I’ve been an Evernote user and big fan of the application for sometime now but one thing I’ve struggled with in the application has been the disconnect between my notes and the various ToDo’s associated with them.
Sometime ago Evernote introduced the ability to insert a checkbox (instructions at the bottom of this post) into your notes to flag something as a “ToDo” item which helped, but still fell a little short since I now had to go through my notes to find the ToDo’s. Part of the problem was me, since I was used to a traditional ToDo lists (outside of Evernote) which were all consolidated and orderly. Yet there was a problem with those consolidated lists too… a lack of context around that ToDo item.
Of course some ToDo’s are easy to figure out and don’t need context (“Pick Up Dry Cleaning” for example), but with others, particularly those more business oriented, or associated with on-going projects, it helps to have other information to refer to.
Back to Evernote…
So I set out for searching for a way to create a dynamic, consolidated list of the items in Evernote that I mark as “ToDo” (by adding the little checkbox) in Evernote, without the need for yet another 3rd party application. While I assumed there must be a way to do accomplish this in Evernote, I was wrong. However, there is something better, and if you can challenge yourself to think a little differently, and appreciate having your ToDo’s in context this might work for you too.
As it turns out there is an array of Evernote search parameters that you can use from within the Evernote application and on the web interface. One of those parameters is:
todo:[true|false|*] - If the argument is “false”, this will match notes that have ToDo checkboxes that are not currently checked. If the argument is “*”, this will match notes that have a ToDo checkbox of any type. If the argument is “true” then it will match notes with ToDo checkboxes that are currently checked.
So, in your search bar simply type “todo:false” and you’ll get back all of the notes which have unchecked ToDo items.
Why This Is Better Than A ToDo “List”
While it challenges us to think about the ToDo list a little differently, I’d argue it’s better because it puts our ToDo’s in context (surrounded by the notes on that subject). And by combining the todo: search parameter with other search parameters, for example tag:tagname we can easily refine our searches and see only what we want to currently focus on, again, kept in context.
I’d recommend creating and saving searches that you use frequently so that you can easily execute the search later without having to type things in every time.
Adding The ToDo Box:
In case you are not sure how to add the ToDo box in Evernote here is a quick tutorial:
If you prefer to use keystrokes then on Mac try : Command+Shift+T
on Windows try Control+Shift+C.
Extra: Check out the very cool “Evernote Peek” Smart cover App designed specifically for the iPad2.
About Scott Ellis
cool. My new way to deal with todo lists. Thanks
Pity it does not work with iphone version of EN.
Hey,
Thanks for the post.
This is just what I needed without having to fork out money for a new to-do mac app and being able to keep it all in one of my most frequently used apps- Evernote.
Keyboard shortcut makes it a breeze too.
Thanks and cheers from Singapore,
Clarence
@clarencechanxy
http://about.me/clarencechanxy
http://clarencechanxy.posterous.com
I use the tool for a while but just found the hint to make a list
Thanks Scott.
Bob, http://tattoodesigngroup.com
This is a great search paramater tip.. thanks very much
But my problem is a bit different. I maintain a standard ToDo list on Evernote, including check boxes. The problem is that once I complete a task and “check” it… I want it to either disappear or go to the bottom of the list or get archived or…. something.
At the moment all I can find to do is go back and erase it… which is a bit tedius when doing it on an iPhone.
Thoughts of suggestions?
Tom
Tom – That is an understandable request but I have no idea how to make them disappear or archive once checked. The reality is that Evernote is a note taking app (not really todo list management as much as we’d all like that) so it’ll be have more like a notepad than anything else.
FWIW I looked at the API and it doesn’t appear that there is anything in there that would allow an extension to be written to automatically delete checked items too. I think the assumption (and correctly in my opinion) is that people will want to keep a record since checkboxes could be used in a number of contexts, not just stand alone todo lists.
Hi Scott,
There are several ways that you accomplish this. I have chose to use saved searches that look for unchecked check boxes. I’ve gone a step further because I want to use both Home and Work ToDo Items
EN interprets a note that has a check box as a todo item (a mistake IMHO) so you can create saved searches that look for notes with a checkbox and any combination of checked, unchecked or either. To search your notes for:
-checked checkboxes, type todo:true into the Evernote search box.
-unchecked checkboxes, type todo:false into the Evernote search box.
-all checkboxes (checked or unchecked), type todo:* into the Evernote search box.
I have created 2 tags to separate my Work and Home ToDos (or general notes) and you guessed it, those tags are named Home and Work. Then I created 2 separate saved searches to separate my incomplete Home and Work ToDos:
—-
NAME: ToDo Home
CRITERIA: tag:Home todo:false
—-
NAME: ToDo Work
CRITERIA: tag:Home todo:false
—-
On to my question…
I want to create a search that will return all notes where todo:false AND (tag:Work OR -tag:)
Plain english, I want to create a saved search that shows me all uncompleted ToDos that have either a Work tag or No tag.
Any ideas?
TekMason
TekMason –
I think you’ll need two separate searches. I can’t find a way to do “AND/OR” logic with search parameters on the same parameter (in this case tag:)
todo:false tag:Work
todo:false -tag:*
I’ve tried various combinations but none returned results when trying algebraic combinations like that.
Great info. I am almost there:
We are using it in our team meetings as a note taking application. And, we use the todo’s to register follow-up actions / taskts. Of course, we create a notebook per project/customer or whatever. And, in that note are also meeting notes.
Now, the question: can I create a view/search so I am have create a list of all todo’s?, so a sort of crawler of all notes and returning JUST the todo, not the text around it.
Thank you Scott for your post,
I was wondering how to search my To do’s and it was a big help. We are using Evernote as you are using for our meetings and projects. But the checkbox is coming only on the text inside a note. is there any way to put checkbox on the note title itself.
Arash – If I understand you correctly I don’t think so. I don’t know of any way to “check off” an entire note.
Scott,
Thank you for your prompt reply. There is another problem which you may help me. After finishing a MOM and the tasks which the team member are going to follow up, I would like to distribute notes and tasks to all team members in a acceptable report format. When I send the tasks and notes via e-mail, it does not have a good look as a report format. is there any way to create a report out of our notes and tasks in Evernote?
kind Regards,
Arash
Arash,
You can export notes for archive in HTML format. Or if you can (potentially) print a note to pdf (might require some extra software.
If you want to do something more dynamic you’d have to have a programmer build it for you using the Evernote API. It’s probably doable from what I can see in the API but I don’t know that it’s already been done.
Evernote API: http://www.evernote.com/about/developer/api/evernote-api.htm#_Toc297053060
Just a fantastic tip!!!! Thanks a lot!
Best regards,
Viviane