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Pros
Innovative tag-based organizational schema. Fresh interface with system-wide integration. Automatic OCR. Integrates with cloud-based services such as Google Drive, DropBox, and SkyDrive. Android support.
- Cons Cannot designate particular folders to ignore or parse version history. Cloud support has yet to include SugarSync, Box, Evernote, or iCloud. No iOS apps?yet.
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Bottom Line
In the crowded space of document management, upstart Mac app doo trades folders for tags and elegantly interoperates with online repositories.
Doo (free) is a quietly revolutionary application?not because of its purported ability to corral "Every Document of Your Life." Other document managers allow you to consolidate cloud-based services; in fact, Otixo ($47.90 annually) supports a far greater breadth of online repositories. Rather, doo stands out in the manner in which it remaps?or perhaps I should say un-maps?constellations of documents and repositories. Where Otixo and its kin rely upon traditional folder hierarchies, doo shreds them. In promoting a searchable, taggable library, doo takes your Mac (or Windows 8 PC) where it was already headed: to an unbounded space where folders matter as little as the location of their contents.
Most Documents of Your Life
Given that doo.net has existed scarcely two years, I decided to test its most mature offering, doo for Apple OS X 10.8 Mountain Lion, though doo also supports Microsoft Windows 8 and Google Android, with additional support slated for Windows 7, iPhone, and iPad. Installation is effortless via the Mac App Store, and a simple prompt, familiar to those who have used Dropbox (free, 4 stars), guides you though initial setup.
Folders play an incongruously integral role in the setup process. You will be asked to designate a Home folder (I placed mine in my Home library), add folders you want to watch (I designated my Documents, Downloads, and Dropbox folders), and connect other document sources. Sources include Gmail, Google Drive, Microsoft SkyDrive, and, of course, Dropbox.
All of which is dandy, should "Every Document of Your Life" reside in these repositories. However, for millions of customers who rely upon SugarSync (free, 4.5 stars), Box (free, 4 stars), Evernote (free, 4.5 stars), or?perhaps most egregious for a Mac OS X application?Apple iCloud (free, 4 stars), many documents fall outside doo's purview. Furthermore, for those repositories doo does support, support is somewhat stingy. You cannot designate folders to ignore (such as shared Dropbox folders), and you also cannot peruse file versions (as with Google Docs). My hope is that future iterations of doo will address these limitations.
Foregoing Folders
Once you have added document folders and connected document sources, doo quickly transforms into Apple Spotlight on steroids. In the first place, doo can integrate system-wide. You can shortcut key to conduct searches (Preferences/Hotkeys), add files using the drag and drop space (Preferences/Menu Bar), add doo to Spotlight (Preferences/Advanced), or even set the application to launch at login (Preferences/General). Secondly, and perhaps more importantly, doo looks like an Apple application. In fact, given where iOS is likely headed, doo may foretell things to come. The interface is inviting yet demure: a flat navy-grey color scheme, in contrast to Apple's current skeuomorphism. If it sounds drab, take a look at the slideshow and prepare to be pleasantly surprised.
In selecting a less sumptuous interface, doo foregrounds what is important: your documents and their metadata (of which it makes excellent use). Everything in doo is searchable: titles, authors, dates, full text, and, of course, tags. For many of my documents, doo accurately tagged companies, people, and places?all searchable. Doo will even automatically scan images for text, further expanding the ways you can peruse files.
The tectonic shift, however, is that doo foregoes folders. Instead, doo retrieves dynamic results based upon a set of criteria (tags). Any terms with which you search qualify as tags?locations, people, dates, names, document types?and you can save a set of criteria for Quick Access (think: iTunes Smart Playlists). For example, over the years I have created a number of resumes, and I have no idea where I have saved the most recent. With doo, I located six versions created by me, after 2010, from New York, in Microsoft Word, including the word "CV." The search I conducted functions as folder?it collects documents?but better, because it will collect future documents that meet the criteria. Doo, meanwhile, will identify duplicates (if I care to confront my messiness), preview files from searches, or simply open them in the software in which they were created (in this case, Microsoft Word).
Traversing Boundaries
Many advanced users may already rely upon system-wide search as an alternative to complex folder hierarchy. For those users, doo augments the depth and scope of search. Yet a far greater number of users fall into a liminal space, conceptualizing information as files and folders, yet relying upon cloud-based services that the test the boundedness of that conceptualization. doo earns the Editors' Choice designation because it traverses boundaries: Practically, it will collect most?not all?files in a fresh, elegant interface; conceptually, it will challenge users to move beyond static folders to a more dynamic tag-based organizational schema. Doo may not work for everyone, but given it's free, there's little reason not to try it.
By William Fenton Junior Analyst, Software William Fenton is Junior Analyst of the Software, Internet, and Networking team at PCMag.com. Having worked for Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Bill Smith Group, and both of his alma maters, Rollins College and Fordham University, Will...
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