Notational Velocity is a software program that I use daily. There is a very good reason for this, I am at my computer desk numerous hours each day and I work with a lot of websites and text. I also have a lot of passing thoughts that I need to write down. Notational Velocity allows me to get all of my information in one place and allows me to retrieve it later since it auto-saves instantly. It is small but offers big functionality and it is free. It simply doesn’t get any better than that!
Notational Velocity is probably a little different than any other note-taking software you have used for many reasons. First, the program window has three levels, the Title and Search bar, a Filtered Note List, and the Content of the Notes. Let’s say you want a note for things to do today. In the title, just type in Things To Do Today and press enter, the title is created ("Things To Do Today") and you can then make your notes in the content area.
It’s features include:
• Intuitive. By this, I mean it is not your average note taking software, but it is easy to use and simple to learn.
• Search feature is priceless. You can create any title you wish and then search it later. For instance, let’s say you need to paste some useful websites you found but do not want to bookmark them (we all know how fast bookmarks can grow and get out of hand). Your title can be, “Websites 11-25”, when you need them later, you just type in websites – actually you just type in “w” and it begins displaying results in the filtered note area.
• Instantly saves. This is so useful not to have to click a “save” button, the information is saved instantly until you delete it
• Stable. Another stable freebie software, I have never had it crash on me in over two years of use
• Tags. You have the ability to add a tag name to your note if you wish and then have the ability to search by tag name
• Note types. You can set up the notes to encrypt, or be in rich text, or plain text
Truly, Notational Velocity's only flaw (if you can call it that) is that it is a little different from any other note-taking program so it might take you a few minutes to get used its "ways" – it just works and does what it is suppose to do very well.
I give Notational Velocity 5 stars for overall usefulness and easy to use format, as well as stability. I recommend it to anyone who spends a lot of time on the computer and deals with a lot of text. It’s a great way to keep all your pieces of text in one place, it increases productivity because you always know where to find that important text, thought, or website.