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A Chrome extension for bionic reading on any website

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Re: A Chrome extension for bionic reading on any website

#31

Post by hexomancer »

ansh_nanda wrote: post #28
hexomancer wrote: post #4

If you want to try it out on a PDF, I have implemented this in sioyek PDF reader: https://github.com/ahrm/sioyek You need to enable experimental features in `prefs_user.config` by adding `enable_experimental_features 1` and then enable this mode using `toggle_fastread` command within sioyek. I also experimented with more sophisticated algorithms, you can read about the experiment here: https://ahrm.github.io/jekyll/u…

(Developer of the Github repository in the post here) Is it possible for me to easily integrate with sioyek to provide PDF converting ability directly within the Chrome Extension? This would be useful for the following reasons: - For the times when you click on a link and it opens the PDF in Chrome - Many people I know use Chrome as their main "PDF Viewer" app. I believe this will be a great way for both our OSS proj…

I am not very familiar with chrome's PDF API (or lack thereof) but I doubt that it is possible.

Re: A Chrome extension for bionic reading on any website

#32

Post by smolder »

martindbp wrote: post #7

Is there any actual research/study on the efficacy of bionic reading? If it improves reading speed / comprehension significantly then it's really a no-brainer.

My n=1 is that it makes me slightly slower but probably within the margin of error. I find that I recognize whole words at a time, and the shape of the word is unnatural to me when half-bolded like this, which might inhibit recognition slightly. Perhaps after an adjustment period it would be useful, but in my current state, it is not.

Re: A Chrome extension for bionic reading on any website

#34

Post by leokennis »

satysin wrote: post #27

I saw the stories about Bionic Reading a few days ago and ended up going down the rabbit hole for a bit. What interested me was that it wasn't the weight of the letters that helped me read quicker but the shorter lines . The examples with and without Bionic Reading formatting were just as easy for me to read but where it fell apart was when I read something with more words per line. Put 12+ words on a line and the Bi…

I have no way to verify this, but of course speed comprehension. It's better to read a book once in 100 minutes and comprehend everything, than requiring two speed-reads of 60 minutes to reach that same level of comprehension.

Re: A Chrome extension for bionic reading on any website

#35

Post by hovnatan »

hexomancer wrote: post #4

If you want to try it out on a PDF, I have implemented this in sioyek PDF reader: https://github.com/ahrm/sioyek You need to enable experimental features in `prefs_user.config` by adding `enable_experimental_features 1` and then enable this mode using `toggle_fastread` command within sioyek. I also experimented with more sophisticated algorithms, you can read about the experiment here: https://ahrm.github.io/jekyll/u…

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Re: A Chrome extension for bionic reading on any website

#36

Post by prashnts »

hexomancer wrote: post #31
ansh_nanda wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(Developer of the Github repository in the post here) Is it possible for me to easily integrate with sioyek to provide PDF converting ability directly within the Chrome Extension? This would be useful for the following reasons: - For the times when you click on a link and it opens the PDF in Chrome - Many people I know use Chrome as their main "PDF Viewer" app. I believe this will be a great way for both our OSS proj…

I am not very familiar with chrome's PDF API (or lack thereof) but I doubt that it is possible.

Correct, it's not possible in default PDF view in Chrome -- contentscript is not injected. However as long as you have full access to pages, you could intercept a PDF link, render it with, say, PdfJS, and start from there. Maybe!

Re: A Chrome extension for bionic reading on any website

#38

Post by amflare »

I actually found this quite jarring. I'm a decent speed reader (by no means the best, but generally able to consue vast quantities of information quickly), and having these artifical focus points completly threw my rhythm. I can only assume that I've interally developed my own way of skimming that achives the same thing, though not in the same way. So having the first letter bolded actually disrupted whatever my brain was attempting to do.

Re: A Chrome extension for bionic reading on any website

#39

Post by rzwitserloot »

Years upon years ago I read about a trick to speedread by just flashing words in giant font at a set speed; your eyeballs don't need to move, and you can force-train yourself by speeding it up.

I wrote an Objective C Mac OS app (which I normally never do, so that was quite a bit of messing with completely unfamiliar tools such as Xcode) and the rarely used 'services' menu so that I could select any text and fire up this app.

It worked wonders for prose. It doesn't work for highly specific technical reading, or anything where the formatting itself is important, as that is, naturally, obliterated.

A mac or two later and I don't really want to build it again.

But, does anyone know of an app or site that does this for you? Possibly with some nice advances such as:

* Give you a little more time on complicated words. * Possibly let you click a paragraph in e.g. a webpage and then just blast that paragraph past your eyes, letting you mix reading and looking at the layout. This sounds great for wikipedia, where there are images to look at, table data, paragraphs, etc.

If no such thing exists I might be tempted to write it as a browser extension.

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