iPhone ereader apps with good highlighting

[basil.random]

I'm looking for an ereader app. What I really care about is highlighting/note-taking *and* highlight export capabilities.

I used iBooks until one day I upgraded my phone and that deleted all my old highlights. I currently use the kindle app, but it won't let me export highlights on "personal documents", i.e. things you don't buy in the kindle store. Super frustrating, screw Amazon.

Apps I've tried:

1. Marvin: highlighting is god awful. Can't click and drag; hard/impossible to highlight across pages; impossible to highlight nicely across paragraphs.

2. Amazon Kindle: Can't export highlights on personal documents!!!

3. iBooks: is it possible to export all highlights at once in a convenient way? Currently this is what I'm leaning towards.

4. Goodreader/Foxit: can't read epubs??

5. Readmill: no longer supported

6. NeoSoar: can't export highlights/notes!

7. Bluefire: requires three taps to highlight, argh

Apps I haven't tried, would appreciate opinions:
- BookMaster

Thanks!!

[tomsem]

With Kindle personal documents, there is copy to clipboard. Then from there you can paste to another app.

A number of apps, like iBooks (but not Kindle, which only does FB/TWTR/GR sharing and copy/paste), will let you share highlights with other apps, such as Evernote, OneNote, etc. So as long as you do that as you go along, you can keep a notebook of everything. That is the best solution I've arrived at so far.

Gerty (same developer as Marvin, iPad only I think) has a 'Reading Journal' that captures all of your notes from everything you are reading with it, including time and location tags. These can be exported to an ePub file. Then you can share that (Mail, Dropbox etc.) or Open In. But curiously it doesn't seem to let you highlight anything. It also has scrolling mode, which obviates the need to highlight 'across pages'. Interesting app, but I'd like more 'atomic' sharing with Evernote etc.

Finally there is a brute force method that will work with any app: screen capture. Then you can go to Camera Roll and share with another app, including for example, an OCR app that will turn it into text that you can in turn copy or share with another program. I think Evernote will look for text or handwriting in image captures and allow search by that text (though it is not OCR as such).

Mantano Reader is interesting as well, and does well up to a point. But there are no sharing options, and all you have is cut/paste. Not sure how you get them out of the reading app.

It is really weird that there don't seem to be many apps that let you export all highlights/notes in some convenient fashion.

[FlorenceArt]

Originally Posted by tomsem

It is really weird that there don't seem to be many apps that let you export all highlights/notes in some convenient fashion.

MarginNote does this (syncs with Evernote), but it's iPad only.

I just discovered Gerty last night and installed it, but I'm not sure what to do with it.

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by FlorenceArt

MarginNote does this (syncs with Evernote), but it's iPad only.

I just discovered Gerty last night and installed it, but I'm not sure what to do with it.

I meant to say 'reading apps that let you export notes/highlights'.

As for Gerty, it also shares with Evernote (or any app that registers for sharing) just fine (even includes a thumbnail of the book), so I can find some use for it. Marvin just 'hard codes' FB/Twtr/email.

[FlorenceArt]

Originally Posted by tomsem

I meant to say 'reading apps that let you export notes/highlights'.

MarginNotes is a reading app.

[basil.random]

Thanks for the responses. Tomsem, I got super excited about Gerty for like 15 minutes. It's gorgeous like Marvin and I like it a lot. But it preserves the super inconvenient feature of Marvin: you have to tap 3 times to add a highlight/annotation. (. Argh.

FlorenceArt, if only MarginNotes was available for iPhone :/

[astrodad]

I have upgraded numerous Apple devices and have never lost a highlight or note. I can even access them from my other devices, assuming they have the same file name (for example, downloaded from the same file from my calibre server).

Do you have your iBooks settings set up to sync bookmarks, notes, and collections? I have tried many iOS reading apps and always end up back at iBooks for some reason.

[FlorenceArt]

Originally Posted by astrodad

I have upgraded numerous Apple devices and have never lost a highlight or note. I can even access them from my other devices, assuming they have the same file name (for example, downloaded from the same file from my calibre server).

Do you have your iBooks settings set up to sync bookmarks, notes, and collections? I have tried many iOS reading apps and always end up back at iBooks for some reason.

iBooks is a solid app. I only abandoned it because it lost my reading place a couple of times through sync. Don't know if that could happen to notes.

And yes, iBooks can export all highlights together via email (and to Evernote, among other export options), but it looks like you have to select them one by one, I didn't see a "select all" option. Go to the Notes tab (next to the table of contents and bookmarks tabs), press on the share button then select Edit notes, select the ones you want to export and then press Share. Not sure this would work on a DRMed book. Probably not.

[astrodad]

You can select all after hitting edit. I do this all the the time.

[FlorenceArt]

Ah yes, I see it now!

Originally Posted by basil.random

I used iBooks until one day I upgraded my phone and that deleted all my old highlights.

It sounds like you didn't do a backup of the old iPhone followed by a restore of that one to the new iPhone. If you do the backup/restore thing you shouldn't lose information from apps. I don't use iBooks, and thus don't know how it handles highlights, but I think Amazon does it by creating a companion file for the highlights, notes, etc. If you don't have sync turned ON then Amazon cannot sync that file to its cloud. I'm guessing iBooks is similar. So make sure you have sync turned on for any reading app to ensure highlights, notes, etc. get backed up to a cloud somewhere.