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Quick links: |  | New & Open Import & Export Index Synchronize Database Properties & Close Database Maintenance Print

|  |  | The File Menu

The File menu contains commands creating and deleting databases. There are options for adding or exporting files, as well synchronizing them. Additionally, if you need to do database maintenance, you will find those commands here. New & Open New Database: Creates a new database in the selected location. New Encrypted Database: Creates an AES-256 encrypted database file at a user-specified size. Technically this database uses an encrypted disk image but will not be visibly mounted in the Finder. Obviously, when you enable Spotlight for the database the data that Spotlight needs to store will not be encrypted. The anticipated size of the database can be specified in megabytes (MB) or gigabytes (GB). Open Database: Opens previously created databases. You can select multiple databases. Open Recent: Presents a list of recently used databases, which gives you quick access to your frequently used databases. Choose Clear Menu to remove all items from the menu. New Window: Opens a new main window for the selected database. Import & Export Import: The Import submenu contains various options for importing data, e.g.,selected files, bookmark, contacts, and some data from compatible applications. Some options will import files into their own special groups at the root of the database. Files and Folders: Imports selected files or folders. Files will be imported to the current location. Finder tags and Spotlight comments will be imported. Bookmarks: Imports bookmarks from DEVONagent Pro, Firefox, Google Chrome, or Safari as bookmarks. Bookmarks are imported into a newly created group bearing the name of the chosen browser. Only new bookmarks are imported if you use this command again. Contacts: Imports Apple Contacts addresses selected in the import dialog into a newly created group named "Addresses". Contacts can be imported as a sheet, as vcards (`.vcf`), or as bookmarks. Previously created groups are reused. Tip: To import all addresses, select all addresses in the group "All" and import them. Address card bookmarks link to the original card in the Contacts application. Folders & Attachments from Notes: Imports your notes from Apple Notes. Items from Yojimbo: Imports all items from Yojimbo into a newly created group named "Yojimbo". Imported items retain their name, label, flag, URL, comments, tags and creation/modification dates. Items without a URL link back to the original item in Yojimbo. Notes from Evernote: Imports selected notebooks from an import dialog into a newly created group named "Evernote". Tags, dates, and URLs should be preserved. Notes are stored as formatted notes. This option requires the Evernote application to be installed. PRO Images (with OCR): Imports images and applies optical character recognition (OCR) to create a searchable PDF. This makes all written text searchable and available to DEVONthink's AI functions. You can change the setting in Preferences > OCR. Read more... References from Bookends: Imports selected collections from the presented dialog into a newly created group named "Bookends". Already imported references are updated. The keywords assigned to a Bookends reference are added to the Document Properties of the created rich text document. Use the optional script Scripts > Tags > Convert keywords to tags to convert the keywords to tags if needed. Unix Mailbox: Imports Unix mailboxes, like those exported from Thunderbird. Read more... Website: Opens the Download Manager and downloads a complete web page/site for archiving and offline viewing. Make sure the download options are set correctly, especially the options that define which links DEVONthink should follow (if any). All links within the site are modified so that they point to the downloaded images or other embedded objects. This ensures that the page/site can be displayed at any time. By default, groups created by the Download Manager are excluded from tagging. Scan from ScanSnap: Scans a paper document using an attached Fujitsu ScanSnap scanner.
Note: Groups created when importing bookmarks, contacts, email messages, and items from Evernote or Yojimbo are not automatically excluded from classification and tagging. This makes it easier to classify them later.
Export: The Export submenu presents options for exporting selected documents or groups to the file system. In addition, the Export menu provides export methods based on plugins. DEVONthink comes with a number of standard plugins for exporting documents in different formats. For these formats, the export creates a single merged document when multiple files are selected. Files and Folders: Exports the selected documents in their native format. Groups are exported as Finder folders, preserving the group structure you have built in DEVONthink. DEVONthink tags are applied as Finder tags to the exported files. Internal metadata for the items is preserved in invisible `.DEVONtech_storage files`, used for reimporting into DEVONthink. If you will not be reimporting the exported files, you can safely delete `.DEVONtech_storage files`. Document: Exports the currently viewed document in its native format. For images exported from a separately opened document window, DEVONthink lets you choose the desired file format or image quality; e.g.,you can export a PNG files as a JPEG file. Text: Exports the selected items as one large plain text file. RTF Document: Exports the selected items as one large rich text file without embedded images, etc. RTFD Document: Exports the selected items as one large rich text file with embedded images, etc. Word Document: Exports the selected items as one large Microsoft Word file. PDF Document: Exports the selected items as a paginated PDF. Hold the ⌥ Option key to change allow the command to PDF Document without Annotations. OPML: Exports the selected items as one OPML file. Website: Exports the selected items as standalone web site that you can upload to your web server and share with colleagues. In the presented dialog window, choose the desired template, text encoding, and whether DEVONthink should convert diacritics and accented characters to HTML entities or not. Check Create Index Pages to create `index.html` pages with cross-links to all included documents. Markdown and formatted notes are rendered to HTML, other file types that cannot be displayed in a web browser, e.g., Pages files, are converted to PDF if possible. Cross-links are converted correctly. For the export templates are used that you can modify yourself. Template: Saves the selected documents as a template, which can then be used to quickly create new documents using Data > New from Template. Export multiple documents and/or groups at once to create e.g.,a project template. Data & New from Template & Open Template Folder; can be used to organize templates. Database Archive: Creates an optimized ZIP file of the current database in the selected location. This can be useful as a secondary backup strategy. PRO Unix Mailbox: Exports all selected email messages and saves them as Unix mailbox file that can be imported into other email applications. Note this only applies to exporting native email (`.eml`) files, not files that have been converted to other formats, like plain or rich text. Share: This shows the standard Mac share menu. Index Index: Use this command to add external files and folders from the Finder. This creates links to the files but leaves them in the current location. Regarding see-also and classification, DEVONthink treats these files the same as imported files. To easily distinguish indexed items, a small Finder icon is displayed to the right their name. Update Indexed Items: Indexed items are updated when you view them. If you need to be sure everything is up-to-date use his command. If nothing is selected, the enclosing group of the current group is used. It also reads changes made to the Finder or Spotlight comments of the to-be-updated files and applies the changes to the files' counterparts in the database. Finally, this command removes indexed items that have lost their external counterpart. It does not affect items moved manually to the group. Use Update Indexed Items to keep indexed groups and their originating folders in sync or to manually update an item that you have changed directly inside the database package when DEVONthink was not running.
Note: Indexed groups are excluded from tagging by default. For more information on importing and indexing, please see the Import and Index section of the In & Out chapter.
Synchronize Synchronize: Synchronizes the selected database with all its locations. Note, this command will be disabled if the current database has no active synchronization. Holding the ⇧Shift key shows the Synchronize All option to synchronize all actively syncing databases. Download Pending Files: Downloads the files of selected documents if they are available through one of the database's locations. Only necessary of none of the database's locations is set to synchronize indexed files. Database Properties & Close Database Properties: Opens the Database Properties popup for the current database. This panel presents a few options, statistics about the database, and allows you to change the displayed name, add comments, and add a username and password. Close Database: Closes a selected database. If multiple databases are open, use Close All to close them all at once. Note that closed databases will not reopen on launch. Only databases that were open when DEVONthink quits will reopen on the next launch. Database Maintenance Like any database, DEVONthink databases need a bit of maintenance from time to time. All the commands you'll need for this can be found here. Verify & Repair: Verifies all database structures and repairs them if necessary. Use this whenever you feel it is necessary. By default, DEVONthink automatically verifies the database structure every time you open a database. If it finds significant errors, DEVONthink will advise you to run this command. Optimize Database: Creates an internal backup of the database and then optimizes the database structure. Optimizing removes unnecessary internal elements from the database and rebuilds the internal structure to optimize performance. DEVONthink also creates internal backups on a regular basis. Hold the ⌥ Option key to display the Restore Backup option. This allows you to roll back the metadata to a previous date. This option would only be used in troubleshooting situations. Rebuild Database: Completely rebuilds the database by exporting all items to a temporary folder in the file system, creating an empty database, and reimporting all items. This removes any structural problems. Depending on the size of your database, this can take from a few seconds to several hours. This option is typically only used in a troubleshooting situation. Delete Database: Closes a selected database and moves it to the Finder trash. Print Page Setup: Sets your preferred page size and printer settings. Print: Prints the current document or view.