As these are by far the most popular posts on this blog, here are direct links to my devonthink posts in order:
Devonthink and Other Mac Apps for History and Humanities Research
Devonthink for Historical Research, part II
Devonthink for Historical Research, part III
Please do stay around and read some of the other entries too!
Update: Devon Technologies released Devonthink 2.0 for public beta today, 18 December. I’ve just downloaded it and will be playing around with it for the next few days. In reading the initial documentation, it promises to be an excellent improvement on an already fantastic application. I’m especially excited about the universal inbox, the expansion of file-type indexing capabilities, the ability to open and search two databases at once, new PDF annotating functionality (not fully implemented in this build), tagging (not yet implemented), and more. As I get some time with it, I’m sure I’ll update how it changes/enhances the processes described in the posts above.
December 19, 2008 at 3:46 am
A few days ago I started to fool around with DT with some mixed feelings about it. I do like the OCR feautre and can see its potential (if it works reliably, again, mixed results so far. Just throwing some random PDF’s to it and see what happens. Some do convert others don’t. Some take a few tries…). I haven’t even touched the documentation. Seems daunting, and I have to finish grading
.
Then I see DT 2.0 is out with some features that make it even more attractive, like storing externally. Somehow I don’t like the current default of duplicating a PDF into the database. For instance, if edit the original, the copy won’t reflect the change–yes, I know I can hold the command key and it becomes a symbolic link–but I just like keeping all my PDF in one folder and not worry if I’m making changes in one place but not another and then have multiple copies of the same file and have to figure out which one has the changes I made. Thus, I use symbolic links (short cuts) to all my PDF’s for the different projects (which reminds me, is there a way to do this in Scrivener? keep a link to the file but not actually copy it into the Scrivener folder?).
December 24, 2008 at 6:19 pm
parezco y digo,
Thanks for the update on DT 2.0, and based on some of your comments on the pervious version, I’ve decided to try out 2.0.
Do you have any more thoughts about the 2.0 interface and its usability?
Thanks,
~A
February 23, 2009 at 12:17 pm
[...] If you are using (or planning to use) DEVONthink for serious research, you may want to read a bit more on how Chad has integrated DEVONthink into his workflow. Read his articles here. [...]
September 5, 2009 at 1:01 pm
[...] DEVONthink is an extremely powerful and adaptable database program that has significant potential for qualitative researches across the humanities. It’s ability to store and connect discrete bits of information, from the quickly jotted idea to pdfs of articles, books, dissertations (many of which can now be downloaded directly from UMI), and the like, is in my experience unparalleled in either the Mac or Microsoft worlds. Your mileage may vary, but that has been my experience. Last Fall I wrote a series of posts documenting what was then my digital workflow, and which utilized DEVONthink Pro Office 1.5. Those posts are all linked to here. [...]
November 3, 2009 at 8:45 pm
[...] DevonThink for historical research [...]