Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Google Scholar PDF Reader

scholar.googleblog.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

151–160 of 165 posts

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#151

Post by Helmut10001 »

gerroo wrote: post #145
Helmut10001 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I use a combination of Zotero, Locally Linked PDFs/Folder Structure, and SumatraPDFs (Comments etc.): folders: - for every literature search, create a folder with date and name - e.g. 2024-03-21_Quantum_Entanglement - use CTRL-SHIFT-DRAG to drop files into Zotero as Links, see [#77](https://github.com/zotero/zotero/issues/77) - You _can_ organize in Zotero, but you don't have to. Files can be linked to multiple Zoter…

Do you know if there's a way to write latex comments in Zotero / Mendeley? It's something I've been looking for.

Did you check the `zotero-better-notes`? [1]

> LaTex math in Zotero note is no longer a dream. The `zotero-better-notes` addon now supports this feature!

[1]: https://github.com/windingwind/zotero-better-notes

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#152

Post by [deleted] »

Unlisted6446 wrote: post #121
KingMob wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a daily Zotero user, not really. The nicest thing I can say about it is, it has plugins and is FOSS. Maybe the new 7.0 release will blow me away, but I've been waiting for it to get out of beta forever. More fundamentally, we need to stop disseminating scholarly work as PDFs, a format primarily designed for print. Plain HTML would be an improvement. Even better than HTML would be an extended variant with scholarly…

So I'm a researcher that almost always uses pdfs... Does HTML have the reproducibility that PDF promises? My feeling is that if I store a PDF, it'll look the same in a decade. But is HTML the same way? It seems like it relies on the web browser and many other things... How would one manage things like images and gifs? Is there a way to keep everything into one HTML file that's easily shareable and feels secure?

[deleted]

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#153

Post by cxr »

Unlisted6446 wrote: post #121
KingMob wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a daily Zotero user, not really. The nicest thing I can say about it is, it has plugins and is FOSS. Maybe the new 7.0 release will blow me away, but I've been waiting for it to get out of beta forever. More fundamentally, we need to stop disseminating scholarly work as PDFs, a format primarily designed for print. Plain HTML would be an improvement. Even better than HTML would be an extended variant with scholarly…

So I'm a researcher that almost always uses pdfs... Does HTML have the reproducibility that PDF promises? My feeling is that if I store a PDF, it'll look the same in a decade. But is HTML the same way? It seems like it relies on the web browser and many other things... How would one manage things like images and gifs? Is there a way to keep everything into one HTML file that's easily shareable and feels secure?

> Does HTML have the reproducibility that PDF promises? My feeling is that if I store a PDF, it'll look the same in a decade.

Feelings and promises are each one thing. Reality is another. PDF doesn't even look "the same" today. I have serious questions about how often folks who think that PDF is reliably consistent from system to system step outside their bubble and just how diverse their setups are that they're testing on.

> is HTML the same way?

Well the status-quo for copy-and-paste in HTML isn't dogshit, it's comparatively trivial to find and use tools that can thoroughly and exhaustively search your collection (or even write your own), and HTML is a dead simple plain-text format that if worst comes to worst you can read with your eyes (unlike needing to run a bunch of inscrutable code from a PostScript subset through an interpreter before you can do anything with it). So, no, I wouldn't call them the same.

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#154

Post by drhelix »

chipdart wrote: post #132
KingMob wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a daily Zotero user, not really. The nicest thing I can say about it is, it has plugins and is FOSS. Maybe the new 7.0 release will blow me away, but I've been waiting for it to get out of beta forever. More fundamentally, we need to stop disseminating scholarly work as PDFs, a format primarily designed for print. Plain HTML would be an improvement. Even better than HTML would be an extended variant with scholarly…

> As a daily Zotero user, not really. The nicest thing I can say about it is, it has plugins and is FOSS. Maybe the new 7.0 release will blow me away, but I've been waiting for it to get out of beta forever. Can you elaborate where you think Zotero drops the ball?

one major issue with zotero is the lack of android support. they are working on an android version or app or something since forever.

then is the way you store the pfds. if you want to sync between multiple computers you have to either know how to work with webdav or know how to point zotero at the location where you have your pdfs or (what they most certainly love) pay a lot of money for not so much storage space on their system. that last thing is what i don't like because i just don't trust anyone these days. you get invested in a system, build your routine around it only for them to shut it down, sell it watever and then puff you have to start over.

people keep calling zotero foss but if they were truly foss they would have a much more transparent way for people to roll their own selfhosted zotero server. instead, what they have is a dump of an old version, with next to zero documentation and a bunch of stubborn people that have managed to get something working but not quite.

I get that they are trying to make money but I am sure they could do that and be more transparent.

The other thing is the reliance on so many plugins. While zotero itself may last a while, who can say anything about the many devs of the many plugins that you end up relying on in order to make zotero bow to your routine? I like zotfile and a few others, but how long are they going to last? Also, reinstalling my system is a huge pain to get back to my routine because I have to remember all the settings for each and every plugin I install. They should come up with a way to save all these settings and restore them, and no don't do it through another plugin!

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#155

Post by moritz64 »

jwr wrote: post #101

Already counting the days until this inevitably gets killed. I've been burned too many times to rely on Google for anything, except tracking me and pushing ads, which they indeed do better every day.

google has worked hard to earn this reputation. i don't want to rely on any part of the google ecosystem anymore.

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#156

Post by hju22_-3 »

telegtron wrote: post #130
Unlisted6446 wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So I'm a researcher that almost always uses pdfs... Does HTML have the reproducibility that PDF promises? My feeling is that if I store a PDF, it'll look the same in a decade. But is HTML the same way? It seems like it relies on the web browser and many other things... How would one manage things like images and gifs? Is there a way to keep everything into one HTML file that's easily shareable and feels secure?

The potential to freeze an HTML page in time with minimal changes at render time is already there. [0] Such an ability can even be baked directly into the rendered HTML page so the viewer would be able to download a copy of the page as it is seen at a given time. Other archiving facilities, such as archive.org, take static snapshots of accessible pages if allowed by the publisher of the page and requested by anyone w…

I like SingleFile, but it's not perfect. It usually works just fine, but will occasionally drop the ball depending on the type of JavaScript on the page.

For example, I once backed up a page using it, and while it got all the content, it did not grab the JavaScript necessary for the images to display correctly.

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#157

Post by omnster »

drhelix wrote: post #154
chipdart wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As a daily Zotero user, not really. The nicest thing I can say about it is, it has plugins and is FOSS. Maybe the new 7.0 release will blow me away, but I've been waiting for it to get out of beta forever. Can you elaborate where you think Zotero drops the ball?

one major issue with zotero is the lack of android support. they are working on an android version or app or something since forever. then is the way you store the pfds. if you want to sync between multiple computers you have to either know how to work with webdav or know how to point zotero at the location where you have your pdfs or (what they most certainly love) pay a lot of money for not so much storage space on…

Here's a guide I found useful to set up zotero storage. In brief, it relies on zotfile to flatten the storage (keep all pdfs in one directory) and better bibtex.

I realized that it helped me to get rid of exactly the pain with fresh installs that you mention. I realized that the two plugins give me most of the functionality that I want.

https://habr.com/ru/articles/443798/

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#158

Post by gillesjacobs »

felipefar wrote: post #72
gillesjacobs wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mendeley beat Zotero for me with automatic pdf renaming, organising and its highlight and note taking tools in the reader. The Elsevier account integration is disgusting though, and I hate the idea of using all Elsevier product.

What do you like about organization in Mendeley?

Ever since the big UX app overhaul there is not much to like regarding functionality. They removed the pdf renaming and some other major automated file mgmt features from mendeley.

Other than that the commenting and note reader UI was pretty good. And overall UI/UX felt more modern than Zotero, also free (as in beer) cloud backup.

Today I had to do some literature review, and I reinstalled Zotero 7beta because I am not happy with the removed functionality from Mendeley.

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#159

Post by gcr »

chankstein38 wrote: post #133
gcr wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve seen other apps that have Systen, Light, Dark, and “Very Datk” for OLED devices, so it isn’t out of the question

Did you put "Very Datk" in quotes because it was spelled like that where you saw it? Or is it just "Very Dark" and it's quotes because it doesn't fully imply what you get?

i put it in quotes because it's a funny

i've variously seen apps call this "Extra Dark," "Midnight mode," "OLED dark," "Pure Black", ...

Re: Google Scholar PDF Reader

#160

Post by cttet »

ildon wrote: post #90
smburdick wrote: post #76

For me, reading papers requires deep focus. I have to have it physically printed out if I'm going to really read the whole thing.

I suggest you try new devices to read papers. Often the perception that paper is a better support is due to a lack of more convenient devices. Paper is better than a 15'' screen for sure, for many reasons including size and posture while reading. But have you tried larger screens (> 27''), large tablets (>= A4) or as large as possible E-Ink readers? Depending on your preferences, you might find that some of these wor…

Paper enables non-vision based(scroll bar) random access to content, when you keep going back an forth between two pages, it is very annoying on all current devices except paper. Vision pro/VR/AR or a particular multi-screen set-up can achieve that, but so far all alternatives are not as good.
Post reply on HN