Hello, I would like to insert images into PDFs. On the iPad, I could do this by simply making a clipboardcopy and pasting the appropriate image into the PDF. On Devon Think “pro” on OSX, there seems to be no way to do this at all. Honestly, this is really driving me nuts right now, since I sold my iPad and almost assumed this was a standard feature. Am I doing something wrong, or does this feature not exist in the newly revamped PDF editor? Drag and drop didn’t give me a chance either. I am using Ventura, the latest version. The solution doesn’t have to be pretty, it’s just a matter of quickly processing images as notes.
Intended workflow: Copy chords from an iPhone app to the clipboard and paste them into the PDF via “hands on” on the Mac.
PDF editing is, afaict, outside the scope of DT (and I tend to think DTTG as well). I don’t believe either that DT sports a “PDF editor”, much less a “newly revamped one”. Where did you see that? I couldn’t find any mention of such a thing in the release notes.
Why not simply copy/paste the image in a format that supports editing, like Markdown, and then convert the result to PDF?
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The solution described above is too cumbersome. Furthermore, there is the solution I favour in DTTG and it works, besides the iPad, also on the iPhone.
I have worked with Devonthink to go on the iPad for a very long time. Here again is the simple and effective work flow I wanted. I assume that the developers of DTTG have the same approach in mind.
Take a screenshot and at the same time copy it to the clipboard using the shortcut → Paste from clipboard to PDF. This all works in Devonthink togo, “on the fly” in seconds.
I don’t find the previous answer helpful, so I would like to ask you again to answer my questions directly:
Is it possible to transfer the described function or workflow from DTTG to the OS X version?
Wouldn’t this procedure make sense?
I’m not sure that I understand what you’re really after.
- Firstly, there is no such thing as a PDF editor in DT nor in DTTG. You can convert (that’s what’s probably happening with the screenshot to PDF shortcut) an image to PDF. You can annotate the PDF, but that is not editing in the usual sense of the word. That’s what I tried to point out in my first answer.
- What you seem to be doing there is adding an annotation to a PDF.
- And it seems that DT on the desktop does not (yet?) support images as annotations
- I saw a shortcut “convert to PDF” on iOS which may or may not be the one you’re using. If it is, why not use it on the desktop, too?
- Perhaps unrelated: Not even Preview supports adding images as annotations. Nor is there an
PDFAnnotationImage class available in Apple’s PDFKit. Therefore, it might not be an easy task to implement a similar feature in DT.
- Even if it were, an annotation is, in my opinion, not a good way to add an image to a document. That’s why I’d suggest again to use a format that supports pasting images out of the box.
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Again:
In DTTG it is possible to insert images into PDFs simply by copy-pasting. I have outlined the corresponding button in green in the screenshot, just for you.
For me, this kind of workflow makes a lot of sense.
I ask the developers of DEVONthink Pro to integrate the above mentioned function into the OSX version of Devon Think.
What I didn’t ask and/or didn’t mean:
- whether Devon Think includes a PDF editor. In the sense I described, editing PDFs in DTTG is possible.
- I did not write anything about converting images to PDF. I know this function and use it, so that texts converted by OCR come out. But that is something completely different. Please stick to my question when you reply to my text.
- converting anything into a PDF is not the solution for the need described. Please accept that.
- i don’t know if preview accepts inserting images into PDF. DTTG does. Please follow my simple presentation
I hope you understand my simple approach. I want the above feature to be available in Devonthink Pro on OSX. Since the feature is already implemented on the iPad and iPhone and also on the iPhone I could imagine that this small implementation is also easily possible and useful in OSX.
I have now used really very simple words to explain a very simple circumstance to you. I would be happy if there were other opinions, besides yours, on my question. It would be nice if an administrator could answer who also has direct contact with the developers and could pass on my small request to the development team.
The PDF library used by DEVONthink To Go is a completely different one than the PDFkit framework of macOS and therefore the features are not identical (and due technical reasons it’s not yet possible to use the same libraries on both platforms).
Again: you’re not modifying or editing the PDF proper, you’re adding an annotation to it. You may of course ignore this difference, or select to throw a sensible search term at your preferred search engine.
Apart from that: if what you want is not available, it is of course one option to hold your breath until your wish is fulfilled. Another option is to find a way around the obstacle. Your choice.
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I would like you to pass on my change requests to the development team. Will you do that?
@cgrunenberg is the CTO and Lead Developer for DEVONtechnologies. 
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Hey nice 
, I just wanted the message to get through. Your function in DTTG is really good for inserting, for example, chord symbols and the tabulator symbols in PDFs. I’m glad the message got through. Please ignore the superfluous ramblings from this post. 
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