Unable to initiate clipping on some websites

[cjmarshall313 0]

When trying to clip ideas from www.homedepot.com the extension pops up a small box that says "Loading Web Clipper..." and just hangs there, green circle spinning away.

This action is repeated regardless of the permission settings.

I'm using Chrome 90.0.4430.212 with the latest version of Web Clipper and Evernote all running on Windows 10.

Perhaps there is some sort of coding voodoo on the home depot domain?

Similarly, my attempt to use OneNote failed miserably at capturing on multiple secure sites so I have switched to Evernote only to find this one road block so far.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

[gazumped 12,070]

Hi.  Not sure what's going on here - some pages are hard to clip (it's apparently not an exact science,  given the different codings and automations involved) so trial and error is required in those cases.  There are several options - 

• If you have reason to doubt the Clipper - use Browser Admin tools to remove and re-install it. 
• Reload that page and - if nothing else works - restart your system.
• Try bookmarking / simplified article / separate sections of the screen 
  (Selecting sections of the screen - a big page may involve lots of links and images;  a lot to capture)
• Screen cap - images are OCR'd by Evernote,  therefore searchable.
• Try online services - various websites will 'clip' pages to PDF as a service
• Try third-party tools like Nimbus Screenshot - https://nimbusweb.me/screenshot.php 
• Print to PDF - PDF editors like NAPS2 can convert images to text. Subscribers can attach PDF files to notes and they will be OCR'd within (usually) a few hours
• Print to paper and re-scan (if absolutely nothing else works!!)
• If you're really stuck - try sharing the site to Evernote from a mobile - or use it to take a picture!

[PinkElephant 8,819]

Have you tried to log WebClipper out of your account, and login again ?

Is there sufficient upload margin available for your Basic plan this month ?

[dustov 11]

My totally speculative theory is that web sites are being created to incapacitate, disable, or diminish functionality of any kind of clipping in order to force readers to register and even subscribe thru a paywall.

Does anyone else have an opinion or actually have technical evidence of, again, my totally speculative theory?  I decided to find out myself and tried several search terms in Duck Duck, and limiting search time to only search the last year, and this search sentence "stop website copying" seemed to be the most successful with  only two results that could be considered as addressing the issue.  The first is from a site called "Webginner.com" and title is, "How to Prevent Text Selection and Copy/Paste in WordPress (Easy)", and here is the URL: 

https://www.wpbeginner.com/wp-tutorials/how-to-prevent-text-selection-and-copy-paste-in-wordpress-easy/

The second is from the clippers perspective at "askleo.com"  entitled, "How Do I Copy Text from a Copy Protected Website?" at this URL:  https://askleo.com/copy-from-a-copy-protected-website/

I then used the search phrase "protect website coppying clipping", and did not seem to get results.  You can try yourself.

Just to be sure I wasn't missing out on something due to my concern that Duck Duck Go is not as effective a  web browser as Google I tried the search phrases "protect website from clippers" and "protect website from being copied and the second search produced these results using the Google search engine; "Proven methods for protecting content from being copied" from this URL:  https://seranking.com/blog/protecting-content-from-being-copied.

Here is a summary of that article; "What are the consequences of website content being copied?"  and these are the reasons listed less the explanatory text for each reason:  1. Traffic loss.  2.Drop in rankings. 3.Decreased reader loyalty. 4.Search engine sanctions. 5.Updated website information.  Of course what is ironic is that I did copy these summary content from that web site.

And it is important to note that most of the protection sites seemed more concerned about plagarism and stealing the website content or structure for re-use as a website by the copier.

 

[gazumped 12,070]

8 minutes ago, dustov said:

Does anyone else have an opinion

 

On 5/24/2021 at 6:21 PM, gazumped said:

some pages are hard to clip

If you are a web page owner,  then you have a number of reasons to protect your content.  Copyright / loss of traffic etc are all valid concerns.  It's not necessary to 'verify' the situation,  because it is a fact of life.  As is the difficulty of designing software that can download some or all of a full page content and present it as it appears online.  As already pointed out there are many different flavours of web coding,  and more are being invented each day. There's no standard or agreed format.

There's also no 'right' to clip,  so the onus is on the clipper to find a way to grab the content they require in acceptable quality.  Worst case - use a separate camera to take a picture!

[dustov 11]

I do a lot of clipping of articles and have been noticing that some seem to be harder to clip or cannot be clipped at all.  I clipped one from The New Yorker but in Evernote all the tool bar features were greyed out.  So, I think your answer makes the most sense, but, I still believe, without evidence I will admit as I don't know Web page technology, that they would like to disable clipping so you have to pay.  Totally understandable, in spite of the cry "the web must be free", they obviously have expenses and I have no right to copy their content.  Of course there are sites such as Pocket, where you can read articles and save them on your account.  And, my clipping can almost be a type of hording, as I rarely return to the content I have clipped.  There just may be a talking point that I want to save that I think might be useful in a discussion or argument.

[PinkElephant 8,819]

The web page owner has means to determine what you can see, and what you can copy.

• There are sites where you can perfectly see the page, but if you clip it, you only clip the (hidden) paywall window.
• There are sites where you clip, but if you clip simplified to get rid of clutter, the content is drastically reduced.
• There are sites where the clipper goes into a loop, and you have to kill it.

You can report difficult to clip pages to EN support - I think they have to permanently adapt the WebClipper to keep up with the changes in web design.

When running into trouble, you can try another browser. There are basically only 2 browser engines left for Windows (Chrome and Firefox / Mozilla), and 3 for the Mac (+ Safari / WebKit). It usually only makes sense to try another browser with a different engine. Sometimes you are lucky.

[Slfisher 0]

Clipping just doesn't work at all for me anymore. It acts like it's clipping, and doesn't save it. I'm a Pro customer.

[PinkElephant 8,819]

It would help if you posted the OS and browser you are using, plus some of the web sites where you have trouble.

[Slfisher 0]

Browser: chrome

OS: android 11

Website: it doesn't matter. I get the same response on all of them. Including this one.

Thank you.

 

 

[PinkElephant 8,819]

Don’t know about clipping on Android. On iOS it uses system processes to clip.

The only true WebClipper released by EN as an extension I am aware of is for desktop browsers.

[gazumped 12,070]

The process on Android is to 'share' a page to Evernote,  not to clip it - and I agree;  there's no approved clipper (AFAIK) for Chrome Android.