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For notes that relate to a specific date such as receipts or tickets, I prefix with YYYY-MM-DD and then include the name of the company and the item. If it's a booking I add the reservation number to the title so I can access it even if Evernote decides not to load the note (it has happened despite me having everything selected for offline access.
I have seen my naming conventions for notes evolve over the years and I always wanted a link with the file folders of my computers. When I discovered the PARA approach of Tiago Forte I learned that I was already doing most of it, but with a little twist for my own purposes. So I use a list of 4 letter acronyms which relate to areas of responsibilities and interests. There are roughly 15 of these and they cover most of my life. Any note, notebook, or file folder always start with that. I double that with using the same acronym in a single tag, which help with search and exporting. So i.e. HEAL concerns anything health related, HOME is about the house, what’s in and around it, FOOD are recipes, diets, etc. You get the idea. Next I indicate if it’s a Project with short term goal associated, then a description of the contents and I conclude with a status item – adding year means the project is finished and archived, OH means on hold, anything else means it’s ongoing. This gives examples like: MONY Tax 2023, HEAL Dentist, TECH Buy iphone OH, HOME Dishwasher Brand Modelname, etc.
i’ve been asking Evernote for years to replace the very unwieldy “intitle:” with a single-character command. For example, *invoice instead of intitle:invoice
I'm not sure if that's feasible (technically speaking). As far as I can remember, the advanced search was never intended for end-users. The original documentation was, in reality, part of the developer's blog Evernote used to have back then. It was spread by the users, and many years later Evernote started sharing posts about it in the main blog. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that the current syntax is the foundation for all applications that use the API, including the AI-powered search. So, changing anything there would probably break many things.
I think my note naming convention has evolved over time to mirror yours.
Like tags, there's always the danger of making it too complex.
I think I've trained myself now that when I forward an email into Evernote that I don't just let the subject default to "Fwd: <original email subject>" but replace that with a meaningful note title, rather than just hitting send. And if there is an obvioius task arising, I'll type the text of it avbove the email body, so that when I look at it EN, I can easily create a task from it.
That's a good idea. I've read a few articles about how organising at the point of collecting the information is more efficient than throwing everything into one notebook and organising later. I do struggle with it though!
Evernote is my filing cabinet. Invoices, bills and receipts are titled first with the date (yyyymmdd), then the organization/vendor, and invoice/bill/receipt number.
I add at least one tag which equals the vendor name.
This format, in my opinion, is superior for finding content.
Other notes have concise titles which are descriptive enough to highlight the note content.
For notes which capture daily events (think diary), I’ve adopted the Forever*Notes format. So, the note title is Month DD.
I’ll chalk it up to dumb things I learned writing C but it works pretty well in lots of places. Interesting layer comes when people pick up on it and start making all the folders ALL CAPS thus defeating the purpose.
For notes that relate to a specific date such as receipts or tickets, I prefix with YYYY-MM-DD and then include the name of the company and the item. If it's a booking I add the reservation number to the title so I can access it even if Evernote decides not to load the note (it has happened despite me having everything selected for offline access.
For example:
2025-03-25 Apple MacBook Air M4 receipt
2025-06-02 easyJet flight EA12345
Thanks. Nice idea. Going to stick booking references in the title from now on. I like that.
I have seen my naming conventions for notes evolve over the years and I always wanted a link with the file folders of my computers. When I discovered the PARA approach of Tiago Forte I learned that I was already doing most of it, but with a little twist for my own purposes. So I use a list of 4 letter acronyms which relate to areas of responsibilities and interests. There are roughly 15 of these and they cover most of my life. Any note, notebook, or file folder always start with that. I double that with using the same acronym in a single tag, which help with search and exporting. So i.e. HEAL concerns anything health related, HOME is about the house, what’s in and around it, FOOD are recipes, diets, etc. You get the idea. Next I indicate if it’s a Project with short term goal associated, then a description of the contents and I conclude with a status item – adding year means the project is finished and archived, OH means on hold, anything else means it’s ongoing. This gives examples like: MONY Tax 2023, HEAL Dentist, TECH Buy iphone OH, HOME Dishwasher Brand Modelname, etc.
Thanks. I like that, pretty simple and 15 is not too many to remember. Also like the idea you tag as well.
i’ve been asking Evernote for years to replace the very unwieldy “intitle:” with a single-character command. For example, *invoice instead of intitle:invoice
I'm not sure if that's feasible (technically speaking). As far as I can remember, the advanced search was never intended for end-users. The original documentation was, in reality, part of the developer's blog Evernote used to have back then. It was spread by the users, and many years later Evernote started sharing posts about it in the main blog. Anyway, what I'm trying to say is that the current syntax is the foundation for all applications that use the API, including the AI-powered search. So, changing anything there would probably break many things.
Interesting Vlad... I did not know that. Hopefully if they update the API new advanced search will be exposed🤞
I like that idea.
I think my note naming convention has evolved over time to mirror yours.
Like tags, there's always the danger of making it too complex.
I think I've trained myself now that when I forward an email into Evernote that I don't just let the subject default to "Fwd: <original email subject>" but replace that with a meaningful note title, rather than just hitting send. And if there is an obvioius task arising, I'll type the text of it avbove the email body, so that when I look at it EN, I can easily create a task from it.
That's a good idea. I've read a few articles about how organising at the point of collecting the information is more efficient than throwing everything into one notebook and organising later. I do struggle with it though!
I create a note daily for work on customers alway: YYYYMMDD - Custname - DayofWeek.
I tend to use YYYYMMDD at the beginning of any daily log type notes, just another option for sorting.
I also tag the notes with Custname & -Invoice
When it's time to invoice I simply filter for the tags -Invoice and once the item/day is entered in the invoice, I delete the tag -Invoice.
Nice. You use EN almost like a time sheet? I hadn't thought of that. I use Zoho Projects to manage time and invoice from that. Its got me thinking.
Evernote is my filing cabinet. Invoices, bills and receipts are titled first with the date (yyyymmdd), then the organization/vendor, and invoice/bill/receipt number.
I add at least one tag which equals the vendor name.
This format, in my opinion, is superior for finding content.
Other notes have concise titles which are descriptive enough to highlight the note content.
For notes which capture daily events (think diary), I’ve adopted the Forever*Notes format. So, the note title is Month DD.
Thanks. I like the idea of tagging the vendor and you're not able to forget the tags as you're processing the invoice anyway. I like this.
The only real convention I use is to include emojis to indicate things like importance. However there is a quirk in the EN search syntax because
intitle:🔴 doesn't work
but
intitle:🔴 🔴 works as expected (There is no 🔴 in the body of the note)
I like how you use emoji's for importance. I saw one of your posts on the official forum about it and started using a few. It helps.
I have never been successful with any naming conventions save two:
1. Notes tied to things like meetings or events start with sortable dates.
2. Notebooks that are big, structural or important and should not be moved or renamed get ALL CAPS names.
Thanks. I like the idea of all caps to signify importance.
I’ll chalk it up to dumb things I learned writing C but it works pretty well in lots of places. Interesting layer comes when people pick up on it and start making all the folders ALL CAPS thus defeating the purpose.