Tools Update: Evernote, Instapaper, Echofon

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Technology Thursday

Finding tools to manage the large amounts of information that cross my actual and virtual desktops every day is an ongoing challenge. I've mentioned, for example, Evernote before, but recently Karen asked what the advantage of Evernote over simply jotting notes down in a simple notepad on the phone or computer was. I am definitely not (yet) a power-user of Evernote (although I have plans in that direction), but it is a tool that I use every day. I'll steal some of what I wrote in a comment earlier this week:

Lately what I'm finding most useful about Evernote is ubiquitous access. I have Evernote open constantly on my laptop and my desktop, and I have it installed in my iPhone. They are all synced together. So wherever I happen to be, if I want to add something to the notes I keep there, it's handy and it will be replicated everywhere else. It's easier for me to type on a real keyboard, but I often want access to notes when I'm out and about, so typing at a computer and being able to see it on my phone is really handy.

Current notes that I update regularly enough to want this kind of access include things like:

• one line journal (an experiment for this year; 1-2 lines to just jot down what happened that day)
• medical logs (reverse chronological) for each family member
• car logs for each car
• house log of repairs or updates we've done to the house, and
• notes on open loop household items (we're in the middle of a refinance, so I have notes on that in my current notebook in Evernote).

I have a reference notebook that includes notes on, among other things:

• babysitter notes (things to remember to tell sitters)
• my Lush wishlist, and
• books to check out of the library.

I also have a recipes notebook. When I come across interesting recipes online to try I put them in Evernote for easy access later. I've added several CurrentMom Meal Monday recipe suggestions, in fact! My longterm goal is to eventually scan all the loose recipes stacked in a pile (er, piles) in my sideboard and keep them digitally in Evernote (tagged for easy search on dinner/appetizer/dessert/breakfast/etc). One of the features that Evernote offers that I haven't really taken advantage of yet is generating text automatically from images and scans. That feature will make those recipes easily searchable and will be very handy for the Great Recipe Digitization Project of 20-something-something. (I'll keep most of my cookbooks, but I have a non-trivial volume of loose papers containing recipes that really needs to be sorted and organized.)

In addition to keeping these and many other types of information readily accessible to myself in Evernote, I recently started sharing some of my notebooks with my husband so that he can access and update the household information. One downside is that this sharing is only possible through the web interface -- which is clunkier than the applications. But, it's still handy and now my husband can check in anytime to see what ideas I've added to the "Vacation Ideas" notebook or the "Family Outing Ideas" notebook.

Another new tool that has been recommended to me for quite some time that I'm finally putting to use is called Instapaper. It's much simpler than Evernote and while it also stores information is really for a different purpose. The idea is that if you come across something interesting to read online and don't have time to read it, you can just click 'read later' and the article will be saved in your 'instapaper.' You can then access those articles from any computer or your phone. I'm finding it handy to queue up things to read on my Metro ride home from work. Even better, it integrates with the new Twitter client I'm using, Echofon. I'm finding Twitter a very rich source of information and links lately (fodder for another post, perhaps), but rarely have time to actually read an article if I'm scanning Twitter while, say, waiting in line at the pharmacy. Instapaper linked to Echofon means I can quickly and reliably save items of interest for reading at my leisure -- rather than losing them in the fast-moving Twitter river. (Well, "leisure" is a relative term, but you know what I mean!)

Comments

[Diane]

Another nice online resource for Google users is Google Documents. My husband and I can work on the same document online that way. You're not limited by file types either. We also have a shared Google calendar to help us keep track of our busy schedules. Both are great resources!

P.S., what's with the picture?

[Lyn]

I am increasingly uncomfortable with turning things over to the Google maw, although I do know plenty of people who swear by Google Docs. Gmail has been so slow and sometimes unreliable for me lately, that I'm getting nervous.

If you click on the link under the picture it'll take you to a description. If you mean *why* that picture I just searched on 'fire hose' or something for a public domain image to represent the fire hose of information overload. That's how I feel most days. :)

[JenBeee]

I use Google Docs too - I like it because it's easy to share documents with other people. I try to back it up periodically. Instapaper sounds great - I was just wishing for something like this the other day, when about 20 of my facebook friends all posted links to articles that sounded really interesting but I was too busy to read any of them. I guess I could bookmark them, but that's too clunky.