Find a note again: pins, tags, links and versions

The notes you can find again are rarely the ones in the neatest folders. They are the ones you pinned because you use them every day, tagged because they belong to more than one topic, linked from the note you were already reading, or recovered from an earlier version after a bad edit. Apple Notes and Finder give you most of these tools already, and Inkling has all four in a note that opens from the MacBook notch.

Here is how to use each one, and the habits that stop them turning into a second mess.

Why folders alone stop working

A folder asks one question when you save a note: where does it go. Most notes have more than one answer. Notes from a call about a client’s budget belong with the client, with the budget and with the week the call happened. Put them in one folder and the other two routes are gone.

Deep folder trees make it worse, because finding a note means remembering a path you chose months ago, in a different mood. Keep a few broad folders if you like them. Let pins, tags, links and versions do the finding.

Pin the handful you use every day

Most days run on a few notes: a running to-do list, the project you are in the middle of, a page of things you keep needing. Those should never have to be searched for.

• Apple Notes. Control-click a note in the list and choose Pin Note. Pinned notes sit in their own section at the top of the list.
• Files. Drag a folder into the Favorites section of the Finder sidebar, or drag a document or folder into the part of the Dock beside the Trash.

What keeps pins useful is keeping them few. When a project ends, unpin it. A pinned section with a dozen notes in it is just another list to read through.

Tags for the themes that cut across

A tag is a label you can put on as many notes as you like, and one note can carry several. That is exactly what a folder cannot do.

In Apple Notes, type # followed by a word anywhere in a note, such as #budget, and it becomes a tag. Tags collect in the sidebar, and clicking one shows every note that carries it. To combine tags, or tags with other conditions, choose File > New Smart Folder.

Finder has tags of its own for files. Control-click a file and pick a color or a tag name, and the tag appears in the Finder sidebar with every file that carries it.

A few rules keep tags from sprawling:

1. Use a short vocabulary. If you cannot remember whether you used #money or #budget, you have one tag too many.
2. Tag by how you will look. Client names, project names and kinds of note (#idea, #decision) are what you reach for later.
3. Pick singular or plural, once. #meeting and #meetings split the same notes in two.
4. Do not tag what search already finds. If the word is in the note, a tag with the same word adds nothing.

Links between notes

A link takes you from the note you are reading to the one it depends on, and that is how you find notes you had forgotten existed. A meeting note links to the project it was about; the project note links to the decisions that shaped it.

In Apple Notes on macOS Sonoma and later, type >> in a note, start typing the name of another note, and pick it from the list to make a link.

Two habits make links pay off:

• Link at the moment of writing. You know which note this one belongs with right now. In a month, you will not.
• Link both ways for notes that matter. A link only goes in the direction you made it. If a project note should list its meetings, add the link there too.

Links to web pages count as well. A note that keeps the address of its source is a note you can check later, instead of a claim you have to take on trust.

Versions, for when the note itself changed

Sometimes the note is easy to find but what you wanted is no longer in it: overwritten, trimmed or pasted over. That calls for an earlier version, and macOS is uneven here.

• Apple Notes keeps no version history you can browse. Undo works while the note is open, and a deleted note waits in Recently Deleted for a while before it is removed for good.
• TextEdit, Pages and other apps that save automatically keep versions of documents. Choose File > Revert To > Browse All Versions and step back through them.
• Time Machine, if it is set up, keeps copies of files from past backups, which is the last resort when a file has been changed or deleted.

Search, the net under everything

Even with all four habits in place, search does most of the everyday finding, so write notes that search well. Put the words you will search for into the note itself: the client’s name, the product, the exact error message. A note titled “Call” is hard to find. “Call about the Lisbon office budget” finds itself.

Spotlight, with Command-Space, searches inside files on the Mac, and the search field in Notes covers every note in it. Searching for a phrase rather than one word cuts the results down quickly.

All four in one place

Inkling brings these together for notes that open from the notch. You can pin notes, search for a phrase, follow tags and links from one note to another, and revisit previous versions of a note when an edit goes the wrong way. Daily local backups sit underneath that, so there is a second copy even if the note itself is gone.

Getting there is quick: hover over the notch or press Option-N, and the note opens over whatever you are doing. Press Command-Return and it tucks away while Ink, the pair of eyes in the notch, gives a nod. On a display without a notch, it shows a virtual one.

Notes live on the Mac, and writing and searching work offline. iCloud sync is optional, off by default, and goes through your own private iCloud. Notes export as Markdown, rich text or PDF, so a well-organized library can leave with you.

The limits: Inkling has no iPhone or iPad app, and no sharing or collaboration. It costs $12 once, with 24 hours free and no card needed, on macOS 14 Sonoma or later. If the trial ends without a license, every note stays readable, searchable, copyable and exportable, so nothing you organized is lost.

Questions

Should I use folders or tags? Both work together: a few broad folders for where notes live, and tags for the themes that run across them. If you only want one, choose tags, because a note can carry several and sit in only one folder.

Can I get back an older version of a note in Apple Notes? Not from a version history, since Notes does not keep one. If the note was deleted, look in Recently Deleted. If it was changed, Undo helps only while the note is still open.

How do I know I have too many tags? When you stop being sure which one you used. That is the point to merge the near duplicates and keep the shorter list.