Wouldn't it be nice if you can read long text smoothly and without interruption?

Scroll Hint is a browser plugin that helps you read long web pages (lots of text) comfortably.

(Scroll Hint in action)


I conceived of Scroll Hint because of the way I got disoriented by reading large amount of text on web pages. The disorientation problem comes in two flavors: screen similarity problem and the last page problem.

Screen Similarity

As an example, the following are the second and third page of a 17 page article.




Note how similar the two screens are. This is especially so if you are scanning, rather than reading, the page.

To read efficiently, I usually read (or more often, scan) a full page before scrolling down (Space or PageDown keys) to the next page. However, because the screens are so monotonically similar, I often lose track of where I was reading, and need to take a few seconds to re-orient myself.

Last Page Problem

To be efficient at reading, you should read and scroll in full-screen increment (similar to how bulk processing in computer is more efficient than context-switching).

However, at the very bottom of multi-page content, there usually isn't enough room to scroll a complete screen by the Space or PageDown key, so scrolling does not go all the way (full screen). Because of this, you cannot just start from the top of the screen. Instead, you have to waste a second or two scanning for your last reference point.

Take a look at the follow screenshot, which shows a page that didn't scroll a complete screen. As a result, when you read the last page, you need to find the previous reference position, somewhere in the middle of the page.

Solution: Scroll Hint

Scroll Hint is a browser plugin that deals with this problem. Everytime the page is scrolled, it shows you a hint of where the page content used to be (before your scrolled), so that you can orient yourself to start reading from where you were reading.

Take a look at the following screenshot.



Note how the previous bottom-of-the-screen has been marked. If you have just finished reading at the bottom of the previous page, you know exactly where to start reading after the scroll.

Browser Requirement

Scroll Hint itself is generic Javascript, so it should run in all browsers. Currently, I have a Firefox GreaseMonkey user script that makes Scroll Hint available on all web pages. If you have Firefox and the Greasemonkey extension installed, you can download version 1.0 of Scroll Hint.

Feedback Wanted, Dead or Alive

I am very interested to hear what you think of Scroll Hint. Please share your thoughts by leaving a comment below (or mailto:peter@oaktop.com).