Add annotations in android via alternate app+google drive?

[paperbrain]

A thought r.e. sidestepping the problems where the android app does not save annotations on samsung tablets:

A possible alternate approach would be to install the google drive app, open the Gdrive paperpile folder, open the particular file with a pdf editor, make the desired annotations, close the app (or do whatever to insure that the file is saved).

This would have the advantage that we could use any app (with its full features), however I do not know how it would work offline. At the very least I guess one would need to open the file in the app before going offline to ensure that it is cached.

Do you think this should work / is anyone using this?

I briefly tried it on a test file (using the Xodo editor). It successfully saved the annotation, however it does not seem to record the chosen font size (the annotation is huge).

[vicente]

There’s been some increase in demand for this possibility since last year, for the mobile and web viewers alike. One of such requests:

[Android] Alternative PDF viewer/editor

I have Paperpile for Android installed on an e-ink device, and whilst it works, the reading/annotating experience is naturally not as optimal as using the device’s own PDF viewer. So I would really like the option to download a PDF and have the possibility to use another app for the editing, and have Paperpile manage the upload etc. I don’t know if this is a common use case, but as more and more Android based 10 and 13" e-readers are available, I can see an increasing need… Thanks for all your …

While not something we’re actively considering at the moment, the matter is on our radar and we continue tracking user demand.

As Stefan mentions on that thread above, if a PDF viewer uses ISO-conforming annotations, Paperpile should be able to automatically sync annotations in both direction from Google Drive.

[paperbrain]

Thank you. I will try editing via google drive in alternate apps and see if some other ones work.

[KeenHawk]

I have tried this suggestion, but I am still losing my annotations on articles I save in Paperpile when I switch from my laptop to android tablet. I have tried annotating and saving to Google Drive directly, annotating and saving in Paperpile using the viewer, and other methods but no luck. I am still losing all of my annotations in Paperpile and the Google Drive folder it is linked to. I am losing so much time. Any other suggestions?