Ask HN: Software for Reading Pdfs?

#1

Post by pragmaticpirate » Mon, Sep 14, 2020, 5:04 AM UTC

Hi HN, I am looking for recommendations for native software for reading and annotating pdfs.

text-to-speech feature would be good to have but not necessary

Re: Ask HN: Software for Reading Pdfs?

#2

Post by thesuperbigfrog » Mon, Sep 14, 2020, 6:47 AM UTC

Native for what platform? Are you on Windows, MacOS, Linux, BSD, iOS, iPadOS, Android, etc. ?

Re: Ask HN: Software for Reading Pdfs?

#3

Post by Jugurtha » Mon, Sep 14, 2020, 4:12 PM UTC

Check the following threads:

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24460142

- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=24471058

There also is a Python library:

- https://github.com/jsvine/pdfplumber

Re: Ask HN: Software for Reading Pdfs?

#4

Post by Jtsummers » Mon, Sep 14, 2020, 9:33 PM UTC

Maybe Polar [0] would suit your needs, I have no idea how it does with TTS. I'm assuming by native you mean "runs on your hardware not a web app". It's native for desktop OSes, not for mobile and they have a syncing service between your devices.

On my iPad I've long been a fan of GoodReader, again I've never tried TTS with it.

[0] http://getpolarized.io/

Re: Ask HN: Software for Reading Pdfs?

#5

Post by theSealedTanker » Tue, Sep 15, 2020, 12:39 AM UTC

If you are using linux, try Zathura

Re: Ask HN: Software for Reading Pdfs?

#6

Post by approxim8ion » Wed, Sep 16, 2020, 5:49 PM UTC

theSealedTanker wrote: post #5

If you are using linux, try Zathura

+1 for Zathura. I use it for reading PDF and CBR and it's great. Minimal and vi keybindings.