BookWith
Productivity
e-book reader
SHOW HN2025
86points
61comments
#834of 3,837 in 2025
Top 22%of 2025 by points
How HN took it
DebatedReal support and real criticism
12 positive, 9 neutral or asking, 0 mixed, 12 critical, out of 33 comments about the project. Thread score -0.07.
Idea: 9 for, 9 against
The thread, comment by comment
Each row is a top-level comment and its replies, in HN's order. Select a cell to open that comment on HN.
positive neutral or mixed critical about another commenter or something else the maker
What HN said
What people liked
Useful for reading difficult technical or academic books
From 2 comments
mega based project, i was thinking about the same. LLMs are very helpful for reading difficult books, or just books requiring previous context. i would add a feature of adding…
karolcodes on HNThank you for sharing this! I'm disappointed by some of the negative comments. I'm pretty excited about this and plan to try and get this running locally this week. I end…
nathan_douglas on HN
Fills gap for recalling details in long book series
From 1 comment
Interesting project. I've been thinking about a tool like this; I might be following a multi-volume book series, but it's been years since the last book. When I pick up the…
future10se on HN
Objections
LLM answers may be inaccurate and could mislead readers
From 2 comments
If we are purely talking about textbooks, I can see the value in a tool like this... assuming we still have yet to actually solve the problem of AI being able to tell the truth…
nerdjon on HN"By conversing with an AI that fully understands the book's content in real time," That seems like a maybe a wee bit of an overstatement of possibilities.
Finnucane on HN
Hard to install; needs server, Supabase, Docker and Python dependencies
From 2 comments
If this looks hard to install (you need to host a server, supabase, docker, lots of python dependancies) - instead, you could just install this to Edge…
geor9e on HNInteresting project. I've been thinking about a tool like this; I might be following a multi-volume book series, but it's been years since the last book. When I pick up the…
future10se on HN
Could reduce attention span and reading immersion
From 3 comments
If we are purely talking about textbooks, I can see the value in a tool like this... assuming we still have yet to actually solve the problem of AI being able to tell the truth…
nerdjon on HN"Too much thought into whether they could, and not enough thought on whether they should" could be the motto of the vast majority of AI products. Algorithmic social media has…
andrepd on HNI recently finished a book I was looking forward to but wound up really disliking [0]. Throughout the book I found myself saying "wtf?" and I occasionally would complain to my…
johndhi on HN
No spoiler prevention for fiction
From 1 comment
Is there any mechanism to prevent the AI from answering with spoilers? For example, when I ask about a character I don't want information coming from pages/chapters I still…
slopdo on HN
Requests
Spoiler prevention limiting AI knowledge to reading progress
From 2 comments
Is there any mechanism to prevent the AI from answering with spoilers? For example, when I ask about a character I don't want information coming from pages/chapters I still…
slopdo on HNThis is a crucial feature - perhaps implementing a "reading progress tracker" that masks content beyond your current position would make this truly useful for fiction.
ethan_smith on HN
Mobile or phone-friendly version
From 1 comment
Nice! I was also thinking about e-reader with LLM support to discuss topics of the book I'm reading with, explain words or phrases (I'm not a native English reader) and so on.…
l3x4ur1n on HN
Docker image for easy local or home server deployment
From 1 comment
Interesting project. I've been thinking about a tool like this; I might be following a multi-volume book series, but it's been years since the last book. When I pick up the…
future10se on HN
Integration with Calibre and OCR for scanned PDFs
From 1 comment
Can you look into integrating with private book repositories like Calibre? Also, many books on Archive.org are scanned PDFs (usually as images). This would need OCR probably.…
guiltygods on HN
Questions
Does it work with scanned PDFs needing OCR
From 1 comment
Can you look into integrating with private book repositories like Calibre? Also, many books on Archive.org are scanned PDFs (usually as images). This would need OCR probably.…
guiltygods on HN
Can it prevent spoilers
From 1 comment
Is there any mechanism to prevent the AI from answering with spoilers? For example, when I ask about a character I don't want information coming from pages/chapters I still…
slopdo on HN
Alternatives named
Microsoft Edge EPUB reader extension with Copilot sidebar
From 1 comment
If this looks hard to install (you need to host a server, supabase, docker, lots of python dependancies) - instead, you could just install this to Edge…
geor9e on HN
Built-in e-reader dictionaries
From 1 comment
> The problem: Traditional e-readers are passive. Why is that a problem? Your statement is a bit like saying "traditional avocados are too delicious. We at YuckCo are aiming to…
edent on HN
General chatbots like ChatGPT or NotebookLM
From 2 comments
Thank you for sharing this! I'm disappointed by some of the negative comments. I'm pretty excited about this and plan to try and get this running locally this week. I end…
nathan_douglas on HNWhen I was trying to extract as much meaning out of George Eliot's Middlemarch as I could, I would read a chapter, and then upload that chapter's text file (thank you Gutenberg)…
spudlyo on HN