Extracting highlighted text from iPad pdfs

TCWO
Hi there,
I am trying to extract highlighted text using zotfile from PDFs that have been marked up on an iPad using the extract annotations add-on.
I cannot find an app that Zotero will recognize as highlighted text and hence extractable. Ideally I’d like to do this without paying a subscription for adobe acrobat.
Does anyone know what app to use or have any suggestions?
Tess
  • dstillman
    edited October 31, 2019
    Which annotation apps have you tried? I would expect most to work fine.

    Have you tested with Preview on your Mac, to make sure the extraction is working for you in general?
  • TCWO
    Hi there, thanks for your reply.
    Yes I have tested with preview and adobe on Mac and this works for extraction.

    I've tried a number of apps - Adobe, Goodnotes and Notability.
    You are able to see the highlighted areas on all of the programs but none of them seem to be recognised as highlighting for extraction. This is even when I save them as editable not combining the layers.
    Cheers,
    Tess
  • loneberrywang
    I am having the same problem! Please help. I highlight the PDFs with apps like PDF Expert and then when I send them back to my desktop and try to extract the annotations it doesn't work. When I open the PDFs the highlights are there. The extractions are not working.
  • derickson
    Hello,

    I am having a similar problem. I am using Zotfile and Notability to annotate my PDFs on an iPad. I can make annotations on my iPad in notability, retrieve the PDF with Zotfile, and read them on my computer (PC), but I cannot extract the annotations.

    If I use Adobe to make annotations, that is, with comment boxes or highlights, I can extract those annotations.

    I want to be able to use Notability so I can use the handwriting-to-text feature.

    Any suggestions?

    Thanks so much!
  • derickson
    UPDATE:
    I realized that Zotfile only extracts those text annotations which are "comments." It does not extract text, whether typed or written, on the side margins. This seems to be the problem.

    Any chance that will ever change? Or, does anyone know how to have handwriting automatically become a comment in Notability?

    Thanks!
  • fwmm
    I have the same issue with GoodNotes. Highlights are properly displayed on any pdf viewer, but Zotfile extraction feature is totally blind to them.
  • Venkataragavan
    I have started with Notability to export them, and I face the same problem. Text extraction through Zotfile does not work as @derickson writes.

    Hope Notability/Zotfile can soon work on this. Would prove very helpful!
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