I have been using DevonThink as a ‘Read It Later’ service. I have been very reluctant to add more ‘tools’ (and costs) into the mix, but I keep reading about Pocket, InstaPaper and ReadWise, in all their product glory…
I have several issues I am trying to expand or improve on from the research side of things and I keep wondering if one of them would pair nicely with my DT workflows.
First, I think discoverability of materials is something I want to improve on. Not all sites have RSS feeds (for which I use Reeder 5.0) to scan, then shoot over to DT if I want to put it on my Read It Later List. Sometimes it is very hard to find specific news feeds as well. Feedly can sometimes help me find what I am looking for, but I don’t want to pay for premium services like key word searches unless they are really good.
Second, when I do find web content to put into DT, I sometimes struggle to get a web page to render in a way that is asthetically pleasing and condusive to reading. It is not completely rare for me to try several clipping settings to get a page to render completely with as little clutter as possible, but also keep some good structure. This causes a bit too much friction and sometimes I wonder if some sites purposely lay out their content to make it harder for archival purposes.
I have considered looking at some of these services, but again cost and additional steps are something I try to avoid. I am curious what others have found in the DT community regarding finding and harvesting information in an effecient way for read it later analysis.
That is a very well known problem which has been discussed many times here already. There simply is no silver bullet because the best target format depends on the website and on your requirements. For example, who defines what “clutter” is? And what is a “good” structure? A semantically correct one? One that conforms to your expectations of “good” layout? Would that include the header and/or the footer? The navigation bar? The “read also” section?
This morning I started up a free trial of Readwise and their new Reader. I can see some benefits, but the more steps you add to the equation, the more friction in what you are trying to solve. Frankly, I find Reeder 5.0 a pretty good intermediary, but then when I shoot the article over to DT, the fun begins.
Anyhow, the quest for the Holy Grail of the best way to do this will likely just continue to be what it is!
I played a bit with this. Regarding content discovery, I will explore whether or not I will use Feedly or Ionreader to help me find content.
Regarding managing content, I think I will use Reeder 5.0 to curate the first pass of my reading materials. If I decide to keep something and annotate it, then I will then go through the trouble to see if I can bring it into DT in a way that is reasonably manageable. This will mean that if it makes it this far, then the friction of trying multiple means to get a good copy is worth the effort.
Ugh! Medium, and any author or publication still using it, get a hard pass from me now. Not only are any articles there nigh-on impossible to archive into DEVONthink, but they really want you to log-in & subscribe!
What is your outcome and review on those tools after a year? Readwiser + Reader. Feedly, Reeder5 …etc ?
Would love to hear your opinion on this. Thank you
