The Stig
11-21-2011, 11:37 PM
I use a product called Evernote (http://www.evernote.com/) in my work life to organize all the little bits of technical information required. It's worked out really well for me and then I realized it could also benefit an organization effort for prepping.
Essentially this is very powerful notes software. Notes are organized by notebook and then you tag with key words like "inventory" or "Bug Out Gear" or "Recipe" or whatever. The best part is it syncs easily with your droid/smart phone so you have easy access while you are away from your desktop.
Here's how it works: Open a note and type out whatever you want, software allows for all the normal font formatting, indentations, alignments, etc. You can create a table, use a hyperlink, attach a file such as another word document or PDF and even attach a voice note. You can take a picture with your cellphone, attach it to a note in Evernote and then file it away either for reference or as a reminder to look into it more later.
See come cool content on a website and want to save it for reference, you can "clip" it for insertion into a note and store it as easy as pie.
So you could have separate notebooks for inventory, valuable belongings, food stores and emergency check lists. From there you can tag individual notes to further identify them and make it easy to search for later. Can't find your note on trioxane fuel tablets? Search for "fire starters" and it pops up. Looking for that schematic of your water storage system? Search for "schematics" and it pops up.
Notes can be emailed. Say you have a neat emergency load-out checklist you want to share with your net-buddy across the country. Click, click...it's emailed. You can facebook and twitter notes also but since I don't use either of those social mediums that doesn't interest me. You can also print.
I find the sync feature very useful if I need to look something up and only have my phone handy. While limited use in long-term situations, in short term you could pull up a list of emergency contacts or a PDF of directions to your in-laws farm up in the hills with ease. Before a SHTF event you can use them as a shopping list or a reminder for your next supply run to Lowes.
I'm only touching on the surface of what this could be used for, but I think this could be a really useful tool for the tech-savy amongst us.
Like anything, there are cons:
There are no reminders or calendar features. It's really just information organization and storage. That's a big negative in my mind and thus far I haven't come up with a good work around.
Also, to preform the sync between desktop and phone the notes are all uploaded to Evernote servers in god-knows-where. For some folks this can be an issue, for others not so much. I'm not terribly worried about "them" reading my work notes but if you feel this is a massive security breach you might opt for the stand alone version.
Lastly there's a standard and premium level. Premium allows more data storage and some features that I needed and costs $45 per year.
Here's a picture of my actual work notebook.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&ik=21d95b614b&view=att&th=133c89eab3528658&attid=0.1&disp=emb&zw
Essentially this is very powerful notes software. Notes are organized by notebook and then you tag with key words like "inventory" or "Bug Out Gear" or "Recipe" or whatever. The best part is it syncs easily with your droid/smart phone so you have easy access while you are away from your desktop.
Here's how it works: Open a note and type out whatever you want, software allows for all the normal font formatting, indentations, alignments, etc. You can create a table, use a hyperlink, attach a file such as another word document or PDF and even attach a voice note. You can take a picture with your cellphone, attach it to a note in Evernote and then file it away either for reference or as a reminder to look into it more later.
See come cool content on a website and want to save it for reference, you can "clip" it for insertion into a note and store it as easy as pie.
So you could have separate notebooks for inventory, valuable belongings, food stores and emergency check lists. From there you can tag individual notes to further identify them and make it easy to search for later. Can't find your note on trioxane fuel tablets? Search for "fire starters" and it pops up. Looking for that schematic of your water storage system? Search for "schematics" and it pops up.
Notes can be emailed. Say you have a neat emergency load-out checklist you want to share with your net-buddy across the country. Click, click...it's emailed. You can facebook and twitter notes also but since I don't use either of those social mediums that doesn't interest me. You can also print.
I find the sync feature very useful if I need to look something up and only have my phone handy. While limited use in long-term situations, in short term you could pull up a list of emergency contacts or a PDF of directions to your in-laws farm up in the hills with ease. Before a SHTF event you can use them as a shopping list or a reminder for your next supply run to Lowes.
I'm only touching on the surface of what this could be used for, but I think this could be a really useful tool for the tech-savy amongst us.
Like anything, there are cons:
There are no reminders or calendar features. It's really just information organization and storage. That's a big negative in my mind and thus far I haven't come up with a good work around.
Also, to preform the sync between desktop and phone the notes are all uploaded to Evernote servers in god-knows-where. For some folks this can be an issue, for others not so much. I'm not terribly worried about "them" reading my work notes but if you feel this is a massive security breach you might opt for the stand alone version.
Lastly there's a standard and premium level. Premium allows more data storage and some features that I needed and costs $45 per year.
Here's a picture of my actual work notebook.
https://mail.google.com/mail/?ui=2&ik=21d95b614b&view=att&th=133c89eab3528658&attid=0.1&disp=emb&zw