Take the clips

If you are extensive web surfer (or even better reader), you are probably aware of the fact that you forget many things you should remember, and that you have trouble in finding some important articles you have read. And you might feel the need to take these clips on your mobile device.

First solution for this is EverNote, which is capable for taking of all sort of notes, though I think it is best suited for clips. The most valuable thing is actually very simple - every time you open EverNote, you will see your latest clips, and that way refresh your memory. Second interesting thing is that you can reformat text, so that you can mark which part of the text is important to you with color. Then, it integrates well with browsers (both Internet explorer and Mozilla Firefox), so you can take clips directly from there. Finally, options to recall articles are nearly perfect. You have hierarchally sorted topics on the left, and every clip can get into several topics (popularly called tagging). Clips are also automatically sorted according to source (web, office document). And on top of that there is search as you type.

If you need those clips on Pocket PC, you will have to pay for full version, which also includes handwriting recognition.

Firefox users has one more interesting option: extension called Scrapbook. As every good product, it does just one thing - stores web pages or portions of it on your computer. Integration with browser makes the page look "as is" - EverNote has text with some formats and images, but not more than that. Marking with colors, adding comments and erasing is very easy. On the other hand, options to find articles are limited compared to EverNote - just simple folder structure and text search (but not as you type).

Both programs deserve attention - Scrapbook is ideal for storing full pages and articles, or for collecting data for one work. But when you collect a bunch of small clips, then EverNotes wins. The best thing is that you can use them both.