Inserting Web Pages into OneNote

When using OneNote for school or work, you might find it helpful to insert Web sites with research information or other useful content. For example, Figure 13.1 shows a Google search result inserted into a OneNote page.

Figure 13.1. Inserting the results of a Web search can be a helpful time-saver.

Most Web sites will paste into OneNote without problems, as shown in Figure 13.2.

Figure 13.2. Many Web sites can be inserted into OneNote exactly as they appear.

When you insert information from the Web into OneNote, the address of the Web page is inserted directly below the pasted information in the same note container, as shown in Figure 13.3. OneNote saves this information so you can return to the particular Web site at any time from your note page. Just click on the inserted hyperlink to open a new Internet Explorer window of the originating Web site.

Figure 13.3. The URL of the pasted information is inserted below the pasted information.

caution

Not all Web sites insert properly into OneNote. In particular, it's possible you'll lose some formatting such as line breaks and empty space on your notes page. Unfortunately, there isn't a good way to work around this problem. Until you try to paste Web content into OneNote, you won't know whether the page will paste properly.

Copying and Pasting Web Information into OneNote

To insert information from a Web site into a OneNote page, use the following steps:

1. Navigate to the desired Web site in Internet Explorer.

2. Use the mouse to select (highlight) the information on the Web site you want to insert into OneNote.

3. Choose Edit, Copy.

4. Switch to OneNote and click anywhere on the note page to create a new note container.

5. Choose Edit, Paste. The copied information is inserted in the note container.

If you copy information from a long Web page, OneNote only remembers the page address, not the spot on the page that contains the copied information. You'll need to scroll down the page to find the copied information.

You can also insert copied information into an existing note container. Just position your cursor within an existing note container before you choose Paste from the Edit menu.

Dragging Information from a Web Page to OneNote

You don't have to go through the hassle of copying and pasting if you want to insert an entire Web page into your OneNote page. You can actually drag and drop the page from Internet Explorer to OneNote.

To drag Web content into OneNote, do the following:

1. Select the content. If you want to select the entire Web page, click anywhere on the page and press Ctrl+A on the keyboard.

2. Once you have the content selected, click and drag the content onto the OneNote taskbar icon.

3. Once the OneNote window is visible, move your mouse pointer to the appropriate place on your OneNote page and release the mouse button to paste your content.

tip

You can quickly copy information from the Web to a Side Note. Open a new Side Note by clicking the OneNote icon in the system tray. Then drag and drop selected content from the Web to your Side Note. You can always rearrange the information into another OneNote page at a later time.

Controlling How OneNote Inserts Web Content

OneNote includes the Web site address when you copy information from a Web site. At a later time, you can click that URL to return to the Web site that contained the copied information.

If you don't want OneNote to insert the address of the pasted Web content, you can turn this feature off by following these steps:

1. Choose Tools, Options to display OneNote's Options window.

2. Click Editing to display the Editing options shown in Figure 13.4.

   Figure 13.4. You can configure how OneNote inserts pasted Web content.

   

3. Uncheck the box marked Include link to source when pasting from the Internet.

4. Click OK to save your changes.