How to Use Ratings in DEVONthink

In DEVONthink and DEVONthink To Go, you can add different markers to objects to highlight or distinguish them from each other. This also includes the ratings for objects. But how do you use them?

Although it may not seem intuitive to you, you do not have to use the ratings qualitatively. You could use them to show the state of progress of something. For example, one star could merely indicate a project has been defined. Two stars may be the project is assigned to someone, and so on, through the fifth star being completion.

Each star could also indicate steps in a process. For example, one star equals a project is created. The second star indicates the details are being worked out. The third star is used when the project is being reviewed. If changes are needed, it goes back to a two star as changes are made. It could go back to three stars if a subsequent review is needed or even jump to four stars if the project goes directly to production after changes. And a fifth star is used when the project is completed or archived.

Also, there’s no requirement to use all the stars. Perhaps you only have three steps in a process, use 1, 3, and 5… or use 1, 2, 3. It’s up to you. You could even use a single star to indicate a boolean condition. “Has this document been emailed? Yes, so it gets a star.” No star shows it hasn’t been emailed.

Lastly, ratings can be easily used in a search. Do a search for specific ratings, e.g., rating:3. Using our production example, you could use an Any search and search for items with a rating of 2 or a rating of 4 so see what’s being worked on for submission or in production.