"Insert link to file"- where did this go?

Anonymous
2013-02-06T22:04:23+00:00

I'm an attorney, and I created a great litigation and trial-management system using only OneNote.  We put it to use in a large "mass action" case with over fifty plaintiffs and tens of thousands of exhibits.  The system allowed us to completely outmaneuver the plaintiffs at trial, and we were able to line up exhibits, deposition citations, and both direct and cross examination questions from a single program.   We all credit a great deal of our defense verdict to the system.

The key feature that let us build the various pages for trial quickly was the ability to drag and drop exhibit pdfs into the onenote pages as links to files.  Due to the sheer volume of exhibits, as well as the ease of using tables, links were far more effective than inserting the files directly, and certainly more effective than inserting printouts. 

With OneNote 2013, this mission-critical feature appears to be missing.  I can only insert the file, or insert a printout.  I don't want to do either- I want to insert a link.  I know that I can insert links using the manual "insert link" function, but that is slower and more error prone than the simplicity of the previous versions.  Am I missing a key option to trigger?  Or is this a missing feature from OneNote 2013?  If the latter, I suspect we will stick with 2010....

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  1. Anonymous
    2015-02-11T16:56:32+00:00

    Preparing for several annual meetings come this february and march, having hundreds of files in several folders, drag to link in OneNote is a much missed option by me too after upgrading from Office 2010 to Office 365 Small Business Premium. 

    There is a workaround I figured out.  It's fairly simple, but does not excuse the removal of this important, basic feature.  It's considerably faster than manually linking, and it doesn't require the installation of any add ins which might be problematic for users with draconian IT departments (is that a redundant expression?).

    1.  Open your web browser. 

    2.  In the address bar, navigate to the folder path with the load of files you want to link.  The browser should display a list consisting all the files in the directory.  The listed files are links to the same. 

    3.  From there, select the links you want, then copy/paste them into the onenote page.  It will create a table automatically, which you can modify/destroy/whatever

    And done. Regardless, a return to this as an option for a simple drag and drop operation would be quite welcome.  I'd still love to know why they removed this feature.

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  2. Anonymous
    2015-02-11T12:13:17+00:00

    (i guess it's CTRL+K instead of CTRL+I)

    i think it's much more intuitive if you can just drop files to notebook, or just save files in explorer so they show up in the notebook

    like i describe in

    https://onenote.uservoice.com/forums/256328-onenote-users/suggestions/7080538-files

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  3. Anonymous
    2015-02-11T10:44:04+00:00

    Its still possible, but not by dragging.

    CTRL+I (also located on right click but cant remember the name of it) opens a Insert box where you can browse for the wanted file and insert it.

    Also possible to change the name of the text that will appear in OneNote.

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  4. Anonymous
    2015-02-11T09:59:11+00:00

    Preparing for several annual meetings come this february and march, having hundreds of files in several folders, drag to link in OneNote is a much missed option by me too after upgrading from Office 2010 to Office 365 Small Business Premium.

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  5. Anonymous
    2015-02-11T08:22:36+00:00

    Hi

    i elaborate a view on this matter.

    Could you share your views on this idea?

    1. Allow for files to be added to a section. Don’t embedd the files in the section page, but show a different ‘tab’ on the section lever (or any suiting visual representation) for files linked to the section. Either show each file as separate tab, or one tab ‘Files’, showing all the files– Perhaps give the choice to insert a copy of the file or a shortcut.
    2. Revert from the move in onedrive and onedrive for business (which even operate in different ways) to hide (or rather obfuscate) the underlying file/folder structure of the notebooks. (For users who want to see how this works in local (eg not onedrive integrated mode) , just create a notebook in one local folder, then create some sections and section groupings (and perhaps some sublevels as well) . Next go the folder in file explorer. You’ll notice that:

    a) The notebook takes the parent folder as it’s name.

    b) Every section page corresponds with a seperate file in the (parent) folder.

    c) Every section group corresponds with a (sub)folder. In every section folder a new table of contents files is generated.

    -> Moreover, manipulating this structure in the file explorer (creating subfolder will give section groups and creating (copying) section files will create section pages in the notebook).

    In short, onenote just uses plain old file/folder paradigm to organise itself. This offers a lot of advantages. As you can use your file explorer (or it’s appbased or webbased counterpart) to organise your notes; from spefic tasks, this is more convenient then using the onenote interface)

    I’m pretty sure the cloud solutions, onedrive and onedrive for business still behave like that. But instead of this file/folder structure we only see a stub file (onedrive for business or a link onedrive). This link is not an easy way to manage notes. Eg, it can even not be removed, you have to go to the webbased client in order te remove something. Hence the leverage of being able to use your file explorer is completely gone.

    1. Combine 1) en 2) -> Have OneNote represent every element in the parent folder . Section pages show up as sections, subfolders show up as section groups (as explained in 2), but every other file is represented as well (eg next to the section pages) in some way.

    So if someone would like to add some file to a notebook, the only thing that needs to be done is to save it (and/or a link to it perhaps) to the (sub)folder of the notebook involved. Automatically they wil show up. Vice verse if a file is added through the onenote interface, it should be showed as a seperate file in the folder (and not as an embedded file in the secion page.

    1. This might alsof or the need of having onenote sync in it’s own way (it seems to sync seperatly from onedrive logic). Onedrive might just provide for syncing and sharing as it does for any other file.
    2. Take this one step further, and the need for a onenote.toc file might be taken away as well. Just add folders to the onenote list and have onenote represent the folders with onenote ‘view’. I fit sees section files, i twill show them as section pages, i fit sees non-sectionfiles, it will represent them in some way, and if it sees subfolders is will show section groups. All this without the of a separatly maintained toc file.

    From explorer offer the option to ‘show the directory in  onenote’ so you immediately jump from any location to onenote-view. In onenote, don’t open notebooks, just add directories to some favorites folder.

    Perhaps the whole specific caching structure might be abandoned as well, as onedrive might be allready doing this.

    https://onenote.uservoice.com/forums/256328-onenote-users/suggestions/7080538-files

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