Sync reMarkable notebooks to an Obsidian vault as transcribed Markdown — over plain SSH, no cloud service, no OAuth server, no background sync daemon.

1. Pull — cheap metadata-only rsync over SSH lists every notebook on the device without transferring page data. Only the notebook(s) you actually ask for get their real page data pulled.
2. Convert — rmc turns each .rm page into SVG, which rsvg-convert rasterizes to PNG at native resolution (1404x1872).
3. Transcribe — each page image is sent to Claude (Haiku by default) to transcribe handwriting into Markdown, describing diagrams/sketches in bracketed notes and marking illegible words with [?].
4. Export — one Markdown file per notebook, written straight into your Obsidian vault folder.

No reMarkable Cloud account, no Docker, no persistent sync process — you run it whenever you want a notebook exported.

• SSH access to the tablet with rm-ssh-over-wlan (or USB) enabled and a key installed (see the reMarkable SSH docs)
• rsync, rsvg-convert (brew install librsvg)
• Python 3.10+
• Claude Code CLI, authenticated

git clone https://github.com/AmitSubhash/rmscribe.git
cd rmscribe
python3 -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -r requirements.txt

Add an SSH host alias for your tablet (e.g. rm2) to ~/.ssh/config.

# list every notebook on the device (fast, metadata only)
python main.py --list --vault /path/to/vault

# sync one notebook by exact name
python main.py --notebook "My Notebook" --vault /path/to/vault

# sync everything (slow, pulls every notebook's page data)
python main.py --all --vault /path/to/vault

# use a different Claude model
python main.py --notebook "My Notebook" --vault /path/to/vault --model claude-sonnet-5

A companion CLI routes a "Journal" folder on the tablet into an Emacs org-mode file+datetree journal (e.g. ~/org/journal.org) instead of the Obsidian vault. Handwrite in that folder, and each new page is transcribed and appended as a dated entry, interleaved with your typed SPC X j captures:

* 2026
** 2026-07 July
*** 2026-07-06 Sunday
**** [2026-07-06 Sun 09:14] :handwritten:
  transcribed entry text ...

# preview what would be added, without writing the journal (recommended first)
python journal.py --dry-run

# transcribe new "Journal" pages into ~/org/journal.org
python journal.py

# point at a different folder / journal file / model
python journal.py --folder "Journal" --journal-file ~/org/journal.org --model claude-sonnet-5

Details:

• By default only the notebook named "Journal" inside the Journal folder is touched, so other notebooks you keep in that folder (plans, scratch) are ignored. Pass --notebook "" to journal every notebook in the folder, or --notebook "Name" to target a different one. Reuses the same pull → convert → transcribe engine as main.py.
• Idempotent: each page is deduped by the SHA-256 of its raw .rm stroke data (state in state/journal_pages.json), so re-runs never duplicate an entry even as you keep adding pages to one journal notebook.
• Each page is its own entry, dated by that page's own write time (the reMarkable's per-page modifed stamp), so keep one journal notebook and add a page whenever you journal -- every page lands on the day you wrote it, even if you sync several days at once. (Falls back to the notebook's last-modified time if a page carries no stamp.)
• Missing year/month/day nodes are created in sorted order; the journal file is backed up (journal.org.bak) before every write and replaced atomically; transcribed body text is indented so a line starting with * or # can't be misread as an org heading.
• --bootstrap marks all current pages as already-journaled without transcribing (run once if you point it at a notebook with a back-catalog you don't want dumped under today's date).

The triple-tap trigger (device/poll_trigger.sh) runs this automatically after the Obsidian sync, so one triple-tap syncs notebooks, publishes the blog, and files your journal.

• Only plain handwritten notebooks (fileType: "notebook") are supported — annotated PDFs and EPUBs are skipped for now.
• Transcription quality depends on handwriting legibility and the chosen model; treat output as a searchable draft, not a verbatim transcript.
• Pen colors outside rmc's built-in palette (e.g. custom ShadingMarker colors) render as black — cosmetic only, doesn't affect transcription.