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Posted by simedw 7/1/2025

Show HN: Spegel, a Terminal Browser That Uses LLMs to Rewrite Webpages(simedw.com)
426 points | 180 commentspage 3
deepdarkforest 7/1/2025|
The main problem with these approaches is that most sites now are useless without JS or having access to the accessibility tree. Projects like browser-use or other DOM based approaches at least see the DOM(and screenshots).

I wonder if you could turn this into a chrome extension that at least filters and parses the DOM

jadbox 7/1/2025||
I actually made a CLI tool recently that uses Puppeteer to render the page including JS, summarizes key info and actions, and enables simple form filling all from a CLI menu. I built it for my own use-cases (checking and paying power bills from CLI), but I'd love to get feedback on the core concept: https://github.com/jadbox/solomonagent
andoando 7/1/2025||
Dude I love this. I've been thinking of doing this exactly this, but for as a screen reader for accessibility reasons.
jadbox 7/1/2025||
Thanks, it's alpha at the moment- next feature is complex forms and bug fixing broken actions (downloading). Do give it a spin! Welcome to contribute or drop feedback on the repo :)
willsmith72 7/1/2025||
True for stuff requiring interaction, but to help their LCP/SEO lots of sites these days render plain html first. It's not "usable" but for viewing it's pretty good
ghm2180 7/2/2025||
This is great! Another useful amendment to this that would make me use it add a chrome browser tool to allow access to pages that need authn and then scrape them for you.

My #1 usecase is fetching wikis on my hard drive and letting a local coding agent use it for creating plans.

pepperonipboy 7/1/2025||
Could work great with emacs' eww!
sammy0910 7/1/2025||
I built a project that basically does this for emacs

https://github.com/sstraust/simpleweb

thephotonsphere 7/1/2025||
also with lynx because it can browse from stdin
neocodesoftware 7/1/2025||
Does it fail cloudflare captcha?
ospider 7/2/2025|
I think it will, it uses requests, and cloudflare blocks traffic from non-browser, e.g. python http clients. It would be better to use something like curl_cffi.
stared 7/1/2025||
Any chance it would work for pages like Facebook or LinkedIn? I would love to have a distraction-free way of searching information there.

Obviously, against wishes of these social networks, which want us to be addicted... I mean, engaged.

aydyn 7/1/2025||
Does anyone really get addicted to linkedin? Its so sanitized and clinical. Nobody acts real on there or even pretends to.
encom 7/1/2025||
The worst[1] part about losing my job last month was having to take LinkedIn seriously, and the best[2] part about now having found a new job is logging off LinkedIn, for a very long time hopefully. The self-aggrandising, pretentious, occasionally virtue signalling, performance-posting make me want to throw up. It takes a considerable amount of effort on my part to not make sarcastic shitposts, but in the interest of self preservation, I restrain myself. My header picture, however, is my extremely messy desk, full of electronics, tools, test equipment, drawings, computers and coffee cups. Because that's just how I work when I'm in the zone, and it serves as a quiet counterpoint to the polished self-promotion people do.

And I didn't even get the new job through LinkedIn, though it did yield one interview.

[1] Not the actual worst.

[2] Not the actual best.

simedw 7/1/2025||
We’ll probably have to add some custom code to log in, get an auth token, and then browse with it. Not sure if LinkedIn would like that, but I certainly would.
Buttons840 7/1/2025||
A step towards the future of ad-blocking maybe? Just rewrite every page?
conradkay 7/1/2025||
Something tells me we'll see more ad-inserting
Modified3019 7/1/2025||
>Companies burning energy with llms to dynamically hide ads and bullshit on every pageload

>Individuals burning energy using personal llm internet condoms to strips ads and bullshit from every pageload

Eventually there will be a project where volunteers use llms to harvest the real internet and “launder” both the copyright and content into some kind of pre-processed distributed shadow internet where things are actual useable, while being just as wrong as the real internet.

What a future.

userbinator 7/1/2025||
Many people were doing that at the turn of the century(!) with filtering proxies, more deterministically and with far less computing power. Some still do today.
cyrillite 7/1/2025||
I have been thinking of a project extremely similar to this for a totally different purpose. It’s lovely to see something like this. Thank you for sharing it, inspiring
amelius 7/1/2025|
Curious about that different purpose ...
anonu 7/1/2025||
Don't you need javascript to make most webpages useful?
inetknght 7/1/2025||
Good sir, no.

The web has existed for long before javascript was around.

The web was useful for long before javascript was around.

I literally hate javascript -- not the language itself but the way it is used. It has enabled some pretty cool things, yes. But javascript is not required to make useful webpages.

pmxi 7/1/2025||
I think you misunderstood him. Yes, it’s possible to CREATE a useful webpage without JavaScript, but many EXISTING webpages rely on JavaScript to be functional.
jazzyjackson 7/1/2025|||
If Amazon.com can work with JavaScript disabled, any site could be rewritten to do without. But I think to even get to the content on a lot of SPAs this would need to be running a headless browser to render the page, before extracting the static content unfortunately
IncreasePosts 7/1/2025||
No - an experiment: try disabling javascript in your browser settings, and then whenever you see a webpage that isn't working, enable javascript for that domain. You'd be surprised how fast 90% of the web feels with JS disabled.
nashashmi 7/1/2025||
You should call this software a lens and filter instead of a mirror. It takes the essential information and transforms it into another medium.
barrenko 7/2/2025|
I need this, but for the new forum formats such as Discourse or Discuss or whatever it's called. An eyesore and a brainsore.
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