One of the many complaints with regards to the built in Palm’s Memos or MemoPad application (as much as it’s a great app) is that the data saved in the program is NOT in a text-based format .txt which many of us truly require to be able to easily transfer the data from the PDA or Treo to our computer or other devices that can read .txt files.

It seems like a no-brainer to have such a program or at least the capability to transfer or convert the files saved in the Memos program to .txt so that we can easily edit or manipulate and use the data. That’s why we got the PDA device in the first place, isn’t it? Otherwise, we’d carry our bulky and heavy laptop with us everywhere (okay, some of us don’t at least).

Thankfully, there’s a very useful utility called MemoManager by SunTzu Software that does exactly that can be an excellent replacement for your Memos application. Not only can you run MemoManager and be able to edit and view all the Memos you have previously created, you can also export (ie. convert) them into .txt format so that you can later manipulate the data further on your computer or other devices! And best of all, it’s FREE! Yippee!

Memo Manager

The program is quite straightforward. You launch or run the MemoManager program (after installing on your Palm device) and the program immediately loads all your Memos into the program. it takes you to the main screen which lists all your Memo entries, very similar to what you’d see when launching Memos or the Memo Pad program.

Simply select the Memo entry you wish to convert to text and tap on the button and save it on your expansion memory card and it’s done!

The program can also allow you to send your Memo entry as a text (SMS) message or you can edit it just like if you were in the Memos program, except you have much more capabilities than in the Memos program. Unfortunately (probably to prevent accidental deletions), you can’t delete the individual entries from within the program.

Best of all, the program is FREE!

For those who want to skip over all the detailed review and just want a summary, you can jump to the review summary

As mentioned already, to use the program, simply launch it on your Palm device. The program will load all the memo entries in so that it will be able to list all the memos. At the bottom of the screen, you will find three buttons: Text To Memo, Refresh, Memo. Tapping on any of those buttons will do the following actions:

Text To Memo will initiate the Text Editor feature of the program and take you to your expansion card to load a text (.txt) file for editing.

Refresh will refresh the screen and reload all the memo entries.

Memo load and run the Memos or Memo Pad program.

Convert and save Memo Pad entry as Text (.txt) file

To convert a specific Memo entry and save it as a text (.txt) file, simply select the Memo entry and select (or tap) on the Text to Memo button.

It will take you to the root directory of your expansion card and ask you where to save it. Select (or tap) on the specific folder on the card and tap on Save.

It will prompt you for the name (supplies you with one). You can change the name if you like. When satisfied with the name, tap on the Save button.

Done!

Besides converting the Memo entries as a Text (.txt) file, you can also send a particular Memo entry as a text message (SMS).

Send Memo entry as text message (SMS)

Select the Memo entry you wish to send as text message. Select or tap on the to SMS button. The program will load your Text Message (Messaging) program and you can continue on from there to send your text message.

Send Memo entry as Email

Select the Memo entry you wish to send as email. Select or tap on the to Em@il button and your email application should run.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to get it to run on my Treo (probably because I loaded my email app on the expansion card).

You can also edit your Memo entry. Simply tap on your specific Memo entry and edit or make changes like you would in Memos or Memo Pad.

The program also offers a choice of different fonts you can load the Memo entries in. Simply tap on the top right corner and it will provide you with a drop down menu of font choices.

Product Description:

Price: FREEWARE

Compatibility: Palm devices and Treo (CDMA or GSM) 600, 650, 680, 700p, 755p devices

MemoManager is a utility designed to make memo handling easier, more fun, and more efficient.

FEATURES:

» Tap the memo on the list to export it to text file, send by SMS (Treo only), or send by email (Treo only).
» Use the TextEditor drop-down to format the text before exporting or importing. The speed of memo manipulation will depend to the amount of characters.
» Txt to Memo button is use to import text files from your card into the Memo Pad.
» Import or export any text file or memo size defying Memo Pad’s 4,096 bytes limit.
» Refresh button will top up the memo list to which the latest.
» Memo button will launch Palm’s native Memo Pad.

MemoManager’s speed will depend to the amount of memo or text file you are manipulating with.

MemoManager video on YouTube

Here are my observations:

The program is very simple and straightforward to use. Launch it and you can quickly convert and save a Memos or Memo Pad entry into a text (.txt) file on your expansion memory card. From there, you can transfer it to your computer and use it for whatever purpose you wish. I especially like the program being able to support all text files beyond the Palm limit of 4096 bytes. The program seems fast enough to use, although I do find that having the program automatically refresh or reload the Memos a bit tedious after a while. You can however, cancel the refresh and get to the program asap.

The program works very well and fast as a Memos or Memo Pad entry converter. Unfortunately, if you are planning to use this program as a Text editor, I’d suggest you try a Text Editor program instead of using this program. It’s nice to have the text editor feature in the program but since it may take too long to load, I’d suggest trying a different app. If I try to load a decent sized text file, I find that it does take a certain amount of time to load it. Some files (even those that may not be too big) takes way too long (so long that I had to reset since it wasn’t going to load). This definitely is one area of the program where it can be improved upon.

Also, when in the Text Editor mode and going to the expansion card, take care to wait for the program to load before tapping on the screen. Many times, I was in a rush and ended up accidentally loading a file that hung the program (likely a non .txt file) and ended up having to reset. So, when you are tapping on the expansion card to load a file, wait a few seconds for the program and screen to fully load. Or, you may have to do that soft reset since something got loaded and it will likely take way too long to load.

Review Summary

MemoManager is a very useful software that will easily convert and save your Memos or Memo Pad entries in your Palm device into a Text (.txt) file where you can easily edit or use it on your computer. The program is fairly fast at saving and converting Memo or Memo Pad entries into text (.txt) files. Although the program also offers a Text Editor feature, unless you are loading a fairly small sized text file, you may have to wait a while for the file to load before being able to open and edit the file. I’d suggest looking at other Text Editor programs instead. It’s great that Suntzu Software has come up with a useful utility that will enable us to use our Memo Pad or Memos program beyond simply on our Palm devices.

What do you think? Have you tried MemoManager? What do you like or dislike about it? Please share your thoughts in the comments below. Check out MemoManager here.

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