Kindle for Mac and @Evernote – Best Digital Research Tool Ever?
Amazon just released the Kindle for Mac application which lets those of use with Apple computers finally read our Kindle books. What is super cool is that Evernote has a universal short cut that allows you to clip a section of the screen into an image – which Evernote can read text inside. An initial implication is that one can read, make clips of interesting quotes or sections, maybe even annotate on the fly, and then have it all searchable after we are done reading. For research and keeping the best of the books one reads – this is simply fantastic. This also means that your book notes and research are always with you since Evernote has several mobile apps. Check out the video below to see what I mean..
My only beef so far is I wish you could import other epub/pdf ebooks you have, because now I have two readers to manage it all… or maybe there’s a way and I haven’t figured it out.
Well, I don’t know about the reader as much – Kindle is just the one I’ve connected with. But for any eReader on Mac this method of clipping and annotating into Evernote would work.
thanks for this tip.
another way to do this with the kindle is to go to http://kindle.amazon.com/ and on there, it will show you all your highlights. the great thing about this is that it’s TEXT so you can copy and paste it! so i just highlight whatever i need on my kindle, or the iphone or mac (now) and then go there and copy and paste that into either evernote or Word. you probably knew that but maybe for all your readers.
keep the tips coming!
Clever clever.
Tony, interesting thoughts here. I may download the mac kindle version just to tinker with. I don’t have any books on kindle so I’m not sure it would work well for my setup, though I am using google books more and more.
Are you still useing DevonThink? If so how do you distinguish between evernote and DT? Do you use them together, or for separate functions?
DevonThink for me has gone pretty stale. Evernote is where I work for everything in regards to active info, reference material and research at this point. I may get back into DT as seminary starts though – it is just a lot of maintenance to keep both running.
Tony,
This looks pretty sweet. I have a Kindle but still haven’t hit my stride with it. I still like to use a book to flip back and forth quickly for study. I underline a lot and I know exactly where it is in a physical book. I find myself wanting to use my Kindle more for novels. But this has more to do with me not hitting my stride than it not being awesome and a great way to capture information. Graduate school might look very different for me if I was going through it now. When I started my MDiv in 1998 I just barely had a laptop. Got a heavy, heavy Fijitsu for college graduation in 1997 and I used that just to type papers practically. I need to start using Evernote better.
Rhett
The only change that could happen is if they start letting the Kindle for Mac reader highlight and add notes. Right now it can only bookmark which doesn’t help. The iPhone app for Kindle can highlight and bookmark and the Kindle for Mac can sync and have those things in a side bar – which is super helpful. And then you can go to http://kindle.amazon.com and see just the text from what you’ve highlighted – which is super helpful.
All to say – if Kindle for Mac gets highlight and notes the process would just be a little different. Read and Annotate first – then clip highlights page into Evernote, etc.
thanks for the tip, currently setting up!