Looking for note taking overlay app

[Airfoil]

Hello,

I'm looking for a small popup type note taking app for my iPad. My iPad mini is jailbroken, so any app would be great.

The issue is I'm mostly paperless and make heavy use of my iPad mini to keep track of everything I do, and everything that would otherwise be written down on paper. Problem is more often than not, I need some temporary information from one app to write down in another app (i.e. a phone number, address, confirmation number, etc) At present, my only option is to switch back and forth many, many times or to write down the information on a piece of paper. Both of these solutions suck.

My thinking is a small writable area that is available to both apps would be ideal. Either a small post-it type note, or a writable area in the notification area, or even a writable area on the SBsettings popup would do the trick.

I've tried Google searching for such an app, and guess I'm just not using the correct keywords because I'm not finding anything. Closest solution I've ran across is Quasar, but that is too clunky of a solution for what I am attempting.

 

[Mickey330]

Have you looked at the Fast Notes option in SBSettings? You may have to turn on the toggle, but here's what it looks like:



You can easily bring this note pad up to type/jot a note on, then dismiss it for later viewing/editing.

Maybe that's something you can use?

Marilyn

P.S. To those reading - this is a default toggle that comes with SBSettings, something you can only get from Cydia (with a jail broken iPad).

 

[twerppoet]

Marilyn seems to have your best solution, but I'll add a couple (non-jailbreak) ideas anyway.

(1) If you can normally select and copy the information in the first app you might want to consider the combination of Evernote and EverClip.

When EverClip is active anything you copy creates a note in the EverClip app, with a confirmation beep to let you know it happened. Later you can edit and/or combine clips before sending them to Evernote.

The only real weakness of the app is that it will time out in 10 minutes if not used. It does warn you that it's timing out though, so you can reactivate it. I'm hoping the new multitasking features announced for iOS 7 will allow the EverClip app to be running permanently in the background, if desired.

(2) Another workaround is to make sure you've opened your preferred note taking app already. You can four finger swipe between it and your current app. Copy&Paste (again) would be the best way to move info between the apps, if it's possible.

(3) If you're not public, or don't mind looking a bit odd, you can use Siri to create Notes and/or Reminders. The problem I have with this is that Siri doesn't handle pauses very well, and I'm not good at formulating my thoughts on the fly without pausing. And, of course, sometimes Siri doesn't translate the text right.

I'm betting most people don't know that you can scroll back up to where Siri's speech bubble shows what you (supposedly) said, tap it, and edit the text. Depending on what you want Siri to do this can be handy. When taking Notes, it results in two notes, both the original and the edited version.

 

[Airfoil]

Have you looked at the Fast Notes option in SBSettings?

Awsome! Thanks! This is what I'm after, and I love that I can copy/paste from the FastNote window. Perfection would be this window supporting handwriting and perhaps handwriting-to-text conversion.

@twerppoet, Yes, I do utilize copy/paste as well as the linking of common text (phone numbers opening in Google voice, addresses opening in Waze, etc). But it seems I still run across the times where the information can not be selected for copy/paste (such as an app that does not permit copy/paste or readable info embedded within an image). This is where I'm looking for something like the FastNote option enable me to open a small window to write the info down without the 4-finger swipe dance.

 

[twerppoet]

Yep. I figured it was that, but couldn't resist adding a few idea anyway, just in case someone who is not jailbroken came across the thread.

Screen shots are another way to take a quick note if you can't copy and paste. Still a bit of a hassle since you'd have to go back and crop and copy the picture to whatever note keeping app you want. Skitch is nice for that.