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markdown/Read-and-archive-everything.md
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[//]: # (title: Read and archive everything)
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[//]: # (description: Bypass client-side restrictions on news and blog articles, archive them and read them wherever you want)
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[//]: # (image: /img/twitter2mastodon.png)
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[//]: # (author: Fabio Manganiello <fabio@manganiello.tech>)
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[//]: # (published: 2025-06-04)
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I've always been an avid book reader as a kid.
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I liked the smell of the paper, the feeling of turning the pages, and the
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ability to read anywhere I wanted.
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As I grew and chose a career in tech and a digital-savvy lifestyle, I started
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to shift my consumption from the paper to the screen. But I *still* wanted the
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same feeling of a paper book, the same freedom of reading wherever I wanted.
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I was an early support of the Amazon Kindle idea, I quickly moved most of my
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physical books to the Kindle, I became a vocal supported of online magazines
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that also provided Kindle subscriptions, and I started to read more and more on
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e-ink devices.
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Then I noticed that, after an initial spike, not many magazines and blogs
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provided Kindle subscriptions or EPub versions of their articles.
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So nevermind - I started tinkering my way out of it and [wrote an article in
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2019](https://blog.platypush.tech/article/Deliver-articles-to-your-favourite-e-reader-using-Platypush)
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on how to use [Platypush](https://platypush.tech) with its [`rss`](https://docs.platypush.tech/platypush/plugins/rss.html),
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[`instapaper`](https://docs.platypush.tech/platypush/plugins/instapaper.html) and
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[`gmail`](https://docs.platypush.tech/platypush/plugins/google.mail.html)
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plugins to subscribe to RSS feeds, parse new articles, convert them to PDF and
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deliver them to my Kindle.
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Later I moved from Kindle to the first version of the
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[Mobiscribe](https://www.mobiscribe.com), as Amazon started to be more and more
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restrictive in its option to import and export stuff out of the Kindle, using
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Calibre and some DRM removal tools to export articles or books I had regularly
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purchased was becoming more cumbersome, and the Mobiscribe at that time was an
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interesting option because it offered a decent e-ink device, for a decent
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price, and it ran Android (an ancient version, but at least one that was
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sufficient to run [Instapaper](https://instapaper.com) and
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[KOReader](https://koreader.rocks)).
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That simplified things a bit because I didn't need intermediary delivery via
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email to get stuff on my Kindle or Calibre to try and pull things out of it. I
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was using Instapaper on all of my devices, included the Mobiscribe, I could
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easily scrape and push articles to it through Platypush, and I could easily
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keep track of my reading state across multiple devices.
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Good things aren't supposed to last though.
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Instapaper started to feel quite limited in its capabilities, and I didn't like
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the idea of a centralized server holding all of my saved articles. So I've
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moved to a self-hosted [Wallabag](https://wallabag.org) instance in the
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meantime - which isn't perfect, but provides a lot more customization and
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control.
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Moreover, more and more sites started implementing client-side restrictions for
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my scrapers - Instapaper was initially more affected, but slowly Wallabag too
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started bumping into Cloudflare screens, CAPTCHAs and paywalls.
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So the Internet Archive provided some temporary relief - I could still archive
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articles there, and then instruct my Wallabag instance to read them from the
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archive link.
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Except that, in the past few months, the Internet Archive has also started
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implementing anti-scraping features, and you'll most likely get a Cloudflare
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screen if you try and access an article from an external scraper.
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## A little ethical note before continuing
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I _do not_ condone nor support piracy.
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I mean, sometimes I do, but being a creator myself I always try to make sure
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that, if piracy is the only way to freely access content wherever I want, then
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creators are not being harmed (I don't mind harming any intermediaries that add
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friction to the process and prevent me from having a raw file that I can
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download and read wherever I want though).
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So I support creators via Patreon. I pay for subscriptions to digital magazines
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that I will anyway never read through their official mobile app. I send one-off
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donations when I find that some content was particularly useful to me. I buy
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physical books and magazines every now and then from authors or publishers that
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I want to support. And I'd probably support content creators even more if only
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they allowed me to pay only for the content I want to read, and not lock me
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into a Hotel California subscription ("_you can check out any time you like,
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but you can never leave_") because their PMs only care about recurring revenue.
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I also think that the current business model that runs most of the high-quality
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content available online (locking people into apps and subscriptions in order
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to view the content) is detrimental for the distribution of knowledge in what's
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supposed to be the age of information. If I want to be exposed to diverse
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opinions on what's going on in different industries or different parts of the
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world, I probably need at least a dozen subscriptions. And probably pay
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something off to download special reports. In the earlier days we didn't have
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to give away so much money if we wanted to access content for our personal
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research - we could just buy a book or a single issue of a magazine, or even
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just walk into a library and read content for free. If we have no digital
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alternatives for such simple and established ways to access knowledge, then
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piracy becomes almost a civic duty. It can't be that high quality reports or
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insightful blog articles are locked behind paywalls, subscriptions and apps and
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all that's left for free is cheap disinformation on social media. Future
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historians will have a very hard time deciphering what was going on in the
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world in the 2020s, because most of the content that was available online is
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now locked behind paywalls, the companies that ran those sites and built the
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apps may be long gone, and if publishers keep waging war against folks like the
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Internet Archive, then they may start looking at our age like some kind of
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strange digital dark age.
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I also think that it's my right, as a reader, to be able to consume content on a medium without distractions - like
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social media buttons, ads, comments, or other stuff that distracts me from the main content, and if the publisher
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doesn't provide me with a solution for that, and I have already paid for the content, then I should be able to build a
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solution myself.
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And I also demand the right to access the content I've paid for however I want.
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Do I want to export everything to Markdown or read it in ASCII art in a
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terminal? Do I want to export it to EPub so I can read it on my e-ink device?
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Do I want to access it without having to use their tracker-ridden mobile app,
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or without being forced to see ads despite having paid for a subscription?
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Well, that's my business. I firmly believe that it's not an author's or
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publisher's right to dictate how I access the content after paying for it. Just
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like in earlier times nobody minded if, after purchasing a book, I would share
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it with my kids, or lend it to a friend, or scan it and read it on my computer,
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or make the copies of a few pages to bring to my students or my colleagues.
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If some freedoms were legally granted to me before, and now they've been taken
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away, then it's not piracy if I keep demanding those freedoms.
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And content ownership is another problem. I'll no longer be able to access
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content I've read during my subscription period once my subscription expires.
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I'll not be able to pass on the books or magazine I've read in my lifetime to
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my kid. I'll never be able to lend it to someone else, just like I would leave
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a book I had read on a public bookshelf or a bench at the park for someone
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else to read it.
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In other words, buying now grants you a temporary license to access the content
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on someone else's devices - you don't really own anything.
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So, if buying isn't owning, then piracy isn't stealing.
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And again, to make it very clear, I'll be referring to *personal usage* in this
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article. The case where you support creators through other means, but the
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distribution channel is the problem, and you just want your basic freedoms
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as a content consumer back.
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If however you start to share scraped articles on the Web, or even worse profit
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from access to it, then you're *really* doing the kind of piracy I can't
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condone.
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With this out of the way, let's get our hands dirty.
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## The setup
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My current set up is quite complex. At some point I may package all the moving
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parts into a single stand-alone application, including both the browser
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extension and the backend, but at the moment it should be sufficient to get
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things to work.
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A high-level overview of the setup is as follows:
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<img alt="High-level overview of the scraper setup" src="http://s3.platypush.tech/static/images/wallabag-scraper-architecture.png" width="650px">
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Let's break down the building blocks of this setup:
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- **[Redirector](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/redirector/)**
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is a browser extension that allows you to redirect URLs based on custom
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rules as soon as the page is loaded. This is useful to redirect paywalled
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resources to the Internet Archive, which usually stores full copies of the
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content. Even if you regularly paid for a subscription to a magazine, and you
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can read the article on the publisher's site or from their app, your Wallabag
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scraper will still be blocked if the site implements client-side restrictions
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or is protected by Cloudflare. So you need to redirect the URL to the Internet
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Archive, which will then return a copy of the article that you can scrape.
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- **[Platypush](https://platypush.tech)** is a Python-based general-purpose
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platform for automation that I've devoted a good chunk of the past decade
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to develop. It allows you to run actions, react to events and control devices
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and services through a unified API and Web interface, and it comes with
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[hundreds of supported integrations](https://docs.platypush.tech). We'll use
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the [`wallabag`](https://docs.platypush.tech/platypush/plugins/wallabag.html)
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plugin to push articles to your Wallabag instance, and optionally the
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[`rss`](https://docs.platypush.tech/platypush/plugins/rss.html) plugin if you
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want to programmatically subscribe to RSS feeds, scrape articles and archive
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them to Wallabag, and the
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[`ntfy`](https://docs.platypush.tech/platypush/plugins/ntfy.html) plugin to
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optionally send notifications to your mobile device when new articles are
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available.
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- **[Platypush Web extension](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/platypush/)**
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is a browser extension that allows you to interact with Platypush from your
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browser, and it also provides a powerful JavaScript API that you can leverage
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to manipulate the DOM and automate tasks in the browser. It's like a
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[Greasemonkey](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/greasemonkey/)
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or [Tampermonkey](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/tampermonkey/)
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extension that allows you to write custom scripts to customize your browser
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experience, but it also allows you to interact with Platypush and leverage
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its backend capabilities. On top of that, I've also added built-in support
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for the [Mercury Parser API](https://github.com/usr42/mercury-parser) in it,
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so you can easily distill articles - similar to what Firefox does with its
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[Reader
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Mode](https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/firefox-reader-view-clutter-free-web-pages),
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but in this case you can customize the layout and modify the original DOM
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directly, and the distilled content can easily be dispatched to any other
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service or application. We'll use it to:
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- Distill the article content from the page, removing all the
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unnecessary elements (ads, comments, etc.) and leaving only the main text
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and images.
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- Temporarily archive the distilled article to a Web server capable of
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serving static files, so Wallabag can get the full content and bypass any
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client-side restrictions.
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- Archive the distilled article to Wallabag, so you can read it later
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from any device that has access to your Wallabag instance.
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- **[Wallabag](https://wallabag.org)** is a self-hosted read-it-later
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service that allows you to save articles from the Web and read them later,
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even offline. It resembles the features of the ([recently
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defunct](https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/future-of-pocket))
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[Pocket](https://getpocket.com/home). It provides a Web interface, mobile
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apps and browser extensions to access your saved articles, and it can also be
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used as a backend for scraping articles from the Web.
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- (_Optional_) **[KOReader](https://koreader.rocks)** is an
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open-source e-book reader that runs on a variety of devices, including any
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e-ink readers that run Android (and even the
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[Remarkable](https://github.com/koreader/koreader/wiki/Installation-on-Remarkable)).
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It has a quite minimal interface and it may take a while to get used to, but
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it's extremely powerful and customizable. I personally prefer it over the
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official Wallabag app - it has a native Wallabag integration, as well as OPDS
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integration to synchronize with my
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[Ubooquity](https://docs.linuxserver.io/images/docker-ubooquity/) server,
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synchronization of highlights and notes to Nextcloud Notes, WebDAV support
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(so you can access anything hosted on e.g. your Nextcloud instance), progress
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sync across devices through their [sync
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server](https://github.com/koreader/koreader-sync-server), and much more. It
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basically gives you a single app to access your saved articles, your books,
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your notes, your highlights, and your documents.
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- (_Optional_) An Android-based e-book reader to run KOReader on. I have
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recently switched from my old Mobiscribe to an [Onyx BOOX Note Air
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4](https://www.onyxbooxusa.com/onyx-boox-note-air4-c) and I love it. It's
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powerful, the display is great, it runs basically any Android app out there
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(and I've had no issues with running any apps installed through
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[F-Droid](https://f-droid.org)), and it also has a good set of stock apps,
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and most of them support WebDAV synchronization - ideal if you have a
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[Nextcloud](https://nextcloud.com) instance to store your documents and
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archived links.
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**NOTE**: The Platypush extension only works with Firefox, on any Firefox-based
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browser, or on any browser out there that still supports the [Manifest
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V2](https://blog.mozilla.org/addons/2024/03/13/manifest-v3-manifest-v2-march-2024-update/).
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The Manifest V3 has been a disgrace that Google has forced all browser
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extension developers to swallow. I won't go in detail here, but the Platypush
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extension needs to be able to perform actions (such as calls to custom remote
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endpoints and runtime interception of HTTP headers) that are either no longer
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supported on Manifest V3, or that are only supported through laborious
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workarounds (such as using the declarative Net Request API to explicitly
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define what you want to intercept and what remote endpoints you want to call).
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**NOTE 2**: As of June 2025, the Platypush extension is only supported on
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Firefox for desktop. A Firefox for Android version [is
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work in progress](https://git.platypush.tech/platypush/platypush-webext/issues/1).
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Let's dig deeper into the individual components of this setup.
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## Redirector
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This is a nice addition if you want to automatically view some links through
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the Internet Archive rather than the original site.
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You can install it from the [Firefox Add-ons site](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/redirector/).
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Once installed, you can create a bunch of rules (regular expressions are supported)
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to redirect URLs from paywalled domains that you visit often to the Internet Archive.
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For example, this regular expression:
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```
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^(https://([\w-]+).substack.com/p/.*)
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```
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will match any Substack article URL, and you can redirect it to the Internet Archive
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through this URL:
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```
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https://archive.is/$1
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```
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Next time you open a Substack article, it will be automatically redirected to its
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most recent archived version - or it will prompt you to archive the URL if it's not
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been archived yet.
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## Wallabag
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Wallabag can easily be installed on any server [through Docker](https://doc.wallabag.org/developer/docker/).
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Follow the documentation for the set up of your user and create an API token from the Web interface.
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It's also advised to [set up a reverse
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proxy](https://doc.wallabag.org/admin/installation/virtualhosts/#configuration-on-nginx) in front of Wallabag, so you
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can easily access it over HTTPS.
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Once configured the reverse proxy, you can generate a certificate for it - for example, if you use
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[`certbot`](https://certbot.eff.org/) and `nginx`:
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```bash
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certbot --nginx -d your-domain.com
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```
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Then you can access your Wallabag instance at `https://your-domain.com` and log in with the user you created.
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Bonus: I personally find the Web interface of Wallabag quite ugly - the fluorescent light blue headers are distracting
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and the default font and column width isn't ideal for my taste. So I made a [Greasemonkey/Tampermonkey
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script](https://gist.manganiello.tech/fabio/ec9e28170988441d9a091b3fa6535038) to make it better if you want (see
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screenshot above).
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## [_Optional_] ntfy
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[ntfy](https://ntfy.sh) is a simple HTTP-based pub/sub notification service that you can use to send notifications to
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your devices or your browser. It provides both an [Android app](https://f-droid.org/en/packages/io.heckel.ntfy/) and a
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[browser addon](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/send-to-ntfy/) to send and receive notifications,
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allowing you to open saved links directly on your phone or any other device subscribed to the same topic.
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Running it via docker-compose [is quite
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straightforward](https://github.com/binwiederhier/ntfy/blob/main/docker-compose.yml).
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It's also advised to serve it behind a reverse proxy with HTTPS support, keeping in mind to set the right header for the
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Websocket paths - example nginx configuration:
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```nginx
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map $http_upgrade $connection_upgrade {
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default upgrade;
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'' close;
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}
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server {
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server_name notify.example.com;
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location / {
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proxy_pass http://your-internal-ntfy-host:port;
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client_max_body_size 5M;
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proxy_read_timeout 60;
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proxy_connect_timeout 60;
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proxy_redirect off;
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proxy_set_header Host $http_host;
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proxy_set_header X-Real-IP $remote_addr;
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proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-Ssl on;
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proxy_set_header X-Forwarded-For $proxy_add_x_forwarded_for;
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}
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location ~ .*/ws/?$ {
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proxy_http_version 1.1;
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proxy_set_header Upgrade $http_upgrade;
|
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proxy_set_header Connection $connection_upgrade;
|
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proxy_set_header Host $http_host;
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proxy_pass http://your-internal-ntfy-host:port;
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}
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}
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```
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|
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Once the server is running, you can check the connectivity by opening your server's main page in your browser.
|
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## Local Web server
|
||||
|
||||
This approach uses an intermediary Web server to temporarily archive the distilled article content, if available, and
|
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instructing Wallabag to parse it from there.
|
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|
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## Platypush
|
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|
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Create a new virtual environment and install Platypush with the `wallabag` and `rss`
|
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plugin dependencies through `pip`:
|
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|
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```bash
|
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python3 -m venv venv
|
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source venv/bin/activate
|
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pip install 'platypush[wallabag,rss]'
|
||||
```
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Then create a new configuration file `~/.config/platypush/config.yaml` with the following configuration:
|
||||
|
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```yaml
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# Web server configuration
|
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backend.http:
|
||||
# - port: 8008
|
||||
|
||||
# Wallabag configuration
|
||||
wallabag:
|
||||
server_url: https://your-domain.com
|
||||
client_id: your_client_id
|
||||
client_secret: your_client_secret
|
||||
# Your Wallabag user credentials are required for the first login.
|
||||
# It's also advised to keep them here afterwards so the refresh
|
||||
# token can be automatically updated.
|
||||
username: your_username
|
||||
password: your_password
|
||||
```
|
||||
|
||||
Then you can start the service with:
|
||||
|
||||
```bash
|
||||
platypush
|
||||
```
|
||||
|
||||
You can also create a systemd service to run Platypush in the background:
|
||||
|
||||
```bash
|
||||
mkdir -p ~/.config/systemd/user
|
||||
|
||||
cat <<EOF > ~/.config/systemd/user/platypush.service
|
||||
[Unit]
|
||||
Description=Platypush service
|
||||
After=network.target
|
||||
|
||||
[Service]
|
||||
ExecStart=/path/to/venv/bin/platypush
|
||||
Restart=always
|
||||
RestartSec=5
|
||||
EOF
|
||||
|
||||
systemctl --user daemon-reload
|
||||
systemctl --user enable --now platypush.service
|
||||
```
|
||||
|
||||
After starting the service, head over to `http://your_platypush_host:8008` (or the port you configured in the
|
||||
`backend.http` section) and create a new user account.
|
||||
|
||||
It's also advised to serve the Platypush Web server behind a reverse proxy with HTTPS support if you want it to easily
|
||||
be accessible from the browser extension - a basic `nginx` configuration [is available on the
|
||||
repo](https://git.platypush.tech/platypush/platypush/src/branch/master/examples/nginx/nginx.sample.conf).
|
||||
|
||||
## Platypush Web extension
|
||||
|
||||
You can install the Platypush Web extension from the [Firefox Add-ons
|
||||
site](https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/platypush/).
|
||||
|
||||
After installing it, click on the extension popup and add the URL of your Platypush Web server.
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
When successfully connected, you should see the device in the main menu, you can run commands on it and save actions.
|
||||
|
||||
A good place to start familiarizing with the Platypush API is the _Run Action_ dialog, which allows you to run commands
|
||||
on your server and provides autocomplete for the available actions, as well as documentation about their arguments.
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
The default action mode is _Request_ (i.e. single requests against the API). You can also pack together more actions on
|
||||
the backend [into
|
||||
_procedures_](https://docs.platypush.tech/wiki/Quickstart.html#greet-me-with-lights-and-music-when-i-come-home), which
|
||||
can be written either in the YAML config or as Python scripts (by default loaded from `~/.config/platypush/scripts`).
|
||||
If correctly configured, procedures will be available in the _Run Action_ dialog.
|
||||
|
||||
The other mode, which we'll use in this article, is _Script_. In this mode you can write custom JavaScript code that
|
||||
can interact with your browser.
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
|
||||
[Here](https://gist.github.com/BlackLight/d80c571705215924abc06a80994fd5f4) is a sample script that you can use as a
|
||||
reference for the API exposed by the extension. Some examples include:
|
||||
|
||||
- `app.run`, to run an action on the Platypush backend
|
||||
|
||||
- `app.getURL`, `app.setURL` and `app.openTab` to get and set the current URL, or open a new tab with a given URL
|
||||
|
||||
- `app.axios.get`, `app.axios.post` etc. to perform HTTP requests to other external services through the Axios
|
||||
library
|
||||
|
||||
- `app.getDOM` and `app.setDOM` to get and set the current page DOM
|
||||
|
||||
- `app.mercury.parse` to distill the current page content using the Mercury Parser API
|
||||
|
||||
### Reader mode script
|
||||
|
||||
We can put together the building blocks above to create our first script, which will distill the current page content
|
||||
and replace the swap the current page DOM with the simplified content - with no ads, comments, or other distracting
|
||||
visual elements. The full content of the script is available
|
||||
[here](https://gist.manganiello.tech/fabio/c731b57ff6b24d21a8f43fbedde3dc30).
|
||||
|
||||
This is akin to what Firefox' [Reader
|
||||
Mode](https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/firefox-reader-view-clutter-free-web-pages) does, but with much more room for
|
||||
customization.
|
||||
|
||||
Note that for this specific script we don't need any interactions with the Platypush backend. Everything happens on the
|
||||
client, as the Mercury API is built into the Platypush Web extension.
|
||||
|
||||
Switch to _Script_ mode in the _Run Action_ dialog, paste the script content and click on _Save Script_. You can also
|
||||
choose a custom name, icon ([FontAwesome](https://fontawesome.com/icons) icon classes are supported), color and group
|
||||
for the script. Quite importantly, you can also associate a keyboard shortcut to it, so you can quickly distill a page
|
||||
without having to search for the command either in the extension popup or in the context menu.
|
||||
|
||||
### Save to Wallabag script
|
||||
|
||||
Now that we have a script to distill the current page content, we can create another script to save the distilled
|
||||
content (if available) to Wallabag. Otherwise, it will just save the original page content.
|
||||
|
||||
The full content of the script is available
|
||||
[here](https://gist.manganiello.tech/fabio/8f5b08d8fbaa404bafc6fdeaf9b154b4).
|
||||
Loading…
Add table
Add a link
Reference in a new issue