Windows 10 OneNote app sucks.

Anonymous
2018-10-05T06:25:13+00:00

I don't understand why we are being steered toward this app and away from the desktop version which had so many more features.  You can't slap a more vivid shade of purple on a stripped down app and call it OneNote. There's so many note-taking apps out there and none of them comes close to OneNote 2016.  The OneNote app is definitely creating alot of space for those apps to grab a larger share of the market.   

Scrolling through several pages of Word printouts is painful on my computer; slow and choppy.  Not to mention, I can't just drop a Word file onto the OneNote page and have it printout.  I now must convert it to a PDF, insert it, then make it printout from there.  

How about the Outlook functions which are now gone?

I'm not going to go on and on about what's wrong with the app since so many before have done that already.  I'm just adding my voice to those who know that the OneNote app is an inferior product and it's important for Microsoft to hear it.    

The OneNote app should offer everything that the desktop version offered, and I would assume even more. Microsoft, you are slowly taking away the things that keep me from buying a Mac.  This isn't an upgradewhen you give us something with less features than its predecessor.

Microsoft 365 and Office | OneNote | For home | Windows

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  1. Anonymous
    2019-08-28T12:05:33+00:00

    Thanks for the excellent info, Rohn007 -- but to clarify: The class notebooks function is an add-in for the real OneNote. It's also web-based -- in the same way that OneNote online is web-based through OneDrive.

    Thanks again for adding in all the info and links.

    Great post.

    FYI: this forum is for asking for help. Fortunately you got a suggestion from Centurion.  Unfortunately, I suspect that OneNote 2016 will not work in your situation. I've only read about OneNote in the classroom, but I was under the impression it was web based.

    The OneNote Windows 10 FAQ has a question/answer specifically about this "new & (dis)improved" version in Education

    OneNote in Office 2019 FAQ

    https://support.office.com/en-us/article/frequently-asked-questions-about-onenote-in-office-2019-6582c7ae-2ec6-408d-8b7a-3ed71a3c2103

    The above link includes the following link:

    Here is another place you can ask your question / make your complaint:

    https://support.office.com/en-us/education - Education Help Center

    ********************

    Unfortunately, no one of "importance" at MS actively participates in this forum (sorry MS Staff participants, no offense intended). There are a (very) few managers who "lurk" and pop up once or twice a year with useful, deep-insight, replies but we have no idea who or whether there is someone from the OneNote team watching us.

    If you want MS Developers and development managers to see the impact the introduction of the OneNote <cr>applet has had on you, you have to submit a "feedback" to MS. The input area in the Feedback is limited, so just give them a summary and a link to this discussion to see the whole thing.

    **********************

    Send Feedback to MS Developers ****Launch Feedback Hub via  <WIN><F>

    “Official” MS does not pay much attention to this forum. However, you now can send your complaints and feature requests directly to MS developers and managers using one of the 4 possible “Feedback” mechanisms described in this link:

    https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-windows_install/send-feedback-to-ms-developers/506e7654-8ced-405b-911e-c58d8f253069

    Please post a share link to your feedback, back here, so other people who find your question here will be able to vote for your feedback and add their comments to it.

    ***************  Bonus Reading ***************

    .

    Here are some more Education related links that may be of interest to you

    .

    2019 08 13- MS Education Site

    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/education/default.aspx

    Chat with MS Education “expert” chat box

    https://education.microsoft.com/microsoft-innovative-educator-programs/mie - MS Innovative Educator

    https://education.microsoft.com/courses-and-resources/courses - Courses

    2019 08 13- Education >     Student-Centered Learning

    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/education/student-centered-learning-pd

    Meeting the needs of today’s diverse learners and helping them build future skills has never been more important.

    Visit the Microsoft Education Center and get the latest news!

    https://education.microsoft.com/Start/UserCommunicationPreference

    Sign up for the Microsoft Education newsletter and each month we’ll provide you with news, information, training, and tips about how you can create better learning outcomes in your classroom with Microsoft Education.

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  2. Anonymous
    2019-08-28T07:48:51+00:00

    Great post.

    FYI: this forum is for asking for help. Fortunately you got a suggestion from Centurion.  Unfortunately, I suspect that OneNote 2016 will not work in your situation. I've only read about OneNote in the classroom, but I was under the impression it was web based.

    The OneNote Windows 10 FAQ has a question/answer specifically about this "new & (dis)improved" version in Education

    OneNote in Office 2019 FAQ

    https://support.office.com/en-us/article/frequently-asked-questions-about-onenote-in-office-2019-6582c7ae-2ec6-408d-8b7a-3ed71a3c2103

    The above link includes the following link:

    Here is another place you can ask your question / make your complaint:

    https://support.office.com/en-us/education - Education Help Center

    ********************

    Unfortunately, no one of "importance" at MS actively participates in this forum (sorry MS Staff participants, no offense intended). There are a (very) few managers who "lurk" and pop up once or twice a year with useful, deep-insight, replies but we have no idea who or whether there is someone from the OneNote team watching us.

    If you want MS Developers and development managers to see the impact the introduction of the OneNote <cr>applet has had on you, you have to submit a "feedback" to MS. The input area in the Feedback is limited, so just give them a summary and a link to this discussion to see the whole thing.

    **********************

    Send Feedback to MS Developers ****Launch Feedback Hub via  <WIN><F>

    “Official” MS does not pay much attention to this forum. However, you now can send your complaints and feature requests directly to MS developers and managers using one of the 4 possible “Feedback” mechanisms described in this link:

    https://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/forum/windows_10-windows_install/send-feedback-to-ms-developers/506e7654-8ced-405b-911e-c58d8f253069

    Please post a share link to your feedback, back here, so other people who find your question here will be able to vote for your feedback and add their comments to it.

    ***************  Bonus Reading ***************

    .

    Here are some more Education related links that may be of interest to you

    .

    2019 08 13- MS Education Site

    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/education/default.aspx

    Chat with MS Education “expert” chat box

    https://education.microsoft.com/microsoft-innovative-educator-programs/mie - MS Innovative Educator

    https://education.microsoft.com/courses-and-resources/courses - Courses

    2019 08 13- Education >     Student-Centered Learning

    https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/education/student-centered-learning-pd

    Meeting the needs of today’s diverse learners and helping them build future skills has never been more important.

    Visit the Microsoft Education Center and get the latest news!

    https://education.microsoft.com/Start/UserCommunicationPreference

    Sign up for the Microsoft Education newsletter and each month we’ll provide you with news, information, training, and tips about how you can create better learning outcomes in your classroom with Microsoft Education.

    Was this answer helpful?

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  3. Anonymous
    2019-08-28T03:34:27+00:00

    I feel your pain -- as there is no measure for my disgust in this toddler-level toy that shamelessly takes the name of "OneNote" -- an app that butchers the brilliance of the ONE AND ONLY OneNote.

    But fear not, for you can still get the REAL DEAL:

    https://support.office.com/en-us/article/install-or-reinstall-onenote-2016-for-windows-c08068d8-b517-4464-9ff2-132cb9c45c08

    As they are trying to steer people to their abomination of software design, Microsoft does not advertise that you can still get OneNote 2016 (for free). It's confusing to a lot of people (and purposely so) -- because they make people think that they have no other choice (because they removed it from Office 365 and Office 2019).

    Anyway, lemme know if you have any questions. Great post, by the way. I totally understand, as my world revolves around OneNote, both personally and professionally.

    Note: I borrowed "toddler-level" from another poster -- but "toy" is mine. ;o)

    Oh my goodness, I've been pulling my hair out with this damn app all night. I'm a teacher. I've been using the class notebooks function in the REAL program for years. I'm the expert on OneNote on my campus and have been championing it's use as an interactive notebook for all students in all classes. After trying to use this damn app tonight I'm now horrified and have no idea what I'm going to do for my class this year. This app is an atrocity. I have every assignment and activity my students do for the entire year arranged in folders and subfolders that I can distribute out to every student notebook in my class and the only setup I have to do is at the start of the year, I copy the original folders from my previous years notebook in to the new years notebook. In what world is it appropriate to make me scroll through EVERY FOLDER AND SUBFOLDER IN EVERY STUDENT NOTEBOOK I'M CONNECTED TO IN ORDER TO FIND THE ONE I'M TRYING TO COPY TO?!

    And then I discover that when I want to distribute a new folder out to all my student notebooks, there's no way to choose where it goes?! It just gets dropped at the top of their notebook? What? That's not where I want it to go, I want it to go to a specific place, because the folders should be organized by semester and unit of study, but I can't do that? Why?! Now I have 129 student folders distributed to the wrong damn place!

    And then I find out that it no longer integrates with excel. Well there goes all the data tracking and graphing I used to have my students do in their notebooks. I did a whole professional development last year to show other teachers how they could use the excel integration, but I guess all that just went right out the damn window.

    Microsoft DID market OneNote to teachers. They designed it so it integrates with our LMS systems. The student pages show date and time stamps for all their answers so I know if they actually did their work on time or not, and that they can't just cut and paste answers, or even better, they can't just change the name and submit the same file as another student. I can use it for coloring, labeling, graphing, sorting and drag/drop activities so it's not all just worksheets and answers. And when it's time to grade I can lock their pages, and then pull all 129 assignments at the same time and just comment directly on the page, and sync the grade directly to my gradebook. The program was absolutely phenomenal as an interactive notebook program, but they've ruined it for my classroom with this app. I'm completely at a loss. I'm looking at having to completely redesign my classroom because of how terrible the functionality for the app is.

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  4. Anonymous
    2019-08-28T02:46:23+00:00

    Oh my goodness, I've been pulling my hair out with this damn app all night. I'm a teacher. I've been using the class notebooks function in the REAL program for years. I'm the expert on OneNote on my campus and have been championing it's use as an interactive notebook for all students in all classes. After trying to use this damn app tonight I'm now horrified and have no idea what I'm going to do for my class this year. This app is an atrocity. I have every assignment and activity my students do for the entire year arranged in folders and subfolders that I can distribute out to every student notebook in my class and the only setup I have to do is at the start of the year, I copy the original folders from my previous years notebook in to the new years notebook. In what world is it appropriate to make me scroll through EVERY FOLDER AND SUBFOLDER IN EVERY STUDENT NOTEBOOK I'M CONNECTED TO IN ORDER TO FIND THE ONE I'M TRYING TO COPY TO?!

    And then I discover that when I want to distribute a new folder out to all my student notebooks, there's no way to choose where it goes?! It just gets dropped at the top of their notebook? What? That's not where I want it to go, I want it to go to a specific place, because the folders should be organized by semester and unit of study, but I can't do that? Why?! Now I have 129 student folders distributed to the wrong damn place!

    And then I find out that it no longer integrates with excel. Well there goes all the data tracking and graphing I used to have my students do in their notebooks. I did a whole professional development last year to show other teachers how they could use the excel integration, but I guess all that just went right out the damn window.

    Microsoft DID market OneNote to teachers. They designed it so it integrates with our LMS systems. The student pages show date and time stamps for all their answers so I know if they actually did their work on time or not, and that they can't just cut and paste answers, or even better, they can't just change the name and submit the same file as another student. I can use it for coloring, labeling, graphing, sorting and drag/drop activities so it's not all just worksheets and answers. And when it's time to grade I can lock their pages, and then pull all 129 assignments at the same time and just comment directly on the page, and sync the grade directly to my gradebook. The program was absolutely phenomenal as an interactive notebook program, but they've ruined it for my classroom with this app. I'm completely at a loss. I'm looking at having to completely redesign my classroom because of how terrible the functionality for the app is.

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  5. Anonymous
    2019-08-14T22:30:32+00:00

    I'm old school, I never found a feature in OneNote that was awesome enough to move me from note keeping in Word. But I do understand that many people do find OneNote works perfectly for them. Great. I've got 50+ docs with many MB of notes and data.

    My great fear is that this is the thin edge of the wedge.  They start with OneNote, then (dis)"improve" the rest of Office later. They'll claim that they have stats the "prove" people like the new OneNote better than the old one.

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