Best way of keeping track of random notes and stuff?

I use Evernote on my Macs. If I had an iPad or iPhone I would use the app on those too. You can put almost anything in Evernote and organize it however you would like with different notebooks, tags, etc. It's fantastic.

 

Evernote. Nothing else comes close.

1. Folders and Hierarchies
Let go of your urge to do this, master tags, and you'll be a lot more organized, happy, healthy, and wealthy. Brett Kelly's book, or any number of websites and blogs, will help you do this.

2. RTF, PDF, etc.
No problem. Drag them right into it. I highly recommend upgrading to premium in order to take advantage of the cumulative storage.

3. Sequential Ordering
This is where Evernote is weak. For certain projects, like writing a research paper, you need to be able to change the order of elements. Scrivener, for example, is software that works great for this. Otherwise, the process of data colelction and storage is handled really well by Evernote. I think I have 3 or 4 folders now for thousands and thousands of notes. I just don't need them anymore.

 

is evernote a cloud service? is there anything like dropbox that doesn't sync with the cloud and just over local wifi with my computer?

 

Gotta give another +1 to Evernote. Very powerful and easy to use.

 

dropbox is not just syncing through local wifi with your computer, but also with its servers somewhere in another part of the world. for better or worse, that is pretty much what everything does nowadays. If you are willing to plug in your iPad to your computer, Voodoopad is probably the best for you.

lots of great notes programs use dropbox including plaintext, simplenote, and elements. notebooks is nice on the ipad, but really, nothing is quite like evernote. evernote syncs with its own servers and is one of those "cloud" services. it pretty much does everything (most file types), and does it really well (syncs perfectly with any platform).

 

Believe me, I know what you mean. In fact, I once hypothesized that IQ was strongly correlated with the depth of one's directory/folder hierarchy. Having said that, however, Palpatine is correct. Tagging is a more powerful and flexible approach to organization of individual files/docs/etc.

It took me awhile to readjust my thinking to take advantage of the tagging approach, but once you get used to it, it's a better approach. Just think of tagging as a way to find a needle in a haystack with a similar kind of "focus" as the folder hierarchy provides but with more flexibility.

 

My favorite media player, EC Player, now uses tagging and your right it is very effective.

 

OK. I've found that multiple tags can serve that purpose but I'll take you at your word. You obviously know more about what you're doing than I do.

Not sure it will meet all your needs, but you might want to look at OmniOutliner. It's an expensive app (by app store standards), but it is a very flexible "list" manager and allows an almost infinite number of indented hierarchies for individual pieces of information. I've found it very useful for organizing disparate tidbits of information in a way you appear to need. You might want to experiment with it.

Keep in mind that if it doesn't meet your needs you can receive a credit in the app store for the purchase price.

You might also want to look at some of the other products from the "Omni Group." I haven't used OmniFocus, but it may offer some functionality you can use.

 

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Based on what you said, I disagree.

quotes: make a tag called "quotes," and if you like, add more tags like "jokes," "spiritual," etc.

random specs of products: "specs" tag and perhaps other tags like "apple" or "mitsubishi"

random small research notes: "research" tag and then other tags added on. you get the idea. basically, every folder you have can be a tag.

pictures of receipts: "receipt" tag, plus any of those folder names.

again, i recommend brett kelly's book, or any number of blogs out there. the evernote forums are helpful as well.

but, you know what is best for you. maybe something else is, but i am a researcher, and there is nothing i love more than hierarchy and classification, but i have found evernote more than sufficient for most collection tasks (writing is a different matter).

 

I used to be hung up on folders as well. Learned to use tags thanks to gmail and evernote and have never looked back. You can find anything you need very quickly with search. Much faster than digging through folders for me.