now they're being drawn and quartered. 2. "Just a few added keystrokes". When you redid the interface a few years back, you stated that one of your goals was to minimize keystrokes for users. Is that no longer a consideration? Besides, it's somewhat more than "a few keystrokes". It requires doing a Control F, the reentering the search word, either by cut and paste, or by retyping. What concerns me is that the Notes feature was added before I became a regular user 4 years ago. And for 4 years, it's languished like an orphan step-child, without even this most basic feature (I won't call it an "enhancement", it's too basic for that term). I find this very frustrating. It seems that the strategy is to add new features which are barely connected to your base application, task management, to attract new customers, without regard for your established customers. Not just power users, like those of us active in these forums, but general users, who expect the features available to have, at the very least, certain levels of basic functionality, like being able to find words in Notes. These is the kind of discontent that drive established customers to look elsewhere. Only you can decide what path to choose between attracting new customers and losing established ones. And by the way, I have hundreds of friends who will sign up for platinum service tomorrow if you fix this feature! :) This message was edited Aug 15, 2014. |
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Purveyor |
Salgud, are you still using Evernote?
It is difficult (not impossible) for me to understand why anyone would use Notes in Toodledo when something like Evernote is available. Yeah, you might not need to add photos from your smartphone camera, or drag and drop files from your desktop, or annotate those files, or scan and save documents, or clip and save info from websites, or create voice memos, or format text, or add tables and bullet lists, or create stacks and hierarchical tags, or create links among your notes, or add geotags, or encrypt pieces of text, or edit the creation date, or share your notebooks and files with other users, but why give up the powerful search abilities in Evernote? Posted by Salgud This renders the Notes tab, the oldest of the add-ons in TD, virtually useless for my, and most, purposes. You must have missed all the useful hints in the Help section. Oh, wait! There aren't any ... :-\Toodledo is probably the most powerful online task manager. But (as Jake says), they have a small team, working as hard as they can. There have been very few improvements to Notes in the past five years. This message was edited Aug 16, 2014. |
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Salgud |
Purveyor,
Thanks for the suggestion. I've been using EN as my personal notes app for years, back when it had a lot of features it lacks today. I actually used the old pre-cloud desktop version at work for years, until it just was no longer viable with the updated versions of Windoze. Unfortunately, I work for the state, and EN in the cloud is blocked for security reasons. I've actually found a way around their block (just to be contrary), but if I actually kept any job-related information in EN and got caught, I could be in a lot of trouble. |
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coolexplorer |
While the Utopian ideal is to have a single "golden goose" application that does everything well, it is not practical. Multi-party outsourcing of the best specialized processes is the trend. One, an App has to do one or two things brilliantly. Two, they need to have an open API that allows integration with other great third party apps.
Difficult to beat Evernote/OneNote (Notes), WorkFlowy (Outlines), Feedly (RSS), Toodledo (Tasks), Google GMail & Calendar, etc. Wish Toodledo would concentrate its limited resources on further developing its 'raison the etre' ie. "To-do Tasks", particularly when it has robust To-Do competitors snapping at its heels. Building immediate two-way sync of Tasks with Google Calendar (like third party apps do) would be a killer feature. All the best! |
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Purveyor |
Perhaps just words but some very good words from Evernote's founder:
... there comes a time when ... it's more important to improve existing features than to add new ones. More important to make our existing users happier than to just add more new users. From https://blog.evernote.com/blog/2014/01/04/on-software-quality/
This message was edited Aug 16, 2014. |
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Salgud |
Posted by Purveyor:
Perhaps just words but some very good words from Evernote's founder: ... there comes a time when ... it's more important to improve existing features than to add new ones. More important to make our existing users happier than to just add more new users. From https://blog.evernote.com/blog/2014/01/04/on-software-quality/Minor correction: Philbin is not EN's founder. He bought it about 5 or 6 years ago from it's founder, Pachikov, who is still listed as a corporate officer. Philbin is the CEO. They are preparing to do an IPO. This message was edited Aug 18, 2014. |
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Purveyor |
Thanks, Salgud. [Johnny Carson]I did not know that.[/Johnny Carson].
I see that Stepan Pachikov is listed as "Founder" here: https://evernote.com/corp/team.php Maybe Toodledo and Evernote should team up before the IPO ... ;-) This message was edited Aug 18, 2014. |
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Salgud |
Purveyor, I agree that hooking up with EN would have made more sense than the present offering. Then we'd have a full-featured Notes app alongside TD.
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