4 ms·

As a researcher too, I understand exactly what you are saying. I prefer DevonThink[1] to Zotero for searching and organizing over tens of GB of data with tens o

As a researcher too, I understand exactly what you are saying. I prefer DevonThink[1] to Zotero for searching and organizing over tens of GB of data with tens of millions of words. Works with the native Mac filesystem, so you don't have to import into the app if you don't want to. Automatically archiving my entire email history is a huge plus. Finds everything in milliseconds. Mac only. [1] https://www.devontechnologies.com/apps/devonthink https://www.devontechnologies.com/apps/devonthink

porker 6y ago
DevonThink is one of those apps I've always wanted to use, but as I'm cross-platform it's never been possible.
- criddell 6y ago
  If you run a lot of cross platform software, the Mac may be the perfect machine for you. It can (legally) run more software than anything else - MacOS, Windows, Linux - though a combination of dual booting & virtualization.
  - NotSammyHagar 6y ago
    Linux and windows can do the same, inc running mac / hackintosh.
atombender 6y ago
Devonthink is amazing. It's very versatile — it's got great image handling, for example, so you can use it for collecting visual materials, and easily browse as a gallery or as full-sized images. And I particularly love the built-in PDF support, which has everything you need — multiple reader views, annotations, table of contents, rotation, conversion, OCR, etc. Search is fast, multiple database support is great. And it's a very nice touch that you can combine the local database file support with cloud sync, although the mobile app could be better there. It's worth noting that Devonthink does not have citation/reference management, so for scientists/adademics it's probably not an adequate replacement as Zotero, Endnote, Papers, etc.
- mh- 6y ago
  Do you happen to know if it supports annotating PDFs without saving the changes into the original PDF file? I need something that can store them separately, allowing me to export one with annotations if I choose.
  - atombender 6y ago
    No, but you can still accomplish what you want. Annotations become part of the PDF file on disk. But they're stored as separate editable objects in the PDF that remain editable; for example, if you open an annotated PDF in Preview (on macOS) or in Adobe Reader, they are still editable. And so you can remove them. Devonthink also lets you remove all the annotations. With your PDF(s), select Data > Convert > "to PDF without Annotations", and it will make a copy that has all the annotations removed. I agree that it would be nice to keep the annotations separate. But fortunately the PDF format is flexible enough that it can preserve the annotations and not "hard code" them into the visual tree.
  - setu4993 6y ago
    Mendeley desktop saves PDF annotations without saving them to the original PDF.
    - zwaps 6y ago
      Dont use Mendeley, it is owned by Elsevier. You can’t even export pdfs or notes from it anymore to send to others. Only some snippets via some bad Elsevier platform which is a headache. They will lock you in, and they specifically updated Mendeley such that the database is encrypted towards you yourself. I lost my whole Years worth of papers and research to it. Do not use Mendeley. Do not use anything made by Elsevier.
walterbell 6y ago
A subset is available on iOS, including a web/file scraper with full text indexing and search, tags, markdown notes, plus WebDAV sync to other iOS or Mac devices, http://www.macdrifter.com/2016/09/the-all-new-devonthink-to-go-for-ios.html http://www.macdrifter.com/2016/09/the-all-new-devonthink-to-...

porker 6y ago

DevonThink is one of those apps I've always wanted to use, but as I'm cross-platform it's never been possible.

criddell 6y ago
If you run a lot of cross platform software, the Mac may be the perfect machine for you. It can (legally) run more software than anything else - MacOS, Windows, Linux - though a combination of dual booting & virtualization.
- NotSammyHagar 6y ago
  Linux and windows can do the same, inc running mac / hackintosh.

atombender 6y ago

Devonthink is amazing. It's very versatile — it's got great image handling, for example, so you can use it for collecting visual materials, and easily browse as a gallery or as full-sized images. And I particularly love the built-in PDF support, which has everything you need — multiple reader views, annotations, table of contents, rotation, conversion, OCR, etc. Search is fast, multiple database support is great. And it's a very nice touch that you can combine the local database file support with cloud sync, although the mobile app could be better there. It's worth noting that Devonthink does not have citation/reference management, so for scientists/adademics it's probably not an adequate replacement as Zotero, Endnote, Papers, etc.

mh- 6y ago
Do you happen to know if it supports annotating PDFs without saving the changes into the original PDF file? I need something that can store them separately, allowing me to export one with annotations if I choose.
- atombender 6y ago
  No, but you can still accomplish what you want. Annotations become part of the PDF file on disk. But they're stored as separate editable objects in the PDF that remain editable; for example, if you open an annotated PDF in Preview (on macOS) or in Adobe Reader, they are still editable. And so you can remove them. Devonthink also lets you remove all the annotations. With your PDF(s), select Data > Convert > "to PDF without Annotations", and it will make a copy that has all the annotations removed. I agree that it would be nice to keep the annotations separate. But fortunately the PDF format is flexible enough that it can preserve the annotations and not "hard code" them into the visual tree.
- setu4993 6y ago
  Mendeley desktop saves PDF annotations without saving them to the original PDF.
  - zwaps 6y ago
    Dont use Mendeley, it is owned by Elsevier. You can’t even export pdfs or notes from it anymore to send to others. Only some snippets via some bad Elsevier platform which is a headache. They will lock you in, and they specifically updated Mendeley such that the database is encrypted towards you yourself. I lost my whole Years worth of papers and research to it. Do not use Mendeley. Do not use anything made by Elsevier.

walterbell 6y ago

A subset is available on iOS, including a web/file scraper with full text indexing and search, tags, markdown notes, plus WebDAV sync to other iOS or Mac devices, http://www.macdrifter.com/2016/09/the-all-new-devonthink-to-go-for-ios.html http://www.macdrifter.com/2016/09/the-all-new-devonthink-to-...