Good arguments to buy Devonthink Pro

I agree the UI is just not a problem for me. DT is a database–I’m not looking for beauty. I’m looking for effectiveness and efficiency. Of course, my wife says the same thing about me! :wink:

2 Likes

I was at one point (rather loudly) vocal on the DT forum about this. I give two main strikes to the UI. First, the presentation of controls is excessive to the point of causing clutter. Second, following on the mantra of E Tufte for clean design in the visualization of graphical data, the windows generally have significant amounts of useless ink. I have a minor gripe about the outdated icons. Overall, the UI does not help me develop an intuitive or fluid use of the app. Rather, it leaves me more oft bewildered and befuddled.

I am also not looking for beauty. But I am not accepting of cases when UI design gets in the way of effectiveness or efficiency, and I find this to be the case with DT.


JJW

2 Likes

I’m not arguing the point, it is a valid one. :slight_smile: I’m just not letting that keep me from using a superior application that meets my needs otherwise. :slight_smile: Design is important but, for me, not a determining factor.

1 Like

Can you explain this a bit more? Maybe a specific example of a control as it exists and how you think it ought to be?

Also explain “useless ink” Personally I hate the useless white space I see in so many apps. I want text tight and compact in terms of spacing but at a decent size in terms of font size. I do not like text that is spread out with lots of leading on the lines or is a font with thin lines that I can’t see well.

And why are the icons “outdated” What benefit would a newer approach provide?

Just trying to understand because I hear that a lot about Omnifocus and about DT. Lots of folks hailed the newer look in OF and I hated it and have been working to develop my own style sheet to get it back to something I can use effectively. I also like how efficient DT is for what I do in terms of finding and using stuff. SO I’m clearly missing some point of view that other folks feel is important.

I don’t think the iOS version will search inside Microsoft office documents…

I can confirm this: having a PDF and a Word docx document from the same source markdown file a quick search for a specific content will show up only the PDF but not the text document.

Haha thread title should be reasons NOT to buy…

True - but OP was specifically asking about macOS/DTPO.

But who needs MS office really?

Gotta ask, what use case or scenario leads to 150,000 items? Says a lot for the product certainly.

1 Like

I don’t personally. Buy I can’t control what others send.

I thought I would mention a powerful feature that often gets overlooked, DEVONagent–the built-in search tool. I am participating in an Aspen Conference on education innovation. To prepare, I used DEVONthink to research, cite, and annotate relevant articles–all without leaving the program. I’ve attached screenshots to illustrate the power. The ability to have one application for research, storage, annotation, tagging, sharing, linking documents anywhere within/without, and for writing notes in plain, markdown, rich, or HTML formats is amazing for one program. As I’ve said before, I use DT for storing all of my personal stuff as well as for my professional work. And, I have DT collect RSS feeds from various blogs, including my own–which provides for a great archiving resource. I also index selected Google Drive folders for quick reference.

In my estimation, it is hard to beat the overall value of DT. 26%20PM04%20PM58%20PM

e-mail archive. I have saved e-mails going back decades and yes, I end up referring to them often enough to want to hang on to them. Right now I am running with both DT and Apple Mail keeping copies but as soon as I’ve done my next monthly backup plan to start deleting out of Apple Mail and make DT the primary storage for old e-mail.

3 Likes

Much info… intriguing. I’d prefer to try the iOS version not to spend 23 US dollars to see if the pro version suits me.

In capabilities how close are the iOS and Mac apps? The Mac app has a free trial.

Actually, the best use of DEVONthink is for recipes. :slight_smile: image

2 Likes

Now you made me hungry @Bmosbacker! @OogieM I’d love to do this. So I have a Gmail account with all my emails in it. Do you copy mail from Apple Mail into DevonThink? What’s your workflow for this or is it automated?

Where does everyone’s database actually located? I know you shouldn’t put them in Dropbox, but I keep hearing people using Dropbox in some manner. I tried using it with my NAS, but I am finding that when I re-open DTPO, it doesn’t auto-open the databases, I need to manually open each one, each time.

@Bmosbacker how is DT collecting your RSS feeds, is it using IFTTT recipe? How does the formatting look like for it. I’ve noticed that Evernote usually messes up fonts or spacing when it comes to using IFTTT for the RSS feeds.

Used to do this in Evernote. Been doing a weak version in Ulysses. Hmmm

RSS is a feature in DT. You just add the feed. :slight_smile:

1 Like

Mine is in iCloud. It was in Dropbox but for me it seems to sync faster.