Now you can annotate precise points in documents and images with arrows in a range of colors and directions. numerous users have asked for this, particularly for annotating scientific images but it works equally well for PDF pages and images in snapshots.

Now you can share your notes to twitter. So if you want to share something about a particular part of a website or document, just make an A.nnotate note about it and click the little link icon in the top right of the note. The sharing dialog now looks like this:

The first time you use it, you need to tell it about your twitter account, but you can have it save the details after that so you can share any note on twitter with a couple of clicks!

The new version of A.nnotate is now available! It lets you add notes to highlighted text and image regions on a wide range of document formats (including PDF, MS Word (.doc and .docx), OpenOffice, PowerPoint, spreadsheets, JPG, PNG, GIF images) - as well as snapshots of any web page. Notes and documents are private - but you can share with colleagues by sending a link. Everything runs in the browser with no software or plugins to install.

See the Getting started guide for an introduction to the new features including:

The next version of A.nnotate will be released on 7th Dec 2008. It includes a number of new features to make it easier to collaborate on PDF and Word documents in the browser. We were planning a Sept release, but delayed it to give us time to include various extra features which users were requesting.

We've just announced a bargain flat-fee server deal for educational use: $1995 per server to use how you want. There are no limits on the number of users or volume of documents allowed. That just depends on the hardware you put it on. In return, weòùd like your feedback to help improve the system.

A significant fraction of our inquiries come from colleges and universities that see applications for A.nnotate among their staff and students. Naturally, teachers can use it to provide feedback on student assignments instead of writing on printed copies. But there have been a range of other creative suggestions too. Staff could prepare a folder of annotated websites with comments or questions in particular places, or students could be asked to annotate a particular text.

The A.nnotate server is now available for installation on your own local machines (e.g. on an intranet, or on your own dedicated web server) - see Standalone A.nnotate servers for details.

When running on your own servers you'll see the same easy-to-use browser based interface familiar from the hosted service on A.nnotate.com but browsing and uploading should be quicker. You can also keep documents securely behind your firewall and you can upload as many documents as your hard disk space will allow.

Just back from Edinburgh Repository Fringe - a gathering of people interested in making research data and publications more useful and easy to access. There were great keynote talks from Dorothea Salo ['the institutional repository is dead'] and David De Roure ['how repositories can avoid failing like the grid'], and lots of "performances" in the spirit of an unconference / BarCamp event.

A common theme seemed to be that setting up a university-wide database and expecting researchers to populate it by filling out forms just doesn't work; but providing easy to use web services for collaboration and improving visibility / citation counts of research is the way to go.

A.nnotate offers a quick and easy way to collaborate on PDF, Word and HTML documents: simply upload a read-only version to A.nnotate.com and let reviewers add their comments to highlighted text in the browser. It is not an online word processor (like Google docs / Zoho writer / Buzzword) however - A.nnotate is focussed on shared annotation of a read-only copy.   This blog entry discusses some of the ways you can use A.nnotate with your current desktop or online word processor.

With A.nnotate, all reviewers (and the authors) can read and reply to each others' comments, and you avoid the chaos which can result if several people edit a document at the same time. This gives the author additional control: in many cases you want other peoples opinions on a document draft but do not want them to change your wording.

Work is well underway for two major developments in the coming months.

First, the standalone server will be out in July. This is for anyone who wants to run A.nnotate on their own server on their intranet, integrate it with existing systems, or be absolutely sure where your confidential documents are physically located. Beta testing for the install process will begin in a couple of weeks and there will be an announcement here when it's available. Why not subscribe to the RSS feed if you haven' done so already?

The A.nnotate.com site has now been updated. New features for PDF annotation include:

There is now also a simple way to export your notes on a page as plain text; the Tools > Plain notes menu option in the top right of your documents page shows your notes in a new window, where you can copy / paste into other applications.

Documents have long been the information dead-ends of the web, needing separate plugins and viewers to download and read them. Now A.nnotate.com enhances PDF, Word documents and any web page to allow highlighting text, interactive comments and discussion right in the web browser.

Edinburgh, Scotland, 4th April 2008: Textensor Limited, an Edinburgh University startup company today launched A.nnotate.com, a new service that everyone can use to discuss, review and index their documents online.

A.nnotate is the flagship product of Textensor Limited which was incorporated in Edinburgh, Scotland in 2005. The founders had been working for several years on technologies for information capture, storage and reuse in biosciences. Their vision led them to focus on ease of use and universal availability for the core concepts of annotation and collaboration, and they are proud to be able to make these publicly available in A.nnotate.

Today A.nnotate is used online by thousands of individuals and groups who need to store or share comments on documents, web pages or images. Standalone servers are in use in universities, SMEs, blue chip companies and the public sector. A.nnotate technology is increasingly chosen by developers to add annotation capabilities to their own high-value web applications thanks to its flexible licensing, ease of use, and outstanding technical support.