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macmacmacr

macrumors regular
Original poster
Dec 23, 2014
152
5
I would like to know how to backup and restore Notes? I cannot find any information on how to perfrom this action which should not be difficult. I do not use icloud and would think it should be simple to perform a backup function on the Mac OS running high sierra.
 

techwarrior

macrumors 65816
Jul 30, 2009
1,250
498
Colorado
If you have an Exchange account, you can "Move" notes to Exchange.

Why not use iCloud? If you use it for no other reason, it can be a very simple way to backup notes, emails, photos...you don't have to activate all of the services, just those that you need.
 

macmacmacr

macrumors regular
Original poster
Dec 23, 2014
152
5
why would I move to exchange when exchange has its own notes?

The purpose of this post is to see if Apples Notes can be easily transferred to another workstation without placing my information on another network
 

26139

Suspended
Dec 27, 2003
4,315
377
why would I move to exchange when exchange has its own notes?

The purpose of this post is to see if Apples Notes can be easily transferred to another workstation without placing my information on another network

No, it's not easy to transfer Notes to another computer without placing your information on another network.

Aren't Notes backed up via Time Machine? That seems like an easy solution.
 

macmacmacr

macrumors regular
Original poster
Dec 23, 2014
152
5
I ma surprised since I can transfer the keychain (which hold security password) easier than notes which I just use from some scrap stuff.

Does anyone know why its so difficult? Notes will export to PDF only which is strange.
 

26139

Suspended
Dec 27, 2003
4,315
377
I ma surprised since I can transfer the keychain (which hold security password) easier than notes which I just use from some scrap stuff.

Does anyone know why its so difficult? Notes will export to PDF only which is strange.

Because Apple wants everyone to use iCloud, which is easier for most people.
 

macmacmacr

macrumors regular
Original poster
Dec 23, 2014
152
5
What apple want is not the concern. Its what the user want.

I don't think the majority of apple users communicate their local files like notes through icloud.
 

26139

Suspended
Dec 27, 2003
4,315
377
What apple want is not the concern. Its what the user want.

I don't think the majority of apple users communicate their local files like notes through icloud.

I bet the majority of Apple users never think about needing to transfer their notes locally.

You can want to not use iCloud all you’d like, but that’s how it works.
 

ignatius345

macrumors 604
Aug 20, 2015
7,026
11,561
I don't think the majority of apple users communicate their local files like notes through icloud.

You'd probably be wrong about that. I would suspect that most people just set up iCloud and let it sync all their notes between their Macs and iOS devices, which is by far the easiest way to use Notes.

Since for whatever reason you don't want to use iCloud, you can set up a Google or Exchange account, move your notes into that account in the Notes sidebar, and sync both machines to the same account.

If you don't want to do that, you're probably just going to be manually going through each note and copying and pasting it out to .txt or maybe .rtf documents which you should be able to import using File → Import Notes. It does have an option to preserve folder structure, so conceivably you could make Finder folders full of your exported .txt or .rtf documents containing your notes, or just reorganize them after import.

If you want a notes app with more direct access to its files, I'd recommend Simplenote.
 
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ck119591

macrumors newbie
Oct 2, 2020
1
0
Just search on this same question. My new company has supplied a Mac but turned off iCloud as this see it as a security hole ie not secure enough. Therefore I have no way of transferring old notes off an old MAC. Yes I could Microsoft and that is supported but again how do I move my notes without doing everything individually. I thought it was interesting my USA based company though apple was insecure. That the App Store is allegedly full of malware. All roads seem to lead away from apple these days.
 
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