Tested it with my existing vault with restricted mode turned on. No behavior changes.
Expected result
When I re-open the PDF in Obsidian, the changes made in third-party apps should be visible.
Actual result
The file in Obsidian vault isn’t modified. Instead, regardless of which third-party app I use, sharing a file always creates a separate copy in a third-party app’s storage.
Prior to iOS 17, there were some apps (including PDF Xpert mentioned earlier) that would have directly open the shared file instead of creating a copy.
Environment
iPadOS 17.1.1
Obsidian 1.4.16 (114), API version 1.4.16
My workflow with Obsidian crucially depends on an ability to modify PDFs in a vault via third-party PDF reader apps, so I hope that this issue can be fixed soon.
As it may be an issue that should be fixed on PDF reader apps’ side, I will try to contact them as well.
I noticed this too, except it’s something I don’t use often so I thought maybe I’d misremembered what was possible. I recently told someone about the ability but then when I was checking which apps it worked in the answer was unexpectedly none; one I was pretty sure it worked with was iA Writer.
I have got a response from devs of “PDF Expert” iOS app, and they say that the problem “is likely” on the Obsidian’s side. It would be nice if Obsidian developers can take a look to see if something can be done on Obsidian’s side.
This completely broke my workflow with Obsidian, I’d appreciate if this issue is prioritized.
It has always been working in “edit-in-place” way before iOS 17. I’ve been extensively using that feature to index papers using Obsidian and annotate them via third-party PDF reader.
We did some internal talk and we never explicitly supported edit in place, share was always by copy.
It is possible that in the previous version of iOS there wes mechanism (or glitch) by iOS for which it was possible to edit-in-place and Apple changed in iOS 17.
We tried other apps on iOS17 and they are all sharing by copy.
You can open a Feature request for “share and edit in place” and we’ll look if it is feasible at some point in the future. Sorry!
Ah well. I do remember being surprised that it worked, and assuming the receiving app was responsible (for enabling some iOS feature or whatever). @wonderofobsidian If you post a feature request and comment here with a link, I’ll upvote & comment.
On the other hand, I’ve tested the “other way around” on iPadOS 17+ and a pdf stored in Obsidian in a vault stored on/sync through iCloud:
Opening an app to highlight things in a PDF → opening the desired pdf stored in my vault within the app → Highlight stuff
Result: most of the time (depending on the app I used to highlight the pdf) I do see my PDF being modified and the highlights being saved… then being accessible in Obsidian (in some way).
I don’t know if this would be possible with PDF Expert though but I just thought it could be worth to mention it …
We did some internal talk and we never explicitly supported edit in place, share was always by copy.
As I said, share was “by reference” before iOS 17. Try it on iOS 16!
it is possible that in the previous version of iOS there wes mechanism (or glitch) by iOS for which it was possible to edit-in-place and Apple changed in iOS 17.
According to the Apple developers forum link in the original post, there was an update on iOS 17 on how file system works, which doesn’t seem like a “glitch”
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