Breathe · Focus · Read

Papers, without the fight.

A guide for wandering eyes, a spotlight for busy pages, notes beside the paragraph, and spaced review that keeps what you understood. Calm by design — and your library quietly stays your own.

01Add a PDF or Word draft—or pair a manuscript with its reviewer comments.
02Comments, notes, highlights, and AI questions stay beside the original paper.
03Private Drive sync carries your library and original files between devices.

Your library

Opening your libraryRestoring papers and review work…

Phloem is part of houfu72.com ↗

Bring something to the desk

Add to Phloem

Read a paper, work through reviewer feedback, or keep a passage nearby.

Word drafts keep their original file, reviewer comments, replies, and tracked-change summary.

Revision desk

Review a manuscript

How did the feedback arrive?

From a collaboratorAlready have a shared review layer?

Revision desk

Share review layer

Exact paper

Paste text

Rename paper

Changes the name in Phloem, not the original file.

Keep this place

Add a short reminder for your next visit.

Paper details

Add a PDF from a link

Paste a direct PDF link. Phloem downloads one local copy, so the link is not needed again on this device.

Desk settings

Choose how this reading desk syncs, thinks with you, and moves between devices. Your reading settings stay calm and local by default.

Sync with iCloud

Keep your library, notes, highlights, handwriting, progress, PDFs, and Word drafts in your private iCloud database. Reading stays offline-first, and Phloem merges edits instead of replacing this device’s library.

Off — everything stays on this device.

Sync with Google Drive

One tap connects your own Google Drive. Notes, PDFs, Word drafts, and large books up to 200 MB live in a hidden app folder only Phloem can see. Big uploads continue quietly in chunks, so an interrupted transfer resumes instead of starting over.

Encrypted GitHub sync

Notes and library metadata become one AES-GCM encrypted file in a private repo. The passphrase and fine-grained token stay in this browser unless you explicitly make a private device setup link. PDFs remain in your repo’s papers/ folder or on each device. If sync ever needs attention, saving here again resets it.

AI assistant

Choose one AI mode. Private uses Gemini Nano inside compatible desktop Chrome. Choosing a cloud provider uses that provider for review classification and passage matching, while exact quoted passages are linked locally before any model call. Cloud providers receive extracted review text and candidate excerpts—never the PDF file itself.

Share a cloud review pass

Create a one-review link for a friend who needs stronger passage matching. The link carries a temporary grant—not your DeepSeek key—and permits only review classification and location.

Set up another device

Make a private setup link containing your AI provider settings and every saved API key, plus GitHub sync credentials when configured. Open it only on a device you trust. Google Drive still asks you to sign in separately and its session is never placed in the link.

Install as an app

Phloem works offline once installed — papers already on this device open with no network.

Library backup

Portable JSON contains notes and metadata, but not local PDF files or your API credentials.

About & credits

Phloem is a calm, local-first paper reading desk built by Houfu Chen.

Phloem icon artwork by Promma ↗.

NotebookLM export

Review your package

These are the exact files Phloem will put in the ZIP. Read or edit the guide and instructions below before downloading.

Edits here affect this export only. Your saved notes, highlights, and original PDF stay unchanged. To change the reading trail permanently, edit it in Phloem and reopen this review.

PDF
Original paper · untouched
MD
Paper text + your notes, highlights, and prompts · editable below
TXT
README — OPEN FIRST.txtUnzip and NotebookLM upload instructions · editable below

Phloem guide (.md)Full generated content
README (.txt)Instructions included in the ZIP

Pick a GitHub paper

Browse the papers/ folder of your connected private repo, including any folders you keep inside it. Choosing a PDF downloads a local copy for fast reading on this device.

Open Phloem as a local site

You opened the HTML file directly. The library itself can appear this way, but browsers block the PDF reader and OCR workers on file:// pages.

Use the local web address below while developing, or the normal houfu72.com address after publishing. Your notes still stay in this browser.

Open the working local version →

Contents

Install Phloem

Could not open that paper