Why Evernote Is Awesome

1)  It works everywhere.  I mean EVERYWHERE.  I have it on my iPhone.  I have it on my computer(s).  I will have it on whatever tablet I get.  All my crap is available at the slightest whim.  This means I can stand in the middle of Wal-Mart and look up the ingredients I need to make cachasa Brigadero.  And while I might not be able to get all that stuff AT Wal-Mart, it's worlds better than having to tote index cards or not have what I need to try.

2)  The logo.  Have you noticed that it's an elephant?  Elephants (after owls and giraffes) are some of my favorite animals.  It's also a happy-looking elephant.  He's so spiffingly pleased because he hasn't forgotten that document he was going to share with his coworkers on a USB drive that's at home.  This is the secret to happiness, after all.

3)  The ability to make and share notebooks.  Most awesome tool for team collaboration ever.  You can throw anything in, PDFs, web clippings, images, your own freaking handwritten notes, and then pass along the treasure trove to somebody else.  I used to do things like this with ring binders or file folders (which, of course, were never where I needed them).  This is the digital equivalent of my resource cabinet in the back of my classroom.  I want to start my students using them, too, so they can do group research projects with greater ease.

4)  Clearly.  If you're using Chrome and Evernote and haven't managed to stumble on this extension your-own-self, hie it over to the web store and get it now.  It strips pages down to their essentials (removes ads, ornate headers, and other fluff) so all you are saving is something that can be easily edited or printed without taking 487 pages.  It lets you preview and then "clip."  I am preparing all sorts of articles for teaching (Common Core, anyone?) simply by putting them through Clearly when I find them online and then tucking them into notebooks for later.

5) CamScanner.  This one is brand new to me, but it's something I've been needing.  It's an iPhone app that lets you create PDFs by taking pictures with your iPhone's camera.  SHEER GENIUS.  If it works like they say on the tin, it will replace having to take a document to a big scanner for quick recording.  It will also allow me to archive some things that I only have in hardcopy from the days before I did everything digitally.

6)  Did I mention the green elephant?

7) The latest advance in their OCR technology and the fact that they just hooked up with Moleskine to use a specialized notebook to ease scanning in of handwritten stuff.  I admit it, as much of a technophile as I am, I still prefer to use my fountain pen and paper when I need to take notes.  However, having those notes put into Evernote when I'm done allows me all sorts of options I didn't have before.  Since I usually wind up as the "recorder" or "scribe" for every group, I think I can try to do it by hand now and turn it into a PDF, etc., so I don't have to write then type.

I could go on, but I think this is enough.  I am finding new ways to use it all the time.  Tonight, I added an IFTTT action that will archive my Instagram photos automatically, saving me the hassle of individual downloads for each one.  Good stuff, that.  If you're not using it, I think you should at least give it a spin.  Who knows, maybe the green elephant will make you happy, too.