Two simple but very different note-taking apps

Two simple but very different note-taking apps

Note-taking apps come in many forms and capabilities. The best versions let you access your stored notes on whatever device you currently have at hand.

But the most important feature in a note-taker is to let you add, clip, and store — and later find — random bits of information quickly and easily. (If speed wasn’t essential, most of us would simply fire up Word.) Two relatively new players are designed to do just that.

I’ll note (no pun intended) immediately that I’m a dedicated OneNote user, both for work and for personal applications. But though it runs on numerous platforms and devices, it’s a bit slow and clunky to use on my smartphone. It’s also somewhat cumbersome for sharing simple notes with others. (I suspect that Evernote, a popular alternative, has similar issues.)

Two simple, free alternatives are Google Keep and Dropbox Paper. Both are designed to make storing and sharing bits of information easy, while keeping the overhead to a minimum. But they also have some important differences. At this time, Keep is probably the more useful of the two for the average Windows user. I’ll start with it.

Google Keep keeps it lean and simple

Keep is somewhat of an odd duck for a Google product. Since its release about three years ago, Google has enhanced it mostly by adding broader cross-platform support. But the overall user interface remains extremely simple and the options are kept to a minimum.

It’s also an app you’re not likely to run across when using Chrome, Gmail, and other popular Google tools. I found out it about while reading a Windows Secrets Lounge thread. Oddly, if you sign in to Google and click the Google Apps icon, you won’t see it on the list — even if you click the More link. But there is a Google Keep site, and you will find it on the Google Products page.

Keep (see Figure 1) is in the tradition of the classic sticky note. It gives you a place to quickly create and post random chunks of information; but it adds the ability to share notes with others. It doesn’t, however, have the deep organizational tools of more powerful products such as Evernote or OneNote.

Creating a new note starts with clicking the extremely simple “Take a note” box. You then enter or paste stuff into the box and give the new note a title. You can also select the List icon for making quick checkbox lists, or the image icon for adding pictures to a note.

By default, your collection of notes is organized on the home page just as you might put up sticky notes, though with the newest on top. (You can drag and drop the notes into an order you prefer.) There’s also a list view that might make it easier to view notes on small screens.

A Reminders option lets you set a time and date for alerts. To make these notes easier to manage, they’re also placed on a separate Reminders page.

A handy option in Keep is setting a background color for individual notes, making them more readable. The few other options include sharing and archiving, and a sub menu lets you delete the note, add a label, copy it, or copy the information to a Google Doc (see Figure 2). On mobile devices, you can also take audio notes that are automatically transcribed into text — though accuracy can be somewhat erratic.

The main options menu (Figure 3) gives you access to archived or deleted notes (trashed notes are kept for seven days). There’s also a link to the extremely limited Settings menu (Figure 4).

Keep’s power is in its cross-platform support. You can run it in any device with a browser, but Google also offers Keep apps for Android and iOS. On the latter, you must have iOS 8.0 or later — I couldn’t install it on my aging iPhone 4, but it’s now ensconced on my newer iPad Air. (I really must upgrade my phone, sometime soon.)

On PCs, Keep runs in a variety of ways. On any browser, you can add it to your list of Google apps; on Chrome, you can add a Keep extension (Figure 5). Clicking its icon in the Chrome task bar quickly saves a link to the currently displayed webpage, but you can also add your own notes. Right-clicking the icon gives you a “Go to Keep” option.

There are two Keep extensions offered for Firefox, but they don’t come from Google. I don’t suggest using them; it’s possible that your Keep-based personal information might be accessible to some unknown third-party developer.

There’s also a rather confusing app for PCs that runs separately and offline, but it needs to be installed through Chrome. (When offline, any new notes or changes to existing notes won’t be synched with other devices until you reconnect to the Web.)

I couldn’t get the app to run reliability on my Win7 Enterprise notebook, but it worked fine on my Win10 and Win7 Pro test systems.

Security is a bit gray with Keep. There’s no separate sign-in; it uses the Google account you were signed in to when you first set up Keep. Essentially, you’ll have separate Keep collections for each Google account you use. You might have to switch accounts to see the notes you’re looking for.

On the other hand, I was able to add a new note via the Chrome extension, even though I wasn’t signed into Google at the time. (That makes me wonder whether you’re ever truly disconnected from Google — if you have a browser open.)

Overall, Keep is a utility I’ll keep — for at least a while. It’s a good substitute for OneNote, when that more powerful application is more than I need. I might, for example, try it for sharing the grocery list with my Android-equipped spousal unit.

Dropbox Paper focuses on collaboration

Collaboration is all the rage with business applications. Microsoft has pushed it out with OneDrive for Business and Office, and there are numerous workgroup apps and services such as Skype for Business and Slack (site).

Dropbox, best known as a cloud-storage and file-sharing services, is apparently trying to ride that collaboration tide with its Paper initiative (see Figure 6; more info), opened to public beta in early August.

Getting started with Paper proved a bit of a challenge. When I entered my personal account email address, I was informed that I really wanted to use a Dropbox business account. When I entered the address for my Penton/Dropbox account, I was informed that the account did not support Paper. So I went back to my personal account.

It’s a bit difficult to clear picture of what Paper offers and where it’s going. It’s best to think of it as a simple publishing and editing system for shared documents. Those files can be as simple as a checkbox shopping list or as complex as a formatted text with bullet points, embedded images and video, tables, and chunks of computer code (see Figure 7). Page also includes automatic tables of content creation.

As Figure 8 shows, Paper’s formatting tools are relatively limited. But they’re quick and easy to apply by right-clicking highlighted text.

Collaboration features include comment blocks, revisions markings, and adding user initials for noting who added/edited a section of content. Notifications alerts you to changes in shared documents, and edits on one copy of a document show up almost immediately on all other open copies.

For the most part, you work with Paper from within a browser, but Dropbox has also released dedicated Paper apps for Android and iOS. Currently, these mobile apps don’t have the power of the browser-based versions; they’re mostly useful for reviewing changes, making minor edits, and adding comments.

It’s hard to say whether Paper will succeed in its collaboration mission. It’s not going to compel someone to sign up for a new Dropbox account — personal or business. But it could prove to be a useful tool for those who already have a Dropbox account. If you share documents via Dropbox, Paper is a quick and easy way to create, edit, and share basic content.

As a note-taker app, Paper is obviously a very different critter from either Google Keep or OneNote. It doesn’t have Keep’s handy home screen for quickly viewing saved notes. On the other hand, Paper is a far simpler and faster tool than OneNote for getting chucks of information into a coherent format and sharing it with others. If you have Dropbox and work in a team, check it out.

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Moving system folders brings big problems

It’s becoming increasingly risky to move system folders to alternate locations, as one Windows Secrets reader recently discovered. Here’s why, and here’s the fix.

Plus: A PC freezes during power-up — and it must be unplugged before it’ll fully boot!

Trouble after relocating Windows 10 libraries

The longer you’ve lived with the quirks and oddities of various Windows versions, the greater the odds that you follow a time-honored practice: moving some standard system folders off the C: drive to alternate locations, where there’s more space or where the files seem easier to share, back up, or otherwise manage. The recent trend toward faster but relatively smaller solid-state drives has also kept this practice in use.

Windows allows this kind of folder relocation, and offers a variety of built-in methods for doing so. In many cases, it’s just a matter of a few clicks.

But there can be unforeseen consequences, as reader Keith discovered. His issue was with Windows libraries, but problems can also appear when moving other default folders.

• “Mr. Langa, I recently performed a clean install of Win10. I decided to use a second drive to store all my Windows libraries. I used Windows File Explorer to move all libraries from C:\users\user-profile\library-name to L:\library-name. There’s no longer any user content in C:\users\user-profile\library-name.

  “But now File Explorer shows two copies of each library folder: the new folders on L: plus the original (now empty) locations, each with a line through it.

  “When I delete the empty folders, Windows later recreates them.

  “Would you please help me get rid of the unwanted library folder icons?”

You’re lucky, Keith! This is a minor problem that’s easily fixed. When it comes to moving default folders, problems can be much, much worse than this!

Your issue is caused by two separate factors.

The first is simply procedural — the top-level library folders shown in File Explorer aren’t actual folders, so they require special handling.

The more significant issue involves the whole rationale for moving libraries (or any default system folder) in the first place.

Let’s take both issues in sequence.

The Windows Library is a two-part system: It’s made up of virtual folders that link to real content that’s stored elsewhere.

The standard, top-level folders — Documents, Pictures, Music, etc. — shown in File Explorer’s Libraries section (Figure 1) are all virtual. They contain symlinks to actual content that resides elsewhere.

(Note: If you can’t see Libraries in File Explorer, see the related Microsoft Support page.)

A symlink is a special class of local shortcut. Acting somewhat like a hyperlink on the Web, it transparently connects a virtual file or folder to a real file or residing anywhere on your system — on any partition or drive, local or networked (for more info, see the MSDN symlink info page.)

When you first set up Windows, the OS automatically creates default content folders (Documents, Music, Pictures, etc.) with symlinks to the associated Library folder. (These are the folders that Keith referred to as C:\users\user-profile\library-name.)

By default, Windows automatically stores content types it recognizes, such as DOCX, JPG, MP3, and so forth, in these predefined folders. Those files then show up in the associated, virtual, top-level Library folder. This default setup ensures that Libraries can work from first boot, with no manual user setup needed.

If you wish to move the contents of a default Library folder (e.g., the content inside C:\users\user-profile\library-name\) to a new location, you certainly may do so. I’ll link to articles with more how-to information in a moment, but here’s the quick version:

Leave the default content folder in place. Create a new folder with a new and unique name in the location of your choice (for example, at L:\new-library-name). Copy/move/add the files you want to the new folder and then connect it (using symlinks) to a library folder — either an existing, top-level folder (Documents, Pictures, Music, etc.) or an entirely new top-level folder with the name of your choice.

This process might be unfamiliar to you, but it’s not hard. For details on creating and managing library folders, and some background info, see:

• “Make the most of Windows 7’s Libraries” – March 10, 2011, Top Story
• “Tips on working within Windows 7’s Libraries” – March 25, 2010, LangaList Plus
• The Windows Libraries section of “Windows browse and organize features” – TechNet article
• “Libraries: Frequently asked questions” — TechNet article

That gives you the how. Now here’s the second issue: Why mess around with default folders at all?

Sure, Windows lets you put almost any folder in almost any location. (I covered the major methods way back in the Dec. 1, 2011, LangaList Plus, “Different ways to move user folders.”) But because you can do something doesn’t mean you necessarily should.

The practice of system-folder relocation dates back to the earliest days of Windows when data-eating crashes, hangs, and unexpected shutdowns were a routine hazard. In that environment, it made some sense to get your valuable data off the C: drive and out of harm’s way.

Moreover, drives were small; many PC owners needed to add additional drives, and they scattered default folders to wherever there was room.

But with today’s Windows, on current hardware, those reasons typically no longer pertain. File-scrambling OS crashes are now extremely uncommon, and what risks remain can be fully addressed through built-in mechanisms. (See the Oct. 15, 2015, Top Story, “Best of breed: Win10’s hybrid backup system.”)

As for disk space, today’s hard drives are dirt cheap and gigantic, compared to those in early Windows systems. And almost any system (new or old) can be equipped with inexpensive secondary storage, when needed. If, for example, space gets tight on drive C:, you can move the contents of a default Library folder to an external drive and leave the original folder in place. This way, you get the benefits of elbow room without breaking anything.

In short, I believe that moving default folders is a solution to problems that mostly no longer exist.

Worse, altering the default system folders could create new problems on an otherwise-healthy system. Keith was lucky in encountering only a minor problem; other readers weren’t so lucky. For example, see the July 26 LangaList Plus item, “Standard data folder absent from backup sets.”

And possibly more trouble is on the horizon. As Windows evolves and becomes increasingly self-maintaining, changing default folders adds needless risk and complication to Windows’ automatic updates, backups, restores, indexing, cloud-syncing, and so on. It’s far simpler and more certain to leave default folders alone. In other words, let Windows store and recover data in the places it’s pre-wired to use.

For those reasons, I’ve argued, for some time now, against the practice of moving default folders. For example, as far back as the Dec. 1, 2011 “Different ways to move user folders,” I said, “[M]oving folders isn’t something that I recommend.” I made the point again in the Dec. 19, 2013, LangaList Plus, “Why relocating default folders is no longer wise.” And I’ve made this recommendation elsewhere.

My advice to Keith and others is to consider altering Windows’ default folders only after you’ve investigated and rejected all other options.

Again, for the ins and outs of managing Windows Libraries system, and for help with correcting a problem such as deleting a bogus or malfunctioning library, check out the aforementioned “Make the most of Windows 7’s Libraries” Top Story. You’ll see how to create and delete virtual folders inside Libraries and also how to add or delete content — other files and folders — to an existing or new Library.

The information there applies to Windows 7, 8, and 10.

A Windows PC locks up tight during power-up

Pete Freiermuth’s system requires extreme measures to successfully boot.

• “I’m having a problem with my machine freezing up during the power-up cycle. My system displays Windows’ sign-in screen, but I can’t proceed because the keyboard and mouse are inoperable. There’s a red X icon, whose meaning is unknown to me, in the lower-right corner of the screen.

  “I can successfully reboot only by shutting down Windows, unplugging the power cable, reconnecting to power, and then booting.

  “Any idea of what could cause this? My system is a [major brand] 64-bit desktop running Windows 10.”

Pete, here’s what jumps out at me: Your PC won’t boot normally if you leave it plugged in between uses — but it will boot normally if you unplug it between uses.

So the cause of your problem must lie in the different ways your PC handles these two events.

On power-down, many current Windows PCs — and almost all desktop/tower/full-sized systems — default to Hybrid Sleep, a combination hibernation and deep-sleep. (For more info, see the Nov. 13, 2014, LangaList Plus, “PC crashes when waking from sleep mode.”)

UEFI-equipped Win10/8 PCs might use a closely-related function called Hybrid Shutdown — for more, see the Jan. 3, 2013, Top Story, “With Windows 8, ‘off’ isn’t really off.”

When your PC wakes from hybrid sleep, it’ll try to resume from where it left off, using any software and settings (including active drivers) that were left in RAM. If the state of your system hardware changes — perhaps it has timed out, gone into full sleep, not properly awakened, or otherwise no longer matches the state expected by the RAM-based settings — the drivers could fail to resume properly. The wake-up process fails.

Unplugging the PC wipes the RAM; the system then boots, either from scratch or by using the existing hibernation file. In both cases, the system hardware and drivers are in sync and everything works.

You can usually solve wake-up/resume problems by adjusting the driver and power-control settings of the affected devices or systems — in Pete’s case, that would be for the mouse and keyboard.

The following articles deal with similar driver and power-control problems; you can adapt the suggested fixes to help resolve sleep/wake issues with mice, keyboards, or almost any other kind of system hardware. See:

• “PC loses networking after about an hour” – July 11, 2016, LangaList Plus
• “Problems with external, USB-based hard drives” – April 19, 2016, LangaList Plus

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The unending confusion over Windows file naming

Naming conventions in Windows is often a case of “Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.”

A seemingly simple question about the use of periods has generated a lengthy discussion of that topic that’s stretched over several months. The thread gets a bit into the weeds, when the participants get into date formatting in file names.

The following links are this week’s most interesting Lounge threads, including several other new questions for which you might have answers:

Office Applications
General Productivity	Ongoing: Using multiple periods in file names
Word Processing	Word docs opening as read-only
	F9 is locking my document
Spreadsheets	Find number in three columns and lookup
	Help solving conditional-formatting issue
	Combine multiple conditional-formatting rules
Databases	MS removing Access from Office suite?
Presentation Apps	Marking hidden PP slides when printing
Windows
General Windows	OneDrive displays personal information
	Tech for kids in need
Windows 10	Suggestions for imaging applications
	Information on KB 3150513?
	Preview build 10.0.14915.1 released to Fast ring
	Win10 1607 slow to boot
Windows 8	Audio devices disappeared after OS update
Windows 7	Ongoing: Can’t download updates
	Suggestions needed for improving laptop speed
	Start-up options for different accounts?
Windows Servers	User sign-in to domain error
Internet/Connectivity
Internet Explorer/Edge	Saving new favorites in MS Edge
Networking	10/100 router and gigabyte switch?
Software Development
Web Design & Dev.	Best link checker
Other Technologies
Non-Microsoft OSes	My journey into the world of Linux
Security & Scams	Ongoing: Symantec-Norton dangerously insecure
Hardware	Thumb drive not recognized
Graphics/Multimedia	Multiple photos in one JPEG file
Other Applications	Revo Uninstaller Free now has full 64-bit support

Starred posts are particularly useful

If you’re not already a Lounge member, use the quick registration form to sign up for free. The ability to post comments and take advantage of other Lounge features is available only to registered members.

If you’re already registered, you can jump right into today’s discussions in the Lounge.