Make sense of what you read, watch and listen to.

Where to start

Start with a source you want to understand.

A PDF or paper you have not opened, a passage you do not follow, a question you are researching, or notes you are developing across more than one source.

• PDFs

  The 60-page report you keep not opening.

  Open →

• Research papers

  The paper you have to read closely.

  Open →

• Podcasts

  The two-hour episode you saved on a walk.

  Open →

• Talks and videos

  The conference talk still open in a tab.

  Open →

One way to use Omphalis

Two short pieces, Keeping a Useful Research Note and Returning to an Unfinished Question, in one session: an explanation opens beside a difficult phrase, one question is answered from both pieces, and a note stays with the words it came from.

Sample material created for this demonstration.

1. 01

   Open an explanation

   Select a phrase you don’t follow. Here, “source anchor” gets an explanation written for this passage, and the passage stays in view, so you read the two together.

   

   Keeping a Useful Research Note, with the explanation of “source anchor” open above its passage.

   Select your own phrase with Learn more

   In a different article, Chelsea Rosenthal’s Mattering That It’s You, we selected “judgment calls or personal styles” and chose a deeper explanation. It looks at why having room to use your own judgment matters to the author’s argument.

   Learn more starts from a passage you select. Highlight the part you don’t follow and the explanation opens beside it, so you don’t leave the piece to go and look it up.

   
2. 02

   Ask across your sources

   Put both pieces in a notebook and ask one question. The answer says what each source contributes, and its numbered markers open the source they cite.

   

   Markers 1 and 2 cite Keeping a Useful Research Note; marker 3 cites Returning to an Unfinished Question. This is a screenshot: in the app, each marker opens its source.

3. 03

   Keep a note with the passage

   Highlight the line you want to come back to and write what you mean to do next. The note stays with the highlight, and Marks opens the piece at that passage.

   

   A note kept with a highlighted line in Returning to an Unfinished Question.

See it in motion

Short clips from the real app.

Pasting in a link and getting back something you can read.

Questions and notes stay attached to the source

Further examples from the app. A question cites the passages it used, an episode keeps the transcript beside the explanation, and a notebook can hold your own notes with more than one source.

Ask the question you are stuck on

Why can work be useful without feeling meaningful? The answer points at Rosenthal’s paragraphs. Open a citation or ask a follow-up.

Ask starts from a question you type, or say out loud in the web app. You choose what it draws on, either just this piece or everything in your library, and the answer links back to the passages it used.

Select the image to see the detail.

Why build around the source? Read the case for comprehension.

Articles, PDFs, EPUBs, Word docs, podcasts, YouTube, newsletters and your own voice notes all run through the same pipeline. Subscribe to Substack or any publication with a feed right in your Inbox, alongside your podcasts.