7

I've got a Dropbox account where I store my OneNote files. On my Windows boxes this makes it really handy to work with the same files on multiple machines, however I would also like to be able to view them on my Mac's too (I'm not so bothered about editing them).

So does anyone know if there is a OneNote file viewer for Mac OS X?

2
  • 1
    From what I have seen, the only thing that comes close is importing the OneNote files into Evernote in Windows, and then synchronizing that with your Mac.
    – fideli
    Feb 19, 2010 at 0:23
  • @fideli - Thanks for the suggestion, I didn't know Evernote could do that. I already use Evernote for personal stuff whilst OneNote is for work. I think I'll give the import a try! Can you put your comment as an answer please so I can upvote it :).
    – Pauk
    Feb 19, 2010 at 9:15

7 Answers 7

4

Adding my comment as an answer. From what I have seen, the only thing that comes close is importing the OneNote files into Evernote in Windows, and then synchronizing that with Evernote on your Mac.

OneNote Import Wizard

2
  • 1
    Thanks fideli. I've gone with this approach and whilst the importer does a good job, its not perfect. Specifically links to other notebooks and sections you may add don't get converted and any embedded files (like PDFs, Word Docs, Excel spreadsheets) are not copied over. It just creates a screen shot of the file so you have to manually copy them over. But for me, I can live with that. Gives me a chance to do some tidying up. Plus I like how its tagged the individual notebooks so they're actually easier to find now. Anyway, I don't know why I didn't think of using Evernote!
    – Pauk
    Feb 19, 2010 at 14:47
  • Hey, that's great. I don't use OneNote myself so I wasn't aware about how the functionality is decreased with this import method. Having said that, the screenshot style method is good enough for when someone sends me OneNote files.
    – fideli
    Feb 19, 2010 at 16:54
2

I have been using OneNote in Windows environments for years and I always appreciate its ability to synchronize between machines. About a month ago I had a similar need to yours because I started to work also on iMac.

There is Outline app (http://outline.ws) that not only reads OneNote notebooks but also allows editing them. It supports native OneNote format and can easily synchronize changes between Windows and Mac OS X machines. It also integrates with Dropbox so you can directly open notebooks from your current repository.

I am still watching carefully this synchronization abilities but it seems to work pretty well so far (I do not use Dropbox but Bittorrent Sync to move files between Windows and iMac).

Previously I had been using Outline on iOS for about a year or two in read only mode - usually I exported bunch of OneNote notebooks to my iPad just before my holidays to have them available in case I need to find some information. Outline is great in this scenario.

1
  • 1
    Thank you for a kind and right comment. I have expanded my answer. Sep 13, 2016 at 21:25
1

OneNote files format is proprietary, so finding a viewer is not easy.

You could always export your notes as PDF to view them easily on a Mac.

1
  • Interesting idea, but I have a lot of notebooks and sections, so there would be quite a lot of export. I'd like to be able to view them as needed. Thanks for your answer though.
    – Pauk
    Feb 19, 2010 at 9:20
0

You can open Onenote files directly on your Mac, with no need to go through Evernote on a PC, etc. Here is how. With a Onenote file open in a browser save the whole page as an html file (not webarchive). Do it on the desktop for the sake of clarity if you need to. Your html file will have its own folder alongside of it. Open this folder and scroll until you find a file called onenoteframe.html.

Don't open it with a browser. Do not just click on this file. Open it with TextEdit or with Evernote right on your Mac. You can open this file with any editor that will open html. Right click to "Open with") You will probably have to erase a little unwanted info from the Onenote website, but you will have your complete formated file. Evernote renders many unwanted icon images from the webpage that need to be deleted but produces a better copy all in all. - Max

1
  • Open the file with a browser on a Mac? How do you get the browser to do this? Safari and Firefox both just prompt me to save the file.
    – kuzzooroo
    Jan 20, 2014 at 17:11
0

You can use OneNote for Mac from Microsoft. Download it from Mac App Store. Connect to your OneDrive. It is free, all. If you want independence from MS, then Outline (Mac, iOS, many clouds supported, and even possibility to keep files local only) is the best solution, but not free. GrowlyNotes, even similar to OneNote in the way to naage information in, is not compatible with the format and will not open the notebooks.

0

BitRecover has a OneNote converter for Windows. If you can borrow a Windows machine you can break out of the OneNote jail, converting your notes to various formats. Its not free though.

Outline is an app that you can trial for free that will allow you to export to .pdf format but it puts all the notes from a single Notebook into a single .pdf file. You can copy and paste individual notes from this file in text format (not an image file like OneNote copies).

I found that I can copy and paste from OneNote notes into Mac TextEdit and it will convert the image into text but you lose formatting.

-2

You can use Growly Notes, a very well-rated freeware solution.

1

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .