extract highlights from pdf with zotfile 02-02-2015d1206

2015-05-02

This looks like the very best free method that I have found.  This method is not the most user friendly at first, but once you see how it works one time it is not too bad, and the method seems quite powerful and effective.

how to extract highlights from pdf with zotfile
-first make sure you have the Zotero Firefox extension and the Zotfile Firefox extension installed.
-Next make some new reference by finding a random article, and adding this to your Zotero reference library (click the magic wand button "Add item by identifier" and enter the doi, pubmed id, or isbn (I like to add the reference to a folder called "pdf highlight extraction" to keep things organized ->)
-Add the pdf document with the highlights and comments you are interested in to zotero (click white cross in green circle "New Item" button->Store copy of File)
--note that zotfile seems incapable of extracting comments if there are many pages in the pdf.  However, you can split up a pdf using pdftk, attach multiple pdf documents, and extract annotations for each one.  I know that zotfile can at least handle about 100 pages in my experience. 04-19-2015d2232
-associate the file with the reference you made earlier (Either right click the reference and click attach new file or drag and drop the pdf file onto the reference)
-right click the pdf associated with the reference->manage attachments->extract annotations
-open the extracted annotations file associated with the reference->copy and paste all the highlight text, comments, etc.->paste the text where you want it to be->delete the reference and file in Zotero if you don't want it there anymore.
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s: how to extract highlighted text from pdf files with zotfile
-http://www.mvkonnik.info/2013/09/how-to-extract-highlighted-text-from.html
-received this warning: zotfile warning: skipped attachments attachments skipped because they are top-level items, snapshots or the file does not exist
--https://forums.zotero.org/discussion/35936/zotfile/
-I played around with the program and got it to work!

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