PDF Case Review

Appearance

Set up categories ​

Categories are how highlights carry meaning: each one has a name and a color, and the color is what you pick in the viewer. The defaults suit a business case: Fact, Financial, Strategic implication, Concern, Question.

Change the palette for new documents ​

Set pdfCaseReview.categories in your settings (user for everywhere, workspace for one course or project):

json
"pdfCaseReview.categories": [
  { "id": "claim", "name": "Claim", "color": "#FFFF98" },
  { "id": "evidence", "name": "Evidence", "color": "#53FFBC" },
  { "id": "doubt", "name": "Doubt", "color": "#FF4F5F" }
]

Rules: each id is lowercase letters, digits or dashes; each color is #RRGGBB and must be unique, because the color is how the viewer tells categories apart. An invalid setting falls back to the defaults with a warning.

Use a preset ​

PDF Case Review: Apply Category Preset... replaces the setting with a built-in palette (Business case, Academic paper, Contract) or one of your own from pdfCaseReview.categoryPresets. Presets you define use the same item shape as categories.

Documents keep their own palette ​

Every sidecar records the categories it was created with, so a settings change never silently recolors existing documents. To bring an open document up to date, run PDF Case Review: Sync Categories from Settings; it offers to save and reload the viewer so the new colors apply. Highlights whose category no longer exists appear under Uncategorized until you re-assign them.

Pick categories while reading ​

  • The category dropdown in the viewer toolbar (next to the highlight button) sets the category for new highlights: pick one, then select text and highlight as usual. It starts on the palette's first category and follows the color picker.
  • Ctrl+Alt+1 to Ctrl+Alt+9 (Cmd+Alt on macOS) highlight the current selection with the Nth category of the document's palette.
  • The viewer's highlight color picker shows the same palette; picking a color there is picking a category.
  • Set Category on a row of the Highlights view, or the category dropdown in the Note view, re-categorize an existing highlight.