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Translating Hacker News Support Doc
Last updated: 2026-04-26
A modern Hacker News reader for iOS that uses Apple's on-device Translation framework to translate stories, comments, and even linked articles into your preferred language in real time.
- Open the App — the Stories tab loads the current Top stories.
- Tap a story to open the discussion, or tap Read Translated to open the in-app Reader for the linked article.
- Reopened stories appear in the Recent tab with view counts and total reading time.
- Long-press a story or comment to save it. Saved items appear in the Saved tab.
- Open Settings to choose your target language, toggle auto-translation, or change the appearance.
Switch between Hacker News feeds using the segmented control at the top:
- Top — top-ranked stories (default)
- New — newly submitted stories
- Best — best stories
- Ask — Ask HN posts
- Show — Show HN posts
- Jobs — Who's hiring posts
Pull down to refresh. Scroll to the bottom to load more.
The story detail page shows:
- The title (translated, with original underneath)
- A Read Translated button that opens the linked article in the in-app Reader
- A Open Original button that opens the article in your browser
- The full comment tree, threaded and collapsible. Tap any comment to fold/unfold its replies.
Long-press any comment for actions: save, copy, view profile, or share a deep link to news.ycombinator.com.
A two-segment list of your saved stories and comments. Swipe-to-delete works on either segment. Tap any item to reopen the original discussion.
Shows stories you have opened recently, sorted by the latest view. Each row includes the number of times you opened that story and the total time spent on its discussion page. Swipe to delete an item from the list.
- Target Language — Pick the language you want translations in (defaults to your system language; falls back to Simplified Chinese if your system language is English).
- Auto Translate — When on, every visible story title, comment, and reader paragraph is translated automatically. When off, content is shown in its original language.
- Show Original Below — Display the source comment under translated comment text.
- Hide Original Comment Text — On by default. Shows a shimmer placeholder before translation finishes, then shows only the translated comment.
- Font Size — Adjust the reader font size.
- Clear Caches — Clears the in-memory translation cache and HN API cache.
In Settings, choose a target language and tap Check Translation Model to verify whether the English-to-target translation model is installed. If the model is supported but missing, iOS immediately shows the system download prompt. Once downloaded, translation works fully offline.
If a language shows Not supported in Settings, Apple Translation does not yet support it. Choose another language or update iOS.
The in-app Reader loads the original page in an embedded browser and translates the visible text in place — images, layout, and links are preserved. From the ⋯ menu you can switch between three modes at any time without reloading the page:
- Translated — every text node on the page is replaced with its translation.
- Original — the page is shown exactly as the publisher served it.
- Side-by-side — the translation is shown in place, with the original phrase appended in a faded italic right after it.
Pages translate once on first visit (results are cached) and toggling between modes is instant. Tap the Retranslate button in the top-right toolbar to parse the current page again and retry translation after accepting cookie prompts or unlocking article content. Tap Reload Page in the ⋯ menu to re-fetch the page from the publisher.
If the Reader cannot automatically identify an article's original language, it asks you to choose the source language once for that Reader session. Closing and reopening the article lets you choose again.
Inside the Reader, tap the ⋯ menu and choose Share Article to bring up the system share sheet. The article URL is shared so the recipient can open the page themselves; sharing happens entirely on-device and nothing is uploaded to AI Doge servers.
| Problem | Try this |
|---|---|
| Stories don't load | Pull down to refresh; check your connection. |
| Translation doesn't appear | Open Settings → Translation and verify Auto Translate is on and that the model status reads installed or supported. If a cookie prompt or access banner just changed the page, tap Retranslate. |
| Page shows untranslated text mixed in | Some sites lazy-load content after the initial render. The Reader watches briefly for newly available untranslated text and retries automatically; you can also tap Retranslate or use Reload Page from the ⋯ menu. |
| Reader page won't load | Pick Open Original from the ⋯ menu to open the link in Safari. |
| Saved items missing after reinstall | Saved data is local and is removed when you uninstall the App. iCloud sync is on the roadmap. |
- Hacker News account login (upvote, reply, flag)
- iCloud sync for saved items
- Widgets
- macOS / iPad layout polish
- More app themes and custom theme creation options
Email aidoge.ys@gmail.com with questions or feedback.