5 ms·

Show HN: Serve your saved articles to a Kindle

90 points by edgartaor 5y ago

mariusor 5y ago
The kindle ecosystem is a disgrace when it comes to compatibility. I have implemented a similar service (working from the WWW) that tracks your favourite RSS feeds and sends content to your kindle via their (terrible) sharing email address. I find it sad that a company with Amazon's reach plays this dirty with what users are allowed to have on their devices. :(
- dewey 5y ago
  > I find it sad that a company with Amazon's reach plays this dirty with what users are allowed to have on their devices. :( To be honest I'm always surprised how easy it is to put things on your Kindle even if they are not purchases from Amazon. I regularly purchase ebooks some other place and then just send it to the Kindle with Calibre's feature using the amazon sharing email address and it works without a problem for years.
  - edgartaor 5y ago
    Yes. I was reluctant to buy a Kindle to read my already owned ebooks but using Calibre to sync to my Kindle it's really simple.
  - mariusor 5y ago
    Yes, calibre is a powerful tool. However not all content can (or should) go via it. My specific use case is something like the integration that Pocket has with Kobo ebook readers: I see an article I want to read on the internet, I add it to Pocket and then at my next sync I can read it on my device. An email that Amazon controls is no replacement for a proper API. Having tools to convert to mobi is not a replacement for supporting open ebook formats.
    - criddell 5y ago
      Have you tried Instapaper?
      - mariusor 5y ago
        Yes. A long time ago though, and all I remember is that it didn't quite manage to give me the same flow as I had with Pocket/Kobo. Maybe I didn't look deep enough into it.
      - esperent 5y ago
        Testing it out now. I just signed up on the website then it popped up a "Get the App" button. Clicked that, and it brought me to this link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tumblr&referrer=utm_source%3Dtumblr%26utm_medium%3Diframe%26utm_campaign%3Dbn_continue_or_install_cta https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tumblr&ref... Which is the Tumblr app! What the hell? EDIT: ok, figured it out. After signing up on the website, I'm given a page which has a single item called Getting Started. Nothing else, no menu, no header, no footer. So I clicked the link and it brings me to the Getting Started page on blog.instapaper.com I now realize this is actually hosted on Tumblr so the Get the App button there is from Tumblr. Not a great onboarding experience so far. Hopefully the rest of the app is better.
  - goosedragons 5y ago
    It has limitations. I don't think Amazon really likes it much as a feature anymore but I think they know people would be really angry if they got rid of it. They haven't bothered adding support for newer file formats beyond KF7. You can sometimes trick an ePub on there by renaming it .zip and get an AZW3 but it doesn't always work. They also make it annoying to get covers on emailed documents.
jp57 5y ago
Instapaper has this as a feature. Only in the paid subscription, though, I think.
lostinroutine 5y ago
There is an official browser extension from Amazon for this[0] that allows you to send any web page from browser to your Kindle in 2 clicks. [0] - https://www.amazon.com/sendtokindle/ https://www.amazon.com/sendtokindle/
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
ptudan 5y ago
I made this myself a long time ago for just a few specific websites. Thank you for this, a generalized version is amazing.
2color 5y ago
Another great app that can send articles to Kindle is https://hq.getmatter.app/ https://hq.getmatter.app/ The Send to Kindle browser extension is great but it's not really usable on mobile. With Matter I can add something to my queue while browsing on mobile and from Matter send it to my Kindle already parsed and ready to read.
conor_f 5y ago
This is super interesting. I've wanted to get an e-reader for a while now, but I'd really like to be able to read the articles I have saved in Wallabag[1] on it so I could go fully offline for a day or two a week. One potential solution I saw which is similar to this was wallabag-kindle-consumer[2] but both of this and your solution have issues that dissuade me from them. The first is that I think there's a lot of metadata that isn't encapsulated by both of these solutions. Tagging/highlighting are the first things that spring to mind. The second issue is both are very kindle-specific and I wonder if/how they'd work on a non-Amazon e-reader? Take my comments with a grain of salt though - I haven't owned an e-reader in years so maybe the interface wouldn't even readily support tagging/highlighting the way I imagine it. I appreciate how simple your solution is and can readily see how it could be extended to support tags at least from the search interface and integrate with other services like Wallabag! Thanks for your work and if I do end up getting an e-reader you'll definitely be seeing some pull requests from me! [1] https://github.com/wallabag/wallabag https://github.com/wallabag/wallabag [2] https://github.com/janLo/wallabag-kindle-consumer https://github.com/janLo/wallabag-kindle-consumer
- edgartaor 5y ago
  Tagging/highlighting cross my mind but I did want to keep this project as simple as possible. Tagging could be possible if I include a sqlite database but I don't think highlighting is possible in the Kindle web browser. Outside of this project you can get tagging with TagSpaces[1] desktop app and highlighting with the SingleFile[2] web-extension. >I wonder if/how they'd work on a non-Amazon e-reader? If the e-reader have a web browser it would work without problems, maybe adjusting css properties a bit. [1]https://github.com/tagspaces/tagspaces https://github.com/tagspaces/tagspaces [2]https://github.com/gildas-lormeau/SingleFile https://github.com/gildas-lormeau/SingleFile
gigglesupstairs 5y ago
Tangential, there used to be a web service called Readlists which used to transform collection of articles into a kindle readable book and send it to the added kindle address. I found it very optimal to my needs due to its non technical nature and simplicity. That service shutdown a while back though. Is there any similar service?
- hybridtupel 5y ago
  There is a similar service [1] however it does not collect articles but lets you send single articles to your kindle via your email address. [1] https://www.fivefilters.org/push-to-kindle/ https://www.fivefilters.org/push-to-kindle/
robin_reala 5y ago
I haven’t tried it, but one of the features Kobo push is native Pocket integration,[1] which might be useful to some people in this thread. https://help.kobo.com/hc/en-us/articles/360017763753-Use-the-Pocket-App-with-your-Kobo-eReader https://help.kobo.com/hc/en-us/articles/360017763753-Use-the...
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- mariusor 5y ago
  I use that a lot, I even created a web service where I have my favourite RSS feeds that get pushed to pocket when they get new content which then gets synced to my Kobo device. It's much better than the kindle option where sending the content over email feels like a twenty years step back.
  - saravanannkl 5y ago
    I am looking for Kindle alternatives as Amazon has closed my account unilaterally. I was looking for alternatives and Kobo seems to be the only alternative to Kindle. RSS integration via Pocket seems interesting. Apart from the ereader feature, how does Kobo compare against Kindle ? Do you have any recommendation for which model to buy ?
    - goosedragons 5y ago
      There are other options in the eReader space. Pocketbook is another one, there's some Chinese Android devices like Boox and Boyue that are more flexible since they run Android. Kobo compares favorably to Kindle. Really they just lack something like "Send to Kindle" but they make up for it with other things. Some models support Dropbox syncing, they support getting books from the library via. Overdrive right on the device and they have a lot more customization with regards to what you can do with fonts, spacing etc. out of the box. And you can even get pen input for note taking on the bigger ones if you want. I'd just pick the model that most appeals to you with exception of the base model. I think the extra $30 to get a 300PPI screen is worth it.
dcchambers 5y ago
In the same vein, I discovered https://ktool.io/ https://ktool.io/ recently - if anyone is interested in similar functionality but doesn't want to run the media server themselves.
- longnguyen 5y ago
  KTool founder here. Thanks for the mention. While KTool is still in active development, feel free to give it a try (no account needed). Much appreciated
  - wintermutestwin 5y ago
    It would be great if I could email it to myself for transferring to the Kindle via USB as I don't trust Amazon enough to allow their device to connect to the internet.
    - longnguyen 5y ago
      Interesting. So something like "download .mobi or .azw3 files" would fit your requirement?
      - wintermutestwin 5y ago
        Sure...
  - esperent 5y ago
    Looks interesting but it's only showing me a Twitter sign in option. Is that the only one?
    - longnguyen 5y ago
      It is, at the moment as my entire audience are on Twitter. I'm working on other login method right now. Is there any way I can reach you when it's ready? Also I assume you would like a email/password login option? Thanks
mft_ 5y ago
It's slightly different, but I can recommend https://www.fivefilters.org/push-to-kindle/ https://www.fivefilters.org/push-to-kindle/ Works perfectly. I use it as a (n effectively) free browser plugin, and also paid for the iPhone app, because it's super-useful to have available there, and also to support the creator - this was something I'd wanted to write for myself and was very glad to not have to.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
saravanannkl 5y ago
There is a free service called Tinderizer[1], which sends web page to kindle using a bookmarklet. It works by opening the web page in a browser, apply readability javascript code, convert to PDF and emails to your kindle email address. All of this done in backend in a very few seconds. It will automatically appear in your kindle shortly after that. It won't work properly for subscription sites as it takes snapshot of the non logged in user. I have used this service for nearly a decade until Amazon decided to close my account. [1] https://tinderizer.com/ https://tinderizer.com/
- copperx 5y ago
  Amazon closed your account for using this service?
  - schwartzworld 5y ago
    More likely they couldn't continue to use the service BECAUSE Amazon closed their account, therefore deactivating their kindle email address.
  - saravanannkl 5y ago
    No. Tinderizer is fine. Amazon provides an email id for your device. If you send any document to that email address, then it gets delivered to your kindle. If you use Convert as subject line, then it converts the attachment into Kindle format (AZW3). Otherwise it will send the attachment as is to your device. Tinderizer uses this feature. To send email to this kindle device address, you have to whitelist the from address. It is one of the step that you have to do while setting up Tinderizer bookmarklet. Account closure was due to different reason. Few months back I ordered a phone from Amazon India, but they delivered a perfume. When complained to CS, they closed my account with a vague reason reason that I violated ToS by using a duplicate account. This account closure after I had this account for more than 10 years and have used it in Amazon.com and Amazon.in. Earlier this month, I have a filed a consumer court case (similar to small claims in US) in India.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
cmurf 5y ago
Everytime I email PDFs to my Kindle, I get a verification email with a link I have to click on. This same email says I can avoid this verification step by adding the sending email address as an approved sender (or whatever) which I've done. But then also I've got these sent emails with large attachments to go delete. So it's a pretty clunky workflow.

90 points by edgartaor 5y ago

The kindle ecosystem is a disgrace when it comes to compatibility. I have implemented a similar service (working from the WWW) that tracks your favourite RSS feeds and sends content to your kindle via their (terrible) sharing email address. I find it sad that a company with Amazon's reach plays this dirty with what users are allowed to have on their devices. :(

dewey 5y ago
> I find it sad that a company with Amazon's reach plays this dirty with what users are allowed to have on their devices. :( To be honest I'm always surprised how easy it is to put things on your Kindle even if they are not purchases from Amazon. I regularly purchase ebooks some other place and then just send it to the Kindle with Calibre's feature using the amazon sharing email address and it works without a problem for years.
- edgartaor 5y ago
  Yes. I was reluctant to buy a Kindle to read my already owned ebooks but using Calibre to sync to my Kindle it's really simple.
- mariusor 5y ago
  Yes, calibre is a powerful tool. However not all content can (or should) go via it. My specific use case is something like the integration that Pocket has with Kobo ebook readers: I see an article I want to read on the internet, I add it to Pocket and then at my next sync I can read it on my device. An email that Amazon controls is no replacement for a proper API. Having tools to convert to mobi is not a replacement for supporting open ebook formats.
  - criddell 5y ago
    Have you tried Instapaper?
    - mariusor 5y ago
      Yes. A long time ago though, and all I remember is that it didn't quite manage to give me the same flow as I had with Pocket/Kobo. Maybe I didn't look deep enough into it.
    - esperent 5y ago
      Testing it out now. I just signed up on the website then it popped up a "Get the App" button. Clicked that, and it brought me to this link: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tumblr&referrer=utm_source%3Dtumblr%26utm_medium%3Diframe%26utm_campaign%3Dbn_continue_or_install_cta https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.tumblr&ref... Which is the Tumblr app! What the hell? EDIT: ok, figured it out. After signing up on the website, I'm given a page which has a single item called Getting Started. Nothing else, no menu, no header, no footer. So I clicked the link and it brings me to the Getting Started page on blog.instapaper.com I now realize this is actually hosted on Tumblr so the Get the App button there is from Tumblr. Not a great onboarding experience so far. Hopefully the rest of the app is better.
- goosedragons 5y ago
  It has limitations. I don't think Amazon really likes it much as a feature anymore but I think they know people would be really angry if they got rid of it. They haven't bothered adding support for newer file formats beyond KF7. You can sometimes trick an ePub on there by renaming it .zip and get an AZW3 but it doesn't always work. They also make it annoying to get covers on emailed documents.

jp57 5y ago

Instapaper has this as a feature. Only in the paid subscription, though, I think.

lostinroutine 5y ago

There is an official browser extension from Amazon for this[0] that allows you to send any web page from browser to your Kindle in 2 clicks. [0] - https://www.amazon.com/sendtokindle/ https://www.amazon.com/sendtokindle/

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

ptudan 5y ago

I made this myself a long time ago for just a few specific websites. Thank you for this, a generalized version is amazing.

2color 5y ago

Another great app that can send articles to Kindle is https://hq.getmatter.app/ https://hq.getmatter.app/ The Send to Kindle browser extension is great but it's not really usable on mobile. With Matter I can add something to my queue while browsing on mobile and from Matter send it to my Kindle already parsed and ready to read.

conor_f 5y ago

This is super interesting. I've wanted to get an e-reader for a while now, but I'd really like to be able to read the articles I have saved in Wallabag[1] on it so I could go fully offline for a day or two a week. One potential solution I saw which is similar to this was wallabag-kindle-consumer[2] but both of this and your solution have issues that dissuade me from them. The first is that I think there's a lot of metadata that isn't encapsulated by both of these solutions. Tagging/highlighting are the first things that spring to mind. The second issue is both are very kindle-specific and I wonder if/how they'd work on a non-Amazon e-reader? Take my comments with a grain of salt though - I haven't owned an e-reader in years so maybe the interface wouldn't even readily support tagging/highlighting the way I imagine it. I appreciate how simple your solution is and can readily see how it could be extended to support tags at least from the search interface and integrate with other services like Wallabag! Thanks for your work and if I do end up getting an e-reader you'll definitely be seeing some pull requests from me! [1] https://github.com/wallabag/wallabag https://github.com/wallabag/wallabag [2] https://github.com/janLo/wallabag-kindle-consumer https://github.com/janLo/wallabag-kindle-consumer

edgartaor 5y ago
Tagging/highlighting cross my mind but I did want to keep this project as simple as possible. Tagging could be possible if I include a sqlite database but I don't think highlighting is possible in the Kindle web browser. Outside of this project you can get tagging with TagSpaces[1] desktop app and highlighting with the SingleFile[2] web-extension. >I wonder if/how they'd work on a non-Amazon e-reader? If the e-reader have a web browser it would work without problems, maybe adjusting css properties a bit. [1]https://github.com/tagspaces/tagspaces https://github.com/tagspaces/tagspaces [2]https://github.com/gildas-lormeau/SingleFile https://github.com/gildas-lormeau/SingleFile

gigglesupstairs 5y ago

Tangential, there used to be a web service called Readlists which used to transform collection of articles into a kindle readable book and send it to the added kindle address. I found it very optimal to my needs due to its non technical nature and simplicity. That service shutdown a while back though. Is there any similar service?

hybridtupel 5y ago
There is a similar service [1] however it does not collect articles but lets you send single articles to your kindle via your email address. [1] https://www.fivefilters.org/push-to-kindle/ https://www.fivefilters.org/push-to-kindle/

robin_reala 5y ago

I haven’t tried it, but one of the features Kobo push is native Pocket integration,[1] which might be useful to some people in this thread. https://help.kobo.com/hc/en-us/articles/360017763753-Use-the-Pocket-App-with-your-Kobo-eReader https://help.kobo.com/hc/en-us/articles/360017763753-Use-the...

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
mariusor 5y ago
I use that a lot, I even created a web service where I have my favourite RSS feeds that get pushed to pocket when they get new content which then gets synced to my Kobo device. It's much better than the kindle option where sending the content over email feels like a twenty years step back.
- saravanannkl 5y ago
  I am looking for Kindle alternatives as Amazon has closed my account unilaterally. I was looking for alternatives and Kobo seems to be the only alternative to Kindle. RSS integration via Pocket seems interesting. Apart from the ereader feature, how does Kobo compare against Kindle ? Do you have any recommendation for which model to buy ?
  - goosedragons 5y ago
    There are other options in the eReader space. Pocketbook is another one, there's some Chinese Android devices like Boox and Boyue that are more flexible since they run Android. Kobo compares favorably to Kindle. Really they just lack something like "Send to Kindle" but they make up for it with other things. Some models support Dropbox syncing, they support getting books from the library via. Overdrive right on the device and they have a lot more customization with regards to what you can do with fonts, spacing etc. out of the box. And you can even get pen input for note taking on the bigger ones if you want. I'd just pick the model that most appeals to you with exception of the base model. I think the extra $30 to get a 300PPI screen is worth it.

dcchambers 5y ago

In the same vein, I discovered https://ktool.io/ https://ktool.io/ recently - if anyone is interested in similar functionality but doesn't want to run the media server themselves.

longnguyen 5y ago
KTool founder here. Thanks for the mention. While KTool is still in active development, feel free to give it a try (no account needed). Much appreciated
- wintermutestwin 5y ago
  It would be great if I could email it to myself for transferring to the Kindle via USB as I don't trust Amazon enough to allow their device to connect to the internet.
  - longnguyen 5y ago
    Interesting. So something like "download .mobi or .azw3 files" would fit your requirement?
    - wintermutestwin 5y ago
      Sure...
- esperent 5y ago
  Looks interesting but it's only showing me a Twitter sign in option. Is that the only one?
  - longnguyen 5y ago
    It is, at the moment as my entire audience are on Twitter. I'm working on other login method right now. Is there any way I can reach you when it's ready? Also I assume you would like a email/password login option? Thanks

mft_ 5y ago

It's slightly different, but I can recommend https://www.fivefilters.org/push-to-kindle/ https://www.fivefilters.org/push-to-kindle/ Works perfectly. I use it as a (n effectively) free browser plugin, and also paid for the iPhone app, because it's super-useful to have available there, and also to support the creator - this was something I'd wanted to write for myself and was very glad to not have to.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

saravanannkl 5y ago

There is a free service called Tinderizer[1], which sends web page to kindle using a bookmarklet. It works by opening the web page in a browser, apply readability javascript code, convert to PDF and emails to your kindle email address. All of this done in backend in a very few seconds. It will automatically appear in your kindle shortly after that. It won't work properly for subscription sites as it takes snapshot of the non logged in user. I have used this service for nearly a decade until Amazon decided to close my account. [1] https://tinderizer.com/ https://tinderizer.com/

copperx 5y ago
Amazon closed your account for using this service?
- schwartzworld 5y ago
  More likely they couldn't continue to use the service BECAUSE Amazon closed their account, therefore deactivating their kindle email address.
- saravanannkl 5y ago
  No. Tinderizer is fine. Amazon provides an email id for your device. If you send any document to that email address, then it gets delivered to your kindle. If you use Convert as subject line, then it converts the attachment into Kindle format (AZW3). Otherwise it will send the attachment as is to your device. Tinderizer uses this feature. To send email to this kindle device address, you have to whitelist the from address. It is one of the step that you have to do while setting up Tinderizer bookmarklet. Account closure was due to different reason. Few months back I ordered a phone from Amazon India, but they delivered a perfume. When complained to CS, they closed my account with a vague reason reason that I violated ToS by using a duplicate account. This account closure after I had this account for more than 10 years and have used it in Amazon.com and Amazon.in. Earlier this month, I have a filed a consumer court case (similar to small claims in US) in India.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

cmurf 5y ago

Everytime I email PDFs to my Kindle, I get a verification email with a link I have to click on. This same email says I can avoid this verification step by adding the sending email address as an approved sender (or whatever) which I've done. But then also I've got these sent emails with large attachments to go delete. So it's a pretty clunky workflow.