tharlin@gc.cuny.edu
Member
I'm looking to annotate a PDF (or, if that's not possible, a stylized text file) with words and images, and present it online. I've looked into five programs--A.nnotate, Annotator, HyperStudio, Hypothes.is, and Pliny--and none allows users to share the results of their annotating publicly (whether via Word Press or a handmade site). Is anyone familiar with such a tool? I'm happy to research any leads.
Regards,
Tayt
Maybe Google Drive with the DocHub app? Upload the PDF to Google Docs, click "Open with", and choose DocHub.
hopegreenberg
Member
We've been getting lots of questions from faculty about annotations here at UVM and find that that term covers lots of possibilities and variations. So, feel free to describe in more detail what you would like to do if the following is on the wrong track:
We've had the best results in text, highlighting, underlining, or circle/square-type annotating by simply using Preview (if one is Mac-centered) or Adobe Reader (on either Mac or Windows platforms). In this case "best" is defined as easy, familiar and free. However, while you can annotate the pdf with a variety of text options and, in the case of Adobe, with audio (or even video if you buy the not-free Professional version), you cannot annotate it with an image, no picture on top of your pdf file.
Once annotated you put it online by attaching it to a blog post where it becomes a link for people to click and download.
Here's a slightly different approach that may be of interest: Thinglink. This is an online app that allows you to upload an image and then annotate it with text, pictures, links or video. So, no highlighting or red circles or squiggles. Instead, what you see is a picture of your pdf file with some circles on it. Hovering over the circles displays text, images, links, etc. (Some caveats: there are free and not-free versions with different features. There is an upcoming video version that lets you annotate videos, i.e. place annotations on a video.)
Now, to be clear, this is an image annotator so it is not annotating a pdf file, but if you are not expecting people to download and use the pdf as a pdf but instead want them to see some text that started out as a pdf file and now has annotations on it, it might do the trick. You would have to export the pdf file as a jpg (you can do that in Mac Preview; for non-Macs use zamzar.com). Then upload the jpg to Thinglink, annotate it, and then have it generate a link. Here's a really raw example:
http://www.thinglink.com/scene/609860816400809984
Like the pdf attachment, you could put this link into your blog. Yes, people would have to click on it but they would not have to download the file - it would just appear in their browser as it does here.
- Hope
tharlin@gc.cuny.edu
Member
Replying to @hopegreenberg's post:
Hey, Hope.
That's very nice. And would I be able to host the annotated images--or would Thing Link host? I'd really like to get them on my own Web site.
Tayt
Tayt: While I haven't actually used Google Drive with the DocHub app, my impression is that after you annotate the PDF file using DocHub, you can share make the Google Drive document available to the public and the link to it from your website or even embed it in a webpage.
Hope/Tayt: A word of caution about the annotation features of Adobe products and Preview ... I recall at least once finding that not all annotations made with an Adobe product are visible in Preview, leading the person viewing in Preview to get an incomplete picture of the suggested revisions.
hopegreenberg
Member
Replying to @kevin.s.hawkins's post:
Thanks Kevin. Yes, that's correct - I should have left that sentence in my original post! If you use Adobe to create an audio annotation, or use Adobe Pro to create a video annotation, those annotations will not be visible, thus not accessible to Preview users. Thus we always tell our faculty to include a "you must use Adobe Reader (free) to access audio/video annotations" warning when using these features.
Tayt: yes, Thinglink does the hosting, at least for the free version. I know it has Wordpress and other plug-ins that can be installed by whoever administers your Wordpress that allows for easier Thinglink integration, but I'm not sure if the image is, even in that case, still hosted at Thinglink. Interesting question.
I wish I could remember more clearly, but my experience was with text annotations only. I had additions, deletions, and comments, and some portion of these got lost when viewing in Preview. Maybe it was the additions.
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