IMHO it's the lack of obvious manual control over the special sorting algorithm that causes readers to suck.
Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
61–70 of 79 posts
Re: Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
#62I've tried several Firefox plugins, Outlook, and a few others that I can't remember and finally settled with Google Reader.
Not sure why you think it's horrible. It's always available from wherever I am, mobile or desktop. Adding feeds is as easy or easier than most other readers I tried, and it even creates feeds for sites that don't have them. Also, the sharing and commenting features are nice.
Re: Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
#63I think I created a very nice feed reading experience with NewsBlur: http://www.newsblur.com . It shows the original site, allows you to read as you normally would, but keeps track of the stories you're scrolling past. It also allows you to filter stories based on what you like and dislike about them: words/phrases in the title, tags and categories, authors, and the publisher themselves. There is a slider that allows…
Awesome work! I'm definitely using this over Google Reader from now on! But there are few tiny details I hope will be fixed soon: The "Original" tab is the default one - which slows down the whole thing if I open some content-heavy site, and the reason why I use feed readers in first place is not to have to watch those horrible sites at all, so it would be nice if we could change the default view. The other thing is…
The default view is the last used view for that feed. I'm planning to have that in later today.
Drag and drop moving feeds is coming sometime this Summer, but you can delete a feed right now. There is a "manage" button at the bottom of the feed bar.
Re: Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
#64I think I created a very nice feed reading experience with NewsBlur: http://www.newsblur.com . It shows the original site, allows you to read as you normally would, but keeps track of the stories you're scrolling past. It also allows you to filter stories based on what you like and dislike about them: words/phrases in the title, tags and categories, authors, and the publisher themselves. There is a slider that allows…
Awesome reader, first one I've actually liked. Only major problem so far is that I can't delete a feed (the link isn't working) or edit details. Other than that, awesome job.
Thanks a lot! I'll fix the link pronto. :)
Re: Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
#65I use Feed on Feeds, a PHP script that runs on my home machine so I can access it from anywhere. It pulls in feeds once an hour and I view them in a big list. It's got a bookmarklet that makes it easy to add a new feed when I'm looking at a site I like.
My workflow is to scroll down the list of unread feeds. If something looks interesting, I either read it within the browser window, or I open the article in a new tab and continue scanning. When I hit the end of the list, I "mark all as read". If I don't finish the list I can mark everything up to the one that's visible as read. Then I go through the tabs I've already opened.
I follow about 200 feeds, most of which are infrequent posters, so I'm going through about 100-200 items a day. Out of those I find I open up maybe 5 or 10. Since I'm scanning everything in a row I can go through the list in a few minutes if I check a couple of times a day.
In most cases I've found that high volume feeds have the good stuff duplicated elsewhere, so I can unsubscribe from the high volume one (though for some reason I still subscribe to Slashdot, even though I learned about all the good stuff a few days prior from other feeds)
The Feed On Feeds interface is also so sparse it doesn't get in the way.
Re: Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm using essentially the same strategy. Basically I split feeds in two categories: "Fresh" ones I either read on the spot, or mark-all-as-read. These are the ones I usually check frequently, and very quickly. And I don't have to feel bad about marking all as read :-) "Evergreens" are ones I like to read entirely, but not necessarily now. I'm using Google Reader, but these days mostly through the splendid Reeder on t…
I really like Reeder for the iPhone. Google Reader fluid app on the desktop and Reeder for the iPhone works great for me.
I'd use Reeder if it weren't for the fact that I read a bunch of math blogs and Reeder usually doesn't want to download the PNGs of formulas produced by the LaTeX plugin for Wordpress. It's OK on other feeds I've tried it on.
Re: Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
#67I think you need to categorize your feeds by importance. There are some sites you will surely want to catch everything from. There are others where you do not. Do not categorize your feeds by topic but by importance.. that way you can read the "Must Read" folder every day and hit mark all as read on the "Less Important" (or similar) folder if you haven't got the time. That's how I manage my Google Reader and it works a treat!
That aside, relating to filtering the news, my site at http://coder.io/ is doing exactly that but with only coder/programming related news. Still in alpha and very early days but I'm hoping it will resolve the problems you raise for one tiny niche.
Re: Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
#68Earlier quoted context omitted.
The problem of reasonably determining what someone is interested in from what they've previously read, skimmed and skipped shouldn't be "AI complete." It only involves matching patterns to key-words. It might not be easy and the results might not be perfect but it seems possible. Using data from friends and finding the best correlates could help too. You could use the Netflix algorithm or other magic. I suspect that'…
I agree with your claim that recommendation algorithms aren't AI complete, but for different reasons. "It only involves matching patterns to key-words." False. Recommendation might be far trickier. Nonetheless, if you can do recommendation perfectly, it still doesn't mean that you can solve NLP, machine vision, control (robotics), planning, or any of the other major AI tasks.
Well, I was speaking broadly...
But the point is that we have many examples of recommendation systems that do work reasonably well and working reasonably well is what I suspect would satisfy most users.
Further, a reader which could learn reasonably well from passive observation would give users the base do explicit tagging and rating.
Re: Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
#69Most RSS readers suck because they a) are too slow and b) assume you want to read every article i every feed.
I've not tried all the suggestions here (Reeder and Fever sound interesting) but having used GReader and Feedly I keep coming back to using Firefox Live Bookmarks with the LiveClick plugin. I can very quickly see and scan what's new. And with XMarks the feeds can be synced between your computers. Horses for courses I guess.
Re: Ask HN: Why do RSS Readers (mostly) suck?
#70I haven't tested it, but I'm intrigued by Shuan Inman's Fever reader ( http://feedafever.com/ ). Basically the idea is that you separate your feeds into two distinct types: essential feeds that you read completely, and supplemental, high-volume feeds (aggregator-type blogs, like Engadget). Then the essentials are cross-referenced with the supplementals to see what you're likely to be interested in. I have a similar s…
For me, it's a BIG drawback that it's not a hosted service. I don't want to be updating my feed reader myself, I don't want to have to install it and deal with server config issues that might come up, I want to access it from anywhere (I'd probably host it locally on my network, otherwise) I want the computer hosting the service to do all the grunt-work.