devonthink pro search keywords in pdf cant search

My own paper-writing workflow has been in flux for quite some time. (ok, this turned into quite an epistle, but here it goes anyway…)ĬTS, if you’re still keeping an eye on this thread, could you elucidate on how you use (physical) index cards? Perhaps a short description of why this organizational model appeals to you can help us think of an app that best approximates what you want to do. The inability to associate among them is a major deficiently in TB. Since large files are cumbersome to work with in TB, I need to use several, smaller projects file. Importantly, TB cannot search in or link between several files.

Tinderbox is looking more and more appealing, and I have several ongoing projects as TB files. This is where I am still uncommitted to a workflow. If the project is large, or I predict that I might revisit its topic, I arrange data in another application. I data-mine in DT, and export relevant data to Scrivener’s Research area. If I am working on a relatively small, one-time writing project, I migrate relevant notes to the Scrivener file I am working on. I write (research articles and grant applications) in Scrivener. I am much more comfortable with EF’s storage system, which is, after all, what a database is all about. However, as soon as EF can index external files, and adds the ability to sort search results by relevance, I will migrate all these data to EF. ) My criticism is somewhat unfair, though: DT is primarily a data repository and not a writing environment.

Others disagree (see, for example, this post, or this one. I also find it difficult to write within the database, as I can in Scrivener (see below). Its main deficiency, for me, is that it is not an intuitive environment to map and store relationships (“links”) between data. The notes are small text-only or RTF files, and include “metadata” such as the source of the material and a date stamp.ĭT’s strong points are its flexible data capture options, and unparalleled search engine. These databases also index text in files located in the Finder, including a large repository of PDFs managed by Bookends. These are dumped in with little or no organization. I have a very large number of texts (PDFs, text files, notes and clips from the web) that I keep in several DEVONthink Pro databases. If you’ve got a minute, I’d love to hear what your workflow is Oddly, with all these great programs, there are still things for which index cards are superior (organizing things chronologically, moving them around into an outline).Īnyway, I’m curious whether and how people are using EF for writing papers that draw on massive amounts of notes. I notice that users of Zotero, designed specifically for academia (and with bibliographic functions I don’t care so much about), have the same concern (organizing notes). I use Word’s Outline view for final organization, but that means cutting and pasting out of EF’s notes, which is less than ideal. (Especially once I discovered Skim and so could handle PDF’s better.) I’m not yet sure whether the note-taking function is ideal for reviewing and organizing notes, though. I chose it over the much-hyped DevonThink.

I’m finding EF unparalelled at keeping track of lots of information, and searching it. (I’m a journalist, but our needs would be similar.) Given the recent question in the forums about Bookends, I’m curious how many people are using EF to help organize research papers and/or dissertations.

Devonthink pro search keywords in pdf cant search