- I am using a Boox Note Air 3C as my primary notetaking tablet and I am using a daily organizer PDF. For the past year I have been using an app called NeoReader to open the PDF that I then annotate with my handwriting, and that has worked very well. However, a shortcoming of annotating a PDF on this device is that I cannot search for that handwriting, to find something I basically have to recall the date on which I wrote something and go to that page. The cool thing about the PDF is that it's a very robust template and includes hyperlinks to move throughout the file, which makes it function more like an app than a document.#
- The latest version of the Boox firmware for the Note Air 3C adds the ability to create notebooks using a PDF as a template. After upgrading my Note Air 3C to this version of the firmware I created a new notebook using the daily organizer PDF and I found that the linking function exists in the notebook. The benefit of using a notebook is that I can search for handwriting, which makes it much easier to find something. Prior to using the Note Air 3C I had been using OneNote on an iPad that also supports search of handwriting, so I have missed this feature.#
- Boox notebooks are backed up to PDF files that I have configured to sync with my OneDrive account and I also use SyncThing to sync copies to file shares on computers on my home network. The problem is, the links are not preserved in the backup files, which are an export of the notebook, so navigation through the backup files is not as easy as with the annotated versions of the PDF that I had been using. I also cannot search for handwriting in the backup files.#
- If I had a way to perform a type of OCR indexing of the annotated PDFs so that I could do searches on a PC I probably would stick with that approach, using NeoReader, rather than using the original PDF as a template for a notebook. #
- I am using a Boox Note Air 3C as my primary notetaking tablet and I am using a daily organizer PDF. For the past year I have been using an app called NeoReader to open the PDF that I then annotate with my handwriting, and that has worked very well. However, a shortcoming of annotating a PDF on this device is that I cannot search for that handwriting, to find something I basically have to recall the date on which I wrote something and go to that page. The cool thing about the PDF is that it's a very robust template and includes hyperlinks to move throughout the file, which makes it function more like an app than a document.#
- The latest version of the Boox firmware for the Note Air 3C adds the ability to create notebooks using a PDF as a template. After upgrading my Note Air 3C to this version of the firmware I created a new notebook using the daily organizer PDF and I found that the linking function exists in the notebook. The benefit of using a notebook is that I can search for handwriting, which makes it much easier to find something. Prior to using the Note Air 3C I had been using OneNote on an iPad that also supports search of handwriting, so I have missed this feature.#
- Boox notebooks are backed up to PDF files that I have configured to sync with my OneDrive account and I also use SyncThing to sync copies to file shares on computers on my home network. The problem is, the links are not preserved in the backup files, which are an export of the notebook, so navigation through the backup files is not as easy as with the annotated versions of the PDF that I had been using. I also cannot search for handwriting in the backup files.#
- If I had a way to perform a type of OCR indexing of the annotated PDFs so that I could do searches on a PC I probably would stick with that approach, using NeoReader, rather than using the original PDF as a template for a notebook. #