Microsoft OneNote

Through my university, there’s some Microsoft thing where they can give us Microsoft software and other stuff for free, except Microsoft Office which they think we’ll be willing to pay for. So the end result is that I downloaded Windows 7 for free, and that’s great, and then I torrented Microsoft Office on the university wi-fi. At the time I didn’t install Microsoft OneNote (part of the greater Office suite) because I had no idea what it was, then I was at a bus stop yesterday and saw an ad for it. Essentially, it’s supposed to be a “virtual notebook,” allowing you to type wherever you want on the page, draw/write if you have a tablet, paste pictures, whatever.

        I’ve been taking notes in WordPad thus far, just typing as my professor speaks basically, and so far this hasn’t been a problem because I haven’t actually had to read over my notes. I do have a folder for each of my classes, but each has a simple “COMP1005” text file where the class number and date are the only thing to distinguish where and when something happened.

        As a form of self-promotion, I guess, and because it’s meant to be really useful to us, OneNote is offered for free through the school without any of the other Office programs. I guess I would have had an older version with the Office that I torrented, but that’s alright. I got it and installed it, and here’s the surprising part: it seems really damn good. I’ve seen Mac users with a similar program that looks a whole lot snazzier, so likely that’s where they got the idea, but either way: this is an awesome idea.

        Here’s how it’s set up: you create as many “notebooks” as you like (which are a lot like folders, used just for OneNote) displayed along the left side. Inside each notebook are a number of tabs along the top, which could be your to do list or your different classes or what have you. Then inside each tab, you add as many pages as you like, displayed along the far right side. This sounds confusing, but imagine your notebook or binder: you may have one for each class, or each day of classes. If you’re well-organized, you may have separators (tabs) to separate your homework from your notes or something like that. Then each of those tabs has as many pages as you need. Currently, I’ve got two binders: one for my monday/wednesday classes, and one for tuesday/thursday. Then I have separators labelled for my classes in chronological order.

        OneNote, then, managed to replicate that perfectly, with the bonus of to do lists per day. I could also have a universal to do list in a miscellaneous folder, for the long term. Or I could add in a calender. I can do this shit, unlike WordPad or MS Word. I add a new page for each day of classes (under the tab of the class itself) and go on my way. Add a tab for important projects. Tada! Everything in one place.

        Moral of the story is that this is infinitely better than text files or .pdfs or whatever else you might have been using on the computer, and likewise it has many advantages over your physical pen and paper. If you’re allowed to take notes on your computer, this would be wonderful. If you can’t, that’s a shame. At any rate I love this program, and I never thought I’d say that about a Microsoft program. It uses nearly the same amount of memory as MS Word (20k), and about a third more than simple WordPad (15k), so it’s not like it’s a huge memory drain either. I just have to convert the notes I’ve already taken and then we’ll be golden.

        GOLDEN.