[HN Gopher] Google Scholar PDF Reader
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       Google Scholar PDF Reader
        
       Author : gerroo
       Score  : 147 points
       Date   : 2024-03-20 16:03 UTC (6 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (scholar.googleblog.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (scholar.googleblog.com)
        
       | superkuh wrote:
       | That's nice and all, but google scholar recently removed all the
       | 'cited by' 'related articles' and other links from the HTML pages
       | of google scholar. It was like this for about two months before
       | they restored the functionality. It likely they will remove it
       | again soon. Google scholar is getting worse, not better. The
       | google devs have no idea what a typical academic's computer is
       | like around the world. They dev for their lived experience and
       | it's just not applicable. A javascript (slow, computationally
       | expensive) pdf reader is just another aspect of this ignorance.
        
         | xnacly wrote:
         | I couldn't agree more, I dont want you displaying the pdf, let
         | me download the file and view it with zathura
        
           | adr1an wrote:
           | Or Sioyek (vim keybindings!), Okular, Xournalpp, Zotero, ...
        
         | adolph wrote:
         | A js pdf reader they control has monetization possibilities.
         | Slip in an interstitial page for Naturally Fun Arkansas with an
         | article from Nature. You don't want scholar going the way of
         | reader do you?
        
         | newzisforsukas wrote:
         | What are the base hardware requirements for a JavaScript PDF
         | reader where it isn't "slow"?
        
         | lukeinator42 wrote:
         | Alongside this, I have found that Google Scholar's search has
         | become noticeably worse in the last year or so. I can search
         | for an author's name and a few keywords from a paper title and
         | it won't show up, even if the paper has like 5000 citations.
        
         | google234123 wrote:
         | Are you sure this actually happened? I never noticed this. can
         | anyone else collaborate? Maybe you installed some extension
         | that messed with the html
        
           | superkuh wrote:
           | Yes, I confirmed it with 3 other people on IRC a couple
           | months ago. I didn't know google scholar had restored it
           | until I checked right before I wrote the above post. I
           | thought the links were still gone. They had been the last
           | time I'd used google scholar about 3 weeks ago. Back then I
           | also confirmed it myself first using 3 different computers, 4
           | browsers (with JS disabled), coming from 3 different IP
           | addresses, both logged in to google and logged out. I
           | probably wouldn't have started writing the post at all if I
           | didn't think they were still gone.
           | 
           | I figure in addition to the feedback they received from me
           | (and presumably others) at the time they saw a drop in usage
           | and restored the functional version. But they'll try again.
        
             | google234123 wrote:
             | I think you are wrong - I don't recall seeing this.
             | Screenshots of scholar on twitter from feb, jan, dec all
             | show those links
        
       | sorenjan wrote:
       | Does anyone have any recommendations for good local PDF readers
       | for Windows? I've been reading a lot of various papers recently,
       | and clicking on a citation in Acrobat reader is very frustrating.
       | The document scrolls to show the citation in view, but doesn't
       | clearly show it in the long list that most papers have, and then
       | I have to scroll up to where I was since it doesn't seem to have
       | a working back feature.
        
         | drmaximus wrote:
         | Sioyek is a PDF viewer designed exactly for reading research
         | papers and textbooks: https://github.com/ahrm/sioyek.
        
           | random3 wrote:
           | Sioyek seems awesome, especially vim inspired features. Too
           | bad u (undo) doesn't work and there doesn't seem to be a way
           | to undo. Am I missing something or is it laking it?
        
             | severine wrote:
             | I found this related issue:
             | https://github.com/ahrm/sioyek/issues/633
        
         | wslh wrote:
         | I am interested in knowing why and how Google Chrome is not
         | enough?
        
           | somethingsome wrote:
           | Mostly too slow for a lot of content, not every content is
           | supported, not easy to keep it open at the right page, no
           | comments, not easy to find the right tab, etc.
        
         | mikepo wrote:
         | I've been using Sumatra PDF on Windows to read papers (and as
         | my default PDF reader) for more than a decade. Clicking on a
         | citation takes you to the bibliography page and lands the cited
         | paper at the top of the screen. Then Alt-leftarrow brings you
         | back.
        
         | user- wrote:
         | ive always used SumatraPDF because its super fast and free
        
         | eitally wrote:
         | What you might consider if finding an ebook reader app and
         | using that. I had a similar issue but on Android (for ebooks
         | not in kindle format). I ended up with Librera but there are
         | several. Turns out it's also equally great at academic or work
         | PDFs.
        
         | somethingsome wrote:
         | Just so you know: normally it scroll down so that the reference
         | is on top of the page.
         | 
         | But most importantly.. ALT+'left arrow' allows you to go back
         | before you clicked on the citation! It doesn't work all the
         | time, but usually it does after some left arrows ;)
         | 
         | Also, in Android: you can click on the 'scrolling sign' on the
         | right of the pdf and specify the page, or see the link to 'jump
         | back' to before you clicked on a link!
         | 
         | I hope that will help
        
         | abhayhegde wrote:
         | Irrespective of the OS, I recommend Zotero
         | (https://www.zotero.org/).
        
         | Nicksil wrote:
         | Mozilla Firefox has put a lot of time into their PDF reader.
         | 
         | https://www.mozilla.org/firefox/browsers/
        
         | Depurator wrote:
         | Zotero's V7 reader is great, built on pdfjs (Mozillas pdf
         | reader) and adds neat things like notations and dark mode.
        
           | random3 wrote:
           | is it possible to point Zotero to a local dir with papers, or
           | am I forced to import documents into it?
        
           | specproc wrote:
           | I love zotero. The combination of annotation, highlights,
           | document management and a healthy plug-in ecosystem are just
           | killer for me.
           | 
           | It feels a bit dated sometimes, but I'm yet to find anything
           | that comes close.
        
             | kristjansson wrote:
             | It looks a lot nicer after the recent design update!
        
           | wolverine876 wrote:
           | IIRC, pdfjs is used by Google also, and was based on Foxit? ?
           | Does anyone know?
        
             | Tijdreiziger wrote:
             | PDF.js came out of Mozilla, not Foxit.
        
               | wolverine876 wrote:
               | Yes, but I think Mozilla may have started with code from
               | Foxit.
        
           | elektor wrote:
           | Where are you accessing Zotero V7? My understanding is that
           | it is currently V6.[1]
           | 
           | [1] https://www.zotero.org/download/
        
             | zuminator wrote:
             | https://www.zotero.org/support/beta_builds
        
         | SkyMarshal wrote:
         | Same question but for MacOS. There don't seem to be many good
         | ones for it.
        
           | airstrike wrote:
           | Unfortunately, Preview has been the best reader in my
           | experience. I say "unfortunately" not because it is
           | inherently bad, but because it is a sad state of affairs when
           | nobody can build something better than the barebones native
           | tool
        
           | moritz wrote:
           | Try Skim
        
           | SkyMarshal wrote:
           | Just found this one I hadn't seen before, free version may
           | suffice: https://highlightsapp.net/
        
         | airstrike wrote:
         | SumatraPDF if you want speed above all else
         | 
         | DrawboardPDF if you want something more full featured and like
         | to annotate, highlight, bookmark and whatnot, particularly if
         | there's any chance you'll also use a stylus
        
         | Tomte wrote:
         | Okular. You don't need the rest of KDE. It has a Windows
         | installer and I think it's also in the Windows Store.
        
         | aragonite wrote:
         | Jumping back works in SumatraPDF (backspace).
         | 
         | STDU Viewer might also be worth looking into. Default shortcut
         | for jumping back is ctrl+z.
        
       | ttul wrote:
       | Now all they need is a way to grab documents from SciHub..
        
       | abhayhegde wrote:
       | This looks great! Since they link it all to one's Gmail account,
       | I wonder if they implement saving annotations to these PDFs and
       | have them live on your Drive or elsewhere.
       | 
       | Edit: Also, Chrome now defaults to this extension for rendering
       | any PDFs you load.
        
       | meekaaku wrote:
       | Does anyone know of a library (or reading material) that can
       | render a pdf (mostly architectural drawings) on to webgl canvas
       | as actual vectors not image?
        
         | me_jumper wrote:
         | Not sure if that's what you are looking for but mupdf can
         | render to SVG.
        
       | alecco wrote:
       | Most important papers can be read with highlighting at
       | https://www.semanticscholar.org/ (PDF Semantic Reader, skimming
       | assist)
        
       | lxgr wrote:
       | Looks great, but can you imagine Google pulling the rug under an
       | academic's document/citation database?
       | 
       | I don't even want to imagine having to migrate all annotations
       | and citations to something else when they inevitably pull the
       | plug on it some years down the road.
        
         | resolutebat wrote:
         | Huh? This tool just parses PDFs, it doesn't require academics
         | to actually do anything.
        
           | lxgr wrote:
           | Hm, I got the impression they store notes and annotations to
           | your Google account, but maybe I'm mistaken.
        
             | glial wrote:
             | The Chrome Web Store page doesn't say anything about
             | annotations.
        
       | SamBam wrote:
       | Has anyone tried installing this? It says "PDFs on all sites will
       | have a new look in Chrome."
       | 
       | This makes me nervous. I'm often looking at PDFs that are
       | embedded in a page (either grad school software for commenting on
       | PDFs, or publishers' sites). Is it going to play nicely with
       | those? Is this only for navigating directly to a PDF?
        
         | gnicholas wrote:
         | My guess (as someone whose company makes a PDF extension for
         | Chrome) is that it may intercept embedded PDFs as well.
         | Sometimes sites use iframes or the like, and those get
         | intercepted. But if the PDF is displayed through some sort of
         | third party tool then it would be unaffected. Just my 2C/!
        
       | cygnion wrote:
       | Capturing and visualizing research knowledge is personally an
       | exciting space. I feel that deep reading and absorbing content
       | continues to be challenging, due to the ever-increasing amount of
       | published research, rudimentary reading apps (Google PDF reader
       | finally addressing issue with easily looking up references), and
       | due to somewhat disconnected tools for reading and note-taking.
       | Similar to the readers piggy-backing on the PDFjs library, I've
       | developed an app that helps me capture and organize personal
       | research knowledge [1]. Additionally, visualizations and
       | customizable contexts for notes help to recall and link
       | information.
       | 
       | [1] https://www.knowledgegarden.io/
        
       | antimora wrote:
       | Can someone recommend an app for ipad that can read PDFs? I want
       | to be able to bookmark using my browser but read it on my ipad.
       | Sort of like "Save to pocket" extension.
        
         | buildbot wrote:
         | In theory the built in files app will work for this. However, I
         | like goodnotes, which has good highlighting snd library
         | support. I've used it since grad school for reading papers.
        
         | Tortoise wrote:
         | I really like PDF Expert for this. It's free. They have a
         | subscription for some editing/advanced features, which I
         | haven't tried.
         | 
         | https://apps.apple.com/us/app/pdf-expert-editor-reader/id743...
        
         | kristjansson wrote:
         | Zotero w/ their first-party storage is the best I've found.
        
       | kennydude wrote:
       | I just wish Google Scholar would be a bit more open in terms of
       | debugging why a site isn't picked up by the platform
        
         | mixedmath wrote:
         | I would also be interested to know how they decide _to_ pick up
         | a site. I was very surprised to learn that a technical note
         | posted only to my website was picked up somehow. (I am a
         | mathematician and so there are other things on my site, but
         | it's some custom static site generator thing and I'm still
         | astounded).
        
       | jinay wrote:
       | Does anyone have a research paper reading tool they're happy
       | with? Zotero is what meets most of my needs but I wish I could
       | organize the papers faster and I wish the annotation tools were
       | better. AI-assisted reading is a plus too.
        
         | mixedmath wrote:
         | What does AI assisted reading mean to you?
        
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       (page generated 2024-03-20 23:00 UTC)