I’ve been using Evernote for awhile now. The Windows client is pretty good. The editor supports ordered/unordered lists, font types, color, etc. All of the expected things in a rich text editor are there.
At the same time the Mac client is really awful. The latest update has some new icons, etc. but they haven’t improved the editor functionality. There is no ability to create lists as in the Windows client. Given that the Mac development environment, which comes with the OS, has the source code to the TextEdit application I’m not sure why the Evernote folks can’t duplicate that functionality in their client.
To make things worse the Web client now has more editor functionality than the Mac client. Guys, if you’re not going to at least have parity between the clients why are you bothering with the Mac client at all?
Update: OK. So apparently the Mac client does support lists….just not directly. I found out that creating a note with a list in the web client results in the list being maintained in the Mac client. When you add more items to the list numbers/bullets (I assume…I didn’t try bullets but numbers do work) increment automatically (and decrement if you remove items). There just is no way to create these directly in the Mac client as of yet. Very weird.
Update 2: Ok. According to this forum posting the Evernote folks are going to address this in the next Mac client release. Great to read this as it might mean not having to run Windows in VMWare Fusion to get the better desktop client.
I’ve been mucking around with adding my Remember the Milk lists as iCal event feeds to my Google Calendar account. The idea of having tasks with due dates show up like “local” GCal events is great but it doesn’t work as I’d hoped.
Apparently I’m not the only one noticing this either based on this post on the GCal Google group. That post notes that it takes hours for the feed to refresh and that there is no way to manually refresh it (you can in with a 30boxes.com calendar but that one leaves a lot to be desired). Quite frankly it’s ridiculous that it takes hours. At that point I can’t be sure that anything I entered actually shows up in GCal. It would appear this behavior just isn’t an RTM issue as I see the same behavior with a feed from iWantSandy.com.
RTM does have two other options available, one for GCal, and if you’re using Firefox, one for GMail. The GMail Firefox plugin is quite nice but I don’t want my tasks there…I want them in my calendar. The option for GCal itself is OK but I’m picky and don’t want to have to click that checkmark to see what I have for the day.
I suppose that GCal is like so many other pieces of software, it gets you most of the way there but then dumps you off about a mile away from your intended destination. This is a real disappointment. I know GCal is free but adding a manual refresh link for the external feeds can’t be that difficult. The Google Group link above notes that “they’re looking into it”. I hope it happens sometime soon.
Not surprisingly this works flawlessly on iCal on the Mac. I can even see tasks with no due date set in the To-Do list part of iCal. But I can’t use my Mac at work anymore where I really need to see these lists 
You hear the whispers coming out of co-workers, hushed tones with odd inflections repeating words like ‘yes’, ‘no’, ‘customer service’. Is this some weird conversation with a loved one? Then it dawns on you that your co-worker is busy navigating the world of a voice-recognition-based phone system.
Almost everyone has used one of these systems by now. Many companies are using them these days and the trend seems to be moving away from number-based (”please hit 1 if you require immediate medical attention”) to voice-recognition-based (”please say yes if you require immediate medical attention”) phone menu navigation systems. The question is why?
There is nothing inherently better about these systems and I’d argue that in fact they are worse. In most cases hitting a number on the keypad would be quicker. In all cases it is certainly not as disruptive as navigating a voice-based menu system. I suppose there is one situation in which a voice-based system could be better and that would be a menu that gets very deep with options.
With a voice-based system it would probably be easier to skip levels of the menu depending on what the person is saying. Something like “pay my bill” could certainly save time if the keypad-based option required inputting more than 2 numbers to navigate down in to the menu system. In my experience with these systems though I am not seeing this savings.
Most of the systems have voice input that is closely tied to menus that would be equivalent to the keypad-based systems. I just don’t see the savings in time and see a lot more aggravation. I have had, on more than one occassion, had to repeat myself multiple times to be understood. Higher levels of background noise really mess with the voice recognition. In some instances I have even been transferred to a human because the voice recognition can’t understand what I’m saying.
Keep the keypad-based systems guys. They are the less annoying option.
While messing with a Google Apps setup I have created for my volunteer group I found some interesting things about entering events. Not sure they’re features given the circumstances but they’re interesting nonetheless.
First of all, I selected 1pm to 3pm on a Thursday and entered the term “Kayak Thursday” (no quotes). The calendar application then entered an event for me for the Thursday after the Thursday I had selected.
Then I tried entering “Kayak-Thursday” (again no quotes) and it then scheduled the event for the Thursday prior to the Thursday I had selected.
Putting the title in quotes makes it work the way I want.
I’m not sure this is a feature I really like. When I select a specific day put the event on that day. Don’t try to guess what I want. The behavior with the “-Thursday” was even more odd even though it sort of makes sense. Well, it makes sense now. It certainly didn’t make sense then.
I can understand these things for the quick event feature but not given the context I was in while entering events.
Updated!!!
I’ll keep updating this page as I find more tools since this seems to be one of the more popular pages on this blog.
Thanks,
Jason
One thing programmers don’t generally know is good design techniques. You can usually tell when a programmer has created a UI because they’re ugly and difficult to use. There are exceptions to be sure (Romain Guy for one). For those of us that aren’t as blessed I present here a list of color pickers that allow you to pick harmonious color combinations for web sites, etc.
- Added 03/06/2007:
Kuler
From Adobe and pronounced “cooler” this is a fantastic color chooser. Not only can you create your own color scheme using a very intuitive color wheel but you can also search on the hundreds of color schemes people have already generated to find something quickly. This is a fantastic resource.
- ColorJack Sphere or more generally ColorJack.
This is another fantastic color resource. Sphere is another easy to use color wheel with options for both the traditional RYB color wheel as well as the standard RGB model. There are many algorithms to choose from (triad, complementary, etc) but the really unique thing about this tool is the ability to see how color blind people interpret colors. Very cool stuff. ColorJack also offers a service similar to Kuler where you can see color schemes others have created using the Studio tool on the website.
- Colors on the Web
This site is more than a color chooser (one is available from the Color Wheel menu option) as it also gives user-created color schemes, forums, writing on color theory, etc. It’s a fantastic resource for those who want to learn more about color.
- Color SynthAxis
OK. This is a real designers tool and complicated but damn is it cool. I believe it is best explained by the tutorial.
- Added 11/25/2007:The Color Wizard
The interesting thing is that tools such as these are coming out of the woodwork these days. At one time Harmony, a Photoshop plugin for the Mac from Hot Door, was the only thing available. They now recommend Kuler and their own application hasn’t been updated in years. My how things change.
The other night I was ordering some clothing (a new coat and some slip-on moc shoes if you must know) from Lands End and had a fantastic experience…for most of it anyhow.
I have to say that they have done a wonderful job in the shopping experience. The site is quite easy to navigate and finding the color, size, etc. you need is really easy. They have also done a fantastic job in the support of the buying process when you need help on such things as what the definition of Tall means, etc.
Great. But they have totally failed after the sale is over (an area I believe that Amazon.com has done wonderfully). Where do I see my orders? Where are the easy to click links for tracking those orders? Come on guys. This stuff really is not that hard.
Listing my orders
If I sign in to the My Account section of the Lands End site nowhere to be found is a listing of my orders currently in process. In fact nowhere on the site can you find such a listing. Again this stuff is not hard. Have a page that shows my in-process orders, the stage at which they are in whole process, etc. When the order has shipped have a link to the proper shipping site that already has the information embedded so that I don’t have to input it. Lots of other sites that are a lot smaller than Lands End/Sears are doing this.
They are relying on my to use the email that is sent when the order is placed. Really poor design guys.
Tracking my orders
OK so I still have the email with my order number. Wonderful. I can track it that way. Oops. Not so fast. The link provided takes me to the right page on their website for order tracking but it doesn’t have the number populated in the text input. I have to copy and paste it in. Clicking the button then forwards me to the UPS tracking page with my information already input so that the tracking information comes right up.
Yeah. Rewind just a bit. They know how to do this on the order tracking page but they haven’t figured out that a clickable list available right my from account page would be good too. Odd.
The other thing I don’t get is why not just have a clickable link in the email that goes directly to the UPS site with the relevant tracking number already set up?
Wrap Up
So kudos to Lands End for most of the experience because the shopping experience itself is fantastic. They really need to work on the follow-up though. They have great customer service but it isn’t showing there.
