Why Your Notes App is Cluttered and How to Fix It
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My typical workflow when studying or working involves saving a lot of materials for later use. This includes links, audio files, PDFs, screenshots, and other reference materials. In the past, any resource for an assignment or an interesting article ended up in my Apple Notes inbox (aka the default Notes folder). I would then sort everything into the appropriate folder during a weekly review, and, if needed, assign a tag to it.
Initially, this worked well, and I liked having everything in one place, minimising the need to switch between different apps. However, over time, I noticed it became difficult to find things, even with Apple Notes’ powerful search function. The search results were often inaccurate, and I spent more time manually searching for notes than I had anticipated.
I quickly realised that the majority of my notes weren’t actually notes. Instead, I had hundreds of saved notes with barely any text, only attachments. Moreover, when I reviewed what I had saved over time, I found that most of these items were things I had forgotten about and never really used. My initial idea was to have information at hand whenever I needed it, but I realised I needed another solution that could solve this problem while still being convenient.
Sometimes, You Just Need Another App
I’ve always tried to keep a simple approach of “use one app for as many things as possible.” Over time, I realised this wasn’t optimal and made everything feel bloated and overwhelming.
I had never given a bookmarking app an honest try; the furthest I had gone was using basic bookmarks in my browser. However, using Arc on my Mac and Safari on my iPhone created a problem as I couldn’t access bookmarks from both devices.
I decided to try a proper bookmarking tool to meet my needs for saving reference materials or items to revisit later. I chose Raindrop.io after reading many positive reviews. The fact that it also has a web-based application was a bonus, making it easy to access bookmarks within my browser.
Raindrop.io has everything you need. The free version is probably sufficient for most people, but I ended up getting the affordable monthly subscription after using it for a while.
I must say, it’s such a relief having all my saved items in one place, separate from my notes. I now have a clear vision: a notes app should be used for note-taking and not be stretched beyond its intended purpose.
I Should Have Done This a Long Time Ago
After using Raindrop.io for almost two weeks, I regret not realising this sooner. It’s so easy to save items, both from the iPhone’s share sheet and Raindrop’s browser extension on the Mac. Besides URLs, it also handles various file types, which was essential for me when searching for this kind of tool. I use it not only for bookmarking but also as a read-later service, which has been working great.
Organising is a breeze, and you don’t need to think about it too much since its built-in search function is excellent. You can sort your bookmarks into collections (aka folders) and use tags similar to Apple Notes. Additionally, you can give bookmarks a description to remember why you saved them.
Raindrop.io has many other neat features, such as a customisable reader view, text highlighting, setting reminders for specific bookmarks, and automatic backup if you get the premium subscription. There are many more features, and numerous articles and videos delve into them in detail.
Overall, Raindrop.io has made my workflow much more efficient, keeping my notes app organised and my reference materials easily accessible.
As always, thank you for reading! Until next time, I hope you have a wonderful day!
Bye đź‘‹
My switch to Things 3
In one of my recent posts I wrote about how I completely switched to using only Apples stock apps for my productivity workflow. Where I briefly touched on rabbit hole of productivity apps, systems and workflow had been getting up to me and eventually made me feel overwhelmed. Which resulted in me not getting my actual work done, and instead spent time on one another app. I then decided to convert back and simplify things by using only Apples stock apps[Link to article]
Now, I am still mostly using the default apps on my Mac and iPhone. However, after sticking with my last workflow for some time, I found a few minor hindrances that I thought needed to be addressed. I believe this is a great approach - using your tools as long as you don’t encounter any problems or inconveniences. If you do, it may be wise to search for alternative tools that could solve the issues. I know that trying new apps can be really fun for those of us interested in such things, and I’m not suggesting you should avoid it. But be cautious before switching, as it takes time to learn a new approach for a new app, and moving all your data around can also be time-consuming. Ensure you have done your research and at least tried the software before deciding to make a switch, so you don’t end up wanting to switch back again.
We don’t need to go into depth on why I switched from Apple Reminders to Things 3. However what I wrote in the article I mentioned above, was that I only used Apple Notes for managing all my projects, which also included all the tasks for it, which I usually kept on a pinned note in the projects folder. However, after having some bigger assignments in school containing a lot of tasks, I stubbled on some problems which caused me to miss tasks and deadlines. Which of course I found problematic, and indicated that something wasn’t working as it should.
Therefore I simply decided to try Things 3, as they have a great approach for managing project-related tasks in a very simple and straight forward way. And I must say,I do not regret taking the decision as I now have improved my workflow even more, and would defiantly say that I am spending less time organising and managing my tasks overall. I simply ”trust my system”, and have been since start of doing the switch.
I don’t want to make this into a review of Things 3 as an application, there are a bunch of other articles and videos doing just that. What I want however, is to kind of go through what I dislike about reminders and what the main reasons for switching was.
I will go through some of them underneath and explain why these stuff matters to me and my work.
Things that was missing in Apple Reminders
- Lack of keyboard shortcuts
- No ”project” approach
- No deadlines
- Less intuitive UI compared to Things 3
- Overall speed
My reasons for switching
Lack of keyboard shortcuts
To be honest, Things 3 has superior keyboard shortcut support on the Mac for quickly navigating and accessing all the features. Which makes it a breeze to use and really speeds up your task management.
No real ”projects” approach
Reminders instead use lists which probably isn’t a problem for most people, but I much prefer Things approach of having projects that you complete when they are done. Every project you create in Things also has support for notes at the top of the projects page, which is really convenient for pasting URLs or jotting down instructions.
No deadlines
Having assignments in school, this has been a life saver for me. I can easily differentiate my start dates which is the date I will start working on a project, and due dates which is the last day I have on me to get the project done, otherwise there will be consequences.
Bad UI compared to Things 3
Even though Apples software have a great design, I find Things 3 to be that much better. The feeling of using it, both on Mac and the iPhone is so much more enjoyable which I do appreciate as a tech geek.
Overall speed
Now Apple Reminders isn’t slow by any means, however navigating around the app, specially on the Mac is just not intuitive at all. For example, assigning a date for a task is a hazel, as the little popup window for selecting the date is really small and it makes it very easy to accidentally miss click.
On the iPhone I would say it’s better, but the workflow in Things is really superior. There are different ways of assigning dates to task, but what I usually do is to just type the date with words as Things support some basic natural language for inputing dates.
The gestures on iPhone also are a lot better in Things, it has a quick find feature which you easily can activate by swiping down on the screen and literally search for anything. This includes, tasks, words, dates, projects, areas, headings within projects and so on.
Hope you found this post enjoyable. If you’re interested in reading more about these kind of things, please let me know in the comments.
Thanks for reading :)