12 Days Of Paperless Gifts – Productivity Software

12 Days Of Paperless Gifts – Productivity Software

12 Days Of Paperless GiftsThis is Day 11 in a 12 Post series: 12 Days Of Paperless Gifts. If you know someone who could use some help going paperless, or if you’d like to drop some hints, this series is for you. Don’t worry, the regular DocumentSnap tips will still be flowing.

At a high level, going paperless isn’t complicated. Use a scanner, create a high-level folder system on your computer, make sure everything is backed up, and go.

However, just because something is simple does not mean it is always easy. Fortunately, you can be more efficient by using some productivity software that takes some of the heavy lifting out of going paperless. Here are a few of my favorites.


Hazel

Hazel

  • Who is it for?: Mac users who want to automate as much as possible on their computer, including naming and filing electronic documents. I hear there is a pretty good Hazel webinar too.
  • Where can I buy it?
    Noodlesoft

File Juggler

File Juggler

  • Who is it for?: Windows users who want a Hazel-like tool. It gives you the ability to automate as much as possible, including naming and filing electronic documents.
  • Where can I buy it?
    File Juggler

TextExpander

TextExpander

  • Who is it for?: Mac users who want to dramatically speed up entering recurring bits of text (for example, filenames for electronic documents). This is the first tool that I install on a new Mac.
  • Where can I buy it?
    Smile

Breevy

Breevy

  • Who is it for?: Windows users who want to dramatically speed up entering recurring bits of text (for example, filenames for electronic documents), or TextExpander users who want to be able to sync their snippets to a Windows machine.
  • Where can I buy it?
    16 Software

PDFPen

PDFPen

  • Who is it for?: Mac users who want be able to edit PDFs, add signatures, perform OCR, and do pretty much everything else with a PDF without Acrobat’s crazy price tag.
  • Where can I buy it?
    Smile Software

Nitro Pro

Nitro Pro

  • Who is it for?: Windows users who want be able to edit PDFs, add signatures, perform OCR, and do pretty much everything else with a PDF without Acrobat’s crazy price tag.
  • Where can I buy it?
    Nitro

About the Author

Brooks Duncan helps individuals and small businesses go paperless. He's been an accountant, a software developer, a manager in a very large corporation, and has run DocumentSnap since 2008. You can find Brooks on Twitter at @documentsnap or @brooksduncan. Thanks for stopping by.

Leave a Reply 4 comments

spiritracker - December 23, 2014 Reply

Why use paid software when there is freeware that does what you need? Instead of File Juggler, I use LifeHacker’s wonderful program Belvedere. Instead of Breevy, I use Spartan Lite Multi Clipboard. It has a different purpose and therefore different approach, but it allows you to save often used text to retrieve easily… and it manages your clipboard very nicely. Instead of FileThis, Mint (from Intuit) aggregates statements rather well. I have no need to aggregate my bills. Before purchasing anything, check out free alternatives. Frequently the paid versions are what you want, but often the freeware will do the job just fine.

    Brooks Duncan - December 23, 2014 Reply

    Belvedere is great but (as far as I know) it doesn’t move files based on the text content of the PDF, does it?

Carol Dubs - December 23, 2014 Reply

Great article – I’m sure you’ve mentioned/reviewed this elsewhere on the blog, but what do you use for automatic statement retrieval? I subscribe to FileThis, and it has cut my paperwork time drastically. FileThis retrieves bank, utility, credit card, and other statements and deposits them to Evernote (you can also choose Dropbox, Box, and other locations), where I file them easily. No scanning hard copy into Evernote, no retrieval of e-statements from websites. One of my indispensable cloud tools.

    Brooks Duncan - December 23, 2014 Reply

    I don’t personally use anything for automatic statement retrieval. FileThis is excellent but for the most part it doesn’t work in Canada so it is a no go for me.

Leave a Reply: