RSS?

[Donn]

Does anyone use RSS feeds?

If so;

What do you like about it?

What reader(s) do you use?

Favorite feeds?

Thanx

[Donn]

Nobody? All youse tech-weenie news-junkies internet-dweebs and no one uses RSS?

[Meerkat]

I've used RSS a little bit.

The current software darling seems to be the reader in the latest Firefox. YMMV of course.

I think it can be useful if you want to get info from a lot of sites that are tailored to your interests. Might be a great thing for an investor if the relevent sites have an RSS feed. Much faster and more concise than surfing.

[ 02-09-2006, 07:11 PM: Message edited by: Meerkat ]

[Donn]

FireFox doesn't have a built in reader. There are a couple of dozen extensions, with Sage being the most highly rated. Is that the one you mean?

[Meerkat]

I'll have to go look. I thougt it was intrinsic to Firefox as of late, but maybe not. Firefox figured in it somewhere, so you're probably right.

[Meerkat]

Since PR 1.0 (also known as version 0.10) Mozilla Firefox has a very nice feature: Live Bookmarks. With Live Bookmarks you can see the item titles of an RSS web feed ("headlines") in your bookmarks. This way you can stay in touch with sites without visiting them all the time.
How to create a Live Bookmark

Subscribing to an RSS web feed is as simple as creating a so called Live Bookmark. And to make life even easier Firefox can auto detect some feeds, and provide a shortcut for subscribing. Mozilla Firefox: RSS and Live Bookmarks (http://johnbokma.com/firefox/rss-and-live-bookmarks.html)

[Donn]

Yeah, I've tried that. It doesn't give you the features of a true RSS reader, which is why there are so many extensions.

I'm wondering about standalone readers v. browser extensions. Most reviewers are pitching standalone readers.

I'm surprised there are no users on this forum.

I spend a good deal of money for newsfeeds that aren't RSS, and I've been told by a few folks that RSS is much faster. More and more news sources are casting via RSS these days, and it seems like it might be something to consider.

[Meerkat]

Newsgator has had a lot of talk in the standalone category. www.newsgator.com (http://www.newsgator.com)

RSS has come and gone and come again. At one time, all the major news sites had RSS feeds and then pulled them, I think out of fear that it would cause a drop in site visits and thus ad revenue. They've come back gangbusters. Probably due to the ease of streaming to PDA's and other wireless gadgets.

MS has "discovered" it and seems intent on embracing and making it proprietary.

[Donn]

Maybe this is an area you should get involved in. It looks like it may be a part of the information streaming revolution.

[Joe ( Cold Spring on Hudson )]

Yes of course I do tongue.gif .

http://www.apple.com/macosx/features/safari/

[ 02-09-2006, 08:23 PM: Message edited by: Joe ( Cold Spring on Hudson ) ]

[Meerkat]

RSS rippled through the dev world awhile back and I was interested in it and dabbled with some of the apps. Then, for awhile, the standards started flipping around, with one called "ant" gaining a lot of ground for awhile.

A good source of RSS info/chatter/products is probably Dave Winer's site. He's had a lot to do with RSS, especially taking the old Netscape protocol and turning into (IIRC) RSS .91. http://www.reallysimplesyndication.com/

Here's something that might interest you: http://www.pythonology.com/success&story=devnet

PyMetar is also fun if you want a live weather feed from gov't sources.

[imported_GregW]

I use it at home, and we are starting to experiment with it at work.

What do you like about it?
It sits in the system tray, and lets me know whenever there is something new, sort of cool at home, can be PITA at work.

What reader(s) do you use? Akregator (Linux)

Favorite feeds?: BBC, CBC, NYT, DIGG.

[Donn]

Thanx Greg. I figured we had to have some users here.

Why is it a PITA at work?

[Meerkat]

Yeah, thanks Greg.

Heh.

[imported_GregW]

Donn,

Maybe PITA was too strong, I find it more annoying that anything else. I think it just comes down to information overload. I'm the type of person that if I see I have new email, I'll stop what I'm doing and at least take a look to see who it's from. Now with with the RSS icon in the system tray telling me that I have x number of new news items, I just don't need more distractions. I suppose I going to have to learn how to ignore it, either that or spend my time reading emails and useless what passes for news items. ;)

[Paul G]

Kontact has a good rss
reader, works fine

[Donn]

Greg....I think the better readers can filter out the nonsense, and provide you with only the headlines you need.

What feeds do you use, at home versus at work?

[imported_GregW]

At work they are using something called Feedreader.( I think)
Part of the issue at work is that you don't have a choice of what to get, you get what the news administrator wants you to get, it strickly for internal use, part of our intranet. However it's still in early developement, and still needs to be refined.

[Donn]

I just discovered that you can add RSS feeds to MyYahoo, which is my homepage.

Cool!

[Meerkat]

Greg; I'll bet it's called FeedDemon. ;)

[Donn]

FeedReader... (http://www.feedreader.com/index.php) highly rated.

[Meerkat]

http://www.bradsoft.com/feeddemon/



RSS Feed Reader for Windows
Simplify the way you read the web!

Stop wasting time checking your favorite web sites for updates. Use FeedDemon instead, and make them come to you.

* Pre-configured with dozens of popular feeds, so you can start using it right away
* Easy-to-read newspaper displays the latest news from dozens of sites
* Built-in podcast receiver downloads audio to your iPod or other media player
* Watches alert you to items of interest so you don't have to look for them
* News bins store your favorite items for future reference
* Search channels which integrate with Feedster, del.icio.us, Flickr and other popular RSS services
* Integration with Bloglines and NewsGator Online Services
* Built-in tabbed browser

[Donn]

FeedReader and FeedDemon are both "runners up" to SharpReader (http://www.sharpreader.net/) , according to BlogSpace (http://blogspace.com/rss/readers) .