
Readable Hacker News Chrome Extension - jarquesp
https://chrome.google.com/extensions/detail/jnnojalnifmaekkfknejbppafnaiepjl?hl=en
======
idle_processor
Aesthetic changes like this seem better suited to being Stylish[1] layouts or
Greasemonkey[2] scripts, rather than full-blown extensions.

A quick userscripts.org search for Hacker News reinforces this:
[http://userscripts.org/search?cref=http%3A%2F%2Fuserscripts....](http://userscripts.org/search?cref=http%3A%2F%2Fuserscripts.org%2Fcse.xml&cof=FORID%3A9&q=hacker+news&x=0&y=0)

[1] <http://userstyles.org/stylish/>

[2] <http://www.greasespot.net/>

~~~
jarquesp
I ran into a few limitations when using Stylish (didn't try Greasemonkey).

This extension uses a JavaScript to re-align some elements, change classes
etc. It's not only aesthetic changes, at least won't be in the next few
updates.

------
ricefield
Sorry, but i'm not sure i find your "readable" hacker news more readable than
the default layout. Might be because I don't mind reading small text, and
can't bear scrolling. Also find the font and color choices iffy.

That being said, I think it has some of potential. Maybe do a little user
testing and get a little more feedback and iterate on the design?

~~~
jarquesp
It's definitely an on-going thing. Over the past week I've gotten feedback and
kept working on it, changing things here and there. I finally decided that
it's at a good enough spot to post on Hacker News and get even more feedback.

It's been a 50/50 hit on whether or not to use a sans-serif or serif typeface.
At least that's the biggest type of feedback I've gotten thus far.

But yes, I'd love feedback on this.

~~~
keyle
I agree, it's not really usable. That being said, if you would give settings,
everyone could make their own style. That would be ace!

~~~
jarquesp
A settings menu is on my todo list. An easy way for you to customize the look
and feel, fonts, colors etc.

------
jschuur
My biggest beef with HN (apart from the amount of cool articles on it) isn't
the look and feel of the site, it's the inability to distinguish old from new
content.

I know, I could probably just subscribe to the RSS feed and do this in a feed
aggregator, but sometimes I want to just quickly look at the front page and
see the new stories since my last visit, without also having to deal with the
stuff from 2 day ago that is still unread in Google Reader e.g..

Are the any community HN tools out there to help me out here?

~~~
_frog
For me, visited links are greyed out whilst anything I haven't seen since last
visit is black.

Are you emptying your cache and history on exit perchance?

Here's what I see for reference: <http://cl.ly/57jx>

~~~
jschuur
No, but that assumes I visit every link. I only end up clicking on 10-20% of
them.

I suppose I could simply find a browser extension t visit all the links on the
site, automatically, but that doesn't seem right if I'm not going to look at
the articles.

------
akent
Seems like a solution in search of a problem to me.

------
greyman
I like to original comments page more. The font after applying the extension
is not contrasty enough, and the gap between the lines is too big. It's
definitely not more readable.

Generally, too much free space - I personally prefer tighter desing with less
scrolling. But still good try, it would be great if you offered some
customizations.

~~~
snarknet
Yeah, I'm using it right now. A thicker font would be wonderful.

------
didip
hm, I was expecting Readability-like styling, but it's a good start. A couple
of feedback:

    
    
        * make the upvote arrow HUGE.
    
        * make the comments link HUGE.
    
        * more contrast between color and background-color.

~~~
jarquesp
I've been thinking about changing the up arrow. Will play around with it.

Also, I just noticed that text within code is terrible.

~~~
Herald_MJ
I like it! If you could also make comment threads foldable, it would be
fantastic.

------
jemka
I actually use hnsort.com for a related reason. Do you think you'll be adding
any sorting options? Maybe even a feature like reddit to hide posts?

Thanks!

------
ck2
Is stylish available for Chrome?

Because then you could do it cross-browser with Firefox.

In fact it looks like some folk have been busy:

[http://userstyles.org/styles/browse/all/http:%2F%2Fnews.ycom...](http://userstyles.org/styles/browse/all/http:%2F%2Fnews.ycombinator.com)

------
jasonkester
Ow. My squint muscles are just now recovering from having that thing up for a
minute.

I think this has conclusively proven that light grey on light grey is not a
good color scheme for "readability".

------
johnm
Cool.

Yes, customizability would be key for me. There's not enough contrast now, I'd
change the typefaces and font settings, and the line-height (and a bunch of
the rest of the spacing as well).

------
tealtan
I'm happy with your design choices, actually. However, I do wish that clicking
through to the comments was easier - giving the link a larger hit area, for
example.

------
aDemoUzer
You could also use: <http://peri.me/Hack3rNews/>

------
lfx
It's nice. Text is easer to read.

But, could you add some color schemes, from witch I can choose? It would be
great.

------
jonmaim
If you can keep the one page no-scroll policy of the default layout that would
be awesome!

------
mise
You're certainly addressing a problem. HN is the only site I leave zoomed-in
in Firefox.

------
flexterra
Looks really good!

------
solipsist
Any equivalent extension for Safari out there?

~~~
jarquesp
I have an initial port for Safari ready if you're interested. Comments is a
bit messed up: <http://cl.ly/3X323L1Q3I0Z1u2D1v2C>

~~~
solipsist
I love it!

------
catshirt
this looks like a job for dotjs

<https://github.com/defunkt/dotjs>

------
bkudria
I think this looks pretty good! Thanks!

