Ink Reader

---
name: tooyoung:ink-reader
description: "Read public or accessible URLs into clean Markdown using platform-aware fallback strategies. Covers common Chinese platforms, X/Twitter, and generic websites; login or anti-bot pages are best-effort. Trigger words: read url, read link, fetch article, extract content, clean markdown, WeChat article, 搜公众号文章, ink-reader"
metadata:
  version: "1.1.1"
  author: shiqkuangsan
  visibility: public
---

# Ink Reader

Intelligently read any URL content. Auto-detect platform, pick the best fetch strategy, output clean Markdown.

## When to Activate

Activate this skill when the user:

- Shares a URL and asks to read / fetch / view / grab its content
- Says "read this link", "what does this say", "fetch this article"
- Uses `/ink-reader <url>`

## Fetch Strategy Overview

Four-layer fallback with platform-specific optimizations:

```
Layer 0: Camoufox       → WeChat-specific, bypasses anti-scraping (requires pip install)
Layer 1: Jina Reader    → Free, no API key, covers most public content
Layer 2: WebFetch        → Claude Code built-in, direct URL reading
Layer 3: Playwright MCP  → Browser automation, handles login-required sites
```

## Platform Detection

Match the URL domain to determine platform and strategy routing:

| Platform    | Domain Contains           | Needs Login | Strategy Order               |
| ----------- | ------------------------- | ----------- | ---------------------------- |
| WeChat      | `mp.weixin.qq.com`        | Yes         | Camoufox → Jina → Playwright |
| Zhihu       | `zhihu.com`               | No          | Jina → WebFetch              |
| Bilibili    | `bilibili.com`, `b23.tv`  | No          | Jina → WebFetch              |
| Toutiao     | `toutiao.com`             | No          | Jina → WebFetch              |
| Weibo       | `weibo.com`, `m.weibo.cn` | Yes         | Jina → Playwright            |
| Xiaohongshu | `xiaohongshu.com`         | Yes         | Jina → Playwright            |
| Douyin      | `douyin.com`              | No          | Jina → WebFetch              |
| X/Twitter   | `x.com`, `twitter.com`    | Partial     | See X/Twitter Flow           |
| Generic     | anything else             | No          | Jina → WebFetch              |

### Routing Rules

- **No login required**: Jina → WebFetch → Playwright MCP (if available)
- **WeChat**: Camoufox → Jina → Playwright MCP (dedicated flow below)
- **Login required** (Weibo, Xiaohongshu): Jina → Playwright MCP (skip WebFetch, it won't help)
- **X/Twitter**: Dedicated flow below

## Execution Steps

### Step 1: Identify Platform

Parse the URL domain and match against the platform table above.

### Step 2: Fetch Content

#### For normal platforms (no login needed)

1. **Try Jina Reader**:
   - Use WebFetch with URL: `https://r.jina.ai/{original_url}`
   - Prompt: "Extract the article title, author, publish time, and full body content. Return as-is in Markdown."
   - If result is meaningful (> 100 chars, no verification page), use it.

2. **Try WebFetch direct**:
   - Use WebFetch with the original URL directly.
   - Prompt: "Extract the article title, author, publish time, and full body content."
   - If result is meaningful, use it.

3. **Try Playwright MCP** (if available):
   - Navigate to the original URL.
   - Wait for content to load.
   - Take a snapshot and extract content.
   - If Playwright MCP is not available, skip this step.

#### For WeChat (`mp.weixin.qq.com`)

WeChat articles have aggressive anti-scraping. Jina Reader and WebFetch almost always fail. Use Camoufox as the primary strategy.

**Prerequisites check** (run once per session):

```bash
~/.ink-reader-env/bin/python3 -c "import camoufox; print('camoufox OK')" 2>/dev/null && echo "READY" || echo "NOT_INSTALLED"
```

1. **Try Camoufox** (if installed):
   - Check if `~/.agent-reach/tools/wechat-article-for-ai/main.py` exists. If yes, use it:

     ```bash
     cd ~/.agent-reach/tools/wechat-article-for-ai && ~/.ink-reader-env/bin/python3 main.py "{url}"
     ```

   - If that path doesn't exist, use inline invocation:

     ```bash
     ~/.ink-reader-env/bin/python3 -c "
     import asyncio
     from camoufox.sync_api import Camoufox
     from markdownify import markdownify
     with Camoufox(headless=True) as browser:
         page = browser.new_page()
         page.goto('{url}', wait_until='networkidle', timeout=30000)
         html = page.content()
         print(markdownify(html, strip=['script','style','nav','footer','header']))
     "
     ```

   - Validate output (Step 3). If valid, use it.

2. **Try Jina Reader** (fallback — occasionally works for WeChat):
   - Use WebFetch with URL: `https://r.jina.ai/{original_url}`
   - If result is meaningful, use it.

3. **Try Playwright MCP** (if available, last resort):
   - Navigate to the original URL.
   - Wait for content to load.
   - Take a snapshot and extract content.

4. **All failed** → Show failure output with suggestion:
   > "WeChat articles require Camoufox to bypass anti-scraping. Install with: `pip install camoufox[geoip] markdownify beautifulsoup4 httpx`"

**WeChat search** (bonus — when user asks to search WeChat articles, not read a URL):

Check if miku_ai is installed:

```bash
~/.ink-reader-env/bin/python3 -c "import miku_ai; print('miku_ai OK')" 2>/dev/null && echo "READY" || echo "NOT_INSTALLED"
```

If installed, search articles:

```bash
~/.ink-reader-env/bin/python3 -c "
import asyncio
from miku_ai import get_wexin_article
async def search():
    results = await get_wexin_article('{query}', {count})
    for a in results:
        print(f'- [{a[\"title\"]}]({a[\"url\"]})')
asyncio.run(search())
"
```

Present results as a list. If user picks one, read it using the WeChat flow above.
If miku_ai is not installed, inform user: `pip install miku_ai`

#### For login-required platforms (Weibo, Xiaohongshu)

1. **Try Jina Reader** (same as above, sometimes works even for login-required sites).

2. **Try Playwright MCP** (if available):
   - Navigate to the original URL.
   - If a verification/login page is detected, inform the user.
   - If Playwright MCP is not available, inform the user:
     > "This platform requires login. Install Playwright MCP to enable browser-based reading."

#### For X/Twitter

1. **Extract status ID** from URL:
   - Pattern: `x.com/{user}/status/{id}` or `twitter.com/{user}/status/{id}`
   - Strip query parameters.

2. **Try Thread Reader App via Jina**:
   - Use WebFetch with URL: `https://r.jina.ai/https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/{status_id}.html`
   - Prompt: "Extract the full thread content including all tweets. Return in Markdown."
   - If result is meaningful (> 100 chars, contains actual thread content), output as thread.

3. **Try Jina on original X URL**:
   - Use WebFetch with URL: `https://r.jina.ai/{original_url}`
   - Prompt: "Extract the tweet content, author, and timestamp."
   - If result is meaningful, output as single post.

4. **Try Playwright MCP** (if available):
   - Navigate to `https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/{status_id}.html`
   - Extract content from the page.

### Step 3: Validate Content

Content is **valid** when ALL of these are true:

- Length > 100 characters after trimming
- Does NOT contain these verification markers: "环境异常", "完成验证", "请完成验证", "access denied", "please verify", "subscribe to continue", "sign in to read", "create a free account"
- Is NOT a login wall or CAPTCHA page

If content fails validation, treat it as a failure and try the next strategy.

### Step 4: Output

Use the output format specified below.

## Output Format

### Success

```markdown
# {Title}

**Source**: {Platform Name}
**Author**: {Author name, omit if unavailable}
**Published**: {Time, omit if unavailable}
**URL**: {Original URL}
**Strategy**: {Camoufox / Jina Reader / WebFetch / Playwright MCP}

---

{Body content in Markdown}
```

Rules:

- Only include Author and Published lines if the information is actually available.
- Do NOT fabricate metadata. If it's not in the fetched content, omit it.
- Keep images as remote URLs. Do NOT attempt to download images.
- Clean up excessive whitespace, navigation elements, ads, and cookie banners from the content.

### Failure

```markdown
# Failed to read URL

**URL**: {url}
**Platform**: {detected platform}
**Attempted strategies**:

- {strategy 1}: {error reason}
- {strategy 2}: {error reason}

**Suggestions**:

- {contextual suggestions}
```

Contextual suggestions by scenario:

- Login-required platform + no Playwright → "Install Playwright MCP to enable browser-based reading for this platform."
- WeChat + no Camoufox → "Install Camoufox for reliable WeChat reading: `pip install camoufox[geoip] markdownify beautifulsoup4 httpx`"
- WeChat + Camoufox failed → "Camoufox could not extract content. The article may have been deleted or restricted. Try opening the link in a browser."
- All strategies returned empty → "The page may require JavaScript rendering. Try using Playwright MCP."
- X/Twitter thread failed → "Try opening <https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/{id}.html> in your browser."

## Save Mode

When the user says "save", "save it", "keep this", or "save to file" AFTER a successful read:

1. Create directory `./ink-reader-clips/` in current working directory (if not exists).
2. Write file: `./ink-reader-clips/{YYYY-MM-DD}_{sanitized_title}.md`
3. File content:

```markdown
---
title: "{Title}"
source: "{Platform Name}"
url: "{Original URL}"
saved_at: "{YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS}"
---

{Body content}
```

- Sanitize title for filename: remove `<>:"/\|?*`, replace whitespace with `-`, truncate to 50 chars.
- Report: "Saved to `./ink-reader-clips/{filename}`"

Do NOT auto-save. Only save when explicitly asked.

## Optional Dependencies

The base skill (Jina Reader + WebFetch) works out of the box with zero setup. For enhanced platform support, install the following optional dependencies into a dedicated virtual environment:

### WeChat article reading (Camoufox)

```bash
# Create dedicated venv (one-time)
uv venv ~/.ink-reader-env

# Install dependencies
uv pip install --python ~/.ink-reader-env "camoufox[geoip]" markdownify beautifulsoup4 httpx
```

This enables reliable reading of `mp.weixin.qq.com` articles by bypassing WeChat's anti-scraping with a stealth browser. No API key or login required.

### WeChat article search (miku_ai)

```bash
uv pip install --python ~/.ink-reader-env miku_ai
```

Enables searching WeChat public account articles by keyword via Sogou. No API key required.

### Verify installation

```bash
~/.ink-reader-env/bin/python3 -c "import camoufox; print('camoufox OK')"
~/.ink-reader-env/bin/python3 -c "import miku_ai; print('miku_ai OK')"
```

## Important Notes

- **No API keys needed**: Jina Reader, Camoufox, and miku_ai are all free and keyless.
- **Camoufox is optional but recommended**: Without it, WeChat articles will fall back to Jina Reader (often fails) or Playwright MCP.
- **Playwright MCP is optional**: The skill works without it, just with reduced capability for login-required platforms.
- **Images stay remote**: Never download images. Keep original URLs in the Markdown output.
- **Respect content**: Output the content faithfully. Do not summarize or modify unless the user explicitly asks.