Has anyone figured out a cross-platform setup for reading PDFs / ePubs with the ability to synchronize highlights / bookmarks among iPad / iOS / Android / PC / Linux etc?<p>What do people use today?
My setup right now is to upload my ePubs to Google Play Books. Once your document/book is uploaded you can access it from the app on Android/iOS or directly from the web-reader on any browser.<p>Play Books automatically syncs your reading progress, notes, bookmarks etc and there's no additional overhead on your part.
I've been playing with Polar ( <a href="https://getpolarized.io" rel="nofollow">https://getpolarized.io</a> ) as a cross platform PDF "consuming" app. By "consuming" I mean reading but also note taking / flashcard making.
So far it's been pretty good, and in addition to the note taking functionality, it doesn't have the creepy surveillance of Kindle or whathaveyou.
I use a remarkable tablet[0] in order to mark/highlight/read stuff, and the send to remarkable extension[1] to print pages and pdfs to the tablet.<p>[0] <a href="https://remarkable.com/" rel="nofollow">https://remarkable.com/</a><p>[1] <a href="https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/send-to-remarkable/mcfkooagiaelmfpkgegmbobdcpcbdbgh" rel="nofollow">https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/send-to-remarkable...</a>
Reading PDFs on Kindle Paperwhite is much more comfortable with KOReader. Thanks to <a href="https://www.willus.com/k2pdfopt/" rel="nofollow">https://www.willus.com/k2pdfopt/</a> it can crop pages and reflow text unlike the native reader. It's not the best experience with some types of documents, but generally it works very well.<p>I don't have a solution for synchronization at this point. My current workflow is quite involved: import a document into Calibre, upload it to Kindle via Calibre wireless connection (KOReader supports it), read and highlight, get the modified doc back to Calibre, extract highlights with <a href="https://github.com/0xabu/pdfannots" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/0xabu/pdfannots</a>. It'd be more convenient to send new highlights from Kindle somewhere immediately without transferring the document itself. I haven't looked into it, but I believe it should be possible with a KOReader plugin.
I use zotero (<a href="https://www.zotero.org/" rel="nofollow">https://www.zotero.org/</a>) for all of these functions of reading, note taking and managing references.<p>Also bonus - support latex and bibtex. You can highlight in the pdf, and zotero will extract those highlights and add them to the entry as notes. Very handy.
It's no use for technical books but for all normal text I use (the real) Kindle for reading most of it, with Pocket for web pages synced over to it via p2k and non mobi books converted via either Amazon through email or Calibre or online equivalent for epubs.
I have a jury-rigged system, as I use my 2-in-1 stylus-equipped Chromebook for most of my reading and annotating. It's not very elegant, or FOSSy, but it works reasonably well.<p>I basically use Dropbox as a back-end, using Autosync for Dropbox (fka Dropsync) [0] on Android and ChromeOS (and the vanilla Dropbox Linux desktop client on Kubuntu) to keep the files synchronized (storing them on SD cards on my phone and Chromebook). I have it automatically sync frequently, and the app automatically uploads local changes to the cloud.<p>For PDFs, syncing the highlights is of course trivial; as a reader, I use Okular on Linux and Xodo [1] on Android/ChromeOS. Xodo has more features -- I like using my Chromebook's stylus to scribble notes in the margins -- and everything ports well to Okular, and vice versa.<p>For EPUBs, I use Calibre on Linux and Moon+ Reader Pro [2] on Android / ChromeOS. In practice, though, I use the latter almost exclusively; it has a built-in Dropbox sync functionality [3], though I'm not sure the highlights etc. are accessible by other apps.<p>[0] <a href="https://metactrl.com/" rel="nofollow">https://metactrl.com/</a><p>[1] <a href="https://www.xodo.com/" rel="nofollow">https://www.xodo.com/</a><p>[2] <a href="https://moondownload.com/download.html" rel="nofollow">https://moondownload.com/download.html</a><p>[3] <a href="https://raymondlamsk.blogspot.com/2018/03/moon-reader-how-to-sync-bookmark-bet-devices.html?m=1" rel="nofollow">https://raymondlamsk.blogspot.com/2018/03/moon-reader-how-to...</a>.
I have to rename my epubs to png and then I can send them to kindle via the share button (send to kindle doesn't support epubs directly for some reason)<p>After that it's available everywhere including my mobile phone and kindle reader which makes it quite easy to remain in sync (bookmarks, highlights, last page, etc)
I'm always looking to better my flow for PDF reading so really appreciate this question.<p>I have settled with Notability due to its nice iPad app where I use my Apple Pencil to annotate - the annotated PDF syncs to iCloud so it's available on Apple products (don't think it supports Android/Linux so maybe not cross-platform but something I'd recommend checking out if you can live with that limitation). If it's a book I'm using to learn something (usually tech), I then transfer notes to Bear in outline format (using the Notability mac app to read notes) and sometimes Anki for flashcards. One downside is that Notability doesn't support ePub so I either convert those or read on Kindle.<p>I tried OneNote recently but the iPad app seems unable to handle larger PDFs like textbooks which is a major bummer and surprising to me.
All my non-technical reads are done in Kindle, so it takes care of synchronizing bookmarks, highlights and notes. When work permits I can read non-technical stuff in my computer (Ubuntu), I use Kindle Read on the browser.<p>For everything else, I use Calibre and the standard PDF reader that comes out of the box with Ubuntu. I keep notes, highlights and bookmark indications in separate Google Keep notes, one note per title or, sometimes, one note per "subject", which would include various books and articles I'm reading. The method sounds like extra work, and it is, but it's rewarding because Keep is very flexible and easy, its tagging feature and "searchability" work fine.
I suffer from the same issue. I use KOReader, which does do sync, but uses its own zsync protocol, which basically nothing else supports.<p>I use Kybook 2 on my iPad. I think Calibre supports syncing with Kybook 3, so you could try that.<p>If you really want highlight syncing etc, it might be worth migrating to a Kindle-first workflow? But PDFs aren't there.<p>Why is this so hard :( Why can't everything use a standard progress sync protocol? (KOReader's is at <a href="https://github.com/koreader/koreader-sync-server" rel="nofollow">https://github.com/koreader/koreader-sync-server</a>)
I used to run a pet-project that was basically pdf.js that would save your last scrolled position in the database so you could continue from where you left.<p>Also, you could upload your PDFs and you would have a simple online library.
Hey There,<p>BookFusion is exactly what you are looking for. BookFusion allows you to upload, organize, manage and sync your eBooks(PDF,EPUB, MOBI and several other formats) across iOS, Android and Desktop(via Web). All your bookmarks, reading progress, highlights and notes are always synced across all devices.<p>More details at <a href="https://www.bookfusion.com/reading" rel="nofollow">https://www.bookfusion.com/reading</a><p>Calibre Plugin - <a href="https://www.bookfusion.com/reading/calibre" rel="nofollow">https://www.bookfusion.com/reading/calibre</a><p>Native iOS and Android apps. We will be releasing our native cross platform app in 2020.<p>PS: Founder at BookFusion. Will be happy to hook the HN crew up. Let me know if you have any feedback. Tons of improvements and new features coming in 2020.
I just use Dropbox. It's straightforward, on Mac/PC it's just use system reader. On iOS you can just open it with Dropbox itself.<p>There are a lot of publications like Manning also have Dropbox integration, and automatically deliver new copy every time when new versions are available.
I do all my reading now in LiquidText on the iPad. I absolutely love the app and it's ease of extracting and cross referencing information onto your own notes section. Sadly, not cross platform.
After being all in the Apple ecosystem for the next 5-10 years but wanting to use a Kindle I decided to use Kindle + Kindle App in iOS (iPhone and iPad), after reading I export the highlights and add them to a Notion DB of my read/reading list where I can easily review the highlights when needed.<p>At one point I think i will give up on Kindle as a book reading and go all in for the iPad and I will switch to Apple Books but I think i will still export the highlights to somewhere.
I use Mendeley, I go through books and then export and print the highlighted version.. I might give zotero another go though.. Polar kind of ran like crap last I tried it.
I have my Calibre library - and lots of other stuff - autosynced to the much maligned but actually superb MEGA service where some small fee gets me 8 TB to play with. So stuff is instantly retrievable on various phones and secondary PC's.<p>If I really need sync of progress, I either rely on something called memory, or work from Calibre's built-in webserver.
I bought Onyx Boox, that runs Android 6, and that means I can read pdf, login to Kindle, Play Books, e.t.c.<p>For pdf's I usually just use SyncThing (but I don't have bookmarks there), for the rest I use the various apps. I am considering trying out Mendeley again, that is geared more towards researchers, but works cross-platform :-)
iBooks. <a href="https://imgur.com/a/TzZjbwz" rel="nofollow">https://imgur.com/a/TzZjbwz</a><p>Works great. Has all the research papers I read. Dunno about synchronizing highlights, but airdrop makes it simple to get PDFs on and off my phone.
For PDFs, I've been using Readdle PDF Expert or Readdle Documents for years now. It syncs with Dropbox (both ways), and I have huge collections of PDFs that I mostly read on the iPad. A subset is also available on my iPhone.<p>Highly recommended.
I mostly have pdf docs and syncing my changes across platforms is very Well managed by syncthing's incremental syncing. Irrespective of the application i use to read, if syncthing is installed, i can access and sync any file.
evince on my desktops / laptops (all of which run Debian), and Adobe Reader on ipad. I upload to my ipad through google drive, then access in safari on ipad, download the pdf, and export to Acrobat. The reason I don't use ipad's builtin Preview app is because it doesn't support continuous reading (so need to manually zoom in a bit every time I turn a page), and also because it doesn't support inversion of colors (I'm aware you can invert colors for _everything_ in ipad, but that comes at the expense of disabling night-shift, and I want both night-shift _and_ inverted pdf colors).
Wonderful thread with many interesting ideas. Along the same lines, does anyone know a shared solution to this? Ideally FOSS. I have huge numbers of PDFs that it'd be nice to be able to share and annotate in a small group.
Does anybody know of an application I can use as both a PDF/ePub reader and a manually sortable reading list? It seems so simple, but I haven't found any program that does both.
On Android pocketbook reader (imho most practical ux experience for reader), Macos - preview and ibooks. I'm still looking for epub/pdf reader with good ux on Windows.
Emacs + org-mode is cross-platform. Anyone using it for their PDF workflow? If so, what works or doesn't work well and what is recommended setup? And is there any way to map digital ink annotation into something more emacs friendly (i.e. text-based representation)?