Mini-Review: RightNote

[rgdot]

App name	RightNote by BauerApps
App URL	http://www.bauerapps.com/RightNote.html
App version reviewed	2.2.2.5 (professional)
Supported OSes	Windows 2000 and newer
Support methods	http://www.bauerapps.com/support.html
Upgrade policy	Registered users receive free minor version upgrades (i.e. all updates to v2.x.x) as well as priority support.
Trial version available?	Fully functional 30-day trial period.
Pricing scheme	Professional: US$59.95. Standard: US$29.95. New freeware version, free for both personal and commercial use. Comparison table at http://www.bauerapps.com/stdvspro.html
Relationship between reviewer and product	No relation at all. Just out of interest to try and review.

Note: This review is for the professional version (Version: 2.2.2.5)

RightNote is a notes manager and organizer, it is also one able to import existing text (File--->Import). Each database is represented as a notebook, each notebook is then divided into pages (horizontally tabbed) and each page has its own notes structure within a tree.

RightNote supports several note types, memo or plain text, richedit, richview - which is a more complete version of richedit with contact, expense, to do list and calendar templates - spreadsheet and source code. Richview also supports styles (Tools->Definitions->Style Definitions) for preset font and paragraph colors for example. Spreadsheet supports xls sheet import and export. Source code supports Java, C++, XML and many others.

Additional types of notes are Link to File and Attachment. The former supports .txt, .rtf, .rvf, .htm and .pdf files. These become indexed and searchable. After adding one choose 'Index' from the indexing drop down and and then click open file to work on them within RightNote. Attachment is simply a link to an external file.

The starting point is to create a new database or notebook (Ctrl+N) then clicking Enter or Shift Enter to add a node or child. RightNote uses 'Sibling' and 'Child' to describe the tree hierarchy.

RightNote has a resource panel (F9 or Ctrl+G) that is a central space to search, manage tags, view history and use a scratchpad. The search is as you type and a multinotebook or global search can be enabled and includes options to search while matching whole words, case and note protection status and others. Another method of managing tree items is the Tree Properties option. Right click on any tree location to change its type, color, to sort note items alphabetically and more.

Other options available via the right click include adding tags (also accessed via the icon on the bottom right of the program window), copying contents to clipboard, assigning an icon, password protecting using 128 bit encryption and moving the note to another location in the tree.

Bookmarking a page using Ctrl+Shift+F7 keeps a simple record of the page with visited date, a thumbnail, the page title and option to add a note about it. Capturing is done via selecting a portion of a page from any application (including browsers) and using the Windows+V keys to create a note.

RightNote features a few other interesting options via its Tools menu, one notable being a page transfer option to copy/drag and drop notes between notebooks and another being a multinotebook search.

RightNote has partial unicode support, the limitation is explained in the unicode section of help. Requires Windows 2000 and newer and is available as a portable version too.

[rjbull]

I wish they'd made it clear on their Web site that there's only one download, and you only choose Free, Standard or Professional when you load it up first time.

[PhilB66]

Thank you, rgdot. RightNote comes in two flavours, install and portable ones.

[Steven Avery]

Hi,

Any contact with the authors requesting a DC discount ... or asking when something will happen somewhere. Its a good program, I would like the Professional, however $60 is big investment when there are so many good programs.

Steven

[tranglos]

It's great to see the review, RightNote certainly deserves attention. I've posted about it before, so I'll just add that RightNote imports KeyNote files very well and is a fine replacement for it.

(There is a hitch though if your KeyNote file contains "virtual nodes" that point to non-existent files. I can help with that if needed.)

[rjbull]

I'll just add that RightNote imports KeyNote files very well and is a fine replacement for it.

-tranglos (January 23, 2012, 07:40 AM)

Import of KeyNote files into other programs is currently a sore point with me.  I have data currently in MemPad, which I'm trying to get into other programs.  MemPad can export a plain text file in a sensible format, which can be easily massaged into a Treepad Lite HJT file.  It looks right in Treepad Lite, and seems to import correctly into UltraRecall.  KeyNote can import the HJT.  Sometimes the files look right in KeyNote, and the tree always seems correct, but usually some of the notes are blank.  I don't know why.  I wondered if KeyNote's import was getting confused about RTF vs. plain text.  It's put semicolons in front of all the text inside one node, which I understand KeyNote does to any note that's been marked as plain text.  There isn't a "%" on a line by itself.  I don't see why KeyNote would only mark some nodes as plain text when the whole file is plain text, yet wrap most of the body text in RTF tokens.

In some cases, when I tried saving a file, this error message appeared:

Virtual node "ABCZ typing abbreviation system - John Knowles" in note "software" cannot write file

Cannot create file

and that's one of the nodes that failed.  But it isn't what I would consider a virtual node.  It contains a URL, but so do other nodes that imported correctly.

Both AllMyNotes and RightNote fail in much the same way as KeyNote.  I've been through several iterations of this, and am losing the plot! 

[tranglos]

KeyNote can import the HJT.  Sometimes the files look right in KeyNote, and the tree always seems correct, but usually some of the notes are blank.  I don't know why.  I wondered if KeyNote's import was getting confused about RTF vs. plain text.

-rjbull (January 23, 2012, 10:34 AM)

I wrote that import procedure 10 years ago. Even a minor later change in HJT file format may be causing all sorts of trouble, I'm afraid.

[rjbull]

I wrote that import procedure 10 years ago. Even a minor later change in HJT file format may be causing all sorts of trouble, I'm afraid.

-tranglos (January 23, 2012, 11:11 AM)

Actually, I started by massaging my output file into a form that the free-standing KeyNote importer kntconvert.exe (dated 2002...) could handle, without using Treepad at all, and that also worked.  But to get an output file imported reasonably into AMN or RN, I had to export it from KeyNote as a (freeware) Treepad Lite-type HJT, then make a new KN file, and re-import the HJT into it!  You can see why I'm bemused 

I used a 2004 description for Treepad HJT.  The only tags I used were basic:

Header: <Treepad version 3.0>
dt=Text
<node>
Node title
Level
Node close: <end node> 5P9i0s8y19Z

That was enough to allow import into UltraRecall.  The default type is Text, but I had to explicitly state dt=Text before UR would do it.

Still, even your KeyNote years are long ago 

[rjbull]

Recording my further efforts at converting a MemPad file for import into RightNote or Keynote:

Whether I ran kntconvert.exe on an indented file, or converted my source file into an HJT and imported it into KeyNote itself, I got similar results.  The KNT file from either process had RTF body text for the first few nodes, but then the converters forgot all about RTF and made everything plain text.  Importing the files into RightNote or AllMyNotes gave the correct tree structure, but non-RTF notes were blank, and they were in the great majority.

I cut the Gordian knot by making another script that converted MemPad's output file directly into a KNT file.  It's a terrible kludge because I don't know anything about RTF.  I cribbed the RTF tags from one of KeyNote's support files, fileformat.knt.  But it seems to work; I ended up with files that appeared to import correctly into both RightNote and AllMyNotes.  There are over 1000 nodes, so I haven't checked them all, but things look right.

[TucknDar]

Hi,

Any contact with the authors requesting a DC discount ... or asking when something will happen somewhere. Its a good program, I would like the Professional, however $60 is big investment when there are so many good programs.

Steven

-Steven Avery (January 22, 2012, 10:48 PM)

Seconded. The freeware version is actually very good and contains the most important features, but a discount would definitely make me buy the standard version or possibly even the Professional.

[rgdot]

I sent an email, hopefully we hear back