Take Control of Getting Started with DEVONthink 2

Take control of your PDFs, paper documents, email messages, and scribbled notes with DEVONthink 2 and Joe Kissell's expert advice!

With the information-management program DEVONthink 2, you no longer have to swim in a sea of Web bookmarks, email receipts, RSS feeds, Post-it notes, and phone bills. DEVONthink stores your digital documents and clippings, helps you scan and store paper documents, and serves as home base for organizing and viewing all your information. But mastering all that power can take effort, and this ebook—created in partnership with DEVONtechnologies—has the real-world advice you need to understand how DEVONthink can bring order to your information.

This book got me around some suboptimal usage patterns that were holding up my profitable use of this excellent software. I'd recommend this book to any level of DEVONthink user. —Scott McGrath

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After covering essential DEVONthink vocabulary and concepts, Joe helps you start using DEVONthink effectively. You'll learn how to:

Get around in the interface
Decide how many databases you need and set them up
Determine whether to input or index data
Configure where incoming data will go
Import data from many different applications
Input data from a scanner, including OCR options
Use grouping and tagging to organize data
Use simple (and sophisticated) techniques for searching
Create smart groups that automatically gather newly imported data
Edit data in DEVONthink (or externally)
Export data out of DEVONthink
Back up and maintain healthy databases

Questions answered in the book include:

What is DEVONthink good for, and what should be left to other programs?
What kinds of data can I import? (Short answer: Nearly everything!)
Which of DEVONthink's many views should I use?
When I import data from different sources, where does it end up, and why?
Is it better to sort imported data right away, or leave it for later?
Should I group my data, tag it, or both?
What are duplicates and replicants, and how can I tell them apart?
Which types of data can be created or edited within DEVONthink?
How do I make my DEVONthink database accessible via the Web?
Are there Automator or AppleScript options for DEVONthink? (Hint: Yes!)

Book Info

151 pages
Version 1.0
Published 24-Mar-10
2.1 MB download
ISBN: 1615420495
Free sample with Table of Contents, Intro, Quick Start, and section starts.

About the Author

Kissell, Joe headshot Joe Kissell has written numerous books about the Macintosh, including many popular Take Control ebooks. He's also Senior Editor of TidBITS, contributes frequently to Macworld, and previously spent ten years in the Mac software industry.

Book Reviews

AAUG (5/5)
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Author Interviews

MacVoices (Mar-10)
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Read Me First
Introduction
DEVONthink Quick Start
Understand DEVONthink Basics
Explore DEVONthink’s Interface
Set Up DEVONthink Databases
Get Information into DEVONthink
Organize Your Information
Find Your Information
Work with Your Information
Get Information Out of DEVONthink
Dig Deeper
Learn More

Read Me First

This book teaches you the basics of DEVONthink (Personal, Professional, and Pro Office editions) version 2. You’ll learn how to find your way around, get information into and out of DEVONthink, and make the most of the program’s most important features. This book was written by Joe Kissell and edited by Adam Engst.

Introduction

I almost don’t know where to begin. That’s my problem as an author, and it may be your problem as a user, too. DEVONthink version 2 is an information management tool with a marvelously deep, rich set of features, and it can adapt itself to just about any set of needs or work preferences. That’s the good news; the bad news is that this wealth of power is like a 50-page restaurant menu in which every dish sounds equally delicious. There are so many excellent choices that finding a clear strategy to make the most of the meal—or the software, as the case may be—can be a daunting prospect.

My goal in this book is to do just that: to help you wrap your brain around DEVONthink’s extensive options and figure out how best to use it to accomplish your goals. Whether you are starting out with the program for the first time or are a seasoned user looking for ways to get more out of it, I hope to show you where to focus, what to try, and how to think about DEVONthink in the most effective way.

DEVONthink already has plenty of good documentation in the form of built-in help files. The purpose of this book is neither to replace that information nor to explain the operation of every command and button. Rather than create an exhaustive reference guide, I’ve concentrated on the key tasks you’ll want to accomplish. After providing an overview of the program’s main concepts and interface, I walk you through the principal activities you’ll do over and over, such as getting information into DEVONthink; organizing, finding and working with that information within the program; and, finally, getting the information back out (exporting or sharing it).

And if all that leaves you hungry for more, I also provide a bit of dessert—a section that goes a bit deeper into some of the program’s advanced capabilities.

DEVONthink Quick Start

This book helps you find your way around DEVONthink and use its most important features effectively. Because each section builds on the one before it, I recommend reading the book sequentially. Even if you choose to jump around, though, please read at least the first two sections—Understand DEVONthink Basics and Explore DEVONthink’s Interface—to learn some crucial background information that will help you understand the rest of the material.

Get your bearings:

Acquaint yourself with DEVONthink’s unique conventions and terminology; see Understand DEVONthink Basics.
Learn your way around and where to find essential features; see Explore DEVONthink’s Interface.
Create one or more containers to hold your personal data; see Set Up DEVONthink Databases.

Put DEVONthink to work:

Create new documents or import data from a variety of sources; see Get Information into DEVONthink.
Group, label, and tag data; see Organize Your Information.
Use simple or advanced techniques to locate data you’ve previously stored in DEVONthink; see Find Your Information.
Edit data in DEVONthink or an external editor, and use OCR with scanned documents; see Work with Your Information.
Share data over the Web or export it in numerous formats; see Get Information Out of DEVONthink.

Go beyond the basics:

Learn about some advanced features; see Dig Deeper.
Find resources for further exploration; see Learn More.

Understand DEVONthink Basics

DEVONthink isn’t difficult to use, but because it offers unique ways of dealing with your data, it requires you to learn a few new concepts and terms, and understand some behaviors that may be unexpected at first. Once you have a grip on the basic principles that underlie DEVONthink’s operation, you’ll find that its other features and capabilities fall into place more readily. Meanwhile, even though DEVONthink is both powerful and versatile, it’s not always the right tool for the job—so it’s also important to understand what it’s not ideal for and when to look for a different tool.

What Exactly Is DEVONthink?

Because you’re reading this book, I assume you already have a copy of DEVONthink, and that in turn implies that you have at least some idea what it is. But as I discovered when surveying a variety of DEVONthink users, different people think of the program in very different ways. There’s no one right answer, but as you get to know DEVONthink, it may be helpful to understand what it is (and isn’t), how it can function, and how it differs from other comparable software.

Among the many hats DEVONthink can wear are the following:

File and media browser: Like the Finder, DEVONthink can organize files in a hierarchical folder structure. And like iTunes and iPhoto, it can also store and play media such as photos, videos, and music (although its media capabilities are less advanced than those in iTunes and iPhoto). In addition, it stores metadata, extra pieces of information about each item (such as labels and modification date) in a special database, separate from the files themselves. Everything you put into DEVONthink is indexed for fast searching and sorting, and you can add your own metadata (user-defined tags, for example) to help you group or identify information in ways the Finder doesn’t offer. All the original files are still available in their raw states on your disk, but from within DEVONthink you can see and use your data in much more flexible ways.
Snippet keeper: In the course of an average day, you may want to keep track of URLs, notes to yourself, parts of Web pages, screenshots, and countless other bits of information that don’t necessarily fit the mold of stand-alone files. Any program that provides a convenient way to capture and store such a wide variety of data can be called a snippet keeper. Mac programs such as EagleFiler, Evernote, MacJournal, SOHO Notes, Tinderbox, Together, and Yojimbo fall into this category. DEVONthink, too, can function as an outstanding snippet keeper, thanks to its remarkable capability to manage random data.
Note taker: For people who spend a lot of time in classes or meetings, another popular category of tool is the note taker. Microsoft Word has a note-taking mode, and several stand-alone programs (such as Curio, NoteTaker, Circus Ponies NoteBook, and Useful Fruit Software’s Pear Note) also offer similar capabilities. With these, you can not only type notes (as you could in any word processor) but also record audio, highlight and annotate text, make outlines, and do similar sorts of note-taking tasks. DEVONthink, too, offers several ways to facilitate note-taking (although audio recording is not currently one of them).
Database: Database applications, such as Bento, FileMaker Pro, Panorama, and 4D, are in some senses the opposite of free-form note-taking programs. By imposing a carefully designed structure on your data—whether it be a list of wine bottles in your basement, data on your company’s customers (or patients or clients), or an online catalog of thousands of products—databases enable you to filter and find data with great precision and flexibility. DEVONthink, too, is a database of sorts, and although it doesn’t have all the capabilities of stand-alone databases, it does let you slice and dice some kinds of information in much the same way.
Web and RSS reader: There’s no shortage of Mac Web browsers (Safari, Firefox, OmniWeb, Opera, and many others) and RSS readers (NetNewsWire, NewsFire, Cyndicate, etc.—not to mention Apple Mail and Safari). DEVONthink may not have all the bells and whistles of a stand-alone Web or RSS reader, but unlike the others, it lets you integrate URLs, Web pages, news feeds, and other online content with the rest of your data in interesting ways, and of course it keeps all the content (and any associated metadata) indexed for fast searching.
Organizational tool: Although DEVONthink doesn’t try to be a mind-mapping program (such as Personal Brain, MindManager, MindNode, or MindView), it does have a number of capabilities that help you find and explore connections between pieces of data. For example, in addition to its support for labels, tags, and multiple pointers to documents, called replicants (see Words You Should Know, two pages ahead), it uses artificial intelligence to classify new documents automatically based on similar documents you’ve already sorted manually (discussed in Organizing Features, later in this section).

In fact, DEVONthink is all of these and quite a bit more. It lets you easily create, store, organize, find, and retrieve almost any kind of data. You can view your data in whatever way suits you best, and customize almost everything about the program and individual databases to meet your needs. It won’t replace the Finder for managing your files, and you may still need other specialized programs for dealing with certain kinds of data. But it’s an outstanding multitasker that can substitute for many other tools you may otherwise need.

Examples of Cool Things People Use DEVONthink For

Just to stimulate your imagination a bit, here are some real-world examples of uses to which a variety of people put DEVONthink:

Writing books: Authors—including yours truly—store research materials, outlines, schedules, Web pages, correspondence, timelines, drafts, screenshots, and reviews (among other documents) in DEVONthink.
Managing a medical practice: Physicians use DEVONthink to store research papers, seminar notes, patient records and correspondence, lab results, and searchable scans of official documents.
Practicing law: Attorneys find DEVONthink a useful tool for managing the thousands of documents often required in legal cases—briefs, transcripts, case files, client information, templates of official forms, and the like.
Performing scientific research: Scientists store journal articles, research papers, experimental data, Web pages, brainstorming notes, text snippets, and other tools of the trade in DEVONthink.
Developing software: Programmers and managers keep specifications, documentation, invoices, correspondence, and similar items in DEVONthink.
Studying religious texts: Ministers, religious scholars, and laypeople alike find DEVONthink useful for holding and searching sacred texts, commentaries, sermons, and research notes.
Maintaining a paperless office: Numerous people (regardless of their occupation) find DEVONthink Pro Office a great tool for converting scanned documents to searchable form, and for managing bank statements, tax records, receipts, business cards, brochures, and other items that would otherwise take up space in a filing cabinet—while being harder to find.
Recreation: Users who are fond of such diverse hobbies as cooking, hill walking, martial arts, and role-playing games find DEVONthink the ideal repository for all their information (recipes, maps, notes, game playing tips, and much more).

Workaround for Sorter Naming Limitation

May 5, 2010 --

On p. 68, I say the following:

Add specific inboxes: You can’t remove the global Inbox from the Sorter (or move it from its home in the upper-left corner), but you can drag the inbox from any of your other databases to the Sorter. Unfortunately, every Inbox has the same name and icon, so you can distinguish them only by position.

Several readers have pointed out to me that although you can't rename items in the Sorter, you can rename the Inbox in each database and then drag the renamed Inboxes to the Sorter, which will then reflect the actual name of each Inbox. Although I dislike this approach because I prefer to leave my Inbox named "Inbox," it is a way you can potentially tell one database's Inbox from another in the Sorter.

—Joe Kissell

Listen to Joe Talk about DEVONthink

March 26, 2010 --

In MacVoices #1066, Joe decompresses from his many months of writing work to complete Take Control of Getting Started with DEVONthink 2 and chats with host Chuck Joiner about some unique aspects of the DEVONthink ebook project. He talks what DEVONthink is, describing it as "a centralized-storage-place, seach-tool, indexing, document-management everything, for just about any kind of information, and that's only the beginning." He also discusses various DEVONthink features and concepts, and how to get up and running with DEVONthink.

—Tonya Engst

New Ebook Explains Managing Data in DEVONthink 2

March 25, 2010 --

Are you overwhelmed with paper bills, downloaded PDFs, email receipts, Web bookmarks, RSS feeds, text files, and useful snippets from who knows where? Our own Joe Kissell once was as well, but thanks to the information management application DEVONthink 2, he has not only beaten back information overload, but also eliminated much of the paper from his small home office (this last bit with the help of a Fujitsu ScanSnap scanner).

If you're interested in using DEVONthink to take control of your digital life too, we have a treat for you: Joe's latest ebook, Take Control of Getting Started with DEVONthink 2. In it, Joe explains DEVONthink's core concepts and guides you through many aspects of putting DEVONthink to work. The 151-page ebook, created in collaboration with DEVONtechnologies, is available for $10; if you don't already have it, you can download a free trial version of DEVONthink 2.

Joe covers oodles of features in DEVONthink, and - more importantly - he helps you match DEVONthink's many options to your personality and requirements. You'll learn how to import your data from numerous sources, organize it using hierarchical groups and free-form tags, find it by browsing or searching, and much more.

You'll learn how to:

Get around in DEVONthink's interface
Decide how many databases you need and set them up
Determine whether to input or index data
Configure where incoming data will go
Import data from many different applications
Input data from a scanner, including OCR options
Use grouping and tagging to organize data
Use simple (and sophisticated) techniques for searching
Create smart groups that automatically gather newly imported data
Edit data in DEVONthink or using external applications
Export data out of DEVONthink
Back up and maintain healthy databases

Questions answered in the book include:

What is DEVONthink especially good for, and what should be left to other programs?
What kinds of data can I import? (Short answer: Nearly everything!)
Which of DEVONthink's many views should I use?
When I import data from different sources, where does it end up, and why?
Is it better to sort imported data right away, or leave it for later?
Should I group my data, tag it, or both?
What are duplicates and replicants, and how can I tell them apart?
Which types of data can be created or edited within DEVONthink?
How do I make my DEVONthink database accessible via the Web?
Are there any Automator or AppleScript options for DEVONthink? (Hint: Yes!)

The ebook covers all three editions of DEVONthink 2: DEVONthink Pro Office, DEVONthink Professional, and DEVONthink Personal, and it is completely up-to-date with today's release of DEVONthink 2.0.2.

—Adam C. Engst

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