Using ChatGPT with PDFs

I think reading PDFs directly might be a future feature but for now, we gotta rely on intermediate steps and tools.

Honestly, I just copy and paste important sections. Honestly, easiest way for me to get the info I want instead of messing with file uploads.

Been using some Python scripts that extract text from PDFs and then query ChatGPT with that text. Not perfect but works pretty well.

Wonder if future versions might directly open PDFs? Would be super cool if you could just upload the file and chat with it.

Sometimes I get weird formatting when copying from PDFs, so the inputs to ChatGPT aren’t clean. Anyone else face that?

I guess it’s important to check your PDF’s text layer. If it’s missing or encrypted, ChatGPT won’t see anything useful.

Just a heads up for those experimenting: watch out for PDF files with heavy graphics or tables. ChatGPT doesn’t handle that well yet.

I don’t think ChatGPT can open a PDF file on its own. You gotta extract the text yourself first. It’s not a file reader, more like text input/output based.

Some web services let you upload a PDF and then ask questions about it using ChatGPT behind the scenes. Saves a lot of hassle!

I've tried uploading PDFs through some apps that integrate ChatGPT, and it does a decent job extracting text. But if the PDF has images or weird formatting, it's kinda hit or miss.

If you’re dealing with scanned PDFs, you’ll want to OCR them first. ChatGPT can’t read images in PDFs directly.

I’ve noticed some apps use embeddings of PDF content to get better answers from ChatGPT. Pretty cool tech!

If you want to analyze a PDF with ChatGPT, I recommend using apps or platforms that specialize in document AI. They handle PDFs and then use ChatGPT's API for understanding.

I found that splitting a big PDF into chunks and sending pieces to ChatGPT helps avoid token limits too.