Exporting Yahoo Notepad to Google Docs

For years, whenever I have created a new account with a website or bought software that had a serial number, I would use notepad.yahoo.com to create a new note titled with the name of the software, company, or website and write hints to myself about account logins and passwords or any other information I might need. This is especially useful for infrequently visited sites or infrequently used information. (Ted uses his Palm Pilot iPod Touch this way.)

I routinely go to notepad.yahoo.com a few times a week and type a quick search to find the notes I need.

However, since I have not used Yahoo mail for a long time, I've always wanted to move all 156 notes over to either Google Docs or Google Contacts. Until today, I never was able to find an easy way to do it.

Today, a google search for "yahoo notepad export" listed at the top exactly what the doctor ordered. Greg Sadetsky created a page that will log into your Yahoo account, export the notes, and optionally create one Google Doc per note. Any labels for the notes are carried over to Google's label/folder tag.

I had to think carefully about doing this. I was giving someone I don't know access to both my Yahoo and Google accounts. And while I changed my logins to have temporary passwords, there is sensitive data behind those accounts. In some ways my Notepad notes were keys to everything else (although I only tend to store hints.)

Can I trust Greg?

I looked at his home page, his linked-in page, and how he wrote the FAQs for his utility. I concluded this was an honest guy who has written some clever code and has gone to the trouble to share it. He even offered a "safer" way to run the program myself by downloading the code.

I decided, sure, I can trust Greg. I ran the utility, and it worked! I had to actually run it 4 or 5 times to get all 156 notes to go over (deleting the incomplete, exported set each time.) The utility seemed to time out at random counts between 80 and 130 until it finally got to all 156. Not sure if it helped, but the last time, I kept bouncing between the utility, Google Docs, and Yahoo Notes to make sure none of the systems were timing out.

Not sure how many other Yahoo Notepad users are out there looking to migrate, but I can highly recommend Greg's work. Thanks Greg!