[jstanley]

This is very awesome! The implementation is different to what I expected (or to what I would have done).

They seem to run a browser on the server and let the user interact with it to choose DOM elements to monitor for changes. I would have just taken a screenshot (perhaps with http://urlbox.io/ or perhaps with CutyCapt) and allowed the user to draw boxes over the screenshot. Then repeatedly screenshot the site and whenever the contents of that box changes, alert the user.

The Sieve method has the advantage that you are able to tell the user what the new text is. The screenshot method is significantly simpler.

EDIT: So, in startup terms, the screenshot method could be the MVP :). Provided, of course, that it is considered "viable" not to know the text. If I were a user I would consider it viable - it is still a vast improvement over having to check the site manually.

[ajitk]

Thanks for the great feedback. :)

Getting started would certainly be much simple when using screenshot or page HTML for comparison. Sieve could do that too! More work needs to be done to make startup faster.

On the other hand having filtered text provides multiple advantages. The filtering becomes accurate. It can be used to compute rules to take conditional actions. Notifications delivery via email and SMS would make more sense as well.

Running a browser on server enables another cool function. User could record macro and run the macro when text satisfied a pre-condition.

Edit: typo

[onassar]

I'm been working on http://imnosy.com for a while, and thought about that approach, but ran into difficulties when slight variations to the screen were made. Right now, we're using a diff engine. Sieve looks pretty rad though. Will check that out. Fun space :)

[jstanley]

This is what the selection boxes are useful for - you can make it ignore changes to irrelevant areas of the page (though obviously that doesn't apply so well to imnosy).