1. In a computing environment, a method for persisting data clippings categorized according to metadata associated with the clippings at the time of the creation of the clippings, the method comprising: detecting that a user has selected one or more items from a source file that is stored on a memory storage device, the items is captured for inclusion in a clipping; determining the format of each item included in the clipping, wherein at least one of the items includes a plurality of different formats where at least one of the plurality of different formats includes a greater amount of item formatting information than another format; identifying a file path for the source file from which the clipping was selected, the file path to access additional items from the source file; generating associated metadata about the selected clipping including the determined formats of each item in the selected clipping and an activatable hyperlink that, upon activation, is configured to access the source file using a stored file path linking the clipping to the source file; for each item of the clipping: determining that the items include a plurality of different formats, each different format including a greater or lesser amount of item formatting information in comparison to the other formats, such that a format with a greater or lesser amount of item formatting information than the format in which the item was initially captured for inclusion in the clipping is selectable by the user for inserting the item; persisting the item in the determined plurality of different formats based on item type along with the associated metadata, the item is configured for insertion into software application fields in any of the plurality of formats; and inserting the items into one or more data fields of a software application in a format different than the format in which the item was initially captured for inclusion in the clipping, the format is selected by the application and based on at least some of the associated metadata, the selected format for each item selected from among the plurality of formats the item was persisted in; receiving a user request to access one or more additional items from the source file; based on the received user request, activating the hyperlink to access the one or more additional items in the source file using the hyperlink provided in the associated metadata; and providing a user interface having a plurality of user-selectable views, wherein at least one of the user-selectable views displays a thumbnail in a user-preferred format corresponding to at least one of the clippings, and wherein at least one of the user-selectable views displays a list view including text corresponding to the clippings.