Beyond the Shelf

I know I’ve been neglecting this blog, but I promise I’ve been swamped with readings…and by “swamped” I mean “obsessed with” and by “readings” I mean the Veronica Mars book. Yes. It’s a thing.

This will be a fairly short post and one in which I test out a new idea for the blog: our favourite things at SIS. Unfortunately, this won’t be Oprah style, though I do sincerely wish I could give you all some SUVs. This will be a place where we talk about things we like – apps, authors, websites, stores, publications committee chair people, you name it! I will literally post anything you want to rave about here.

Without further ado, I’d like to introduce you to my newest crush: Evernote.

https://evernote.com/media/img/products/hero_evernote.png

My room/life may be a disaster zone, but I really like it when my Internet stuff is organized. I recognize that I’m behind the times on this one, but I’ve tried this personal organization system about a billion times in the past and I’ve never found value in it. However, I had been growing increasingly disillusioned with my own system – a rag tag mix of Pinterest, Google Drive, Gmail, and a mass of files and folders on my desktop. The system was sufficient until school started. But once I started working on school stuff in various locations – school, home, work – and on various devices – laptop, work computer, phone – I was frustrated. There has to be a better way!

http://i.imgur.com/e0lly.gif

Enter Evernote! Evernote allows me to “clip” webpages, PDFs, email threads and more into notes, which I can organize into notebooks (which can be organized further into stacks). Stacks, you guys. This syncs no matter where I’m working – on my phone (app), at work (web version), and at home (desktop version). If you use Chrome, I suggest downloading the Web Clipper extension to make this process even easier. You can also share notebooks with your fellow Information Science nerds friends.

TLDR: Evernote combines the functionality of Google Drive with the bookmarking potential of Pinterest – with the added bonus that Evernote is private, until you decide to share. It’s also easy on the eyes, and allows you to “clip” exactly what you want, including simplified versions of articles.

My advice to make it more functional: the more you use it, the more you’ll like it. Try using it for different areas (school stuff, recipes, articles) and make your notebooks and stacks as granular as you see fit.

While I’m positively smitten now, I’ll admit that my eyes will certainly start to wander upon the release of Google Stars.

Want some further reading? Check out the article that made me try Evernote again: http://lifehacker.com/5989980/ive-been-using-evernote-all-wrong-heres-why-its-actually-amazing.

Anything you guys would like to share? With assignments piling up and this miracle approaching, I think I’ll need your help more than ever.