Microsoft OneNote 4+

As a writer, one never knows when an idea strikes. When it does, OneNote is there to capture lightening in a jar. If you can write it, paste it, or record it, OneNote is a repository for inspiration of any sort. The features I find the most useful are the ease in categorizing ideas, accessing the files from anywhere, and meeting minute creation (more on that later.) Create your projects, insert sub-folders and then begin to add pages and pages of materials. I have a “binder” for my writing and a “folder" for each project. In each folder I add pages (chapters) and have a few pages for notes on relative subjects. The ability to return to my writing cave and have all that info at my fingertips is a Godsend - infinately better than carrying a hardcopy note book (although there is no feeling like pencil to paper) or finding that napkin you used to scribble the outline of the next Hemingway novel.

Then there is the creation of meeting minutes. If you have Outlook, go to the Home tab, then select Meeting Details. It will give you a listing of your scheduled meetings. Select your meeting and watch OneNote pull in the meeting details, including Subject, Date and Location, Attendees and the details listed in the messasge section of the invitie. I used this recently and the feedback from management was laudatory. Microsoft’s OneNote is a hidden gem worth discovering.

Great app. Takes some time to build up a workflow, but once you do it’s miles ahead of almost every other note taker. Only exception is Notability, which I think has a little bit better handwriting capability, but not nearly the organizational ability that OneNote has. If you want to be able to organize your notes into more than just one tier of folders, then you have to move to OneNote. The organization is way better than any of the other apps out there, and there’s way more support on the backend as this is synced through Microsoft’s OneDrive cloud, so you know that it has the support of a company that’s not going anywhere.

The only annoyance I have with it, and the reason it’s 4 stars and not 5, is that I have to “Open” all of my notebooks again on each device if I haven’t used OneNote on it for more than a few days. I don’t know if this is to simplify syncing issues between devices and save space on each device, but I would rather there was an option to keep notebooks on a device and keep them synced. That way if I want to start taking notes right away, I don’t have to keep throwing all of my impromptu notes into whichever notebook is the most synced and then move it later. I use this exclusively on iOS/MacOS devices, so maybe there’s some compatibility issue built in by Apple to handicap Microsoft’s apps just a little bit, or vice-a-versa.

After having successfully used OneNote in my business operations for years, I have discovered it all over again in retirement as my “go-to” documentation repository for my vintage RV. I can organize quick “how-to” info from a box full of owners’ manuals, cut/paste essential posts from key “guru” forums into the appropriate owners’ manual section, insert pics of complex systems with annotations for use by a service tech should I need one while on the road, store info about future modifications including pics, diagrams, parts lists and vendors, etc, etc, etc. Best of all, I can now selectively cloud-share this info with fellow aficionados so we are not all reinventing the wheel. All of my work is automatically replicated across my laptop, tablet and phone so I can refer to it anywhere. I’m sure I could find something to complain about, but there’s so much to love that it’s not worth the effort!!

Better still, it’s worth investing the time it takes to create this repository because OneNote is backed by a huge corporation that continues to invest in keeping it fresh and stable. I don’t have to be worried about all my work becoming obsolete tomorrow because a vendor decided to orphan its product (been there, have the t-shirt). Thanks Microsoft.