Though Nuance’s PC and Mac speech recognition programs are relatively expensive, the company provides several free mobile apps that allow users to leverage the power of voice recognition. The company’s latest release, PaperPort Notes for the iPad may be useful to students and for those who want to use their iOS device for notetaking and annotating documents.

Main Features

PaperPort Notes is very similar to many other iPad note apps. It allows you to make typed and free handwritten notes using a stylus or your finger, make audio recordings, change fonts and font sizes, and much more.

But of course because this is a Nuance app, it includes a voice recognition feature that allows you to dictate your thoughts or what you read from existing text. PaperPort seems to be the only app of its type to feature text dictation.

PaperPort also includes a search feature, copying and pasting, bookmarking the pages, and the ability to capture and import selected content from the web, or entire documents from Dropbox and other sources.

Handwriting & Audio Recordings

There are a slew of free handwriting notebook apps, like Noteshelf, Penultimate, and Bamboo Paper that provide near real-life pen and paper quality when using a stylus pen.

While it’s great to see this feature in PaperPort, the digital results (see screenshot above) from handwriting are not as good and smooth as when compared to other notebook apps (see Noteshelf screenshot below).

The audio recording feature of PaperPort, however, does work very well. It will be useful for recording lectures while taking notes, or simply recording your thoughts verbally.

Audio recordings are affixed to a single page, so if you add a new page while a recording is active, PaperPort will automatically stop the recording for the previous page and start a new recording for the current one. Each individual page can be labeled and deleted, and all are kept organized in a drop-down box.

Voice-Recognition Feature

Probably the most inviting reason to download PaperPort is to use its voice recognition feature. Similar to other Nuance mobile apps you can dictate your thoughts or read them from existing text, and PaperPort will process and type out what you dictate.

The feature works fairly well (see unedited dictated note above); however, the biggest drawback is that you cannot see the results of your dictation until after you tap the Finished button. In the desktop versions of Nuance’s voice recognition programs, you see the results of your dictation nearly immediately after you pause after dictating a phrase or sentence. So as with the other mobile dictation programs, you will probably not use this feature for long extended pieces of writing.

You can use the voice recognition program in any page or document you import into PaperPort. You simply tap the Text box icon in the menu bar, and then touch-and-drag across an area on the page to either make typed notes or to start dictation by tapping the Tap & Speak button above the software keyboard.

You can edit dictated notes and add more dictations within the same note. The voice program provides the best capture when using a headphone mic or the mic installed on the iPad. It will not do a good job of recognizing and typing lectures given by someone standing in a room.

PaperPort also allows you to change the font style and size of text, as well as the type of background for added notes. You can select to have text-only, border, sticky style note, or custom image background.

Other Features

A few other advanced features in PaperPort include the ability to add various styles of paper, e.g. white or yellow lined, or graphing paper.

You can also import existing documents from Dropbox, Box.net, or from your PaperPort Anywhere account—annotate them and add written or dictated notes and recordings.

In addition, PaperPort includes a feature for capturing content from its built-in Web browser and other imported documents. You can select both text and images to add to the clipboard and paste them into any document or note page.

And finally, notes and imported documents in PaperPort can be exported in PDF format (with password protection) via e-mail, Google Docs, Dropbox, direct printing, etc.

PaperPort Notes for the iPad requires iOS 4.2 or later and is available for free in the iTunes App Store. Let us know what you think of it.

In order to better your experience with Stickies, I’ve put together some shortcuts that you may have not actually tried out. Granted, if you use Stickies extensively anyway, you may actually know of them already.

Nab Some Text

First off, you may be wondering how exactly Stickies can go beyond the basic function that it has. Rather than proselytize about how great it is to be writing text on electronic Post-It notes, I’ll inform you of this function that’s incredibly practical. Let’s say you’re in a hypothetical situation where you need to remember three long-form URLs. How can you make this a little easier?

In order to remember a URL, simply highlight it in your browser, and then press Command + Shift + Y. After that, a sticky with all of the URL will automatically pop up on your screen. Do this a few more times, and you’re golden. In fact, this function works for any bit of highlighted text across all apps, and that’s pretty great.

Multi-Task

So how many of you actually slap physical sticky notes on your screen while working on your Mac? It seems like it can get kind of cluttered. In Stickies, you can mimic this real-world tool by simply pressing Command + Option + F. After this, Stickies will always appear over whatever application you happen to be using. However, you may be thinking that even this would clutter your desktop a little. Never fear, for you can simply press Command + Option + T, and the entire note will become translucent, allowing you to see what lies beneath.

This is ideal for working with major projects where you need to quickly jot down notes and refer to them. Perhaps you are working with code and want to copy and paste simple bits of it. Maybe you need to keep a checklist of a workflow. This is great for keeping that information in view while still working on your projects.

Incorporate Some Media

Albeit not being a keyboard shortcut, Stickies offers a drag-and-drop function that will allow you to pull all forms of media into any of your open notes. This means videos, pictures, music… anything. My suggestion for this ability is that you use it when working on projects that require you to look over video or pictures.

Granted, this applies mainly to an educational setting, but I’m sure those of you out of school could make use of it as well. Say that you are having to provide an analysis over a news clip or any other video. Simply pop it into Stickies, use the floating function, and you can write while you watch – simple as that.

Other Shortcuts

• Option + Tab: Create a list on your sticky
• Command + M: Collapse the sticky
• Command + W: Closes the sticky, but first allows you to save it in text form
• Command + ~: Simple, but useful. Allows you to rotate between stickies

Conclusion

Stickies is a relatively simple but powerful tool, and even if you don’t use the shortcuts provided, you should at least take a look at it. Besides, you never know when you’ll be bringing your Mac to the grocery store and need a list, right? (That’s a bit of a stretch.)

What other shortcuts do you know of on Stickies? Do you have any other tips or tricks that you could share with us?

Like Evernote, CintaNotes allows you to take everything you’d like to jot down and store it in one big database. From there, you can search and tag notes accordingly. Unlike Evernote though, CintaNotes is completely free. CintaNotes is downloaded in archive form and can be decompressed anywhere (even to your Dropbox) very quickly and easily.

Another big similarity between CintaNotes and note-taking giant Evernote is that you can specify hotkeys that will allow you to clip all selected text from any webpage.

While I’ve been comparing it to Evernote, one of the biggest advantages to CintaNotes vs. Evernote is the fact that it is completely 100% free. It relies solely on your hard drive space, and as long as you’ve got the space on your drive to hold millions of notes then you can do that. CintaNotes does not support clipping entire webpages or images like Evernote does however.

Like Windows Search, the search within CintaNotes begins with the inputted string as you begin to type it. Searching won’t take forever anymore and is limited by your hard drive. Your system may need a little extra “umph” to search cleanly and comfortably after you have a load of notes saved in your database, but it is a very solid and reliable feature.

CintaNotes’ tagging system is very powerful and has the same effect as just simply categorizing your notes. As you can see on the left-hand side of the GUI in those screenshots (where it is blurred), I’ve got many tags made. They’re good to work with and help you keep track of your collection of notes.

CintaNotes is constantly being developed and updated and they make sure to post notices on their forum every time something new comes out. CintaNotes and a flash drive is a great combination if you’re in school or use a flash drive regularly for work. CintaNotes for Dropbox is an even better pair, as Dropbox would act as both a synchronization and backup service for your database of notes. If you do choose to use CintaNotes alongside Dropbox, just know that the database file can get incredibly large and it will want to update and resync every time you edit your notes.

If you’ve previously just used Notepad to jot down your random thoughts and notes, I was in your boat. Trust me, CintaNotes is a big step in improvement as far as functionality and effectiveness goes. Being able to tag and search is a huge plus. Being able to add text from any webpage with a simple hotkey is great, also.

If you find that CintaNotes isn’t quite your cup of tea, check out some similar applications that we’ve gone over such as ZIM, Simplenote, and Rmmbr.

Let us know what you think of this application in the comments.  Do you prefer to use something else or are you already a CintaNotes fan?

So far, sounds like just about any other “sticky note” app out there. So why should you care? Well, mainly because Sticky Notes has a depth of features rarely found in applications of this type. Let me show you a few of my favorite advanced features. Since we’ve already covered sticky-note applications many times before, I will not spend time on the basics, and go straight to some of the things that make Stickies different and better than the rest.

Note Styles

Once you start using a sticky-note Windows program to jot down quick reminders, you may find yourself writing notes about all sorts of random topics. Some may be about work, others may be code snippets, while others may be personal. If you’re a freelancer or juggling multiple projects, you may have several different work-related categories. Like many other sticky-note applications, Stickies lets you configure the font used in any note separately, as well as the note’s background color. But more uniquely, it also lets you save those properties for the future as “styles”. So you could decide that important notes should always have a red background, while ones related to your sweetheart should always come in pink. No problem – set the hue and font you like just once, and use Alt+number to instantly switch any other note to this style.

This way, even when your screen is chock-full of notes (as mine often is), it is always easy to spot the note you’re after.

Nothing Is Ever Truly Lost

When using “real” sticky notes (ones made of paper), has it even happened to you that you took a sticky-note off the wall and threw it into a paper basket, only to find yourself frantically hunting for it through the trash the next day? With Stickies, this never happens. The sticky notes you close are kept in a neat management interface under “Closed”, and are sorted chronologically by default. As you can see, the maximum history size is 999 notes, which is plenty, even if you use Stickies intensively. You can use Stickies’s built-in search function to find notes in any category:

Recurring Reminders

Many sticky-note applications let you set reminders for the future – this is not an innovative feature. But here, again, Stickies takes things to the next level and lets you set recurring reminders:

You can have a sticky-note hidden all the time, and have it pop-up once a week. Say, “water the plants” or something like that. And you get to set how exactly it pops up. It can either just appear on the screen (and you may miss it if you have many), or it can instantly be shown on top of all other windows. You can also have it trigger an alarm – this isn’t something I can show in a screenshot, but basically, in an alarm mode, the note “vibrates” and shakes in a very visible way, attracting your attention even if it is small and you have a very large desktop area (say, two 24″ monitors).

Scoop

The last thing I want to show you about Stickies is actually an add-on from the Stickies Tools page. There are several extra utilities that not all users may need, and are offered as separate downloads (just like Stickies itself, these are also free).  The one I’d like to show you is called Scoop, and looks like this:

Scoop basically lets you configure dynamic categories for your sticky-notes on your Widows PC. For example, all notes that contain the string “//muo” are considered a part of my MakeUseOf note category. Once a category is configured, you can instantly do something to all notes in it.

For example, let’s say your screen is super-cluttered, and you’re now working on one specific project and want to see only the notes that have something to do with this project. No problem:

Clicking the Solo option will hide all notes that don’t belong in this particular category. As you can see, you can do quite a few other things with each category.

Final Thoughts

The most important thing about Stickies is something that can’t really be shown in a screenshot (or three) – it is lean and very, very fast. Creating a new sticky note is instantaneous, as is searching using the management window, or filtering notes via Scoop. It may not be the only sticky-note application in town (not by a long shot, in fact), but for me, it is one of the absolute best.

What’s your sticky-note solution? Do you even use one? Let me know in the comments!

Fetchnotes is a new cloud-based notepad that allows you to create notes via web and SMS, so it can serve both smartphone and feature phone owners. The focus of Fetchnotes is also on simplicity, an almost-instant setup, and easy note organizing with hashtags, which you should be very familiar with if you are a power Twitter user.

If you are intrigued by simple, Fetchnotes will be right up your alley. It’s easy to use and has more exciting features under development. If you would like to check it out, be sure to grab a invite at the end of this post. Let’s take a look at the web-based app it offers up next.

Add Notes By SMS Or Web

You’re most likely comfortable texting at the speed of lightning. Why not channel that same energy to jot down a note you’ll be thankful for later? Fetchnotes makes creating notes via text message extremely easy. After you sign up, click on the gears icon to set your phone number.

You will get a text message with a confirmation code that you’ll just need to enter on the same page where you entered your mobile number. After that, inputting notes will be as easy as texting your best pal or sending a random thought to Twitter.

Auto-Tag Notes With Hashtags

Tagging notes cannot get easier than this. Start any potential tag with a ‘#’ anywhere in your note. Both your note will be auto-tagged and your tag will be created automatically. This works on the web app and via SMS.

When you are actually using the web app, you can create notes by using the quick-add feature and saving them with Shift-Enter. That means your notes can be much longer and spanning different lines without a hitch.

To manage your tags, you can currently eliminate them from a specific note to untag and delete a tagged note, which will delete the tags if they’re the only notes with those tags.

Planned Features

Though Fetchnotes is young, there are many more features being worked on right now. Planned features include the ability to share notes with a specific contact or even custom groups, integration with Evernote, Google Apps, Outlook, Basecamp, and other popular applications so you don’t have to abandon all of your familiar work and start over.

You’ll also be able to enter notes via email, IM and voice. I’d probably keep an eye out for additional future options coming from Fetchnotes.

Excited yet? The kind folks at Fetchnotes have provided us with 150 invites so nab yours from this link.

Looking for other simple and minimalistic way to store all your tidbits of information AND access it anywhere? There are many worthwhile options that can get you up and running. On a Windows machine? Why not try the built-in sticky notes app or this open-source alternative? On a Mac? You’re not without choices either. Linux users have long been able to use built-in sticky notes apps BasKet and Tomboy, though there are other slick note-taking apps, such as Xournal as well.

On Android and iOS, the number of note-taking apps is so high, there’s bound to be one for your needs, whether you want to only record audio-notes, want to replace your moleskine with your iPad, prefer local, private notes, etc. If you’ve been convinced that taking notes on your web browser works better than nothing, see this post for a list of stylish note-taking Chrome extensions. Need access to your notes regardless of the platform? Read this roundup (or search our site for more options) and rejoice.

What do you use to take notes? Share your favorite apps in the comments below! Rather use pen and paper? Voice your opinion below too!

That is exactly what their new Ambassador program is looking to do. Basically, it is a way for users to learn from other like minded people and find new and creative users for Evernote that they may not have considered. For example, it makes sense for teachers to look at what other teachers use the program for. They may find something that changes their work day and makes their life easier.

Evernote’s Ambassador program features users from a number different categories like bloggers, teachers and designers, each with their own ways of using Evernote to make life easier.

They also let users apply to be an Ambassador, so if you think you have some new and creative uses for Evernote, apply at the bottom of the Ambassador page and start sharing your methods.

Source: TheNextWeb

Easypad

Easypad is an incredibly simple notepad app. Its main selling point is its cute widget, which looks something like this:

You can control the widget size:

Although the 1×1 widget is so tiny that it fits just two words; in fact, it fits the words “so tiny” perfectly, so if one of your words is something like “discombobulating”, you’re going to have to go with the 2×1 widget at least.

In terms of actual writing, Easypad isn’t overwhelmingly complicated (to say the least). Here’s what a note looks like when you’re writing it:

You can also select one of several backgrounds, that carry over to the widget:

The “crumpled paper” look (bottom-left) is so crumpled that its difficult to actually read whatever it is you’re trying to write. The other paper backgrounds are cute, and don’t interfere with the text.

That’s pretty much all you’re going to get with Easypad, really. If you’re just looking for a quick notepad which lets you see your notes right from the homescreen, you just found it. But if that’s a bit too simple for you, you might want to talk a look at the next app, called…

AK Notepad

AK Notepad supports note reminders, themes, tags, sorting, searching, and lots more. Of course, it also has its own widget:

Now let’s look at the interface:

That’s the default writing interface. I’m not a big fan of the lines, so let’s see if we can change that.

Indeed, the settings menu lets you switch themes, and thankfully, also disable the horizontal lines. After a bit of tweaking, I got the note to look like this:

Much, much better. Now, those hash tags you see at the end of the note bring me to the next AK Notes feature I like, which is simple note labeling. After adding those two hash tags to my note, I can see them in the Labels list:

And you can tap any one of them to see at a glance all of my notes about awesome things, or bears.

AK Notepad also offers notes sync with Catch.com, a service we looked at when covering Catch Notes for iOS (by the same company). It does require opening an account, and doesn’t support my favorite note-sync service, Simplenote. Another handy AK Notepad feature is passcode protection, but it only applies to launching the entire app: You can’t protect just specific notes. Also, your passcode may only consist of four digits:

You may not use letters, and can’t select anything longer than four digits. A bit of an odd restriction, but there it is.

Final Thoughts

Both of these apps keep things simple, and do what it says on the tin. They don’t burst with features (although AK Notepad does have a few tricks under its hat), but that’s the whole point really. If you’re looking for a simple, quick, and free Android notepad apps, one of these two will surely get the job done.

TiddlySpace lets you create, share, link and organize notes online. It’s a personal wiki, but with some interesting twists.

Okay, that’s a bit busy, at least at first glance. Let’s take a closer look at that Getting Started note, and see what can be easily configured:

Anything you want to change about your mini-site, you can change by editing special topics. A topic is called a “tiddler”, which is kind of like a Wiki page. It’s not called a “page” because the entire Wiki is one single page. For example, let’s change the site’s name by editing the appropriate tiddler:

Now that I’ve edited and saved the tiddler, the site title is instantly updated:

To create a new tiddler (note, topic) on your fledgling site, simply click the new tiddler button:

Now you can just start writing your content, and save it once you’re done:

The end result looks like this:

The formatting is done using simple Wiki syntax, so to create a bulleted list, I only needed to start each line with an asterisk. You can also easily create links to other topics, of course (and you shouldn’t take my note too seriously!).

Tiddlers are divided into categories, and you can navigate between them using the menu on the right. There’s a special kind of tiddlers called “Shadows”, which contain configuration information. The SiteTitle tiddler we’ve edited before is a good example for a Shadow tiddler. There are quite a few of these, and some of them don’t even look like wiki pages.

For example, here’s the Advanced Options tiddler:

You don’t necessarily have to share every note you make with the world; each note has a menu with several options, one of which being “make private”, which makes it so only you can read that note:

Each TiddlyWiki hosted by TiddlySpace is called a “space” (big surprise there, I know). Each space contains quite a few configuration options, but what’s most interesting is that you can enable a wide variety of plugins for added functionality.

Here’s a quick peek into the extensive list of plugins:

That’s just the beginning, and there’s definitely a learning curve here. Some plugins are not even documented with a single comment (such as TiddlySpaceCSRF – what is that supposed to mean?), but others are quite clear (and dare I say, cool) such as the ImageMacro plugin, which lets you add SVG images into your “space”.

TiddlySpace In The Wild

This is all a bit theoretical, I admit. Fortunately, TiddlySpace created a featured spaces page, showing a bit of what can be done with this interesting tool. Just two examples: TiddlyPocketBook shows how TiddlySpace can be used to create a slick cheat sheet:

The other example is called colmbritton, and shows a funky homepage, with lots of social tools in the sidebar:

Bottom Line

Is TiddlySpace for everyone? Certainly not. But if you’re looking for an innovative, low-overhead way to get your content out there and let your voice be heard, you really should take it for a spin.

Let us know if you use TiddlySpace or another wiki app.  What do you like about it and why?

The free web and mobile app and online services is the first product produced a company called Nektoon, founded and incorporated in January 2009. With a free Memonic account, you can save and share up to 100 free notes. While this limitation can’t compete with the unlimited, 60MB/month note upload of Evernote, it does offer some handy features not available to in other web capturing services and apps.

Let’s check them out.

Platforms

Similar to Evernote, Memonic is a cross platform application and service. In addition to being a web application supported by major browsers—Firefox, Chrome, Safari, Opera, IE—Memonic also includes client apps for the Mac, PC, iOS devices (including iPad optimization), and Android. Your web account client, archives and keeps all your Memonic web clippings and screen shots in sync between these platforms.

The dashboard user interface of Memonic is similar in each platform, and its sections—Inbox, Notes, Folders, Tags, Groups, Search, and Settings—are represented by clean icons for quick access.

The default corkboard background design can be customized, except in the mobile apps.

Web Content Features

Depending on which platform you’re working in, the features work differently in Memonic. In the web platform, you use a browser plug-in to bookmark pages, clip selected parts of a page, or save the entire page for “Read Later.”

The clipping features selects individual parts of a web page; there’s no free-hand option for selecting content, like you do when taking desktop screen captures.

In the desktop client, you get options for adding written notes, image files (including screen shots), and links to content in your computer. Image files must be imported into the application; they cannot be dragged and dropped into it. All content can be sorted into folders, tagged, and shared, and set to private.

Another drawback in the free version of Memonic is that you can’t use the “Gathering Mode,” which allows you to save all your clips and notes directly into a preselected folder. It’s a bit of a hassle to select a folder each time you want to save a clip.

The note taking features of Memonic is pretty much like a traditional text editor, including basic tools that you find in Microsoft Word. One little bug that I noticed in text editor is that keyboard shortcut for pasting copied text doesn’t work; instead, I have to click the paste icon in the toolbar.

Notes and image files can be added in the mobile versions of Memonic, but there’s no plug-in for exporting clippings from mobile browsers into the app. As with the other Memonic clients, you can also share your notes and other content directly on Facebook, Twitter, and by email.

All or selected content can be synchronized between each Memonic client, and you get the option for syncing by network or Wi-Fi to save on mobile charges.

Memonic is not quite as robust as Evernote, though it does have potential. While you probably wouldn’t want to switch from Evernote to Memonic, the latter’s app and service could come in handy for specific types of clippings and files that you want to archive and share.

Memonic is worth giving a try. Let us know what you think about it.

Some people choose to bookmark all the pages that they find temporarily useful for whatever project they may be working on, while others go through the long, common processes. Going to the page in Firefox, copying it, opening Word, pasting the content into Word, and then saving it.

Instead, there’s a better way to do things, and the first step to that is to install this nifty Firefox add-on called Notesaver.

Getting Started

The said add-on, named “Notesaver!”, can be installed by visiting this page in the Firefox add-ons collection, and will be active once you restart the browser. The page says that the add-on is for Windows only, but I’m not sure if it could be used on other operating systems as well because it doesn’t require the use of Word itself.

Once that completes, you’ll see that there isn’t a special button for Notesaver to be seen anywhere. Instead, you’ll only see it right when you need it. Whenever you right-click while in the browser, you’ll get your usual list of options that Firefox provides along with a new option called “capture”.

Menu Options

Going further into this menu will lead you to two options:

If you don’t have anything highlighted when you right-click, the first one is CREATE_FILE, which will create a new, empty Word document.

The second option will be File Options, which will let you change the order of the most recent files created that are shown (more on that later).

If you did have something highlighted when you right-clicked, you’ll only see one option named DEFAULT_FILE. If you haven’t done so already, clicking on DEFAULT_FILE will result in the add-on asking you to set the default path of your Word documents, along with options to change the number of recent files that should be be shown, and whether or not the date and time should be appended to the end of whatever you’re saving.

Useful Tips

If you keep saving content by clicking on DEFAULT_FILE, you’ll see everything you saved in the default.doc file.

However, you can right-click when nothing is highlighted, and choose the CREATE_FILE option to create a new one, and then when you try to save content again you’ll see two options, the default file and the newly-created file.

The number of files shown that you could adjust earlier is talking about this list right here. Whenever you highlight something and then right-click, you’ll see up to the number of files chosen in the settings. Note that these settings can also be changed via the Firefox button –> Add-ons –> Extensions –> Notesaver! –> Options.

Conclusion

There’s really not much else about this add-on, which is good because there won’t be any extra fat that you’ll have to ignore when you use it. It’s simplistic, and works great for when you need it. Saving highlighted content to a Word document can be a major plus for some people, who may need to work with Word anyways, and having the content already saved to a local file would be the best option.

For some people it might be beneficial simply because they would rather not use cloud services like Google Docs or Evernote to store their clipped content. Whatever the reason, this add-on definitely enables you to work as efficiently as you wish. If Notesaver isn’t quite what you’d like, you can also check out other recommendations such as Scribbly, or choose one by looking through this list.

Image Credit: Shutterstock ]]> http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/clip-notes-firefox-word-document-notesaver/feed/ 6