eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read • Hacker News Board

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#41

Post by qingcharles » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 5:17 AM UTC

This sounds like it needs to be a new media query in CSS. It could overlap heavily with the print media query.

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#42

Post by gdonelli » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 5:22 AM UTC

Love this idea!

I have been working on a way to turn your phone into a better reader device with https://astropad.com/bookcase

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#43

Post by pyaamb » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 5:44 AM UTC

bityard wrote: post #6

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 bunc…

I wish apple would enter the eink device market. Would be a piece of cake for them and easy new revenue for the company if they even get it half right IMO

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#44

Post by tarasglek » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 5:49 AM UTC

MPSFounder wrote: post #17

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 n…

I got a lenovo thinkbook eink. It is pretty nice hw with awful sw. With some hacks i found on reddit its good enough

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#45

Post by politelemon » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 6:35 AM UTC

pyaamb wrote: post #43

bityard wrote: post #6

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 bunc…

I wish apple would enter the eink device market. Would be a piece of cake for them and easy new revenue for the company if they even get it half right IMO

I find comments like this strange and tbh a bit worrying too; instead of wishing for technology to get better, it's wishing for a specific company's revenue to improve.

I hope they do not enter the eink device market. Eink in general is unfortunately already suffering from the stranglehold of one giant which has locked innovation away due to its proprietary implementations. Having two will not make the situation better, only worse.

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#46

Post by ArinaS » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 7:39 AM UTC

dflock wrote: post #36

groby_b wrote: post #34

This, the same as dark mode, and media queries etc, all completely undermines the core idea of the web - a semantic representation of data, rendered by a user agent, according to the users preferences. CSS & JS are the opposite. Yes, I realize it's a losing battle, but it's a depressing thing nonetheless.

Dark Mode, and media queries are both just options/hints - they are implemented on the client side - by the user agent. The actual problem is that most browsers have forgotten that they're "user agents" - and have stipped away all the configurations and options that they used to have, removing control from the user. Vivaldi is still very configurable, and still behaves like the users agent.

> "have stipped away all the configurations and options that they used to have"

Mozilla with their deprecation of XUL was like that.

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#47

Post by [deleted] » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 7:56 AM UTC

bityard wrote: post #6

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 bunc…

[deleted]

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#48

Post by das_keyboard » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 8:21 AM UTC

The article contains a paragraph about ads and it reads like a nightmare:

> The full-page advertisement you saw on the previous page is an example.

> the paginated website design opens up new possibilities for ad placement and presentation, allowing for innovative approaches in terms of ad type, location, size, and interaction compared to traditional scrolling.

> highlighted and annotated sections often represent the user's key interests, allowing for more targeted and relevant ad placements

> ads embedded in the website will be included in these downloaded PDFs, increasing ad exposure each time the user reviews the PDF file.

> Paid subscribers could download ad-free PDFs, while non-paying users receive PDFs with embedded advertisements, providing a tiered reading experience.

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#49

Post by keheliya » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 10:35 AM UTC

I wish this was supported by default in the Kindle browser. I wonder if there was a way to make it an extension or a wrapper and make it available in eink device browsers. But it seems that even this blog post page is not supported in the Kindle browser. (I don't see the eink mode icon.)

The requirements for me are simple, primarily to make consuming web content on my kindle scribe easier.

* Instead of scrolling by finger gestures (which is a pain to watch on slowly-refreshing eink), have two buttons on the side to do page up and down. * Disable animations * Ability to increase/decrease font size.

I attempted to make this happen for my mastodon feed [here](https://keheliya-slowdon.web.val.run/). source available [here](https://www.val.town/v/keheliya/slowdon). Then there's [Kindly RSS reader](https://github.com/nicoan/kindly-rss-reader)

The goal is to be able to access all the text content that I consume regularly without much pain on a kindle.

Re: eInk Mode: Making web pages easier to read

#50

Post by carlosjobim » Thu, Apr 17, 2025, 11:13 AM UTC

das_keyboard wrote: post #48

The article contains a paragraph about ads and it reads like a nightmare: > The full-page advertisement you saw on the previous page is an example. > the paginated website design opens up new possibilities for ad placement and presentation, allowing for innovative approaches in terms of ad type, location, size, and interaction compared to traditional scrolling. > highlighted and annotated sections often represent the…

Why a nightmare? This is much more reasonable than the current model. It's just like print media ads.