I use DT to run my own Zettelkasten. I work with handwritten notes that I write when reading books or articles, which I then type into small markdown notes in DT, organized like a Zettelkasten.
Now along comes reMarkable, an eInk pad that only allows reading and writing (see https://remarkable.com). It focusses on doing this few things right: I can write and take notes or draw and then either send these files in PDF form to myself or OCR my script and transfer ASCII text to myself (as of yet, only per eMail or some cloud services).
What would be really great is if DT would work together with reMarkable to allow sending OCRed text from my handwritten notes into DT (per eMail or whatever). Even better would be to be able to use tags in my writing that the software than translates to tags, too, that I could use to steer the text into the correct Zettelkasten or wherever I want to and so onâŚ).
My guess is you never heard from reMarkable, right? Does anyone else use it with DT?
I was very tempted to buy it until I discovered that if you want any cloud (even Dropbox or OneDrive or whatever) you must pay subscription.
The only thing I can think about integration is index in DT the folder in any cloud where ReMarkable puts its files and then, once you go to your Mac and the cloud has been synchronized, you will have your annotations into DT.
Or using Hazel or the integrated macOS folder actions, copy those files into DT Inbox folder.
I had never heard of the device until a recent YouTube ad. I donât know of anyone using it in any capacity relative to our apps. You could always contact them and see if theyâd consider an integration. Itâs a definite âNoâ if you donât ask.
I am using an onyx boox note air 2, which is an e-ink reader and notetaker / sketching device similar to remarkable. the main difference seems to be that the onyx boox series runs a full android version and thus can be synced with a number of services.
in my case I have DevonThink index two folders on my mac:
one as an outgoing process with material I want to read & annotate. that folder is also synced via a cloud service (in my case tresorit) with my onyx boox device. once I have read and annotated there or alternatively read ebooks etc my handwritten or typed notes get exported
into a second cloud folder that includes the annotations and / or the atomic notes for my zettelkasten which in turn becomes the incoming process for devonthink as these notes land in another folder on my mac (again via tresorit). that folder once again is indexed into a subfolder of my global DevonThink inbox and voila I can slot the annotation and / or the atomic notes into their appropriate places.
I hope this is not to confusing, however the e-ink device is truly marvellous as a no thrills device to go through my reading without the usual multimedia distractions while being much better on my eyesâŚmy e-ink reader / note taker is (by now) an indispensible addition to my work flow, however the android features are a must on my endâŚ
What reMarkable is excellent in is providing no browser, mail, messenger distractions whatsoever. Also, itâs designed to behave like paper and feel like paper. The surface is not smooth like glass, but like it offers some small resistance to the pen. Also, it sweetens up my handwriting: everyone who sees my notes offers praise for my handwriting when in fact my handwriting usually is not that nice.
Thanks for the automation hints. That is fantastic and I will set up similarly.
at least my onyx boox has that same âfriction featureâ as well - it pretty much feels like writing on paper. as with most of this class of devices one has to change the tips of the pen every now and then thoughâŚ
also you are of course right: the downside of having full android is that it indeed requires some self discipline to be restrictive in what to install, however most of the multimedia apps that distract me the most (i.e. video) donât work (well) with the slow e-ink display to begin withâŚ
I have offered my feedback over there and also offered a feature request and weâll see if ever something happens at reMarkable. Right now Iâm just sending my mails with the text load to myself and from there clip the mail into DT, which works OK.
If you have any success with this with ReMarkable Iâd love to hear about it ⌠I use ReMarkable too and itâs such a great piece of equipment for the specific things it does, and I too have been wishing it could be somehow made to work with DT.
Have you contacted the ReMarkable team with a similar request as @gregor ?
The more interest they receive, the higher the potential it may expedite investigation.
Same, I looked at it a few months ago, then I bought a Paperlike screen cover for my iPad instead (Joking aside, having a decent screen cover on the iPad for the pencil does make a big difference to the writing experience.)
I own a reMarkable 2, which i enjoy owning because it is handsomely designed and built, but use very little. Because I was in the group that pre-ordered the device almost a year before it finally shipped, I have the subscription features for free. That still doesnât entice me to use the device much. The main reason is that it is a walled city. Annotations on PDFs are not readable by other apps. So importing annotated PDFs made on reMarkable into DEVONthink has zero benefit. The handwriting recognition on reMarkable is clunky and inaccurate -â maybe it would be successful for Austin Palmer, but not me. (Same is true of my handwriting in GoodNotes, of course.)
So âDT and reMarkable working together?â -â not at all. Not unlike the the answer to âDT and torque wrenches working together?â
As Remarkable have now announced the end of the subscription model that âpay walledâ a lot of their useful features, Iâm now pondering where it would sit in my workflow. I do fancy an eInk screen that could give my eyes a bit of a rest.
@gregor i am interested to learn, does it support a highlight function in PDF that DT (and other PDF readers but I donât care about them ) can parse? I.e. if I highlight PDFs and maybe add the odd comment in Remarkable, would DT still be able to use the summarise highlights function?
No, no exportable highlight function. I wrote to them and never got an answer. But it seems there are still some news to come, which I hope means opening up to other services or apps like DT. But right now, no: it will export any notes as just another graphic layer within the PDF, but that is no text.
There is a said in Spanish: âCuando las barbas de tu vecino veas afeitar, pon las tuyas a remojarâ (When you see your neighborâs beards shaving, put yours to soak). This is a consequence of the new Kindle Scribe. A lot of people will move to Remarkable, but there is the risk Amazon kill them. .
Oh, thatâs a shame. If they really want this to be an eInk powerhouse theyâre going to have to conform to some convention of PDF highlighting, because locking your highlights into your PDF is not very helpful. (This lack of coherency on how some PDF readers handle highlights is why Readwise had problems integrating PDF highlights. We are fortunate that the DT team thought this through logically before they implemented their system!)
Thatâs a lovely saying. I donât think English or French have anything similar, although I just had a nice few minutes pondering this.
Iâd missed the announcement for this. Iâve just looked it up and it looks good. I wonât be buying it though because Iâm guessing itâs going to have the same problem/âdesign featureâ as the current Kindle, which is that the handling of highlights for PDFs is very poor.
So actually, the first eInk reader that uses an accepted highlighting format for PDFs thatâs compatible with other PDF readers can have my money
(Joking aside, having a decent screen cover on the iPad for the pencil does make a big difference to the writing experience.)