Okay, so I started reading this and got excited to see what this was all about. I've been wanting a web browser that can turn the "regular web" (as much as possible) into something more like an e-book that happens to have hyperlinks.
Essentially, imagine Reader Mode, but all the time.
But this is... something else? I tried scrolling to the bottom and as soon as I click on the scroll bar, I get a pop-up showing a bunch of gestures and can no longer scroll. Pressing the back button does nothing. Closing the tab asks me if I want to discard my unsaved changes?!
So I'm guessing this is some CSS/JS to make a regular site _behave_ something like an e-reader? Which may be fine as far as it goes, I just don't think it's a good idea to hijack the scroll
nottorp 10 minutes ago [-]
When I browsed away by typing another site name in the address bar i got the 'your information may not be saved' firefox popup twice. Didn't see any forms...
neogodless 40 minutes ago [-]
There may be good ideas in here, particularly for the e-reader users, but it's a terribly unfriendly web site from a mouse / keyboard. Having no (apparent) way to escape eInk mode is really not a great user experience.
And I, too, fell into the eInk mode by clicking on the scrollbar. Very odd design decisions there.
I couldn't figure out how to go "up" in pages. Pressing "Home" didn't do anything. So a lot of web browser / mouse / keyboard functionality is thrown out in that mode, which shouldn't be necessary to still be a good e-reader mode.
thinkling 33 minutes ago [-]
I find the wording ambiguous, but this:
> Eink mode is not a closed-file format reader but rather a form of responsive web design (RWD) integrated into the website itself.
suggests to me that it's a display mode you have to enable in the CSS design of the site, like "print" layout. I.e. this particular version is not software you can use on any site, it has to be baked into the site.
Now the quest is to make this something that the user instead enables on her device for all sites.
evantbyrne 1 hours ago [-]
This is something I've been wanting for a while. You could probably build an extension to accomplish that. One hard challenge would be extracting content and then displaying it in a way that retains its semantics across the web, including navigation, sidebars, etc. Another would be form handling.
carlosjobim 52 minutes ago [-]
How about an extension that does it -after- the browser has implemented reader view? Then all that is already taken care of.
bestouff 1 hours ago [-]
Actually it's not a bad idea. Scrolling is impossible on epaper screens.
dheera 36 minutes ago [-]
If it can get rid of any kind of pop-up (newsletter, GDPR, intercom, install the app to keep reading, click here to read the full article) interruptions, I want it ...
These interruptions are especially annoying on e-ink.
This has problems on desktop - the eink mode gets saved to a cookie, and refreshing the page causes it to be blocked by a broken modal.
2 hours ago [-]
chambers 1 hours ago [-]
In lieu of an e-ink monitor, I use a hotkey to toggle "Grayscale" filtering on my Mac.
It's taking some of the addictiveness out of my screen viewing.
carlosjobim 30 minutes ago [-]
This is something genius from the article:
"WYSIWYG Printing (PDF Saving)
When printing web pages, browsers typically use a default pagination algorithm that rearranges the content based on the printed paper size. This ensures images aren't cut off by page boundaries. However, this pagination isn't tailored to the user's current device screen size. Instead, it uses standard paper dimensions like A4, A3, or B5. As a result, when downloading a PDF on a small-screen device using A4 sizing, the text may appear too small to read comfortably in a PDF reader, requiring zooming. This leads to the same issues as general web page zooming: inability to view full lines of text and the need for constant horizontal scrolling.
In Eink mode, pressing the print button will produce a PDF that mirrors the screen's display. While the paper size might be larger, resulting in surrounding whitespace, using an E Ink device's native PDF reader (such as Onyx's Neoreader) to automatically crop the margins will create a PDF that exactly matches the on-screen view. All highlighted annotations and handwritten notes will be preserved in their original page positions, achieving a true 'What You See Is What You Get' experience. This allows users to conveniently save and later review content on the same device without text size issues."
MPSFounder 45 minutes ago [-]
Side note: is there any eink monitor someone recommends? I have a macbook pro, a macbook air and a remarkable pro. The Remarkable pro (has colors) flickers way too much. My macbook pro also uses miniled which dries my eyes. It is using PWM I figured (work laptop, so I used it docked). I want an eink monitor with no flickers, that is easy on the eyes. The macbook air screen is great compared to the macbook pro (does not use PWM). I thought I don't need color on the eink monitor, but syntax highlighting helps ... Maybe I am just getting old ha, but I sit in front of monitors for 10-12 hours a day
egypturnash 2 hours ago [-]
Honestly now I want "paged mode" as an option in my browsers next to "reader mode". Or a thing I can choose for reader mode to involve.
Flipping pages on my desktop with l/r arrow keys (which is what this 'eink mode' does if you invoke it on a desktop) instead of endlessly scrolling is pretty nice.
jnsie 1 hours ago [-]
It's a funny old world. Last weekend I jailbroke my Kindle for various reasons but among them to get continuous scrolling. I never imagined people would want anything else on the desktop. Different strokes for different folks, of course...
mdp2021 2 hours ago [-]
If you don't mind the terminal, `lynx` (for example) could do the trick.
carlosjobim 2 hours ago [-]
You can -almost- do this on most browsers by pressing space bar to scroll down and shift+space bar to scroll up. But on phones there is no remedy yet.
For e-ink the problem with space bar scrolling is that it has an animation which messes up the display.
Historically we went from scrolls to pages when the printing press was developed. Digital reading needs to go through the same evolution, it seems.
egypturnash 2 hours ago [-]
"Almost" is doing a lot of work in this sentence. Lines of text end up halfway off the screen. Sticky headers obscure text and you have to scroll backwards. It's just a messy experience.
carlosjobim 49 minutes ago [-]
If you use reader mode, then you won't have those problems.
Bonus: J/K keys will scroll to next paragraph or HTML element.
stuaxo 1 hours ago [-]
Not sure if it's still there, but when the scrolling was introduced there was a setting to enable or disable it so the old jump mode would work too.
edent 1 hours ago [-]
On Android you can pair a Bluetooth presentation remote. Up and Down work as Page Up / Down. I use that for reading on my phone and eReader.
mattl 2 hours ago [-]
Really like this.
In Safari on iOS this works great. If this combined dark mode and reader mode font sizes I’d call my favorite way to read the mobile web.
Rendered at 20:22:14 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) with Vercel.
Essentially, imagine Reader Mode, but all the time.
But this is... something else? I tried scrolling to the bottom and as soon as I click on the scroll bar, I get a pop-up showing a bunch of gestures and can no longer scroll. Pressing the back button does nothing. Closing the tab asks me if I want to discard my unsaved changes?!
So I'm guessing this is some CSS/JS to make a regular site _behave_ something like an e-reader? Which may be fine as far as it goes, I just don't think it's a good idea to hijack the scroll
And I, too, fell into the eInk mode by clicking on the scrollbar. Very odd design decisions there.
I couldn't figure out how to go "up" in pages. Pressing "Home" didn't do anything. So a lot of web browser / mouse / keyboard functionality is thrown out in that mode, which shouldn't be necessary to still be a good e-reader mode.
> Eink mode is not a closed-file format reader but rather a form of responsive web design (RWD) integrated into the website itself.
suggests to me that it's a display mode you have to enable in the CSS design of the site, like "print" layout. I.e. this particular version is not software you can use on any site, it has to be baked into the site.
Now the quest is to make this something that the user instead enables on her device for all sites.
These interruptions are especially annoying on e-ink.
Hit the "eink" button in the top right to start.
This has problems on desktop - the eink mode gets saved to a cookie, and refreshing the page causes it to be blocked by a broken modal.
It's taking some of the addictiveness out of my screen viewing.
"WYSIWYG Printing (PDF Saving)
When printing web pages, browsers typically use a default pagination algorithm that rearranges the content based on the printed paper size. This ensures images aren't cut off by page boundaries. However, this pagination isn't tailored to the user's current device screen size. Instead, it uses standard paper dimensions like A4, A3, or B5. As a result, when downloading a PDF on a small-screen device using A4 sizing, the text may appear too small to read comfortably in a PDF reader, requiring zooming. This leads to the same issues as general web page zooming: inability to view full lines of text and the need for constant horizontal scrolling.
In Eink mode, pressing the print button will produce a PDF that mirrors the screen's display. While the paper size might be larger, resulting in surrounding whitespace, using an E Ink device's native PDF reader (such as Onyx's Neoreader) to automatically crop the margins will create a PDF that exactly matches the on-screen view. All highlighted annotations and handwritten notes will be preserved in their original page positions, achieving a true 'What You See Is What You Get' experience. This allows users to conveniently save and later review content on the same device without text size issues."
Flipping pages on my desktop with l/r arrow keys (which is what this 'eink mode' does if you invoke it on a desktop) instead of endlessly scrolling is pretty nice.
For e-ink the problem with space bar scrolling is that it has an animation which messes up the display.
Historically we went from scrolls to pages when the printing press was developed. Digital reading needs to go through the same evolution, it seems.
Bonus: J/K keys will scroll to next paragraph or HTML element.
In Safari on iOS this works great. If this combined dark mode and reader mode font sizes I’d call my favorite way to read the mobile web.