David E. Y. Sarna

The Holy Grail of software these days is something that helps organize both work and personal life. Of all the software available, notebook software has come the closest to providing what I call an information ecosytem. Evernote and Microsoft Onenote are the most popular of this type of software. Evernote is free unless you want premium features, and it is very device agnostic - that is, it is available for almost every computer, browser, tablet, or smartphone. It syncs well across all your show more devices. Evernote's other great strength is that it is interoperable with a lot of other hardware and software including scanners.

My Evernote is a very nice introduction to that software. It is beautifully organized and has a clear, clean design, with lots of screenshots of Evernote in action. There is first a top level table of contents (ToC) and next a more detailed ToC that could serve as an index. It doesn't have too, however, as it includes a very thorough index at the back of the book.

I read Evernote for Dummies right after My Evernote, and a comparison might be useful. The Dummies book is not nearly as nicely organized as the Murray book. It seems cluttered. It does, however, cover more features and uses of Evernote.

Comparing the two is somewhat coparing apples and oranges, as I read My Evernote as a trade paperback and Evernote for Dummies as an e-book. While in the past I've been pleased at how well my Nook Color renders graphics, it does not do well with screenshots. The text is blurry. Nor did the Dummies book have an index. Those two criticisms apply equally to the Wordpress for Dummies e-book I read. I do not know if the printed versions have indexes or not. I must say it shocks my librarian soul to the core for a reference book to not have an index. It is less of a problem in an e-book in which the text is searchable, but it is still a problem. If I forget what something is called, browsing the index can help find what I am looking for. And since computers make creating an index easy, the lack is inexcusable.

So both books on Evernote have their merits, but for the new user My Evernote is an excellent introduction. Evernote for Dummies is equally worthwhile because of the additional features covered. show less

A solid, if unremarkable, reference book. Probably best for absolute beginners to Evernote, but I found a few useful nuggets (e.g. sending material from Google Reader, advanced search syntax) that made it worth my while.

Okay, the author states that because this is a reference book, it isn't meant to be read all the way through. I confess that I did exactly that in order to have a better idea of what the book covers. As it claims to be, it's an introductory guide to Evernote, starting at the very beginning, with instructions on how to choose the account level you need and how to register. Sarna explains Evernote's functions on many platforms: desktops, tablets and smartphones, web browsers, BlackBerrys, etc. show more By the end of the book, he's covering sharing and open scripting, allowing the reader to go further on their own with Evernote if they want to. I was also happy to see a detailed table of contents, well-linked in the Kindle edition, that will be helpful for looking up material later. This book isn't a mandatory read if you use Evernote, but it's likely to be helpful. show less

Evernote is a computer and mobile device utility or app that I stumbled across when I was looking for some kind of notepad for my Nook. I hadn't heard of it until then despite that it has over 20,000,000 users. Then I started seeing it in such things as must have app lists. It allows one to take notes or copy things of interest into the program as notes in notebooks and interprets the notes in various ways; the premium version even allows searches in PDF's. It synchronizes the notes across show more platforms, so I have, for example, an instance of it on my laptop (and will put it on my back up laptop), on my Android telephone, and on my Nook.

I have three personal notebooks so far: a general one for shopping lists and odd notes, a to do notebook, and a community notebook wherein I can keep track of what the government and developers are doing to my neighborhood in particular or my state in general. I have copied an email regarding a community meeting on the general plan for the area into the notebook with one click.

The notes can be sound recordings, photographs, or web pages as well as ordinary notes typed or even somehow handwritten in.

A program this powerful needs explanation, so when I saw it advertised I bought Evernote for Dummies by David E. Y. Sarna with Vanessa Richie. I finished reading those parts (I didn't read the Apple parts) that applied to me last night. There is important information in this book; I have put some of it to use already and will put more of it to use as I develop ability with the program. Unfortunately the author is not entirely coherent, so I read paragraphs of procedures and had no idea what he was getting at.

I think that pretty soon I will try My Evernote by Katherine Murray. I will let folks know how they compare. show less