PDF annotation and links

It would be unreal to add support to annotating/marking up pdf and tracking those within Bear notes in some linking fashion.

Logseq has analogous functionality but I’m a long time Bear subscriber and user and I think it provides a much cleaner and more enjoyable note taking experience!

Is this something that would be feasible one day?

At the moment we rely on macOS and iOS Quicklook’s functionalities to display the full-size PDF. On iOS editing can be done in-app via the Quicklook panel. Unfortunately, this is not the case for macOS. We hope for an evolution on the macOS side but if it’s not going to happen we’ll eventually evaluate providing our own tool.

Side note, it’s possible to use third-party apps like Acrobat Reader via the right-click menu Open with... to edit the PDF attachments.

Thanks for a quick response! I hope to see it in the future, whichever route happens to be more viable.

There are definitely options to do this with external apps, but my dream is to have one note tool that can hold all the context I need and maintain the simplicity and usability of Bear :slight_smile:

Hi Trix.

With the Right-click menu “OPEN WITH” in MacOS … can we get it so the PDF isn’t locked? Can we write back to the source with another editor, such as you stated, Adobe Reader? Thanks again!

For me (in mac), pdf is locked only with Preview app. Using any other app can edit the pdf without issue (e.g Highlights, Foxit, Adobe Reader etc)

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The “locked” PDF state you see it’s a Preview “state” and Reader doesn’t seem to be effected by this issue.