Getting Started
Our new app is called MetaPDF and is implemented as generic, standalone application to annotate PDFs in Google Drive:
You can also install the App from the webstore:
https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/metapdf/nhnbognfanffpjhcfldafanffokakpkd
Feedback and reporting bugs
Please post all feedback and bugs in this thread. If you run into issues with a particular PDF (e.g. can’t open or can’t write/sync) and it is not too sensitive or private share it with andreas@paperpile.com.
Feature highlights
- Annotations are saved natively in the PDF and can be read and edited by any standards compliant PDF program.
- Annotations are synced back transparently to Google Drive.
- Fully collaborative. Annotate PDF in realtime together.
- PDFs are processed locally, i.e. the PDF is never transferred or stored on our servers.
- Properly displayed highlight annotations that are not overlays over the text but “painted” natively on the page.
- Streamlined UI with keyboard shortcuts (e.g. select text and try pressing 1,2,3,4) and full undo capabilities
- Markdown support in annotations
- Beautiful, printable summaries of all annotations in a file
- More to come…
Roadmap
Step 1: Initial release as standalone app without sharing and collaboration.
Step 2: Sharing and collaboration.
Step 3: Allow opening PDFs from Paperpile in MetaPDF
Step 4: Integrate MetaPDF as Paperpile branded viewer in Paperpile.
Step 5: Show highlights and notes of PDFs in Paperpile.
Known issues
- Currently, MetaPDF is Chrome only, will work on other browsers in the future though.
- In the unlikely case that MetaPDF corrupts your PDF file you can revert to an earlier version within the last 30 days using the “Manage versions” feature of the Google Drive webapp.
What’s new in Beta 2
A non-comprehensive list of changes since the first beta.
General
- Privacy: Fewer permissions are required (the app now only requires access to files uploaded via MetaPDF)
- MetaPDF can now be installed via the Chrome Webstore
- PDF files can be opened directly with MetaPDF from the Google Drive Webapp or GMail
- Reloading of the tab will actually reload the document
- Linkable URLs via app.metapdf.com/g/[gdrive-id],
- Undo for all actions
- Many more small fixes and improvements
Saving and syncing
- Real-time saving of all changes that will be restored in a new session even when they have not been synced back to Google Drive
- Automatic sync to Google Drive is now optional (useful for large files).
- Check if file has changed outside of MetaPDF and ask the user if she wants to keep the version open in MetaPDF or the externally changed version in Google Drive.
Collaborative features
- Files can be annotated collaboratively in real-time
- Files can be shared with other users right from within MetaPDF
- Other users can reply to comments.
UI
- Annotations list panel can be resized and hidden
- Width of “Sticky” notes can be adjusted
- Comments only show author details if multiple users have added comments. That saves space for the major use case when only one user annotates a file.
- File can be dragged to MetaPDF right from the Chrome download bar
- Always show current page number and total number of pages
- Fixes for zooming
- Improved recent files list (files that are not present in Google Drive anymore when opened will be deleted from the list)
- Various new keyboard shortcuts
Annotations
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Full screen annotation view
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New color scheme for highlights
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Markdown support for notes
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Print document with and without annotations
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Export annotations in Text, HTML, OPML and JSON formats
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Improved text extraction from highlights