StackPrinter: The Stack Exchange Printer Suite

Question

UPDATE:

Version 1.1 - MySE section, PrettyPrint, StackPrinter API

Screenshots:

App Homepage

Homepage screenshot

Printable view

Printable view screenshot

Logo:

Logo
http://www.stackprinter.com

StackPrinter is a website that pulls the main details of a given question, all its answers, comments and votes formatting them in a simple essential printable view.

I've created this micro web application basically to add a "Printer-Friendly" feature to the Stack Exchange Network sites, trying to remove some @Media Print CSS limitations like hidden comments, pagination and empty spaces. (rationale here)

Other features:

Addons:
1. Greasemonkey script - Adds a Printer-Friendly button on question's page (FF|Chrome)
2. Bookmarklet - Allows you to print a question directly from question's page
Favorites: lets you browse and print favorites users's questions from:
1. The Stack Exchange Network
2. Delicious social bookmarking
TopVoted: top voted questions by tags
TopPrinted: StackPrinter top printed questions
Deleted: popular deleted questions archive
MySE: for printing all your Stack Exchange stuff

Demo

Printable question:
What should a developer know before building a public web site? - Stack Overflow
Recovering a lost website with no backup? - Super User
Good tools that fit on a thumb drive - Server Fault
Jon Skeet Facts? - Meta Stack Overflow
API Documentation and Help - Stack Apps

Favorites:
Jon Skeet - Stack Overflow
Jeff Atwood - Stack Overflow
Zoredache - Server Fault
wil - Super User
gangsta75 - Delicious

TopVoted:
python tag - Stack Overflow
discussion tag - Meta Stack Overflow

Deleted:
What's your favorite "programmer" cartoon?

Code

Language: Python
Platform: Google App Engine
Framework: webpy
Source: github
Api: /export
License: BSD

Info

ChangeLog
Todo
Submit issues
Current version: 0.9.9.3

Contact

Contact info

Credits

The Team
Jonathon Watney (sopy library)
Michael Noll (python delicious)
Balpha (unicorn provider)
George Edison (SE logos)
Jon Seigel (idea)

that is brilliant!!! If only this could be a real part of SO! — Matt S., May 22 '10 at 13:34
oh man! also, why don't you modify it so it displays the actual value of the link. Displaying just the text doesn't mean a lot unless you can view the URL as well — Matt S., May 22 '10 at 22:07
the url. Just blue text tells me nothing. I want to see the actual URL so I can type it in later :) — Matt S., May 23 '10 at 02:08
How about doing what Wikipedia does, and have all the links at the bottom of the page? Then just use [1], [2], etc. in the posts. — Nathan Osman, May 23 '10 at 07:17
@sys: I think so - if there were a lot of links, the pages would be much easier to read. — Nathan Osman, May 23 '10 at 16:04
@Koning You will get the unicorn error page (the same you get trying to search an unrecognized id Example:666). Why are you asking per hour?10K limit is per day — systempuntoout, May 24 '10 at 13:53
How about offering to shorten urls automatically? It could make it easier or faster to visit links off the printout. — badp, May 30 '10 at 13:45
I think this is really simple and clever, not sure about the name though. — Toby Allen, Jun 10 '10 at 18:46
PrintOverflow, StackOverflowPrinter, PrintYourQuestion - no great ones, just StackPrint just doesnt work for me. Great idea though. — Toby Allen, Jun 12 '10 at 13:44
@Toby, StackPrint is automatically beter than anything with "overflow" in the title as overflow is specific to one site only, and it's the Stack API (stackapps.com?) — Mark Henderson, Jun 13 '10 at 15:01
@Toby i thought you were arguing on the second part of the title "The Stack Overflow Trilogy Printer Suite", i don't like it too much :). Actually i like StackPrinter. — systempuntoout, Jun 15 '10 at 15:04
@badp it would mean a full blown shorten urls service on stackprinter; anyway if you want to add it, source code is on github :). — systempuntoout, Jun 22 '10 at 16:07
@systempuntoout, interfacing with services like is.gd is no rocket science and I'm kinda swamped with university but I'll see what I can do. — badp, Jun 24 '10 at 09:47
@badp Sorry but your solution in not feasible because Gae imposes a 30 seconds limits per request. In this 30 seconds, StackPrinter via UrlFetch pulls all the questions details from Stack Exchange (you have questions with hundreds of answers!); adding more data fetching from the service you suggest would surely exceed the 30 seconds limit (there are questions with hundreds of url to shorten). Like i said, it would mean a full blown shorten urls service on stackprinter. (in bocca al lupo per gli esami) — systempuntoout, Jun 24 '10 at 10:11
@sys: You and me are the fast ones when it comes to updating our apps for v0.9 of the API! — Nathan Osman, Jun 24 '10 at 19:27
@code :-))), actually i use StackPrinter to save in Pdf for my eReader; i don't have a printer @Home. — systempuntoout, Jul 05 '10 at 05:01
Great application -- there are still a few cases where a nice printout beats reading something on the screen.
Suggestion: include the original question URL in prominent fashion near the top of the printout. That would be a good reference from the printed page back to the online version. — , Jul 05 '10 at 19:32
@BrianC thanks Brian, glad you like it :).API does not return the original question url with the slug at the moment.Anyway i could add something like http://stackoverflow.com/questions/9/ that would work.If you think it is worth, i will add it without any problem. — systempuntoout, Jul 05 '10 at 20:05
@sys: Thank you! Feel free to suggest new features you would like to see there. — Nathan Osman, Jul 09 '10 at 18:55
be good if you could add a users print page (like with their favourites, but with their name and rep and badges in the top left) — Jonathan., Dec 28 '10 at 18:36
no I mean like the details of one user, so the user ID is entered as a parameter and then it returns a page about that user. — Jonathan., Jan 02 '11 at 11:31
@jon can't you just print the user's page? What kind of limitation do you see? — systempuntoout, Jan 02 '11 at 12:06
I'm not sure I understand. The same reason why I don't print a question on the main site, it wastes ink. — Jonathan., Jan 02 '11 at 12:25
I have to say that I don't like the output, harder to read and code isn't formatted with the correct colors. Could there be an optional output for how it is printed? — WmasterJ, Jan 31 '11 at 01:08
Well one thing that makes SO really good is the visual cues that make thing easily readable. I would like a printout that keep the voting number in a better layout. And generally a better typographic solution for the print would be great. Then having the option for code in color and possibly to select which comments of all of comments I want. Maybe I only want nr 1, 4 & 7....just some ideas. But good design. typography and sense of grid in the print will definately help. Haven't installed this yet.....will when these things come. — WmasterJ, Jan 31 '11 at 07:49
What do you mean with *a better typographic solution"? The printing is focused more on the question's content than on the votes/reps etc. I could agree with a not default option for syntax highlighting. Installed? Thanks for your feedback. — systempuntoout, Jan 31 '11 at 07:55
@justin using the topvoted section but, something is broken at the moment :) http://stackapps.com/questions/2164/authorized-requests-auth-parameter-seems-broken — systempuntoout, Mar 04 '11 at 22:55
@justin ok, now it's working, As I said use the topvoted feature with your desired tag. — systempuntoout, Mar 05 '11 at 17:17
Definitely a needed feature of any website. However, it's still not print friendly enough. The code block has a dark background with a white font face. Huh? Talk about a waste of color or black toner. — Mark Stinson, Jul 11 '11 at 19:19
@Mark code block, AFAIK, should be black color on white background. Are you sure? — systempuntoout, Jul 11 '11 at 19:22
where's a userscript link that I can click and install in Chrome? userscripts. userscripts.org page doesn't have it — Andriy Tylychko, Dec 04 '11 at 12:01
yes it has, http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/77298 top right of the page, the install button. — systempuntoout, Dec 04 '11 at 12:31
When using The Printliminator bookmarklet, one can quickly remove certain parts of a page. To use that effectively: would it be feasible to add a parent <div> per answer, and for the comments? — Arjan, Apr 09 '12 at 15:01
Will this break soon with the recent bug fix? Bring back the <10k trick for viewing a deleted question — Danny Beckett, Jul 05 '13 at 16:19
mySE started responding with an error message :`Error: Server Error
The server encountered an error and could not complete your request. If the problem persists, please report your problem and mention this error message and the query that caused it.` Any ideas? — sgun, Aug 04 '13 at 21:37
@sgun hi there, I've tried just now and it seems to work correctly. Can you give it another shot please? — systempuntoout, Aug 05 '13 at 10:14
@kenorb just add &printer=true at the end of the url if you don't want ads. — systempuntoout, May 13 '15 at 14:14
@Pandya When I will be less busy on my work, I might add a new route on StackPrinter API just to handle your request. — systempuntoout, Feb 22 '17 at 21:30
@Pandya Printing answers by id is now supported, check the Api doc (let me know if you have problem). — systempuntoout, Mar 08 '17 at 23:33
@systempuntoout ok. Where to enter answer id? as I can't find such option at Homepage. I've tried by /export?answer=[id] but it doesn''t work. — Pandya, Mar 09 '17 at 02:01
@systempuntoout Yes, adding &answer=[id] is working fine. Thanks! — Pandya, Mar 09 '17 at 09:51
to be https compliant, it's time to update the bookmarklet regex to ^https?://(.*?)\.com/questions/([0-9]+)/ — Kul-Tigin, Jun 19 '17 at 20:50
I have been using Brett Terpstra's "Answered" (http://brettterpstra.com/projects/answered/) bookmarklet. It offers some of the same functionality, but StackPrinter offers more options for archival purposes. — Charles Johnson, Aug 31 '17 at 15:16
Is there no way to 'print all' questions or answer by a particular user? — Iceberry, Feb 28 '19 at 06:26
Is Meta Stack Exchange supported on MySE? I couldn't find the option in the dropdown. — a stone arachnid, Jun 07 '19 at 01:05

score 20 · Accepted Answer · edited Jun 18 '20 at 08:33

Addons

Stackprinter allows you to print directly from Stack Exchange sites using Greasemonkey script or an handy bookmarklet.
Greasemonkey script adds a Printer-Friendly button to the question you are browsing (Firefox and Chrome both supported).
Bookmarklet is useful if Greasemonkey is not an option and has the same effect of Printer-Friendly button, allowing the print of the question straight from the question page.

alt text

Favorites

Favorites allows you to browse and print your favorite questions or other users favorites.
Stackprinter supports all Stack Exchange sites plus Delicious social bookmarking service.
Just star or save your questions and browse Stackprinter to print all of them later.

Users search
alt text

Favorites result
alt text

[Q]uicklook alt text

Delicious result
link text

TopVoted

TopVoted allows you to browse and print the best questions searched by tags.

Tags search
link text

TopVoted result
link text

Is there no way to 'print all' questions or answer by a particular user? — Iceberry, Feb 28 '19 at 06:26

score 5 · Answer 2 · edited Mar 16 '17 at 15:50

5

status-completedI asked this as a question, but apparently the convention is to report bugs/feature requests in the announcement thread. It appears, that the MathJax extension mhchem is currently not enabled in the StackPrinter app. This is rather inconvenient for most of the chemistry.se questions and answers. It would therefore be nice if this feature could be enabled for the StackPrinter app.

Example:
Please consider the sandbox on meta.chemistry.se and its printed version (also see the screenshot below). You can see in the first equation of my post the red \ce. I enabled the mhchem package manually via \require{mhchem] after that and the same command renders now.

printed result

edited Mar 16 '17 at 15:50

Community

1

answered Apr 21 '15 at 09:53

Martin - マーチン

223
2
7

I will take a look at it, is this extension available on Cdn? – systempuntoout Apr 21 '15 at 12:43
I do not know what Cdn is. The extension is part of the whole MathJax package. It is probably just a variable that has to be toggled, since it is already available, as the screenshot proves. Thanks for having a look. – Martin - マーチン Apr 21 '15 at 12:55
Oh OK, it should be easy to fix.(maybe tonight) – systempuntoout Apr 21 '15 at 14:39
Should be fixed, give it a try. – systempuntoout Apr 21 '15 at 21:15
@systempuntoout It works like a charm, thank you very much. Great app! – Martin - マーチン Apr 22 '15 at 03:10

score 5 · Answer 3 · edited Jun 10 '21 at 12:32

Here is a small script (stackprinter) which uses Stack Printer from the command-line:

#!/bin/sh
type wkhtmltopdf || { echo >&2 "wkhtmltopdf command is required. Aborting."; exit 1; }
: ${1?"Usage: $0 (url)"}
URL=$1 && shift
HOST=$(echo "$URL" | grep -Eo "([.[:alnum:]]*?)\.(com|net|org)" | head -c-5)
QID=$(echo "$URL" | grep -o "[0-9].*/" | head -c-2)
PRINTURL="http://www.stackprinter.com/export?format=HTML&printer=true&service=$HOST&question=$QID"
FILENAME=$(curl -s "$URL" | grep -o "<title>[^<]*" | tail -c+8)
wkhtmltopdf $* "$PRINTURL" "$FILENAME.pdf" && echo "'$FILENAME.pdf' saved."

Usage:

./stackprinter (url)

Example (tested on OS X):

$ ./stackprinter http://stackapps.com/questions/179/stackprinter-the-stack-exchange-printer-suite
'app - StackPrinter: The Stack Exchange Printer Suite - Stack Apps.pdf' saved.

head -c-2 doesn't work on macOS, is the intent to get the first string of alphanumerics out of the URL? I guess sed 's/[^0-9]*//;s/[^0-9].*//' would do that in a single process. Of course, using parameter expansion would do it without any external process at all (but require several steps and maybe a temporary variable). — tripleee, Jun 10 '21 at 04:25

score 4 · Answer 4 · answered Aug 11 '21 at 12:34

The default bookmarklet javascript has problems when used with mathoverflow. Because annoyingly mathoverflow ends with a .net instead of a .com. I made some changes so that it could also work with mathoverflow (feel free to improve on it):

javascript:(
function(){
  var re = new RegExp('^https://(.*?)\.com/questions/([0-9]+)/');
  var group = re.exec(window.location.href);
  if (group==null)
  {
    re = new RegExp('^https://(.*?)\.net/questions/([0-9]+)/');
    group = re.exec(window.location.href);
  }
  if (group!=null)
  {
    var service = group[1];
    var questionid=group[2];
    window.open('http://www.stackprinter.com/export?format=HTML&service='+service+'&question='+questionid);
  }
  else
    alert('Attention: question id not found!');
}
)()

Thanks for your contribution! Perhaps you could replace \.com with \.(com|net)? — Glorfindel, Aug 11 '21 at 13:48
I know what you mean. I did not know how to make this work with RegExp but I don't think your suggestion works. I think it's a bit more complicated than that. Anyway, I tried it and it didn't work for me. — Jose Capco, Aug 12 '21 at 13:52