I think it is worth mentioning since 1) I initial though the
same too 2) recently mentioned on the MacPowerUser Facebook page:
that while the meta data is a proprietary format, your files on OSX
are stored in the file system, even if you import them. I routinely
edit PDFs in PDF Expert, edit all my text based files in Sublime,
and DEVONThink sees the changes and indexes them. Similarly for
iOS, you can use the Files app and see all the documents across all
the DEVONThink databases. You can edit the files using Textastic,
PDFExpert, etc…
For me the huge selling point was the flexible and encrypted
sync. Multiple sync locations that can be redundant including
directly between devices. I have some databases with thousands of
PDFs that rarely change. Rather than take up space on dropbox or my
webdav server, I sync directly between my Mac and my iPad.
Completely agree about the interface but I couldn’t find another
piece of software that is as capable or scriptable.
Not affiliated. Just a happy user.
– Stephen