We’re always on the lookout for unexpected ways that people are using Evernote. When we heard about California dairy farmer Ray Prock and his Evernote use, we had to see it for ourselves.
On our recent visit to his family farm, not only did we get a tour of the dairy, but we also learned about the critical role Evernote plays in keeping everything running. Ray, like lots of business owners, has the huge task of managing enormous amounts of information. In his Evenote account, Ray captures information on his cows, including their numbers, treatments and feed details. He also keeps track of his maintenance needs, supplies, notes from meetings, and remaining tasks.
Check out the video below to get a peek at our visit to Ray Lin Dairy.
Posted by Andrew Sinkov at 12:37 pm in General, Video
The, much (read: MUCH) requested, native Evernote for BlackBerry is now available. Yes, it’s true. BlackBerry® owners, you now get a slick app to create new notes and search through all of your existing Evernote content.
We’re very excited about this release because, like a BlackBerry, Evernote is designed to fit perfectly into today’s fluid life/work mix. The minute you need to remember something, take out your BlackBerry and use Evernote to capture or recall whatever it is, then go on with your life. Isn’t it nice not having to worry about forgetting stuff?
Features
Evernote for BlackBerry lets you create notes containing text, snapshots, voice recordings, and file attachments. Once created, the new content is automatically sent to the Evernote Service, making it available across all the versions of Evernote that you use. You can also access your existing notes, search by keywords, filter by tags, or simply browse.
It is important to note that features are linked to the capabilities of your device. For example, if your BlackBerry does not have a camera, then you will not see the Snapshot note option. Also, the note searching and display experience depends on the capabilities of your BlackBerry’s built-in web browser. In general, the newer your BlackBerry, the better Evernote will run on it.
Compatibility
Evernote for BlackBerry is compatible with recent BlackBerry smartphones. Currently supported devices are:
BlackBerry® Bold™
BlackBerry® Curve™
BlackBerry® Storm™
More soon (subscribe to this blog or follow us on Twitter to be alerted)
We will release an update shortly, which will add support for some additional devices. Many older BlackBerry smartphones can be upgraded to newer operating systems. Please check with your BlackBerry vendor or carrier. Unfortunately, due to device limitations, some smartphones will not be compatible with Evernote for BlackBerry.
Availability
Evernote for BlackBerry is available through BlackBerry App World in the Productivity & Utility > Personal Organization category.
[UPDATE: A direct download is now available on our BlackBerry page]
BlackBerry App World is designed to only display applications that are compatible with your device, which mean that Evernote will only show up if your smartphone is listed above.
Some time ago we published a post explaining how to scan directly into Evernote for Mac. In this post, I’ll explain how to set up the Fujitsu ScanSnap to work with Evernote for Windows.
Fujitsu ScanSnap
We’re big fans of the Fujitsu ScanSnap for a bunch of reasons: it scans both sides of a multipage document, auto-rotates and discards blank pages, OCRs the text, and, most importantly, can be set to deposit the resulting PDF into Evernote. It has become an indispensable part of my workflow. Every document I have goes through my ScanSnap into Evernote before heading into the recycling bin.
Setting up your ScanSnap
Right click on the ScanSnap manager icon in the task manager and select ‘SCAN Button Settings’ (make sure that the ‘Use Quick Menu’ is not checked)
In the ‘Applications’ tab, click ‘Add or Remove’, then click ‘Add’ in the next pop-up window
Add Evernote by clicking the ‘Browse’ button and navigating to Evernote.exe (in most cases it is in C:\Program Files\Evernote\)
Type ‘Evernote’ for the Application Name and click OK. Be sure to select ‘Evernote’ in the application drop down menu.
In the ‘File Option’ tab, select PDF as the format and check the ‘Searchable PDF’ option (if available). Click OK.
Now, left-click on the ScanSnap Manager icon – you should see Evernote as the selected destination – if this is the case – you are all set up. From now on, whenever you scan a document, it will go into Evernote.
You can also use the Fujitsu ScanSnap with Evernote on your Mac. Steps are almost identical and DocumentSnap has a great blog post explaining how to set that up.
Scanning Handwritten Notes
The Fujitsu Scansnap does a great job OCR’ing printed text, but it does not handle handwritten text. Evernote can help. If you are scanning pages of handwritten notes, our image recognition can make them searchable. To take advantage of this, set up a second profile in the ScanSnap manager to scan your documents as JPEG images, instead of PDFs. Use this profile when you want to archive your notebooks and scribbles.
Using other Windows scanners with Evernote
The instructions vary greatly depending on the scanner and the scanning software you might be using, but there are a couple of general tips that should help you set up your Windows scanner to send to Evernote:
Find your scanner settings (located in the Control Panel, or a stand-alone program)
Look for a way to configure the hardware buttons on the scanner
Set a button to launch Evernote, by pointing it to the Evernote.exe (in most cases it is in C:\Program Files\Evernote\)
Save the settings and try it.
Evernote knows what to do with files sent to it from a scanner, such as images or PDFs. If Evernote is not running, it will launch and create a new note from the received file.
Now you can send your tweets directly into Evernote. Why is this cool? Because Twitter is chock-full of great stuff. Your ideas, thoughts, and experiences mixed together with all of the content from the people you follow: journalism, storytelling, commentary, activism, even comedy –to quote Rob Corddry, “It’s the perfect joke-writing medium. If you need more than 140 characters then it’s not worth it.”
Thanks to the Evernote-Twitter integration, you can easily capture the tweets you like: your own or those showing up in your stream. Plus, as an added bonus, you can now send yourself a quick note right from Twitter –no need to do any of that pesky app switching. Here’s how…
Say ‘Hello’ to @myEN
Evernote now lets you send public Twitter messages, and private Direct Messages, right into your Evernote account for searchable, permanent safekeeping. It’s called myEN, and here’s how it works.
Setting up myEN
First, you’ll need an Evernote account. It’s free. Get yours now »
Follow myEN on Twitter (you will need a Twitter account)
myEN will follow you back, and send you a DM with a link
Click the link, sign into Evernote, and connect your Evernote and Twitter accounts
If you have a protected Twitter account, then do the following: follow myEN, accept myEN’s follow request, then send myEN a DM. After that, go to step 3 above.
How to use myEN
For Public tweets: Add @myEN to the body of any public tweet
For Direct Messages: Send a DM to myEN to create a new note in Evernote
Tip: Retweet something you like and add @myEN to save it into Evernote.
It usually takes under a minute for a message to show up in your Evernote account, depending on how Twitter is feeling.
SMS notes
Thanks to Twitter’s built-in SMS support, you will now be able to send notes into Evernote from any mobile phone, anywhere in the world. In the US, text message “d myEN [your note]” to 40404 (you will need a Twitter account to do this). Go here to see your country’s Twitter SMS number.
Tweets with Twitpics
A popular way to embed photos into Twitter messages is with Twitpic. If a tweet that you send to Evernote contains a Twitpic URL, a thumbnail of the photo will show up in Evernote along with a link to the original image. Nice.
API developers take note
This integration now adds Twitter to the, ever-growing, list of ways to interact with Evernote, and by extension your apps. Think about it. There are tons of great possibilities. Check out our developer section for more info.
We hope you like our Twitter integration. There’s lots more exciting stuff coming soon.
[Update: How fast is it?]
The speed with which your notes get into Evernote depends on how you send them and how bogged down Twitter happens to be at the time. Direct messages (DM) to myEN will almost always get into your Evernote account in a minute or two, while public @myEN replies can sometimes take 30 minutes. Either way, don’t worry, the tweets will be there by the time you need to remember them again.
Did you know that Evernote has a sister company that only works on digital ink and handwriting recognition products for pen-enabled devices? They’re called Ritescript, and they just released a major new version of their ritePen Pro 3.1 software. If you use Evernote for Windows and have a pen tablet or tablet PC, then ritePen might completely change the way you use your computer; and they’re offering a big discount for Evernote users!
In their own words
ritePen is an advanced handwriting recognition software for Microsoft Windows-based pen-enabled computers. Users of ritePen can write anywhere on their screen or other input surface and have their handwriting instantly converted to text for use in any Windows application, including Word, Excel, Outlook, and numerous others.
ritePen + Evernote
ritePen turns your entire screen into a canvas, so your writing is never constrained. You can jot notes, grab and annotate screen content, even launch applications, all without ever reaching for a mouse. The best part is how well it works with Evernote.
Feature: Handwriting recognition
There seems to be an inverse relationship between time spent at a computer and clarity of my handwriting. Luckily, ritePen can deal with whatever you throw at it. Whether you have your third grade teacher’s perfect penmanship or something more akin to a monkey doctor (either interpretation), ritePen will recognize it and place the text right where you need it regardless of where on the screen you write.
Feature: Annotation
See something interesting on the web? Quickly annotate what you like using ritePen’s markup tool, then click the Send to Evernote button to send the image directly into Evernote on your desktop. Since ritePen is designed to be an extension of natural handwriting, you won’t find any bounding boxes or region selection options. Instead, ritePen automatically creates an invisible box around the area that you annotate, so you get only what you want. If you want to capture a larger area, simply draw four dots around the area you wish to capture and ritePen does the rest.
Feature: Macros
ritePen allows you to assign handwritten shortcuts, which perform predefined actions. For example, you can assign a circled “w” to launch Wikipedia or have a circled “en” open up a blank note in Evernote. Does it get any simpler than that?
Feature: Smart Navigation
When you’re working with a pen computer, nothing breaks your productive groove faster than having to switch your brain from “now I’m writing some text” to “now I’m navigating around the system.” With ritePen, you don’t have to think about it. When you move your pen in ritePen, it automagically figures out whether you meant to write text, grab a scrollbar, click a button, resize a window, or fire off a macro. Pen navigation becomes almost invisible, and you can concentrate on the work at hand!
Get 40% OFF
For a limited time, Evernote users get ritePen Pro 3.1 for 40% OFF the regular price. Hurry, this offer won’t last. To purchase, go to the purchase page, select ritePen Pro 3.1, and enter the following coupon code during checkout: ritePenPro31En3Special
We recently launched the Evernote API, which allows third party developers to integrate Evernote functionality into their applications and services. In this series, we will highlight some of the most exciting integrations.
Curio, in their own words
Curio is Zengobi’s award-winning note taking, mind mapping, brainstorming, and task management application for Mac OS X. Its innovative freeform interface promotes visual thinking, a more natural way to gather, associate, and recall ideas.
Curio + Evernote API
Curio 5.4 helps users organize their thoughts and ideas. Now, everyone from creative professionals to students can use any version of Evernote to capture their inspirations, and have that content automatically appear in Curio. UPDATE: For more information on the integration, read the Curio 5.4 release notes.
Why this is cool
Evernote is all about giving you the tools to capture your thoughts and experiences as they happen, which is why we’ve developed over 7 different versions for desktop, web, and mobile devices. So, no matter where you are, there’s always a version of Evernote within reach.
With this integration, you can easily take what you have been gathering in Evernote and automatically bring it into your Curio workflow. Take a note or photo using Evernote on your mobile device, and you will it have it waiting for you in Curio when you return to your desk. Once in Curio, those notes, snapshots, web clips, and research can all be used to help you brainstorm and, ultimately, complete your projects.
Get 20% OFF Curio
The gracious folks at Zengobi are offering Evernote users a very limited time 20% discount off of a purchase of Curio. To receive the discount, use the coupon code: EVERNOTE. BUY NOW »
The Evernote API
Learn more about the Evernote API on our developer page, and join over a hundred developers working with the Evernote API to create new and exciting integrations.
Recently, Google announced that they were stopping development on Google Notebook. We’re big fans of Google Notebook, in fact many of used it before Evernote came along. When we heard the news, we immediately began work on a Google Notebook import tool. Today, it’s ready. So, all of you Google Notebook users can now easily bring your notes, labels, and sections right into Evernote.
Let’s get started
Exporting out of Google Notebook
Sign into Google Notebook
Click on a notebook that you want to export
Click the Export link at the bottom of the page
Choose ‘Atom’ from the export options.
Save the Google Atom Notebook file to your desktop
If you have multiple notebooks that you want to export, simply repeat this process for each.
Importing into Evernote
First, sign into Evernote. Next, go to our Google Notebook import page, which is also accessible from the Setting page on Evernote Web, and import each notebook that you exported. It may take a few minutes depending on the size of the notebook. Finally, if you use a desktop version of Evernote, hit Sync to download those imported notes.
That’s it. Easy, no? We even maintain the creation date, source URLs, images, and everything else. One thing to keep in mind, Evernote does not have the concept of labels and sections, instead we use tags. So, imported labels and sections will become tags.
Now that you’re an Evernote user…
Conceptually, there are a lot of similarities between Evernote and Google Notebook. Both are great for capturing notes and ideas, both have bookmarklets that make it easy to grab web content (get ours here), and both give you lots of ways to organize and find the things you saved. What makes Evernote different and more powerful, is that it goes beyond the web. There are versions of Evernote for Windows, Mac, iPhone, Windows Mobile, and other devices. Anything you put into Evernote automatically syncs and becomes available from any other platform. Plus, we have some pretty cool image recognition, which makes text within images searchable. We recommend reading through our blog for lots of other great Evernote features and uses.
Don’t forget about Delicious
We also have a great Delicious bookmark import tool. If you haven’t tried it, we recommend that you do.
We’ll be adding more import options in the future, so stay tuned.
It’s a big day here at Evernote. In addition to updated versions of Evernote for Windows and Evernote for Mac, we’re launching a fantastic, new Premium-only feature: file and document synchronization.
When we launched, we said we’d help you remember everything. Today, we dramatically expanded the meaning of the word everything to include, well, everything*. Evernote Premium users can now add any type of file to a note. Once a file is added to Evernote, it’s synchronized with the Evernote Service and made instantly available across all version of Evernote, even mobile.
Why this is cool
Now, not only can you take notes, clip web pages, snap photos, and record audio, but you can also add the stuff you’re working on, like that client presentation, the novel you’re writing, your resume, your band’s MP3s, those Photoshop files, and just about anything else you can think of.
Best of all, Evernote Premium users no longer need to worry about where their files are, how to access them, where the last copy is saved, or how to share them. Everything is in Evernote, available whenever and wherever needed.
Multiple files in a note
You can add multiple files to a single note. So, say you’re organizing the big corporate offsite. Create a public notebook called “Offsite.” Create a note with the location, meeting agenda, and include all the PowerPoint presentation files. Now, share this notebook’s URL with other attendees. The whole process will take no time at all and you’ll come out looking like an organizational ninja.
Live update
When using the desktop versions of Evernote, if you open a file contained in a note, make changes, then save the file, Evernote will automatically update the version in your notes to the latest. This feature applies to files supported in Free accounts, as well.
Emailing files from your phone
You need to urgently send a file to a coworker, but you’re out to dinner with friends. No worries, it’s in Evernote. Just pull up the note on your phone and email it. How easy is that!?!
The ability to add any type of file to a note is only available to Evernote Premium users. Sign up or upgrade now for only $5/month or $45/year, or give an Premium account as a gift.
And don’t forget, it’s only $5 to try out Evernote Premium. If you’re like us, you’ll never want to go back, but if you prefer Free, rest assured that you will always have access to the notes and files you added as a Premium user.
* Ok, fine, not everything. There is a limitation to be aware of: the total size for a single note cannot exceed 25MB. That HD family reunion video probably won’t fit.
Evernote is improving our capabilities through partnerships like Twitter.
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