MRCRWALKER  Eaglefiler is a terrific app. for organizing the thousands of documents and thousands more other types of files on my Mac.

I have tried virtually all of the document management apps available (e.g. DevonThink, Journler, YoJimbo, etc.) and they are all different, but the two seriously functional apps in this group are DevonThink (DT) and Eaglefiler (EF). Two things made me choose EF over DT Pro:

1) EF can handle many more types of files than DT can, and

2) it doesn't store the docs it handles in an SQL database that can't be accessed from the Finder (like DT). The latest version of DT can "index" files rather than copy them into its database, but DT doesn't perform very well if you try to "index" a significant quantity of docs (the developer admits the indexing function wasn't designed to be the primary means of bring files "into" DT).

DT Pro Office, as a suite, has more features than EF, but most of those are already easily handled otherwise in my case, and of course it's more expensive. Although I'm still learning EF, it does seem that the "AI" searching and auto-indexing of DevonThink are superior to the search functions in EagleFiler, which are themselves far superior to the functionality of Spotlight. But what both apps can do, EagleFiler tends to do them better. Add to that the two points above, and Eaglefiler was the winner for my own needs.  
(Version 1.4.6)

TEKSESTRO  I intended to use of EagleFiler as an email archival program. As such, I expected that the program would enable me to effectively archive old messages, while enabling me to search through and access them as needed, in the future. Unfortunately, the program seems to be impossibly slow when dealing with reasonably large amounts of email data, which renders it useless to email archival purposes.

My email database has over 50,000 messages, which I've accumulated only in the last 3 years. Exporting these messages from Mail is in itself a chore, as the Mail functions choke on mailboxes that contain over 3,000 messages. Because of that, when exporting truly large mailboxes - such as my 'Sent' or 'Inbox' boxes - I have to 'break down' the export into several .mbox files, each containing less than the 3,000 maximum number of messages. As a result, for large mailboxes, I end up with a series of files - "sent_1.mbox", "sent_2.mbox", etc. - which then will have to be re-compiled together by the importing program. In total, I exported about 20 mbox files, which I then proceeded to import into EagleFiler.

Importing and re-assembling the mailboxes in EagleFiler took over 16 hours in total. Although EagleFiler seems to import an mbox file quite quickly, it has no function to allow you to merge mailboxes. Therefore, the only solution is to create a new folder, and move all of the email messages from the individual mailboxes into that folder. Should be a simple operation, but when selecting and dragging 3,000 messages, EagleFiler would make me wait up to 4 minutes on my MacBook with a spinning beachball before giving me any visual feedback that it had not crashed. Actually transferring each message from the imported mailbox into the new folder takes a lot longer.

Trying to save time, I would try to perform 2 transfers simultaneously. Both transfers would start, and continue for a while, but without fail, eventually one of them would 'get stuck' while transferring a message, and then the whole program would freeze with a spinning beachball. After about 15 minutes waiting for the program to try and recover itself, I would have to force-quit it, re-open it, and start the transfers again.

Once all 50,000 messages were transferred, I found that actually using the program was nearly impossible, due to endless waits and lags that appear everywhere:

* opening the program takes over 2 minutes, with no visual feedback given that anything is happening

* every time the program opens, it checks the entire database to see if it needs re-indexing - this leaves the program unresponsive and sluggish for anything up to 6 minutes

* trying to view *any* single email brings up the spinning beachball, and a delay of about 10-15 seconds

In summary: EagleFiles seems to be absolutely useless when dealing with large amounts of data. It seems that a lot more optimisation needs to happen on the code, before the program can be of any use for longer-term archival of email or other large quantities of data.

It seems to me that this application was designed to 'collect' together a SMALL amount of information, such as documents, pictures, emails, and random bits of information that might belong to a project. At those tasks, it may do an acceptable job, although other, older and more feature-full apps exist that already fill that market - such as DevonThink. As an email or large archival/data storage utility, it fails miserably.  
(Version 1.4.5)

MYSTERY TRAMP  Fine program. Crisp interface. It does an excellent job. I deal with a lot of files with ".ged" extension, and EagleFiler recognizes them as text files, and displays them correctly.

Two quibbles. One, the help file says it reads Bean documents, but the ".bean" docs I've imported aren't displayed.

Two, I think $40 is a little rich for my blood, but I may have to break down and bite the bullet.

Nice job.

mt  
(Version 1.4.5)

KLAGRECA  EagleFiler is an example of why the MacOS platform is the greatest system. This application is amazing.

EagleFiler has helped me organize my stuff by effectively extending the OS -- not replacing it. I can still find my PDFs and other documents through spotlight, or I can navigate my stuff through EagleFiler. That's a big plus.

The features of Eaglefiler are designed to maximize efficency while not complicating my life. Web page? No problem. PDF? Indexes it. Need to add tags? Yup. EagleFiler takes care of everything I need to ever file.

Finally, the software is regularly updated with new features, improvements and fixes.

Hearty thanks go out to Mike. You've helped me simplify my life!   
(Version 1.4.5)

STEVEN GOODHEART  EagleFiler continues to be one of the best and most useful programs I own and use every day -- and the updates and improvements keep on coming. I am especially happy about the new ability to recognize and import tags that are stored in a file’s extended attributes, for use with my tagging programs like Punakea. Also, being able to import from a Smart Folder is a way cool improvement that I immediately find useful. Support from Michael Tsai is as good as I've ever had with any Mac software I've used. Can't recommend EagleFiler enough. Steve  
(Version 1.4.5)

ZX  Good app but:

1. The software update is forever broken..

2. HTML rendering/Webarchive is very bad.

3. The Activity-Windows should be build into the app.

4. Can't find eMails via spotlight....?  
(Version 1.4.4)

BLLOYD  I have been a long time user of DEVONthink, and a long time "tinkerer" with all sorts of applications in this area, including Yojimbo, Together, EagleFiler, and others. I had kept coming back to DEVONthink because it was flat-out superior in search, stability, and speed. But it really bugged me that it was ugly, couldn't be customized as I wanted, and lacked a number of "modern" features like tagging and smart folders.

DEVONthink Pro is immensely powerful and customizable, but the implementation (custom applescripts) left a lot to be desired. Plus, it is unable to view unsupported file types (Pages, Keynote, Excel, etc.) and it permanently munges Word files to RTFs on import. Not great, but I tolerated it.

So I had kept looking at alternatives, including EagleFiler, but EagleFiler also was on the ugly side (IMO) and lacked customizable smart folders. So, not enough to tempt me to switch.

As I waited for DEVONthink 2.0 (and waited...) lo and behold, along goes EagleFiler 1.4. The GUI is overhauled, true smart folders are there (that I can define myself), it supports all file types... and unlike Together, the search is actually powerful. So I give it a try, and migrate all my data over.

I come up with a few snags (file naming, titles, etc.) and within an hour find scripts that help me batch change everything. Awesome! And it's full of good surprises. After a week of use, it keeps getting better... so we have a product that searches well, looks nice, is flexible, and is fairly fast (DT Pro is still faster, but EagleFiler is certainly tolerable).

So, IMO, for document management, flexibility, searching, tagging, organization, etc., EagleFiler is now the top of the heap. Certainly enough for me to plonk down the $40... given many of the features it has (save OCR) are only present in DT Pro Office which is $150.

Nice work, Michael. I'm somewhat shamed to admit that the GUI overhaul had a big part in my final decision, but hey. It's Mac software. We're fickle like that :-)  
(Version 1.4)

STEVEN GOODHEART  All I can say is WOW! What a terrific update. Every new feature makes EagleFiler incredibly more usable and versatile.

The new custom smart folders are a huge leap forward in terms of being able to filter and modify one's data in EF. The sheer flexibility of the criteria one can use (17 different kinds, from tags to notes to labels to file size to URL to creation date to just about you-name-it), combined with the ability to nest criterion give me unmatched horsepower in terms of seeing my gigabytes of research data the way I want to see. If such powerful smart folders weren't enough, I can now add actions to the smart folders and further modify my data. Unbelievably cool! I'm only just beginning to see all that I can do with the new power of these smart folders. This is the first time I've begun to think that I could find a replacement for DevonThink Pro in my daily use; this version of EagleFiler is that much more powerful.

The new Stationery Folder function has immediately become a huge time saver for me - for example, I can now create MS Word files, or MindJet MindManager mind map files, instantly, from within EagleFiler based on templates I've created in these, or other, programs. Sweet!

I am especially loving and using the new tag cloud window for quickly see what tags I'm using with an item and for quickly adding or changing the tags I have assigned.

Now that I can drag individual e-mail messages into EF as free-standing .eml files, I'm finally going to start using EF as my mail archive database, because I really wanted to be able to store individual e-mail messages along side my other kinds of data in my EF folders. Now I can make a individual message a "to do" or "next action" based on tags and other criteria within the email message. And to top it off, I can search for these individual files with Spotlight, and not just within EF.

Although it's short bullet in the list of changes, perhaps the most important new function for me as writer/researcher has been the addition of a Find panel for searching *within* PDF and Web archives. This was one area where DevonThink Pro really outperformed EagleFiler for my daily research. I really needed to see *inside* the hundreds of PDFs I had, not just look at titles or tags. And what's more, EagleFiler does this search within PDFs and Web Archives much faster than DevonThink Pro does, though DTPro still has some advantages in its interface on searches.

As a user of Punakea, I'm really pleased to see the new options for importing tags, especially since the "Import as notes and tags" helps me get Punakea-style tags into EagleFiler without having to lose my non-Punakea style info in my Spotlight comments.

Finally, I've used the new contextual menus dozens of times today -- how cool is it to be able to select text and instantly make it the title of the something you've grabbed from the Internet or some PDF, or instantly to make a keyword in record a tag? Huge time-saver.

Yes, this is a rave review, but I think these improvements deserve my rave. I make my living as a writer/editor and I'm constantly doing research. EagleFiler has always been great in terms being able to instantly grab or import just about anything anywhere on my iMac or the Internet. But with these new features, it takes a huge leap forward in helping the end user filter, classify, and categorize data and research quickly and efficiently.   
(Version 1.4)

HEZMANA  Well things change. Overnite the new version came out and no longer supports Drop Box making the $104.00 spent on 3 lic #'s a loss.

To bad they went back to isync.  
(Version 1.4)

HEZMANA  Love it, I used to use Yojimbo which appears to be ignored by it's developer. Eagle filer is easier to use, but it does not have the slick interface of Yojimbo. As noted in other reviews, it allows you to use a library that can be placed where ever you want, what an idea. It works great in Drop Box. My Yojimbo no longer worked with .MAC (ME), on any of three computers.

Again Eagle Filer is great, maybe a bit expensive, but worth it.

The only issue I have is that you must encrypt entire libraries and cannot just do one document. Maybe a future feature request.  
(Version 1.3.8)