Thank you very much for your fine answer. I was glad to get such a detailed explanation. As I told you in my first mail, I really like the beautiful GUI and the enormous amount of possibilities the program has to offer. In fact, after having owned it for only a week or so, it has already been so much of an inspiration to me that I am now getting a lot more work done than I did before I bought it. I am sure it will continue to be valuable for me in the future.

Best wishes, Jan Wigh Nielsen (GemX user)

To me, last year's most disappointing product--and I'm glad it didn't receive a World Class award--was Microsoft's OneNote file manager. This $199 program was supposed to be a quick and nimble tool, and I was hoping I could use it to capture and organize random notes, images, to-do lists, and maybe URLs or photos. If I had a tablet PC (I don't), I'd be able to add handwritten notes, doodles, and other undecipherable scribblings.

Maybe it's my attention deficit disorder, but I never got comfortable with OneNote--it just wasn't intuitive for me. I found myself laboring to make the program work, rather than using it to be productive. For instance, figuring out how to use OneNote's pages, subpages, sections, and folders drove me batty--and even today I'm still unsure how everything works together.

..........

Instead of supporting OneNote, my World Class vote in the note-taker category goes to TexNotes, a brilliantly simple (and dirt-cheap) text organizer. The $35 program is rich in features, yet I had it customized to my liking in only 20 minutes. And whereas OneNote saves files only as Word documents or in its own proprietary format, TexNotes supports .txt, .rtf, WordPerfect, and five other formats. For such an unstructured guy, I'm feeling amazingly organized these days. You can download a 60-day trial version of TexNotes from PC World's Downloads.

PC World - Contributing Editor Steve Bass is the author of PC Annoyances, published by O'Reilly

GemX is a company that saw a better way to build the mousetrap and then did it very well. TexNotes by GemX was developed to help people jot down and collect all kinds of ideas and notes too random to fit easily into a traditional word processor document or spreadsheet. These are the kinds of notes people keep in a planner or perhaps scrawl on a napkin, even if they are computer users. TexNotes continues to evolve into the premier information management and notes tool on the market today. The program lets you organize files and documents in different "notebooks," which are saved to your hard drive and listed in an Explorer-style browser along the right-hand side of the screen for easy retrieval. Add new files and documents by just clicking a button. Each new note is a blank, white page, but a Microsoft Office-style toolbar lets you format your notes as you like, with different fonts, styles, and backgrounds. TexNotes also includes a calendar, in which you can add appointments and set up reminder alarms. TexNotes is compact, lean, highly customizable, and sports an elegant user interface. Every part of the program has been considered for least hassle and maximum return on your time. The GemX website not only outlines a wide variety of uses for TexNotes, but also walks you through creating your own eBooks with the program, which are great for saving money on printing costs. Bottom line, TexNotes is a robust solution to dealing with most of my day. So go get it now!

The Great Software List - Advocating the great; ignoring the mediocre

In its latest version, TexNotes has graduated to TexNotes Pro, and what a difference it makes! If you like Microsoft OneNote or Onfolio, you might just love TexNotes Pro by GemX. TexNotes Pro is the conflation of both of these programs because it pulls all the elements of good code together — interface, keyboard shortcuts, easy navigation, multiple backup and archival options, complete customizability, and the ability to please both novices and experts — to make a truly great app. TexNotes Pro is not just an application, it's a way of looking at the information from a different perspective altogether. Use TexNotes Pro for managing simple daily to-do lists to creating complex reports, ebooks and large information reference resources. TexNotes Pro shows the way to a paperless office by demonstrating how to get there and save money along with building in its own eBook Reader. No need for third-party apps, just create your own e-documents, access a dictionary and thesaurus all within. Perhaps the greatest endorsement for TexNotes Pro is its own customers — when users begin using it, they never stop, ever!

The Great Software List - Advocating the great; ignoring the mediocre