How do you browse Hacker News?
Hey everyone,
I'm curious about how you all browse Hacker News. Do you use the website, mobile app, or a desktop client? If you use a desktop client, which one do you prefer and why?
I'm curious about how you all browse Hacker News. Do you use the website, mobile app, or a desktop client? If you use a desktop client, which one do you prefer and why?
52 comments
[ 2.6 ms ] story [ 129 ms ] threadAlso, there's a way to make polls on HN:
https://news.ycombinator.com/newpoll
No app, no client, no whatsever. That's one news site among lots others and not worth setting up a read-flow around.
if one's so into news, Bloomberg terminal 24k/y, msy be a proper client. But not for me.
Why the question?
Phone: URL shortcut icon on home screen
Both are fine. I can't imagine an app would provide much more value, especially with the privacy cost.
Sometimes.
Good luck.
(sent from my iPhone)
In contrast, if they were sorted strictly by time-since-posting, I would probably quickly be able to tell once my scan of the list reached the part of the list I had already seen.
Someone else (many years ago) had the same thought as what I wrote above, motivating him to create http://hckrnews.com/, which is mainly what I use to find stories to read. (I also use https://hn.algolia.com/?query=%s&sort=byDate to find stories to read.)
Isn't that exactly what you get on the “New” page?
https://news.ycombinator.com/newest
Anyway, trivial problem: The post IDs in the URLs are monotonally increasing over time. Just sort by ID and the lowest is the oldest, the highest the newest.
I explained already, but am happy to explain again, adding a little background information. I need to keep to an absolute minimum the amount of time I spend looking for generally-interesting things to read on the internet.
Why? Because I have learned the hard way that I need to minimize the amount of time I spend doing things that are pleasurable and effortless and absolutely safe (not in the least dangerous). Consequently, if the project I am currently engaged in is to learn more about oxidized cholesterol, for example, I give myself permission to use hn.algolia.com to search HN for that phrase and read all I want. In contrast, I strictly limit the amount of time I use HN just to see if there are any interesting new stories when I don't have a definite goal for my reading.
hckrnews.com differs from the standard HN home page in that it gives me an easy way to tell when there are no headlines I haven't read already. Specifically, after reading 1 or 2 or 4 headlines I've already read, I know I've seen all the headlines below those 1 or 2 or 4 headlines, too, because the order never changes. That means that most headlines I only read once.
The order hckrnews.com or news.ycombinator.com chooses to sort the headlines is immaterial to me. What matters is that the order does not constantly change.
And that is my answer to "How do you browse Hacker News?" (the headline of the OP).
Then I'd recommend you use HN's “new” page instead. It gives you that exact advantage you seek, of knowing that when you recognise a headline (perhaps by it showing up as “followed” in your browser), then you've seen the ones after (i.e. chronologically before) it, and it gives you the chance to see the ones that didn't make the front page.
Now sure, the HN algo really isn't all that bad; if you do this, you'll get to scan past a lot of dross. But every once in a while, there's a pearl in amongst the muck, some quirky bit of stuff that speaks to you, even though it didn't to almost all of the readership whose input the algorithm is based on.
That's what I do (when I'm at my most compulsive).
I sometimes use hckrnews.com, but not for that reason - it's good for catching up on what's been on the front page if I haven't been here lately.
[1] https://f-droid.org/en/packages/io.github.hidroh.materialist...
Browser:
1) news.ycombinator.com 2) daemonology.net/hn-daily 3) hckrnews.com 4) hn.premii.com 5) hn.algolia.com
iOS:
HACK for Hacker News Reader
RSS:
hnrss.github.io
On desktop I use the website but install HNES extension to help with some of the formatting.
2-3 times a day I go to the site on a desktop browser. Scroll through the first 2-3 pages (logged in, standard view) and open a tab for the story and discussion. Work though these gradually.
Occasionally I open the site on my phone but find a pain to use it that way (and I'm not logged in).
Because everyone else links to their preferred apps: https://apps.apple.com/se/app/octal-for-hacker-news/id130888...
On desktop, I use my own custom CSS hacks to restyle the site:
Dred's HN CSS Madhackery: <https://pastebin.com/gLXiqKyd>
Dred's HN CSS Madhackery -- Dark Mode: <https://pastebin.com/6PF3dCXH>
(Those are linked in my HN profile.)
It was handy having all the SVB stories grouped separately.
[0] https://hackerer.news/
¹ https://www.f-droid.org/en/packages/nl.viter.glider/
I really enjoy Hacki when mobile