Back in 2010, I wrote a review of Joe Kissell’s excellent Ebook Take Control Of Your Paperless Office.
In the intervening two-and-a-half years, I have received countless e-mails from DocumentSnap readers telling me what a great resource it is. Also during that time, a lot has changed in “going paperless” world.
I was happy to see the other day that the Second Edition of Joe’s book has been released, and I decided to take a look and see what is new. Everything I wrote in my previous review still stands, so this will be focusing primarily on the new stuff.
Note: if you aren’t familiar with the Take Control series of Ebooks, they are primarily focused on the Mac. In my opinion, this is one of the exceptions that has concepts that can be applicable to both Mac and Windows, but all the hardware and software discussed in the book are for the Mac.
Take A Step Back And Reassess
For starters, there is what I consider a very clever section called Reassess Your Paperless Office Strategy. Many of us set up a system a few years ago, but have you kept up on some of the latest developments with hardware, software, and security?
The author takes you through some of the things you might want to take a look at with your current workflow so that you can decide what (if anything) you may want to tweak. Good idea.
Where Are You Storing Your Stuff?
There is a good discussion of the things you might want to consider when you are deciding where to store your electronic documents. For example, if you’ve been “going paperless” for a while, have you given some thought to how long hard drives last?
You Have Options
There are new and/or expanded sections on options for reducing the paper you encounter in your life, how to choose a scanner and OCR software, and how to play around with the options for your scanner and software to get the best results.
I’m going to be diving into some of the more advanced OCR stuff.
The Appendix
There is a crazy-detailed online appendix associated with the book that compares and contrasts a number of scanners and OCR software packages so that you can choose the best one for you.
Should You Buy The Book?
There are a number of other updates to the first edition than what I have outlined here. If you already own the first edition, there is a 50% off upgrade price. If what I’ve outlined here sounds worth it to you, I’d go for it.
If you are a Mac user and don’t already own Take Control Of Your Paperless Office, I can highly recommend it. Joe Kissell has done a great job, and this Second Edition is even better than the first one.
