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Ask HN: How do you manage your online reading list?

3 points by wowzer ↗ HN
There are so many interesting posts I come across everyday and because of other commitments I just can't read everything I want to. So I ended up making a list of links in Evernote that I add to each day. That list has gotten unwieldy and I wish there were a tool I could use that would let me tag and rank links. Also, after I read a post I wish I could add some notes about it if I ever wanted to go back to it. Are there are any tools out there I should be made aware of? Any nice hacks around this?

11 comments

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sjs382
If I might want to read something later, I save to Pocket.

If I like it and want to keep it for some reason, I clip to Evernote.

wowzer
Thanks! Pocket looks interesting. I'll try it out.
iDemonix
Looks quite cool, will download Pocket and give it a go. You say you use Evernote if you want to keep it, it'd be nice if a web app like pocket could clip plaintext permanently.
sjs382
Pocket Premium does that, for $45/year. I'm not a subscriber though—I like to separate concerns by keeping Pocket for my "read now" list and Evernote for reference & collecting.
glaberficken
+1 for Pocket

I have a Kobo e-reader (the Kobo has built in Pocket sync). So I just installed the Pocket extension for Chrome and on the icon to send any web article from the desktop to my e-reader. This saves me a lot of eye strain.

This has also done wonders for my productivity.

Before: 1) Computer hangs on some task (query running, software compiling, porgram installing, excel calculation etc)

2) Open Browser to scan my usual sources for interesting stuff to read.

3) Waste 15 minutes reading a few articles

After: 1) Computer hangs on some task (query running, software compiling, porgram installing, excel calculation etc)

2) Open Browser to scan my usual sources for interesting stuff to read.

3) Click to send them to Pocket for later reading on the e-reader

4) Get back to work

sjs382
That's the exact same workflow I use. Then I read later when things are truly slow, or after work or the weekends.

It has the downside of ballooning the number of items in your Pocket list, but if you ignore the "must read everything" impulse and skip/delete items, then it's fine. I usually hit "Pocket-Zero" a few times per week.

glaberficken
True! I've had that feeling myself when I started saving everything to pocket. So I created a few "self constraints":

I don't save articles that are "current news", this decreases the list significantly and takes the timing pressure off from achieving "pocket-zero".

I only save articles that interest me regardless of the timing.

I also use another "trick": for resources that reference other things I would like to read in the future (articles that mention authors or books) I send them to pocket > mark as favourite > archive. Then when I finish reading my current book of choice I go to the favourites archive and pick through what I want to read next.

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scmoore
If I can't read it in a few minutes, I use a "send to Kindle" chrome extension. I don't bookmark long reads anymore.

I do most of my reading at night, in bed. My Kindle is constantly loaded with longer pieces that had sat in my bookmarks unread before. Once I'm done reading, I usually just delete the article from my Kindle.