Apple Notes Web Clipper Replacement for Evernote: Apple Notes Unleashed Series (Dispatch No. 1)
Research, Organize and Archive the Web with Apple Notes and SingleFile
SingleFile combined with Apple Notes is like a long cool drink of water in the desert wasteland of information overload. Writers, readers, researchers and archivists alike who discover its many uses will rejoice.
The Situation
Sometimes you come across the perfect web page you were searching for or critical piece of information from a particular website. You could Bookmark this page to access it in the future, but how often have we all come across a page that is either completely taken off the web or even more frequently restricted behind a paywall.
There are those who have relied upon a tool like Evernote and its Web Clipper to capture and archive elements from the web. But now, with the unbelievably useful and elegant Apple Notes built right in to every Apple device you own, many are looking to integrate a research workflow that can take full advantage of this amazing tool. And now you can with SingleFile!
A Powerful Companion
SingleFile combined with Apple Notes is like a long cool drink of water in the desert wasteland of information overload. Writers, readers, researchers and archivists alike who discover its many uses will rejoice. Whether you use Safari or Firefox on your Mac (or even Brave, Vivaldi, Waterfox, Opera and yes even Chrome, heaven forbid), this guide will show you how to take maximum advantage of this incredible extension and how to integrate it with the incomparable writing app that keeps getting better and better, Apple Notes. SingleFile is even available as a Safari extension to download for your iPhone.
The Apple Notes and SingleFile Web Clipper Workflow
Download the SingleFile extension from the Mac App Store or from the Firefox Add-ons directory.
Configure SingleFile to Run in Private Windows in Tools/Add-ons/Details for Firefox and Allow Private Browsing in Settings/Extensions for Safari
Click the SingleFile icon in the toolbar of your browser of choice to save an entire page to a fully self-contained HTML file:
Image of SingleFile HTML File Preview Select a particular element of a webpage and Right-click to expose SingleFile menu and choose Save selection
Navigate to your Downloads folder, Right-click the HTML file created by SingleFile and click Share/Notes from the menu
Insert Text/Title for your Note and select from Choose Note: New Note or select an existing Note to Append the HTML file to and press Save
Your HTML file perfectly encapsulated by SingleFile is now saved in Apple Notes and accessible from any device
Taking Advantage of Your New Apple Notes Capabilities
You are now in a position to never loose that key piece of information ever again. That insightful comment, article, quote or vital instruction will now reside in a well-chosen Note for instant access and retrieval.
An effective way of interacting with your saved HTML files is to select them on Mac and press the Space bar or simply tap them in your Note on iPhone. You can then scroll through the file and view the content of the webpage as it existed the moment you saved it with SingleFile.
Another key feature of SingleFile is the Infobar. You can access this by Double-clicking a saved HTML file in Notes or the Finder and it will open it in your default Browser. Clicking on the Info button gives you the exact time you created the HTML archive, hovering over the Action button displays the original source URL and clicking this same button launches the Live URL in a new browser window or tab. It’s a great feature of SingleFile that works right out of the box. You can even further customize the output of the Infobar in the extension settings.
Upcoming in This Series
In upcoming dispatches for the Apple Notes Unleashed Series, we will be looking at ways of quickly searching for and effectively retrieving information from your Notes archive, efficiently capturing and creating new content, and more methods of inserting rich media into your Notes to powerfully enhance your research.
Update!
There have been some significant new features added to SingleFile for Safari that I write about in my new post for this series (Click below).
