Maven works on all of them
It runs in any modern browser, on any device. The computer holding your video and PDF files needs Chrome, Edge or Brave. It streams them to everything else you own.
The one thing: opening your own files
If you own videos and PDFs, Maven can open them and play them inside the app. To do that, a browser has to be allowed to read a folder on your disk, and only Chrome, Edge and Brave allow it. That is a decision Apple and Mozilla have made, not a feature waiting to be built.
So one computer in your house needs Chrome, Edge or Brave. That computer holds your files and shares them over your own Wi-Fi.
Everything else can watch. Your iPhone, your iPad, a Mac running Safari: they all play the videos and open the PDFs, streamed from that computer. Chrome is what lets a machine share its files, not what lets you watch them.
Device by device
Chrome, Edge or Brave, on a computer
Can share its filesEverything. Your library is real files on your disk, your own videos and PDFs open in the app, and this is the computer that can share them to your other devices.
Library kept: In a folder you choose
Safari or Firefox, on a computer
The full catalogue: add, search, read, take notes. To open your own files, or share them to your phone, install Chrome on the same computer and point it at your library.
Library kept: Inside the browser
iPhone or iPad
Read and search your whole library. Play your videos and PDFs from a computer that is sharing them. Or keep a library on the device itself, if it is the only one you have.
Library kept: Inside the app
Android phone or tablet
The same as iPhone and iPad. Read and search everything, play files from a sharing computer, or keep a library here on its own.
Library kept: Inside the app
What "kept inside the browser" means
On a computer running Chrome, Edge or Brave, your library is a folder of ordinary files. You can open them in any text editor, back them up, and put them in Dropbox or iCloud like anything else.
Everywhere else, browsers do not hand out folders, so Maven keeps your library in its own private storage instead. It stays put between visits and works offline. Two things are worth knowing about it:
- Install Maven and the browser keeps it. Adding it to your Home Screen, or your Dock on a Mac, is what tells the browser this is something you use and not a page to tidy away when it wants space. Maven asks you to do this before you add anything.
- Keep a backup anyway. Installing stops the browser clearing it. It does not stop you: "clear browsing data" still erases it, and so does losing the device. So Maven saves your whole catalogue as a single file you keep wherever you like, and restoring that onto a new phone or computer is how you move.
The usual setups
A computer and a phone
The common one. Chrome on the computer holds everything; your phone reads it, and plays your videos when you are both on the same Wi-Fi.
A Mac you keep in Safari
Works completely for cataloguing and searching. Install Chrome when you want that Mac to open its own video files, and point it at the same library.
A phone and nothing else
Fine. Your library lives on the phone and everything works except opening files that are on a computer you do not have.
Not sure about your setup?
Describe what you have and you will get a straight answer, including "that part will not work" where it is true.
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