I have posted about OneNote before, and how it can be a great asset for IT staff and Managers to help keep notes and ideas together in one place, but in my search for a good personal knowledgebase I have again come back to OneNote.
With a little help from the Windows Live team.
Keeping my notebook for knowledgebase content updated all the time is the biggest reason for selecting OneNote as the platform. I do not need to save, I can use the application across computers and share information with colleagues as needed.
Syncing across computers is the ticket
My new discovery, from the Live team, is Sync. The application is installed on any computers you wish to share files between. Then selected directories can be synced between these computers and the Sync service.
Where this gets handy is if I setup a sync’d folder and put a OneNote Notebook in the folder. Set it to sync with the web and then anytime I am online, my notebook is backed up for use on any PC I have.
You can configure folders as personal, available only to you, or shared, seen by others you specify. So if I had a team notebook, I would put it in a shared folder, publish the folder to those who I want to access the notebook, and start using it.
Yes other users (or computers) would need to have Sync installed on their computers, and to get it, a live account, but both are free and with the number of places wifi is available (there is a gas station near my house with free wireless Internet for customer – wow.. at the gas station?) there are really no places changes to the file cannot be shared.
As with any notebook, it will OneNote will store the notebook on your PC, so it will be seen as always in sync by OneNote. Sync runs automatically (or on demand if you choose) and will sync changes to the web service anytime a connection is detected.
One more bonus…
Since OneNote keeps the file on your computer locally, sync does not require OneNote to be running to share the folder with the web. In most cases you would need OneNote to be running to use the synchronization features.
I just discovered this today and will be using it for my own personal knowledge base notebook, things that will help me solve problems that may require a bit of digging, and will update this post if my opinions changes, but for now, it is the sweetest use of the Internet for an application I have seen yet. Surely the next thing is right around the corner.
Give it a whirl and let me know what you think of OneNote with Sync in the comments.
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