After a very extended beta period, DEVONthink has finally “come out of its shell” today with the final release of its 2.0 edition. (Congratulations to Eric and the gang at DEVONtechnologies for finally getting rid of those yellow “Beta Stripes”!)

As part of their “virtual launch party”, DEVON is offering a 10% discount on the new edition for both new customers and upgraders — which I think is the least they can do for auto-playing a Rod Stewart song on the page.

Questionable music choices aside — I also noticed that Dan Byler, the author of the NetNewsWire-to-DEVONthink AppleScript, wrote a review of DEVONthink Pro on his blog which won him some swag. Nice work, Dan!

One more bit of good news — the final release seems to have fixed the problem that Beta 8 created with the Evernote-to-DEVONthink AppleScript. Anyone who had trouble with the script recently should download the new version of DEVONthink and try again!

Many of my friends are in the latter group. They’ve often told me “I started reading one of your computer posts and got a few paragraphs in… when I realized that I had no goddamn idea what you were talking about!”

And so with this subtle encouragement, it occurs to me that some content that is less “nuts-and-bolts” and more “Why should I care about this nerdy stuff?” is probably in order.

Why Should They Care?

Earlier today, I was replying to someone in a forum thread about scanning paper documents when it occurred to me:

This is the type of stuff that is (or will be) important to so many people in their everyday lives, but it hasn’t yet made the leap into what we consider “The Ordinary”.

Arthur C. Clarke once wrote that “Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.”¹ I think he was wrong.

Any sufficiently advanced technology doesn’t seem magical — it seems mundane.

“We’ll Be Number One for Takeoff — As Soon As The FAA Finishes Rebooting!”

Whether you like it or not, the fact of the matter is that most people’s lives are getting geekier by the month — which means that what used to be “geeky” is becoming more ordinary.

Don’t believe me? Here in the U.S. earlier today, the Federal Aviation Administration suffered a “nationwide system outage”, which is another way of saying that the failure of a single, solitary internet connection created thousands of bored and frustrated people drinking bad Airport coffee for hours this morning.

Off the top of my head, here are three recent, mundane examples of how the concepts behind the way that computers make and use their files have impacted me or the people I know:

• My fiancée (a clothing designer) calls me and says “I’m leaving work — just as soon as this dumb file finishes rasterizing!”
• A client emails me saying “I can’t seem to download and watch my son’s video… and when I email the file to Windows users, they can’t figure out how to open it”
• My friend who is a music producer sends me an MP3 of a track we’ve been collaborating on. In the time it takes me to walk to my subway station, I download the music to my iPhone and check it out while riding the train to an appointment.

I Got Your Magic Right Here!

Try to have a conversation with an ordinary person about what, exactly, electricity is and how it works…

Most people have a vague idea but, even so, it doesn’t make the idea of electricity feel daunting or especially mysterious to us.

It’s just something that hums along in the background of our lives.

Frankly, that’s okay: An understanding of how electricity works doesn’t make it work any better, right? Flick the switch and the light goes on.

An electrician that I know here in New York puts it pretty well: “Two hundred years ago, I would have been considered a “magician”. One hundred years ago, I would have been a “scientist”. In our time, I’m just a guy doing a job.”

But apply this notion to our modern, digital society: The concepts relating to how computers store and share information, which used to be the sole purview of the pocket-protector crowd, are actually now “the hidden loom” used to weave together so many strands of our everyday lives into a functional tapestry. It’s become more like electricity — something that is taken for granted, but upon which so many other things depend.

And yet, it’s also different than electricity in at least one key way:
Knowing more about how it works actually makes it work better!.

Stay With Me On This…

People are people.

Start to skim a posting like the one I was writing earlier today about scanning papers into your computer and you’ll see phrases like “compression ratio” and “downsample”.

Nine times out of ten — you’ll zone out and move on.

So how can we start to talking about this stuff in a way that captures your interest long enough to de-mystify it’s more boring technical aspects?

My approach-du-jour is this: Let’s make it real life, not abstract. And let’s also work in as many “Animal House” references as humanly possible.

On the Next Page: Flounder and the Not-So-Mysterious Art of PDF File Compression

1. Report on Planet 3 (Signet SF, Y5409)

They have too much paper in their lives.
(…and they desperately want to get rid of as much of it as possible!)

With the advent of scanners (and with digital information becoming the primary means by which we communicate with one another), people are searching for a workable “File Cabinet 2.0″ solution — something that takes the solidity of sticking something in a drawer… and modernizes it.

Right now for Mac users, two of my favorite programs to help tame piles of paper are Evernote and DEVONthink. They each have their strengths and, when used together properly, I think that they can form the backbone of a “paperless life”.

Going paperless certainly isn’t without it’s own pitfalls but, truly, few things are more professionally satisfying to me than seeing a palpable look of relief on people’s faces as we shrink their clutter down to the size of a disk drive.

The Big Picture (With Details)

Evernote is a fantastic program (a platform, really) to collect and access your information from almost any type of device — and from anywhere that you can get an internet connection. But with it’s premium service restricting users to 500MB/month of storage, it isn’t necessarily the best solution for people who have a mountain of paper to digitize. (Although companies like PIXILY are trying to fill that need for Evernote users.)

DEVONthink excels at making sense of a big pile of paper.   Not only can it scan in and index an amount of paper that is limited only by your hard drive space, it can also collect your electronic records (just like in Evernote.) and merge the two “piles” together.   DEVONthink will allow you to organize your files hierarchically (something Evernote won’t do), and it also has a sophisticated relational database which helps to uncover connections between documents that you might not necessarily find yourself.  Add in a long history of developing great products for the Mac community and you’ve got yourself a deep, powerful program that is written to take full advantage of the Apple framework.

For my clients’ workflows, I generally think of Evernote as short-term memory and DEVON as long-term memory: The stuff that they’re currently working on (and need easy web access to) goes into Evernote. When it’s time to archive stuff away, DEVON scoops it up.  As currently constituted, both are useful supplements to one another.

But as it is so often true in life, “not knowing how to talk to one another” is also a fairly common complaint in the digital world as well – and it can be a real challenge to get two programs to speak each others language.

Is there a way to bridge the divide between Evernote and DEVONthink and help these two programs communicate with one another more readily?

The answer is “yes!” And the solution involves a couple of AppleScripts that I’ve written for the job.

The AppleScripts

• One script is used to move items from Evernote to DEVONthink, while the other moves items from DEVONthink to Evernote.
• You should always proceed cautiously at first to understand how each script works before moving large amounts of your files around. I use this script myself and feel very comfortable with using it, but I cannot accept any responsibility for any data misadventure you might suffer (e.g., Use at your own risk!).  I’d suggest starting with a file or two until you get the hang of things.

Do *YOU* use these programs the de-clutter your lives?  Leave A Comment With Your “Paperless Office Strategies”!

Using AppleScript makes it easy!

The Evernote to DEVONthink Script — Updated April 7th, 2010!

I’ve designed a script that:

• Utilizes Evernote’s HTML Export to copy the exported HTML file (and it’s constituent elements) to a temporary folder on your Desktop
• Detects and Imports the Note as a PDF if the source note contained a PDF, or…
• Bundles everything up from other types of notes into a single Web archive file and then imports it into DEVONthink, and
• Throws the temporary files in the trash for you

Features

• The script has been substantially rewritten since the release of Evernote’s native HTML Export function, eliminating the need for a separate webarchiver program and also improving the performance of transferring notes with typographical symbols in their title!
• The revised script also does a better job of importing PDFs
• The script will also retrieve an alphabetized list of your current DEVONthink groups and allow you to select which one to archive your messages into.
• Want to make a new group? No problem — the script now uses DEVON’s own “Group Selector” interface which will let you do that on the fly!
  
• **UPDATED** The script now brings over more of the data from Evernote — Version 1.3 changes the “Creation” and “Last Modified” dates to match the original item in Evernote. Tag transfer is also now supported — but must be enabled manually (see below).
• Automatic Growl detection has also been enabled which will save you a trip to the Script Editor to enable/disable it.

Current Limitations and Open Issues

(Otherwise known as “Places Where You Could Help Out!”)

• I have added the ability to transfer tags from your Evernote items into the new DEVONthink items but, for this version at least, YOU HAVE TO ENABLE IT MANUALLY!

  The reason I’ve chosen to do it this way is because, simply put, DEVONthink treats tags like they are groups. If you bring over a bunch of notes from Evernote with lots of different tags, your group list is going to be populated with them as well. To me, this is counter-intuitive enough to where I feel the need to leave it “shut off” — but allow you to turn it on if that’s what you prefer. If you do decide to try it, I’d suggest that you start with a few notes and examine the results in DEVONthink to see if you like it.

  To enable transfer of tags, you just need open up the script in your favorite editor and change the value of the first property (called transferTags) to “ON”:
  

  

  Change This Value To Enable Tagging -- But Be Careful!

• The file names are sometimes altered in the exported version if they include typographical characters that would halt the file creation process;
• Attachments may not save with the new note
• You should always proceed cautiously at first to understand how the script works before moving large amounts of your files around. I use this script myself and feel very comfortable with using it, but I cannot accept any responsibility for any data misadventure you might suffer. Use at your own risk!
• Errors that will undoubtedly arise when you do something that I didn’t think of (or test for)!

How to Install and Use

To use, just run the script and follow the prompts to select the Notebook/Notes from Evernote and the destination group in DEVONthink.

1. If you’d like, you can install this into DEVONthink’s Script Menu in the IMPORT folder;
2. If you have a lot of notes, it may take a while for the list of notes to appear!

FastScript link and support

Do yourself a favor and download and install FastScripts from Red Sweater. Triggering the script from the keyboard really supercharges the process — you’ll watch items practically fly into Evernote with a few keystrokes! Here’s how you set it up:

• Copy script or an Alias to ~/Library/Scripts/Applications/Evernote
• Set up your keyboard shortcut in the FastScripts Preference menu

For my FastScripts workflow, I am using ⌘ D (as in DEVONthink) for my global “Send to DEVONthink Shortcut”. I use AppleScripts to move items from several programs into and out of Evernote — FastScripts can detect which program I’m in and pick the appropriate script to create the note. All I have to remember is ⌘ D!

Source code and download link on the next page!

Features

• This script exports an HTML copy of selected DEVONthink items and saves them into Evernote.
• The Group Name in DEVONthink is applied as a tag in Evernote;
• Automatic Growl detection has also been enabled which will save you a trip to the Script Editor to enable/disable it.
  

Current Limitations and Open Issues

March 3, 2010: Script Has Been Updated to Version 1.22 — Tagging Issue Resolved With the Help of Christian Grunenberg at DEVONtechnologies!

• ** NEW** DEVONthink 2 is still new and not all of it’s features are currently working 100% in AppleScript (e.g., tagging). For now, all exported items will be tagged “From DEVONthink Pro” when brought into Evernote. In the near future, I expect that I will be able to support full tagging export with the script. (i.e., Check Back Soon!)
• You should always proceed cautiously at first to understand how the script works before moving large amounts of your files around. I use this script myself and feel very comfortable with using it, but I cannot accept any responsibility for any data misadventure you might suffer. Use at your own risk!
• Errors that will undoubtedly arise when you do something that I didn’t think of or test for!

How to Install and Use

Just highlight the items in DEVONthink that you want to send to Evernote and run the script!

1. If you’re importing a lot of items, I’d recommend that you change a few settings inside Evernote before beginning the import. In the “Clipping” tab of the Preferences menu, uncheck the boxes in the section called “After a clip:”
   
   If the boxes are checked while importing a large number of items, Evernote will fill your screen with open windows and sound like it is repeatedly shooting you with a laser from a 70’s Sci-Fi movie. Trust me — uncheck the boxes first and you’ll be much happier!
2. If you’d like, you can install this into DEVONthink’s Script Menu in the EXPORT folder

FastScript link and support

Do yourself a favor and download and install FastScripts from Red Sweater. Triggering the script from the keyboard really supercharges the process — you’ll watch items practically fly into Evernote with a few keystrokes! Here’s how you set it up:

• Copy script or an Alias to ~/Library/Scripts/Applications/DEVONthink
• Set up your keyboard shortcut in the FastScripts Preference menu

For my FastScripts workflow, I am using ⌘ E (as in Evernote) for my global “Send to Evernote Shortcut”. I use AppleScripts to move items from several programs into Evernote — FastScripts can detect which program I’m in and pick the appropriate script to create the note. All I have to remember is ⌘ E!

Source code and download link on the next page!

Latest Update: 8 February, 2010

Want a script customized for your workflow (or a new one that you don’t see here)?

Contact me to find out how to commission a script!

Did this list help you out? Please make a donation!

Evernote Scripts / API Applications:

Veritrope.com Scripts

• **NEW** RTF/TXT File Imported (To Improve Formatting Over Native Import)
• Safari URLs to Evernote (To Generate A Quick List Of Bookmarks from Your Open Tabs)
• Yojimbo to Evernote Exporter
• Evernote to Yojimbo Exporter
• NetNewsWire to Evernote: Batch Sending (For when you need to do some heavier lifting — slower, but brings over multiple items)
• TWO Scripts Connecting DEVONthink and Evernote!
• Evernote to MacJournal Exporter
• MacJournal to Evernote Batch Exporter
• Apple Mail to Evernote
• Export Evernote Notes to HTML (Legacy Script)
• Export Notes From Evernote to an RTF text file
• Export a List of Titles for Notes In Evernote to a text file
• Microsoft Entourage to Evernote
• NetNewsWire to Evernote: Single Headline or Tab (For the quickest way to get an item into Evernote)

Want to know when this list has been updated?

Follow Veritrope on Twitter

Are you using Snow Leopard?

Be sure to check the Snow Leopard Services page as well!

Other Scripts/Extensions/Projects

• **NEW** Import Delicious Bookmarks into Evernote.
  
• **NEW** An Applescript to push all of your LittleSnapper snaps into Evernote, including tags/ratings/title/date!
• **NEW** Toodledo-to-Evernote Workflow
• Automator Actions for Evernote
• Livescribe/Evernote AppleScript
• Import Amazon Kindle clippings into Evernote
• AppleScript to Export entire Evernote notebook in PDF format
• PHP code to send a WordPress post to Evernote
• Ruby Script to import Twitter favorites to Evernote
• Ruby Script to improve import of Delicious bookmarks into Evernote
• Using a Greasemonkey script to speed up import from Google Notebooks to Evernote
• Greasemonkey script to force https: on Evernote websites
• Use the Evernote Bookmarklet via Ubiquity
• AutoHotKey Script for Evernote
• Ubuntu Evernote Clipping Script
• Camino Browser Toolbar Script
• Journler to Evernote AppleScript
• Clip to Evernote via Quicksilver and AppleScript
• Copy title and URL in the front most window of Safari to Evernote with link
• Creating a daily log in Evernote from Quicksilver
• Import Yojimbo items into Evernote
• A Ruby/AppleScript solution to post NetNewsWire Items to Evernote
• Import Evernote ENEX Files into DevonThink as HTML
• A MacFUSE-based file system for accessing the Evernote service. (Under Development — Use with caution!)

Written (or know of) an Evernote Script not listed here? Post it in the comments below and I’ll add it to the list!

Evernote Accessories + Services:

• Pixily is a service that Evernote users can ship their paper documents to — they scan, categorize and upload the documents to a customer’s web account, where they can be transferred into an Evernote account with the push of a button. For a limited time, Pixily is offering Evernote users a $10 discount. To take advantage of the discount, follow this link and type EVERNOTE into the coupon code field during checkout.
  httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srR1RUt0U5w&feature=player_embedded
• The Fujitsu ScanSnap S1500 Deluxe Bundle Instant PDF Sheet-Fed Scanner — available for the Mac and also for Windows users — is Fujitsu’s latest, greatest version of their sheet-fed Document Scanner. With the push of a button, you can create a PDF file of up to 50 pages at a time. Just drop those PDFs into Evernote and, voila, you’re paperless. You can even scan your documents directly into Evernote. I own the previous model and have whole-heartedly recommended it to clients who are trying to digitize big piles of paper quickly (BTW — they also love it!):
  
• The Griffin Clarifi with EasyDock(Black) is a case for your iPhone 3G or 3GS that allows you to sharpen the iPhone’s close-up photos of business cards, receipts, or any small portion of text. Once your picture is in Evernote, text inside the image is recognized and available for searching (and easy cut-and-pasting into your favorite contact manager / word processor / etc.)
  Pretty spiffy! Check out this video from the Evernote blog of the Clarifi in action!:
  httpvh://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vduAAtinBG0
• Don’t have an iPhone? Maybe you need to capture larger amounts of text (like a whiteboard)? How about the name and location of a store or a restaurant while you’re sight-seeing? Eye-Fi makes a whole series of SD cards aimed at both PC and Mac users, professional photographers, and even video enthusiasts! It works with most digital cameras and even allows you to send geo-tagged photos directly to your Evernote account over its own Wi-Fi connection. Not only is the text in any digital photo automatically recognized and indexed, but the *LOCATION* as well. It’s a perfect way to keep a “virtual travel scrapbook”! I use this one myself — and I couldn’t be more pleased with how easy and well it works.

And again, check out this video from Evernote to see how it works:
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HzFpQbV5In8&feature=player_embedded

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