Tomboy

If you are in the Linux/Unix environment it sounds like Tomboy might be a nice little desktop note taking utility to try. It sounds as close as anything to a Linux/Unix competitor to Microsoft's OneNote. I would say Tomboy beats Microsoft hands down on initial price (currently free, but still a pre-release). As I don't have Linux or Unix running on anything and work is slow to adopt anything new including MS products (partly do to budget, partly do to lack of technology direction - currently an environment with the mix of NT and Novell Servers, Exchange 5.5, and I still think a few desktops running Windows 95), I probably won't be utilizing either one, at least for some time. As I haven't used either one I can't really comment on how good either works, but I can say that I am not hurting. Note taking still takes time, which makes it difficult to keep up with no matter what application one uses, but as far as note taking I dump stuff I want to remember into a couple of Notes databases. I have one where I keep info article related and one I stuff project related notes into.

For any note taking product I think the ideal situation would be to have the utility running on a portable or tablet in a wireless networked environment, such that one can take the notes in the meeting rather than have to pen the notes, simply to go back to the office and key them back into an application later.