Advice please: index or not in Devonthink through the Finder?

Software
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I see what you mean. Really nice way of expressing it and one I hadn’t thought of. Thanks for giving us a really useful category. Really, have you written this up somewhere? I would like to see it.

Some of us are ‘opinionated users’ so I guess that figures? I have found DEVONthink 3 team very approachable I have to say and helpful when I have had issues. I don’t know if it is ‘style’ question. Folk can read me very wrong, not being American born, as pompous and lofty. Some truth in it I think but let’s not go that route.

42

I did write it up. Here. :slight_smile: Might be worth expanding.

The phrase “opinionated design” isn’t original to me. I think I picked it up from the MPU podcast or Gruber or someplace like that.

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43

My own experience with DevonThink’s “opinionated design” was when I asked how I can activate Markdown syntax highlighting. Can’t, I was told. I said, OK, let’s call that a feature request. They said what I was asking for wasn’t “syntax highlighting.” I said FINE whatever it is I want it.

I don’t care about beautiful design and fonts and colors – like iA Writer or Ulysses. I just want bold text to look bold, links to be highlighted, and so on. Maybe code folding and drag-and-drop of sections if they want to be fancy.

They said they would add it to the list. I got the idea it is a very long list, and my feature request is way, way down near the bottom. Sort of like the line to buy a new iPhone when I did that in 2008.

Also, the clutter-free web clipper is improving, but it is still nowhere good as Evernote, or Safari Reader view, or even (based on not a lot of experience) Bear.

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44

In this day and age you’ll find few options for your distinct needs.

45

Using the Safari Reader view + Bear is a great way to get “Markdown + images” of a web page.

(I’m not sure if the Safari Reader part is necessary, but I tend to have it on by default anyway, so I thought I’d mention it.)

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46

Probably true but it’s still my requirement and cannot change.

47

I read this again after replying to your question Mitch. I don’t even knoww what syntax highlighting is really. I can guess it is like what happens on Ulysses. Instead of just looking like ordinary black type. Out of interest you often see stars on media sites and so on round words. As if somebody has Marked words up but it hasn’t been ‘translated’ if you will. Is that because a Markup attempt has failed or do people do it now to highlight something. I started doing that but stopped. I actually now read * * no * * as “no” . Forgive that way of escaping the Markup here! :rofl: It is really intersting to me what you think. It is really complicated when you are talking about Markup using Markup :bangbang:

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48

Yes. And in hyperlinks, the text would be highlighted a bit while the link itself is subdued. That kind of thing makes Markdown easier to write i and read.

Some Markdown editors, like Ulysses, take extreme care with fonts, spacing, color, etc. I’m not asking for any of that.

Using asterisks for emphasis predates the Web. People did it on discussion forums like newsgroups, and in email before email supported formatted text.

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49

Syntax highlighting, Visual Studio Code variety:

Screenshot of Code (3-10-20, 2-02-35 PM)
Screenshot of Code (3-10-20, 2-02-35 PM)1676×672 106 KB

It’s useful when scanning documents, especially long documents.

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50

I had no idea! Have you any idea where and when it started and why? That is really interesting to me. Something in fact I should have known about. I can see how useful it can be and in fact I suppose I use it that way without realizing I do. Even finding sub titles in a doc… I just have never written a lot of stuff in plain text without those aids. The notes I put in DEVONthink 3 tend to be short and other longer things get in there via other means. Wow. It is nice to get an insight into one’s own workflows. I assume then that is why it was incorporated into Markup languages rather than vice versa?

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51

Thanks for that. It is always nice when people got to some trouble to answer questions here. It happens a lot.

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52

You’re welcome, it’s a pleasure. Going into the weeds – defining syntax highlighting for a document type is simple, especially if the dev has access (which they do) to a .json-based grammar for that document type. E.g., a syntax highlighting grammar for markdown. The way is easy; the will (as we’ve seen with DEVONthink) is not.

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53

Good to know. I know something are harder than others to do.

54

I run my life off Devonthink (DT3).

I have 16 GB of data in ten DT3 Databases. I import everything. I would never Index things at this point. I have decided I prefer DT over the finder and I want to maintain and use one file system, not two. I would also worry about inadvertently moving or deleting something that would cause a DT index based system to have issues. I hate time-wasting tech issues :slight_smile:

All my personal stuff (bills, financial stuff, manuals for home appliances etc) is in a DT database. I scan everything and try to be paperless except for handwritten notes I may take when on the phone. Those then get scanned as well.

Former Evernote user and DT3 is far more useful - not even close. I find using DT on OSX to store, file and look at files far more efficient than the finder, even with all of the add-on productivity stuff MacSparky talks about on his various podcasts. That’s before you start using the search, OCR and other smart things DT lets you do.

I sync DT via a dropbox syncstore - no issues ever. I religiously back up all my computers (three sets of complete disk images via Chronosync, 1 always offsite).

I travel a ton, sometimes with a portable Mac, sometimes with an iPad. I’m often in 3rd world countries in areas with no internet access. I always buy lots of memory in any iOS device I get, so I can sync everything (all 16GB of data in ten DBs) to each iOS device. That way, wherever I am I have immediate access to everything. I never want to be memory constrained - that just leads to lots of wasted time doing workarounds.

I still use Evernote but only to share trip info with my wife (easier to share stuff via Evernote than DT3 as it has a superior shared sync). We have an Evernote folder for each trip so we both always know where the other is and the details of any travel info. Evernote also has a neat web publishing feature which lets you give others links to Evernote pages. I share event and trip info with many others this way - one link and they have access to a “living” document about an upcoming event.

Sure iOS memory is pricey. Having a hardware based triplicate backup system is as well. I use OWC Thunderbay 4’s as JBODs with 30 Terabytes of Hard Drives in each one. Chronosync does incremental backups overnite - a serious photography hobby is where 16 Terabyte of data comes from. I’m starting to do more 4k video so my backup system has some extra headroom. Having each Backup system in it’s own small self-contained box makes it super-easy to use as well as swap the offsite backup regularly.

Over the years I have found I spent tons of time trying to deal with the constraints of synching limited memory devices and backing up data in many places. Backblaze or any online backup is out for me because of the amount of data I keep. So I came up with this system to simplify things.

For me, the payoff is huge in terms of simplicity and time saved. The extra few thousand dollars in investment up front in memory and hardware pays for itself many times over.

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55

Thanks @BermudaAI, I have been using DT for years, but still feel like a beginner. I’m trying to up my game with it, but am hitting the workflow wall. The incoming materials exceed the time I have to get them into DT. My DT inbox is overflowing with items that I want to file. That’s problem #1.

#2. Some items are in DT, some are in Finder. I get frustrated when I look for something that should be there, but I only find in the other app. I feel like I am using two apps for one job. Maybe there is no way around this. Some things need to remain in Finder and the rest can go into DT.

Can you or anyone suggest a reliable workflow? Or point me in the right direction in this forum? I’m sure its been covered.

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56

Avoiding this problem is why I index rather than import files to DT.

When I index, everthing is in one place. And, if I add a “native document” in DT that points to an indexed iCloud folder, the document also shows up in Finder. The process is a two-way one. However, although this works well when files are indexed from iCloud it does not work the same way if you index Google Drive, for example. Anything created in GD will show up in DT but new documents created natively in DT will not show up in GD.

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I reading your post here: Significant changes to apps and final 2021 workflow

I thought you decided against indexing in favor of importing…?

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That is correct but only because I was in error. First time this year. :slight_smile:

I thought that native documents in DT would not sync back to iCloud. I thought this was the case because of my experience trying this with Google Drive. With GD, the indexing only works one way—from GD to DT.

But, iCloud works in both directions. Anything created and residing in an indexed folder in iCloud will show up in DT and any document created in a DT group that is indexed to iCloud will show up in iCloud/Finder. I tested with plain and rich text files and PDFs.

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I use Dropbox. Will that work?

P.S. I feel your pain: I, too, spend a lot of time on method and processing when I might be better served actually getting the work done. I’m still looking for the philosopher’s stone of workflows.

60

I only use Dropbox to share the occasional file. I don’t want to have to pay a subscription to DB when I’m paying several already, including iCloud. :slight_smile:

I can’t speak for others but I believe there are several reasons why I have struggled on settling on my workflow, but I’m almost there.

  1. I like tech so it is tempting to experiment and tinker.
  2. Listening to MPU and other tech podcasts keep blaring the siren call of new apps and workflows–perhaps I should listen to more music! :slight_smile:
  3. New apps are being created (think of the recent development of PKM apps!) which deserve at least a look.
  4. There is no perfect workflow or app so we keep looking. I am increasingly convinced that this is a fool’s errand.

I am absolutely committed to setting in on my workflow and apps. If fact, I have except with note taking (mainly because I ran into problems with Apple Note syncing issues) and I wanted to give Craft and Obsidian trial runs.

They are fine, in fact I really like Craft, but as I shared in one of my post, the ability to drag an email message into Craft to create a link is broken. The developers told me it should be fixed in two weeks. But, I decided to just avoid this problem and master DT due to its stability on the Mac, and now on iOS, and all of its power features. It is the closest thing I’ve found to the “one app to rule them all.”

So, I’m close… :crossed_fingers: