How digital planner hyperlinks work, and how to tap them in GoodNotes

A digital planner is one PDF with links drawn over its tabs, dates and buttons. They are the same kind of link as the contents page of any PDF: an invisible box that says "go to page 214". Nothing is installed and nothing is online. The app you write in reads the boxes and turns a tap into a jump.

What is linked in a planner

In the planners we make, almost everything you can see on the edge of a page is a link:

• ✓The month tabs down one edge open each month's page.
• ✓The dates on a month calendar open that day's page.
• ✓Section tabs (goals, brain dump, habits, your own tabs) open the first page of that section.
• ✓The index lists every part of the planner, and every line on it is a link.
• ✓Arrows step to the previous and next page, and the little house takes you back to the index from anywhere.

A full dated year runs to hundreds of pages, and the links are what make that usable: any page is one or two taps away, where paper would be a flick through the whole book.

Why a tap writes instead of jumping

While a pen is selected, your app assumes a tap is ink. That is the whole reason a link can seem dead. There are two ways round it, and both are quick.

In other apps

• ✓Notability: switch the note to read-only by tapping the pencil toggle off, then tap any tab or date; toggle it back on to write.
• ✓Xodo and PDF Expert: plain taps follow links while no pen is armed, so there is no mode to switch.
• ✓Flexcil: links follow in reading mode; in pen mode, switch back to read.
• ✓reMarkable: the links inside a planner made for the device work on the tablet itself.

The planner guide has the import steps for each app as well.

Links that leave the planner

Some links open another app rather than another page. In the All-in-One Digital Planner a + beside every hour of a daily page makes an Apple Reminder, a G opens that hour as a Google Calendar event, and small round chips run Apple Shortcuts. These need the Shortcuts installed once from the Apple Shortcuts page, and the Apple ones work on iPhone and iPad. The calendar guide explains them in full.

When the links still do nothing

1. 1Check the mode first: a pen or highlighter is almost always the reason.
2. 2Make sure you opened the original download. A planner that has been printed to PDF, flattened or exported again from another app can lose its links on the way.
3. 3Try the file in another app from the list above. If it jumps there, the first app is the one to adjust; if it jumps nowhere, write to us and we will look at the file.