Showcase submission: hnr — terminal UI for Hacker News

[prasanthj]

Showcase Submission

Project name: h.n.r (say it as "honor")

Repository: https://github.com/prasanthj/hnr

Description:
A terminal UI for Hacker News built with ratatui 0.29. Browse six feeds (Top, New, Best, Ask HN, Show HN, Jobs), read threaded comments with inline expand/collapse, and get comments prefetched automatically after a short dwell so the pane switches without pressing Enter. Fetch and render articles in reader mode (structured blocks with section navigation). All async operations — feed refresh, article fetch, comment prefetch, search — show an animated shimmer progress indicator. Search via Algolia, vote, reply, bookmark, and manage sessions — all without leaving the terminal.

Install:

brew tap prasanthj/hnr && brew install hnr
# or
cargo install hnr

Screenshot/Demo:

1600×900, Catppuccin Mocha theme, shell hidden during recording, 2× playback speed

[joshka]

Please read https://ratatui.rs/recipes/apps/submitting-to-the-showcase/

[prasanthj]

Closing to refile using the proper showcase submission template.

[joshka]

No need to refile - you can copy the template if you want. I'd like you to consider the advice mentioned in the article.

[prasanthj]

Updated the submission with a new showcase GIF (1600×900, Catppuccin Mocha, shell hidden during recording) and renamed the project to h.n.r. Also applied the feedback from the showcase guide — dark theme, hidden shell noise, calm motion at 2× playback. Reopening for review.

[joshka]

Subjectively (and a strong note that I'm not a designer here and that this is mainly an opinion), this feels a bit plain / flat.
I'd recommend keeping on working on it a bit to get it to the point where it really feels solid.

Some notes that cover this from the doc:
Some things that are problems:

• The UI looks too plain, cluttered, or unfinished
• The color choices reduce readability or fail to create hierarchy

I threw this into google stitch with a copy of the link mentioned above and it gave me a neat result that's worth taking a look at:

https://stitch.withgoogle.com/projects/5126439361791883296

Obv. there's lots of ways to make this different / novel / interesting, that's just one. I present it not as a northstar, but as a possible insipration. Take a look at https://ratatui.rs/showcase/apps/#eilmeldung for a similar app here that gets it a bit better.

Also, just a heads up, this feels like in terms of a bit like too much of a kind of app in the showcase, so I feel like there's a higher bar on this than something more novel than RSS / content reader.

[prasanthj]

Thanks for the feedback and the Stitch link.

Did a full visual redesign for v0.5.0 addressing the hierarchy and color issues:

• Three-tier color system: cream for titles, gray for metadata, dim for chrome. Scores heat-map dim to orange based on points
• Continuous ▎ selection bar spanning the full item height
• H·N·R wordmark with uppercase bold mode strip, active feed gets an orange pill
• Threading guides (│) trace nesting depth through blank lines
• OP comments highlighted in full accent orange vs soft orange for others
• Solid/dotted separator pair framing the content area
• Breathing room between story items and section headings

New showcase (install, feed browse, reader with section jumps, comments, search, bookmark):