Turn PDFs, scans and web pages into AI-ready Markdown on your own machine
Sygal converts PDF, Word, Excel, images, web pages and even YouTube links into clean Markdown and JSON locally, so documents drop into a prompt or knowledge base with far fewer tokens.
Source
cyrillsemah on Hacker News · 2026-10-15 · Project link
Written in our own words. Credit to the original author. Link checked 2026-10-16.
What they did
Sygal converts PDF, Word, Excel, images, web pages and even YouTube links into clean Markdown and JSON locally, so documents drop into a prompt or knowledge base with far fewer tokens.
Result (as claimed)
One-time purchase app for Mac and Windows; 45 points on Show HN.
Tools they used
The source does not name specific tools.
Cost: Pricing depends on the tools you pick; check each official pricing page.
Set it up
Gather your sources
Collect the papers, notes, links or files you want to work from in one place.
Load them into the tool
Open the tools you choose and add your sources. Keep the original files so you can check claims later.
Ask focused questions
Ask for summaries, comparisons or connections with citations to the source passages.
Verify and save
Spot check claims against the sources, then save the output as notes you can reuse.
Copy the full setup prompt
Paste into your agent and it will walk you through the setup, asking before anything that sends, posts or spends.
You are helping me set up this AI use case end to end in Claude Code. Goal: Turn PDFs, scans and web pages into AI-ready Markdown on your own machine What the original author did: Sygal converts PDF, Word, Excel, images, web pages and even YouTube links into clean Markdown and JSON locally, so documents drop into a prompt or knowledge base with far fewer tokens. Reported result (as claimed by the author): One-time purchase app for Mac and Windows; 45 points on Show HN. Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50106054 Tools they used: not named in the source Category: Research & learning Please: 1. Ask me 3 short questions about my situation (accounts I have, budget, what I want the output to look like). 2. Propose a step-by-step plan using these tools or cheaper alternatives, with the time and cost of each step. Use official pricing pages; say "check pricing" if unsure. 3. Then do the setup with me one step at a time, waiting for my OK before anything that sends messages, posts publicly, spends money or deletes data. 4. Finish with a checklist to run it again next time.
You are helping me set up this AI use case end to end in Codex. Goal: Turn PDFs, scans and web pages into AI-ready Markdown on your own machine What the original author did: Sygal converts PDF, Word, Excel, images, web pages and even YouTube links into clean Markdown and JSON locally, so documents drop into a prompt or knowledge base with far fewer tokens. Reported result (as claimed by the author): One-time purchase app for Mac and Windows; 45 points on Show HN. Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50106054 Tools they used: not named in the source Category: Research & learning Please: 1. Ask me 3 short questions about my situation (accounts I have, budget, what I want the output to look like). 2. Propose a step-by-step plan using these tools or cheaper alternatives, with the time and cost of each step. Use official pricing pages; say "check pricing" if unsure. 3. Then do the setup with me one step at a time, waiting for my OK before anything that sends messages, posts publicly, spends money or deletes data. 4. Finish with a checklist to run it again next time.
You are helping me set up this AI use case end to end in Grok Bot. Goal: Turn PDFs, scans and web pages into AI-ready Markdown on your own machine What the original author did: Sygal converts PDF, Word, Excel, images, web pages and even YouTube links into clean Markdown and JSON locally, so documents drop into a prompt or knowledge base with far fewer tokens. Reported result (as claimed by the author): One-time purchase app for Mac and Windows; 45 points on Show HN. Source: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50106054 Tools they used: not named in the source Category: Research & learning Please: 1. Ask me 3 short questions about my situation (accounts I have, budget, what I want the output to look like). 2. Propose a step-by-step plan using these tools or cheaper alternatives, with the time and cost of each step. Use official pricing pages; say "check pricing" if unsure. 3. Then do the setup with me one step at a time, waiting for my OK before anything that sends messages, posts publicly, spends money or deletes data. 4. Finish with a checklist to run it again next time.
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