Working Smart

Update to OneNote Virtual PowerToy

Yesterday, I wrote about the marvelous new OneNote PowerToy by Darron Devlin. Evidently, some users had problems printing from Word. I’m pleased to report that Darron has already posted an update to the OneNote driver that fixes the problem. Be sure to uninstall the previous version before installing this one. (The instructions are on the download page.)

Also, I failed to mention his other PowerToy: WebPageToOneNote PowerToy. How does this differ from Microsoft’s own Send to OneNote from Internet Explorer PowerToy? Instead of sending the actual text, so that it can be edited, Darron’s PowerToy sends an image of the page to OneNote as a background image, which can be highlighted, etc. Enjoy!

OneNote Virtual Printer PowerToy

I love OneNote and have grown dependent on it. However, one of my biggest complaints has been the lack of a virtual printer. (See my previous article Three Missing Features in OneNote.)

Unlike Windows Journal, GoBinder, or TabletPlanner, there's not been an easy way to get an external document into OneNote. The recently-released SP1 of OneNote added the ability to import some Microsoft Office documents. However, that left me with cumbersome workarounds for documents like PDFs, Web pages, etc. Until now.

Fortunately, Darron Devlin has just released a new OneNote PowerToy he calls The OneNote Image Writer PowerToy.

I downloaded it and installed it in about three minutes. Man, is it slick—and fast! I printed a ten-page PDF into OneNote in less than five seconds. Amazing!

If I sound enthusiastic about this PowerToy, I am. This fixes two of my three complaints about OneNote. The only thing I still want is the ability to insert user-friendly hyperlinks. Hopefully, someone will develop a PowerToy for this as well.

How to Import PDF Files into OneNote

In my last post, I complained about the fact that OneNote—even the SP1 version—doesn't have a native way to import PDF files. Major bummer, especially if, like me, you receive a lot of PDF files from your colleagues and business partners.

Fortunately, today I discovered a two-step workaround. It requires Office 2003. While it’s not perfect, hopefully it will suffice until the wizards of Redmond add this feature to the next version of OneNote. Here’s how to do it ...

1. Make sure you have Office 2003 installed. The “Microsoft Office Document Image Writer” (MODIW) is a virtual printer driver that is installed with Office 2003. To verify that it is installed, select Start | Printers and Faxes. Look for the MODIW print driver. If you don’t have this installed, you may be able to find another program on the Web that will convert PDF files to TIFF images. One such program is ePrint.
   
   
2. Configure the MODIW driver. Right-click on the printer driver. Select Properties | Advanced | Printing Defaults | Advanced. Make sure the TIFF - Monochrome Fax option is selected. Now click on OK. If you want, you can also select the default folder where you want these types of images stored.
   
   
   
   
3. Load Adobe Acrobat Reader. (The current version is 6.0. If you don’t have it, you can download it for free here.) Open the document you wish to insert into OneNote. You can either insert single pages or multiples pages. If you want to insert a single page, go to that page.
   
   
4. Use Acrobat Reader to print the document to the MODIW printer. Do this by selecting File | Print. Then select the Microsoft Office Document Image Writer from the drop-down printer Name box. It should look similar to the following:




Click on OK and the program will present you with a dialog box, so you can name the file. When you click on OK, the program will create a TIFF image of the page(s) you selected.



5. Open OneNote and go to the page where you want to insert your page(s). From the OneNote main menu select Insert | Document as Picture. Note: This is only available in the SP1 preview. If you don't have this installed, you can download it for free here. Now navigate to the folder where you saved the TIFF image. Click on the image and then click on OK. Your PDF file should now be inserted into OneNote. Note also that OneNote has created hyperlinks to the original source file and to the copy of the source file which it copied into your “My Notebook” folder.
   
   
6. Make annotations right on the page. You will now be able to annotate the document or highlight text using the pen tool-assuming you have a TabletPC. If not, you can still type your annotations on the document wherever you choose. Here’s an example.

 

Okay, I know, it’s not perfect. It’s a little cumbersome and you can’t search on the text. But once you get the hang of it, it’s pretty fast-and it’s better than nothing. Hopefully, this will tide you over until Chris Pratley and the OneNote development team develop a OneNote Writer printer driver or some similar device to write directly to OneNote pages.

Three Missing Features in OneNote

I have a love-hate relationship with OneNote. I keep using the program because of the awesome potential. I am betting on the fact that Microsoft will eventually get it right.

The OneNote 2003 Service Pack 1 Preview is a huge step in the right direction. But still, the program is missing three functions that I consider critical:

• The ability to insert user-friendly hyperlinks. I want to be able to enter the actual URL behind a user-friendly label. Microsoft Word does this perfectly, as do many other programs, including TreePad. Since OneNote and Word are produced by the same company, can’t the OneNote team just borrow the code from the Word team? Here’s how the “Insert Hyperlink” dialog box should look (courtesy of BlogJet):

Nothing fancy. Just a simple three-field dialog box. How hard can this be?

• The ability to print to OneNote. Windows Journal on the TabletPC has spoiled me. Just print to the virtual printer and-bam!-the document appears in Journal.



• The ability to import PDF files. SP1 gives us the ability to import most of the Microsoft Office files. This is an excellent feature and one that I now depend on. However, I receive numerous PDF files from my colleagues and I have no easy way to import them into OneNote. If I had user-friendly hyperlinks, I could at least reference them. (Yes, I know I can drag and drop into OneNote, but that leaves a very unfriendly, ugly URL.) But the best of all possible worlds would be to important them into OneNote and mark them up as I see fit.

I’ll probably hang in there with OneNote until version 2. However, if TreePad had the ability to insert ink (i.e., work with a TabletPC), I’d be all over it.

David Allen vs. FranklinCovey

I began using the Franklin Day Planner in the late 1980s, before the merger with Stephen Covey’s organization. I attended several of their seminars and promoted the methodology to my employees and colleagues.

A few years ago, I read David Allen’s great book, Getting Things Done. This is absolutely must-reading for anyone trying to increase their personal productivity. As a result of reading the book and his White Paper on implementing the system with Outlook, I installed his Getting Things Done Outlook Add-In. I then took the plunge and completely abandoned the Franklin method.

However, for months, I struggled with my implementation. Some things worked great. Some, not so great. I became especially frustrated with having so many unprioritized task lists. Every time I was ready to tackle a new action item, I had to scan back through my lists. More often than not, this made me react to whatever was “top of mind” rather than force myself to wade back through the lists. I just didn't have time to do this every time I was ready to tackle a “next action.”

About six months ago I stumbled across a change that is working really well for me. I added a new category to my Outlook categories list. It’s called “!Today”. The exclamation point makes this category sort ahead of all other categories, including David’s “@” categories (e.g., “@Computer,” “@Office,” etc.). I use it to identify those tasks I want to get done today.

Now, first thing every morning, I scan through my lists. I add the !Today category to each task I plan to tackle today. I don’t delete the existing category; I just add !Today as a second category. That way, in a category view of my tasks, the task appears in both places (see below). Note the “Buy black soft cast at TLC Medical Supply” that appears under the !Today category and also the @Errands category.

Once I have my list, I go back and prioritize using Outlook’s priority field. This corresponds to Franklin’s ABC prioritization methodology. However, I never did like adding Franklin's sequence number to the priority (e.g., “A1,” “A2,” etc.), so I don’t miss that at all. (It always seemed to me to be overkill in the Franklin system. This is where David is right; life flows too unpredictably to plan it out to this level of detail.)

In my view, this is the best of both worlds. David may not agree, but for me, it’s not either/or, but both/and. Your mileage may vary.