How the Gist reader works
Swipe. That is the whole interaction. Click the Gist icon, read the one-slide Gist, swipe if you want more, close when done.
Click the Gist icon on any supported page and the reader opens as an overlay on top of what you are reading. The original page stays underneath — Gist never replaces it and never navigates you away.
The gesture
- Swipe left (or press
→) — forward to the next slide. At the end of a layer it carries straight into the next one. - Swipe right (or press
←) — back to the previous slide. - Press
↓/↑— jump to the next or previous layer, skipping the slides in between. - Esc — close the reader.
The first layer is always the Gist — the one-sentence core. What follows depends on the piece: stories resolve through Setup, Tension, Question, Resolution; arguments build the Logic, then test it with a Challenge and a Rebuttal. A layer can be several slides — the Logic runs as long as the argument needs — so swiping moves slide by slide while ↑/↓ jump whole layers. See The layers for the full model.
Opening the overlay
The Gist icon lives in your Chrome toolbar. If it is hidden, click Chrome's puzzle icon, find Gist, and pin it. See Install Gist on Chrome.
On a supported web page, clicking opens the overlay and starts processing. Gist only runs on ordinary http/https pages — it will not open on browser system pages (chrome://), the Chrome Web Store, or local files, and clicking the icon there does nothing. To Gist a local file or a page the extension will not open on, paste the URL or upload the file at /try.
What the reader does not do
- Does not rewrite the page. Gist is always an overlay, never a replacement.
- Does not decide for you. The original source is one click away at any layer.
- Does not produce one kind of summary. See The layers.
What is next
- The layers — the SCQA arc for stories, the dialectic arc for arguments.
- No overlay appears — if the reader does not open when you expect it to.