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What is the best alternative to Calibre?
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KDE Okular
All
14
Experiences
Pros
6
Cons
7
Specs
Top
Pro
Free and open source
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Top
Con
No XFA Adobe Forms support
Cannot fill PDF Forms created with Adobe.
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Top
Pro
Trim margins
Easily trim margins either automatically or manually for easier reading
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Top
Con
Requires many KDE libraries
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Top
Pro
Featureful
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Top
Con
No middle-mouse auto-scrolling
Instead of scrolling automatically when holding down the mouse wheel and dragging, it instead zooms in or out, in contrast with many other programs.
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Top
Pro
Table selection
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Top
Con
Poor HiDPI support
You may have to tinker with QT__SCALE_FACTOR environment variables to get the desired size and not blurry content (this is a bug; see https://bugs.kde.org/show_bug.cgi?id=362856 and https://bugs.archlinux.org/task/54688)
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Top
Pro
Tabbed view option
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Top
Con
No search results overview
You have to navigate to next/previous hit one by one
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Top
Pro
Supports touch interaction
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Top
Con
No "fit to page" option under printing settings
You can only print the content as given so, when you receive a bigger or smaller image thant the default of the printer, you will have to edit it first on other editor.
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Top
Con
Slow scroll
Its new ultra-slow-scroll for PgUp and PgDn makes it unuseable.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, MacOS, Linux (KDE), BSD
License:
GPL-2.0-or-later
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Experiences
Free
315
38
Sumatra PDF
All
7
Experiences
Pros
5
Cons
1
Specs
Top
Pro
Reads many file types
Including PDF, XPS, DjVu, CHM, EPUB, Mobi, FictionBook, PalmDoc, and comic books.
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Top
Con
Windows only
No Linux or OSX versions available.
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Top
Pro
Book updates on the fly
If Book font, style is changed, Sumatra will take the update instantly, No need to close first and import again! Huge time saver for self publishing.
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Top
Pro
Portable
The application consists of a single file that can be run without installation. You can put it on an external device, such as an usb thumb stick and run it on any Windows machine from the thumb stick.
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Top
Pro
Multilingual
It's available in 69 languages.
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Top
Pro
Free and open source
Sumatra is available for free, licensed under GPL with source code available on GitHub.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows
License:
GPL-3.0-only
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Experiences
Free
14
1
FBReader
All
9
Experiences
Pros
4
Cons
4
Specs
Top
Con
Cannot search for books on a SD card
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Top
Pro
Built in eBook store
FBReader features an in built eBook store for users to download eBooks onto their devices through the app.
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Top
Con
No light mode
Unusable if you have astigmatism.
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Top
Pro
Simple and fast
FBReader, while offering many options is simple in design, with that allowing for fast use.
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Top
Con
UI is bad
User interface is confusing and ugly.
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Top
Pro
Books can be saved to SD card
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Top
Con
Complex and confusing app settings
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Top
Pro
Cloud sync
FBReader has built in Google Drive sync for the users files, allowing them to store their eBooks online, not taking up room on their local storage.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, macOS, Linux, Android, iOS
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Experiences
Get it
here
35
10
Cool Reader
All
7
Experiences
Pros
3
Cons
3
Specs
Top
Con
Constantly changes brightness
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Top
Pro
Free and open source
Cool Reader is available completely free and is also open source.
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Top
Con
Could have a better UI design
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Top
Pro
Fully customizable
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Top
Con
Does not support DRM .epubs
.epubs with DRM are not supported by Cool Reader.
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Top
Pro
A wide range of formats supported
Cool Reader supports epub (non-DRM), fb2, doc, txt, rtf, html, chm, tcr, pdb, prc, mobi (non-DRM) and pml formats.
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Specs
Platforms:
Android
License:
GPL-2.0-only
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Experiences
Get it
here
12
3
Kindle for PC
All
5
Experiences
Pros
3
Cons
2
Top
Pro
Built in store
The Kindle app for Android features an in built eBook store within the app that sells eBooks, magazines, newspapers, comic books and graphic novels. Amazon also offers one of it not the biggest eBook store available today.
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Top
Con
Send to Kindle now has to be paid for
Send to Kindle only works if a user is already paying for a cloud subscription plan.
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Top
Pro
Send to Kindle
The Kindle platform allows users to upload their own eBooks and documents to be read on any of the Kindle apps or devices.
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Top
Con
Not good for students research
The eBooks available from Amazon do not offer normal page numbers, printing or even copy paste, which makes using any of the ebooks for reports or papers pretty much impossible.
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Top
Pro
App supports a multitude of operating systems
Kindle for PC is one of the many apps available from Amazon for the Kindle platform. This allows users to keep their library with them no matter what device they are using.
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Free
20
9
Adobe Digital Editions
All
6
Experiences
Pros
3
Cons
3
Top
Con
Full of bugs. No longer supported
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Top
Pro
Well-designed library management 
All books are automatically divided in categories such as "not read", "borrowed", "purchased", "recently read", and "recently added" and additional categories can be added manually. They can be sorted by various criteria including "title", "author", "publisher", "date of addition", and "number of pages". Great for managing large quantities of books.
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Top
Con
No support for Linux
Doesn't have a Linux version.
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Top
Pro
Can be used with a variety of screen readers
ADE supports JAWS, Window-eyes, NVDA and Voiceover.
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Top
Con
Can't edit metadata 
Lacks a built-in metadata editor.
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Top
Pro
Built-in annotation tools
You can highlight and leave notes in the app.
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15
9
Amazon Kindle
All
7
Experiences
Pros
5
Cons
2
Top
Pro
Ease of use
Clean, simple user interface.
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Top
Con
No support for EPUB files
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Top
Pro
Whispersync
Synchronization between devices. Easily pick up on where you left off reading on your Kindle, smartphone, or tablet.
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Top
Con
Not good for students research
The eBooks available from Amazon do not offer normal page numbers, printing or even copy paste, which makes using any of the ebooks for reports or papers pretty much impossible.
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Top
Pro
Free
Available for free on Windows and Mac, and also a very good web app.
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Top
Pro
Built in store
The Kindle app for Android features an in built eBook store within the app that sells eBooks, magazines, newspapers, comic books and graphic novels. Amazon also offers one of it not the biggest eBook store available today.
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Top
Pro
Send to Kindle
The Kindle platform allows users to upload their own eBooks and documents to be read on any of the Kindle apps or devices.
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Experiences
Get it
here
15
10
Miniflux
All
3
Experiences
Pros
2
Cons
1
Top
Pro
Focused on content
The interface is very simple yet usable (completely navigable with keyboard), and focuses on the content.
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Top
Con
Subscription management
It is currently a bit difficult to handle many subscriptions in the web interface, as there is no mass edit option.
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Top
Pro
Very light and easy installation
It is easy to install, and has few dependencies. It requires very few resources to run.
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Free
12
0
Atlantis Word Processor
All
6
Experiences
Pros
4
Cons
1
Specs
Top
Con
No Mac version.
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Top
Pro
Spotlight
Has the Spotlight feature to let you focus on the current document fragment.
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Top
Pro
Sounds
Can play old-fashioned typewriter sounds when I type text.
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Top
Pro
Ebook
Can export documents directly to EPUB and MOBI.
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Top
Pro
Fully customizable
Can customize toolbars, colors, sounds, and keyboard shortcuts.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows
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$35 or free
12
9
Icecream Ebook Reader
All
5
Experiences
Pros
3
Cons
2
Top
Con
Requires PRO version for basic functionality
PRO version of the reader is required for reading without gigantic "Buy Me" billboard shoved in face every minute for 10 seconds. Oh and it's needed to copy and paste and edit.
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Top
Pro
Clean, customizable UI
The application has an easy to use and understand interface with important features such as search always within easy reach at the top. The interface can also be customized to best suit wishes. For example, font size can be changed, there's choice between single and double column view when reading books, or table and bookshelf view when managing the library.
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Top
Con
Can't read Kindle books
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Top
Pro
Pleasant reading experience
The app tracks how much of the book has been read, jumping between chapters or bookmarks can be done with a few clicks, and there's even a distraction-free mode that takes away all the interface and allows focusing on the book.
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Top
Pro
It is much more lighter than Adobe Digital Editions, Calibre, etc.
So, Icecream ebook reader will work faster.
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here
14
11
Mendeley
All
9
Experiences
Pros
5
Cons
3
Specs
Top
Pro
Good sharing and community support
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Top
Con
Closed Source (Proprietary)
Own by Elsevier
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Top
Pro
Moderately high cloud space
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Top
Con
Not very good web import capability
To support importing citation from your browser
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Top
Pro
Very good PDF management capability
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Top
Con
Proprietary and not-standard PDF annotation
If you annotate the PDFs you have to open it with Mendeley since it uses non-standard formats to annotate PDFs.
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Top
Pro
Great web interface
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Top
Pro
Good video tutorials
Official video tutorials can be found here that take you through what the software is capable and how to go about using it.
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Specs
Platforms:
Web, Windows, Linux, Mac
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Experiences
Free
21
27
FreshRSS
All
4
Experiences
Pros
3
Specs
Top
Pro
Full control
Licensed under AGPL 3 and self-hosted.
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Top
Pro
Polite and respectful community
You can ask questions and receive answers. It seems normal on the surface, but that's currently almost an unique feature for an OSS.
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Top
Pro
Fast
As someone who used Tiny Tiny RSS for many, many years (and sill likes it) I will say that FreshRSS is noticeably faster. Feed checks are quick and jumping into the menus to configure it is effortless.
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Specs
PHP version:
7
Self-Hosted:
Yes
Import OPML:
True
Import Google Reader:
True
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Free
29
2
Sumatra PDF
All
13
Experiences
Pros
8
Cons
4
Specs
Top
Pro
Starts quickly
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Top
Con
Windows only
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Top
Pro
Free and open source
Sumatra is available for free, licensed under GPL with source code available on GitHub.
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Top
Con
Lacking in features
Sumatra aims for simplicity at the expense of functionality. For example, there's no way to annotate PDFs or edit them.
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Top
Pro
Low resource usage
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Top
Con
Fonts are not smooth enough
Not as smooth as e.g. Adobe Reader. No anti-aliasing
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Top
Pro
Does not have heavy editor features
Annotations and other heavy features are just not needed in reader.
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Top
Con
Cannot crop empty fields
Just got used to this killing feature on Goodreader on Mac.
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Top
Pro
Extensive keyboard shortcuts
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Top
Pro
Elegant interface
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Top
Pro
Portable
The application consists of a single file that can be run without installation. You can put it on an external device, such as an usb thumb stick and run it on any Windows machine from the thumb stick.
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Top
Pro
Multilingual
It's available in 69 languages.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows
License:
GPL-3.0-only
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Experiences
Get it
here
192
11
Affinity Publisher
All
8
Experiences
Pros
5
Cons
2
Specs
Top
Pro
One-off reasonable price, with no upgrades or monthly subs
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Top
Con
No EPub options (yet?)
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Top
Pro
Very comprehensive set of features
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Top
Con
No Linux version available
Unfortunately, there is no Linux version available in 2021, despite of numerous requests of the users.
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Top
Pro
Has become sufficiently popular over the past year that there is an excellent knowledge base
You can quickly find solutions, tutorials, etc. online when you need help. Contrast this to Scribus, which despite its rich feature set, is often unintuitive and awkward to use, and help from other users sometimes difficult to find.
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Top
Pro
Lots of Resources to Learn
Serif's forums, videos and other sites offer good resources to learn this tool, which has a very intuitive interface.
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Top
Pro
Most intuitive interface
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, macOS, iPadOS
License:
Proprietary
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Experiences
Free / paid
46
5
Foliate
All
4
Experiences
Pros
2
Cons
1
Specs
Top
Pro
Supports coloured text
Important for example for IT books (source code) or other reference books.
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Top
Con
No PDF support
Foliate cannot be used to read PDFs, which may be a problem for those who read many documents in this format.
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Top
Pro
Minimal reading UI
When reading, there is only a customizable progress indicator at the bottom, and the title at the top.
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Specs
Platforms:
Linux
License:
GPLv3
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free
2
0
Zathura
All
15
Experiences
Pros
11
Cons
3
Specs
Top
Pro
Lightweight
Zathura is fast and can open a pdf file almost instantly.
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Top
Con
No annotation support
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Top
Pro
Clean interface
Inferface is clean and shows only a small statusbar.
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Top
Con
No thumbnail view
Unlike qpdfview, okular and evince, which have it.
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Top
Pro
Vim bindings
You can browse files via keyboard, using keyboard commands similar to vim (text editor).
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Top
Con
Input forms are not editable
qpdfview, okular and evince do this.
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Top
Pro
Automatic document reloading
Zathura will automatically refresh the view when a document has been modified. (By contrast, Chrome requires a manual refresh and brings you back to the top of the document so that you have to scroll back down).
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Top
Pro
Default page layout always same and predictable
No unpredictable window opening behavior like Atril. Together with it's easy ways to scroll and zoom, zathura is perfect for fast look through lots of PDFs
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Top
Pro
Detailed adjustment of dark mode
recolor-darkcolor recolor-lightcolor recolor-keephue recolor-reverse-video (see manpage zathurarc) Also, proper dark mode: colors are grayscaled not inverted.
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Top
Pro
Deactivation of all GUI elements
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Top
Pro
Very detailed adjustment of page layout
For example: pages-per-row 3 (3 pages next to each other) first-page-column 3:1 (for 3 page column layout: first page is on the left) page-right-to-left false (2nd and 3rd page are shown right to the 1st) Unfortunately I haven't found a way yet to map these commands to a key. The ability to prefix a shortcut with a number argument would lend itself perfectly to achieve what I had in mind.
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Top
Pro
Call userscripts on document
For example: map <C-l> exec "termite -c ./termite_config --class float -e 'tmux new-session /bin/ranger $(dirname "%")'" <C-l> opens ranger with directory containing the opened document Other ideas: extract pages print pages
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Top
Pro
Good documentation of configuration options
See man page "zathura".
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Top
Pro
Multiple tabs via tabbed
https://tools.suckless.org/tabbed/ But unlike qpdfview search will only operate on one tab instance.
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Specs
Platforms:
Linux
License:
Zlib
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Experiences
Free
114
27
Tiny Tiny RSS
All
9
Experiences
Pros
7
Cons
1
Specs
Top
Con
Has to be set up manually, tech-savviness and patience required
Using Tiny Tiny RSS is not as simple as creating an account on another service. Merely completing the installation procedure will take at least a few hours. Main requirements include a physical server or a web host supporting PHP and MySQL. The know-how’s also needed, but there are several guides online that explain all the steps quite well. Anyone familiar with computers, even not being an expert, who is willing to spend some hours reading and learning should be able to set up this software.
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Top
Pro
Highly customizable via plugins
The main way to customize Tiny Tiny RSS is via functionality plugins. Some come with the basic installation, but many additional ones are available from third parties. Users can also change the way information is shown, create themes or skins using CSS or download ones created by the community. All this is possible because Tiny Tiny RSS is open-source--anyone can create modifications for it and publicly share them. You just have to look out for possible bugs and security issues with user-made content.
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Top
Pro
Full control of the service
Since this reader is open-source and self-hosted, users can have full control of the service and its data when used on a private server. This means they don’t need to rely on a third party service that can be discontinued anytime. It also ensures the cost for using the reader will not increase and it protects user privacy by not giving up personal data.
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Top
Pro
Multiple users per installation
One instance of Tiny Tiny RSS can be used by as many people as necessary.
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Top
Pro
Organize by tags and labels
Browse and organize feeds and posts by tags and labels.
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Top
Pro
Android client available
An Android app is available on the Google Play store.
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Top
Pro
Integrates with a media center
Feeds can be viewed on a TV or dedicated media box.
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Top
Pro
E-mail digest
Users can request an e-mail to be sent at a set interval with news posts.
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Specs
Platforms:
Web, Android, iOS
License:
GNU GPL v3
Search:
Yes
Annotation:
Yes
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Experiences
Free
140
33
Kobo app
All
3
Experiences
Pros
2
Cons
1
Top
Con
No way to add own titles
The users Kobo account has no way to add outside titles to the users collection.
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Top
Pro
Sync eBooks and position
The Kobo app will sync the users whole library as well as each position read for each title. This way a user can pick up where they left off from one device to the next.
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Top
Pro
App supports a multitude of operating systems
The Kobo app supports just about every main OS out there. iOS, Android, Windows 8, Windows 8 Phone and Blackberry 10. By being available on so many platforms the user is able to read their eBooks on any device they wish.
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here
20
8
Mozilla Thunderbird
All
16
Experiences
Pros
10
Cons
5
Specs
Top
Pro
Free (as in freedom and beer)
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Top
Con
Development slowed to only focus on stability and security
Mozilla Thunderbird has slowed down its development of features to only focus resources on security and stability.
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Top
Pro
Available on Linux, OS X and Windows
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Top
Con
Outdated interface
Thunderbird's interface is very outdated and unpleasant. It feels more like a Windows XP application than like a modern MacOS one.
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Top
Pro
Good filtering system
Mozilla Thunderbird offers a flexible filtering system with the ability to set flags and read/unread, as well as sort/assign to new mail directories. There are also numerous plugins available to assist in the filtering.
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Top
Con
Terrible integration with macOS
Simple things - drag/dropping pictures doesn't work, for instance.
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Top
Pro
Very reliable
Version after version, Mozilla Thunderbird works as expected.
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Top
Con
Subject lines can (temporarily) disappear from the list
This is sporadic behavior.
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Top
Pro
Large assortment of plugins available
Mozilla Thunderbird offers a huge amount of extensions to expand the usability and options of the client.
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Top
Con
Serious bugs
Clicking on a subject line can bring up the wrong email.
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Top
Pro
Great flexibility
More options and extended settings than most power users could dream of. Get it working how YOU want.
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Top
Pro
Tabs for navigation
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Top
Pro
Lightning Calendar and Address Book integration
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Top
Pro
Consistent and involving a moderate learning curve
The app design of Mozilla Thunderbird has not changed significantly since its beginning, making its learning curve almost non-existent.
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Top
Pro
Send large files easy
Install pCloud plugin for Thunderbird and your files (upto 20 GB free storage included) will be received as download links
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, macOS, Linux
Search:
Yes
IMAP:
Yes
Exchange Support:
Yes
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Experiences
Free
854
271
Adobe Acrobat
All
22
Experiences
Pros
16
Cons
5
Specs
Top
Pro
Excellent compatibility with the PDF standard
Since Adobe is the creator of the PDF standard, it stands to reason that Adobe's Acrobat Reader has the excellent support for it.
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Top
Con
Crashes often
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Top
Pro
Cross-platform
Available on Windows, OS X, iOS and Android.
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Top
Con
Very expensive
While there's a free version of Acrobat Reader, it does not allow editing. There's a choice of Standard edition that costs $299, and Pro version for $499.
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Top
Pro
Allows converting MS Office documents to PDFs
You can use the create PDF tool to open any Office document and convert it to an editable PDF or if you're on Windows, you can access the same functionality in Office from the Acrobat tab.
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Top
Con
No repsonisive usability
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Top
Pro
Clean interface
Acrobat has a three tab interface. There are home, tools and document tabs. The home tab has recently used files as well as files stored in Adobe's cloud services. It will be the first thing shown once you start the program. The tools tab includes access to all Acrobats functionality. From here you can add tabs to panels or use the search to look for tools.
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Top
Con
Outdated design
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Top
Pro
Acrobat can construct a font to match scanned content
Instead of simply trying to match the font to the closest available, Acrobat can attempt to construct a font based on other characters in the document.
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Top
Con
Subscription
You cannot use the version you paid before.
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Top
Pro
Search allows finding functionality
You don't have to look trough menus to find specific functionality, instead you can use search that's available in the sidebar and the tools tab to find the functionality you're looking for. You don't have to know the name of the tool either, related terms will work.
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Top
Pro
Good OCR
Acrobat can recognize characters from both both scanned documents and photos of text. Even if the photos are at an angle.
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Top
Pro
Can automatically detect form fields
Acrobat has a form wizard that will attempt to overlay appropriate form fields (single-line and multi-line text fields, checkboxes, radio buttons, etc.) over existing layouts.
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Top
Pro
Integrated cloud service
Gives access to a cloud service that allows storage and sharing of PDF files.
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Top
Pro
Allows getting notified when recipients view or download a file
You can use the document cloud to get a shareable link to any of your documents. And it's possible to get notified when a document cloud document gets viewed and/or downloaded.
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Top
Pro
Desktop app supports electronic signatures
You can both sign as well as send PDFs for signature.
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Top
Pro
Good annotation options
Acrobat allows commenting on text, highlighting text and leave audio messages.
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Top
Pro
Video playback support
Flash and H.264 encoded video can be played back in a Adobe Reader.
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Top
Pro
Allows comparing two separate PDF files for differences
Reader can compare two versions of a PDF file and highlight differences.
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Top
Pro
Allows real-time collaboration
Since version 9, Reader supports real-time collaboration that synchronizes documents and includes chat.
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Top
Pro
Touch-friendly interface for the desktop version
The interface has big enough button that they can be used on a tablet sized device.
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Specs
Platforms:
Windows, MacOS, Android, iOS
License:
Proprietary
Exports:
.pdf, .ps, .eps, .html, .htm, .jpg, .jpeg, .jpe, .jpf, .jpx, .jp2, .j2k, .j2c, .jpc.png, .pptx, .rtf, .txt, .tif, .tiff, .xlsx, .doc, .docx, .xml, .csv
Real-time collaboration:
No
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Experiences
$299 - $499
28
15
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