1. If you name your script with the extension .user.js it is easier to click on to automatically install at least with tampermonkey. 2. When I went to this link from the main page, on mobile I had to scroll to the right to see the (-) to minimize because the sidebar was too large: https://elizabethtai.com/2026/06/10/substack-writers-you-nee... It may make some sense to start minimized so I can read the article first, but I can easily modify the script to do that.
A userscript also let me iterate quickly without dealing with extension packaging and permissions, but being able to see and tweak the code was a big part of the appeal.
Apart from that, there are APIs exclusive to extensions, e.g. instrumenting client-side communication among tabs with different origins, listing all tabs, basically accessing a special API that sits on a higher-level context, and, while gating certain functionality behind user approval, and forbidding other functionality completely (at least in Manifest 3.0), extensions with the corresponding permissions can do more than a script running in the page context. They can inject these as well, though, even overriding CSP sometimes, as far as I know?
The main problem with these permissions, and WebExtension 3.0 partly was an attempt to improve this, or at least claims it: most people give a second of doubt at best when installing an extension, as long as they think it comes from a trusted source.
thought I realize "if it works it works", https://github.com/Tampermonkey/tampermonkey
https://greasyfork.s3.us-east-2.amazonaws.com/sokzpb2ztmatlh... (screenshot)
https://greasyfork.org/en/scripts/588721-hacker-news-comment...
I'd improve it by counting top level comments next to items but that would slow it down. Still need to make some slight changes like closing sidebar by re-clicking orange (beyond just right-clicking sidebar.)
It's very fast and speeds up thinking overall.
zip is available only if you're logged-in on GitHub site
What I do now is open the HN comments, and then when I'm ready to look at the link + comments, right-click on the title and Open in Split View.
Would you be interested in making one?
I normalize the URL and use HN's Algolia search API to find an existing story with a matching URL. I don't currently handle multiple HN submissions of the same article; I just use the matching story I find.
That being said, I could see creating a historical snapshot of all the times an article has been submitted and building a blended comments section in the future.
This shouldn't be a script (no offense, great job!). It should be built into the browsers!