NewsGator Online – Today Page

So another interesting feature packed into NewsGator Online is Today’s Recommended Stories or the Today Page. It seems to be your own personal Rover that tries to bring you much more then the morning paper. It brings things that you want and some things that you never knew that you wanted. So far it appears unique to the online version, but I have not investigated the other platforms (NewsGator Inbox and FeedDemon) fully, yet.

When you sign up for NewsGator Online it automatically brings you several posts/articles/feeds (whatever you want to call them, for our purposes I will call them posts). Each time that you enter NewsGator Online or click on “Home” it launches the Today Page. This basically brings several posts and organizes them into a list full of the day’s headlines segregated by type. These headlines include News, Entertainment, Sports and even Fun Stuff. You have full control over this section and can set which types of headlines are delivered through the “My Settings” tab within the settings menu. This menu allows you to select the types of headlines you receive, your display settings for how it delivers the headlines, and you can even have it deliver videos direct to your finger tips. This is all brought to you within the reading window.

Now if that wasn’t enough there are these thumb’s up and thumb’s down icons next to each headline. This is the part that I think is very interesting and although I did not find anything that said specifically what they are for, I assume this is to learn your interests and bring you just what you want to see. I will have to do some testing and get back to you on whether that is what it does and if it works.

If you click on one of the headlines it is a link to the actual post and it will launch either a new browser window or a new browser tab, it depends on your browser settings. Then when you return to NewsGator Online the headline remains. It does no hide once you have read it even if you have the hide selection setting enabled. Presumably this is so you can select the thumb’s up or down.

In concept this seems like a great tool, especially if it can learn what to bring you and then deliver those types of posts. To date I have only explored it in Firefox and Internet Explorer so I will incorporate some testing in Safari on the Mac along with the thumb’s up and down icons.

NewsGator Online – My Clippings

Since the NewsGator team has seen fit to fill their tools with so many options I will continue where we left of during the last post, with the review of NewsGator Online.

One feature that NewsGator has incorporate that I found useful was the My Clippings folder set within the folder tree. When using RSS Readers I sometimes find myself feeling overwhelmed because online news agencies put out so many feeds everyday. In NewsGator Online the top level category folders, such as “International” in my folder tree, have a cumulative count of how many unread items are in each category, with that number ultimately rolling up to the My Feeds unread count. Some days I may only have a few minutes to check my NewsGator account, which means the numbers of posts can be staggering. I found that by utilizing the My Clippings I can eliminate this feeling by scanning through the feeds like headlines in a newspaper and when I run across one that sounds like something I want to read, then I “Add it to My Clippings”.

So how does it work? Basically you can use the top level My Clippings folder or if you like a little more organization like I do, then you simply create new folders in your My Clippings Folder the same way that you setup your My Feeds folders. Then when you are going through the headlines in your feeds folders and you find one that you like you simply click on the 3.5”floppy disc icon with the words “Add to clippings”. This will create a pop-up that will have a listing of all of your My Clippings folders. Simply select the folder that you want the selected article to drop into. It will not move all of the articles from the feed to the folder but rather just the article you selected from that feed to the My Clippings folder you selected. It also leaves a copy in the original folder except now the save icon and Add to clippings will be gone from that feed article. The others that you have not saved or added to clippings will still have the icon and Add to clippings.

Once you have saved a feed article to your My Clippings folders you can delete them when you are done with them or move them to a different folder. You can Tag them (which I have not explored yet, more to come!) and you can even email the post to a friend. In essence this tool provides a simple way to help you manage your feeds and reduce your news intake from a fire hose down to say a garden hose volume. It allows you to either go back right away to read the articles or posts that you have selected or leave them and come back when it is convenient for you. I find this nice because it means that I do not have to read everything right when I check my account, especially when I might only have a few minutes to review my feeds. This is also nice because I can sort out the feeds that I want to share with friends and the feeds that I want to save for later.

There is one thing that the jury is still out on for me and that the number of unread items is still tallied at the sub-folder and rolled up through the My Clippings folder tree to the top level folder. I am not sure if I like this or if it makes me uneasy. It could just be that having the number of unread there is encouraging my OCD to take over. That being said, overall I found this feature helpful because it saved me time and allowed me to read on my own terms. NewsGator Online does a superb job of placing the info in front of you and this tool helps you sort through it all to find what interest you.

You may have been worried that this would be the last posting about NewsGator Online but never fear, they have packed still more tools into this service so the next post will explore another tool within the NewsGator Online package.

NewsGator Online - Adding Feeds & Creating Folders

The NewsGator team has put a lot of thought around what would be useful for its end users. With that it appears that I will need to continue my review of the various offerings through multiple posts. Last time I discussed a brief overview of each of the tools that I have started to use, FeedDemon, NewsGator Online and NewsGator Inbox. So far I have spent the most time exploring NewsGator Online on my Gateway and using Firefox.

Also in the last post I pointed out that NewsGator has integrated a capability for all of the tools that you choose to use to synchronize. You will have to make your own decision, but for me this was a great feature, mainly because of the different locations and computers that I use throughout the day. At work, behind the zillions of firewalls that today’s businesses feel are necessary, it can be difficult to download desktop application (or maintain them if you do get them downloaded, dang security team!). Equally challenging is navigating to WebPages since many businesses block access in the interest of maintaining employee productivity. That is where NewsGator Inbox comes in. It is basically an outlook plug-in so it is easy to install and so far has gone unnoticed by the internet security team in my office. That’s the end of the tangent, I will get into the NewsGator Inbox and more on FeedDemon in future posts. All of the synchronization seems to be organized and updated through NewsGator Online. Although, I have noticed that if you make changes in any of the programs, the others are automatically updated. Each program syncs with the Online version and is updated the next time that you open it and update your feeds.

So I have gotten ahead of my self. In order to enjoy the bountiful benefits of NewsGator Online, you first have to sign up for an account. Once you have an account then you can begin to add feeds and develop your feed folder organization structure. The sign up was very easy, after clicking the “new user” link, and filling in some brief personal information (like username, password, name and address) I was off and running. They also offer some content to help you get started. You can select checkboxes next to the heading that interests you, such as Technology or Business, and then NewsGator Online will add editor’s selections of just a few feeds. I thought this was interesting so I selected Technology just to see what it would bring. Turns out they allow you to further refine the editor’s choice by including a region, specific people and specific URLs you are interested in. I just breezed though these questions and ended up with just about every well known technology site out there….Engaget, Gizmodo, TechCrunch, Wired Tech Biz, Yahoo News: Technology News…the list goes on. Now that I am inside I see that you can add or delete any feeds or groups of feeds. I also found that through the “Browse Feeds” under the Add Feeds function you can sign up for any of the options that were presented during the account creation phase. I did notice though that when I tried to delete this automatic subscription, the program seemed to flip out. It took it out of my folder tree, but when I added my other feeds (the test feeds) it put the folder back in. So I tried to delete it from the Settings menu and then in Organize Folders. I found that all of my folders had gone missing! So I did the tried and true helpdesk response…..I restarted the program…..and everything seemed to be fine.

Adding feeds is very easy. You have two options basically, you can add the feed by URL (web address for the non-techies) or you can use the Find Feeds option. The first option is relatively straight forward you simple paste the Feed URL into the box and select which folder you want it added to. If you do not have the Feed URL handy and you do not want to go look for it you can try the second option. The Find Feeds option gives you two ways to find feeds as well. You can browse by category or you can put in a search term. So I tried this method for ESPN, but under the sports category it did not work well for just general sports news. In an attempt to bring you exactly what you are looking for, once you click on sports it tries to narrow the scope to a specific sport. This worked well however to add the New York Times feed because under news you could select “Daily News/Newspapers” and the New York Times front page is an option. It integrated the feed into the folder that I had opened which happened to be International (which has the BBC feed). I was able to drag it to the general News folder in my folder tree without issue. To add ESPN I went back into the Find Feeds option and put ESPN as my keyword. The system basically brought up every feed that ESPN has and any feed that references ESPN. The first choice happened to be the one I was looking for and it easily updated into my tree. I could have chosen a folder to dump the feed into but since I do not have all my folder setup I just put it under My Feeds.

So far I have created the two folders and added feeds to both. With ESPN hanging out under My Feeds without a specific folder, I took this opportunity to create a new folder. At first this process seems a little cumbersome. I expected it to be like Outlook where you can simply right click (on a PC) and add a new folder to the folder tree. Although you can right click and select “New Folder”, instead of editing directly in the tree, the reading window takes you to the Organize Folders within the Settings menu. From here you have to click the link “Create New Folder”. Then you select which folder to place the new folder in and name it. Click on Add Folder and wham-o it is added to the folder tree. One note, when you are in the Organize Folders view, it can be confusing if you do not pay attention to what’s written and try to just fly by the seat of your pants. There is a drop down menu with “New Folder” in it and a button marked Move. The first time I tired to create a new folder I selected this option and quickly found that it did not have my intended affect. So remember if you are adding folders you have to click on the "Create New Folder” link. Once I got used to this method of adding folders, it did not bother me too much but I do think that it is kind of weird because once created you can move the folders and feeds around just like in Outlook, through the drag and drop method.

One of the features that I like about the folder tree is that you can hide the folders. In the Settings menu you can select an option that will hide a folder once all of your feeds are read. This is nice because you do not have to waste time looking in a folder if there are no new feeds and it does not clutter your tree. Also as I mentioned earlier, this version syncs with the other versions so any changes I make here automatically push to the other versions. That goes for feeds and folder tree organization as well. In the end you will have a usable space like this…

We have covered a ton of ground today, but just from what I have viewed today in NewsGator Online there is still a lot of features to review.

The First Review: NewsGator

Over the past few days as I was doing research on RSS Readers I found several posts by Bloggers, news agencies, company public relations, that due to a mature and declining market the era of the RSS Reader had ended. Turns out that ended nearly 2 years ago as that is when Pluck shuttered their consumer web RSS Reader. Who knew that this was a dead market! The major threat of the time……web browsers and email clients that were planning to integrate RSS Readers into their software. I was shocked to find out how late to the party I actually am! Undaunted by these dooms day postings; I did a quick Google search and quickly found that many RSS readers still exist today. Lucky for me (and you if you are reading this) I will have plenty of fodder for my reviews.

In the end my search yielded several true RSS Readers, some social networking bookmarkers, and something called a newsroll. I assume that is like a Blogroll, but I will explore it in future posts. After a cursory review of each of the services that the search placed in front of me I decided to begin the reviews with a somewhat well known and seemingly aggressively named serves call NewsGator. Over the next several posts I will be reviewing the plethora of tools and services that the team at NewsGator have put together to take all the work out of finding information on the internet that you might routinely search for. Namely news items, blog postings, commercial advertising (sales at your favorite department store), school event updates, basically anything on the internet that has a regular distribution of information through RSS Feeds.

NewsGator has a multilayer approach to its offerings. First there is a downloadable desktop application called FeedDemon. For the most part it looks a lot like one of the major email clients available (Outlook, Entourage, or Thunderbird), the difference is that it only houses your feeds. It has a folder tree on the left like an email account and the folders can be created to help you sort and access your feeds in the way that suits you best. It also has a second section that is all about keeping the feeds that you want to save for later, called Clippings. The third part of this section is called Watches. I have not played with this too much yet, but at first glance it looks like it is to create your own personalized feed service. I will delve more into FeedDemon in future postings.

The next service that NewsGator offers is NewsGator Online. As the name implies this service is an internet based service. You have a secure login which gives you access to your feeds in a similar fashion as FeedDemon. The look and the feel is very close to that of the downloadable application. The last of the tools that I have started to look at is NewsGator Inbox. This is a downloadable plug-in for Microsoft Outlook. I am not sure yet if it will work with the other email clients as well, but I will let you know what I find out! NewsGator Inbox allows you to receive your RSS Feeds directly within Outlook. You can even navigate to the originating web page without leaving outlook, it utilizes your internet explore settings in order to accomplish most of its internet tasks.

For me the best part (so far) about all three of these tools is that they automatically synchronize across all of the platforms. So if I am in Outlook and I make a change within the NewsGator folder, it flows seamlessly into the online version of into FeedDemon and is ready and available the next time that I open any of the tools. It is pretty ingenious if you ask me.

Introduction - Part II

I received a suggestion that maybe I should include some information about the hardware and software that I will be using in order to review these services. That way all of you will have an idea of how these services might work on your systems. So, here you go! I will be utilizing two PCs and a MAC. I am not sure how technical I should be, but here are some specifics for each one.

Dell Latitude - D620

• Microsoft Windows XP Professional, Version 2002 with Service Pack 2
• Intel Core 2 - 2 CPU - T5600 at 1.83 GHz each
• .99 GB of RAM
• Outlook 2003
• Internet Explorer 6
• Firefox Version 3.0.6

Gateway Tablet PC - CX2724

• Microsoft Windows XP - Tablet PC Edition 2005, Version 2002 with Service Pack 2
• Intel - CPU - T2050 at 1.6 GHz
  
• .99 GB of RAM
• Outlook 2003
• Internet Explorer 7
  
• Firefox Version 3.0.6

Apple MacBook

• Mac O/S X - Leopard - Version 10.5.6
• Intel Core 2 - 2 CPU - 2.16 GHz
• .99 GB of RAM
• Entourage 2004
  
• Safari Version 3.2.1
  
• Firefox Version 3.0.6
  

With the exception of the Dell, my internet connection will be at 8Mbps and I am connected through a 54Mbps Wireless Router in my home network. The Dell is the computer I use for work and when in the office I enjoy a 100Mbps connection.

So that should take care of all the technical-ities and I am just about ready to start reviewing services. Come back soon!

Introduction

So the first type of service that interests me, and hopefully you too, are Really Simple Syndication (RSS) Readers or News Aggregators. My understanding of these types of services is that they can be either Software on your computer, WebPages, or add-ons to your Email. RSS Readers can save you time by automatically pulling together feeds from sites that interest you; such as Blogs or news sites or any other site for that matter that has RSS feeds. RSS Readers are kind of like a butler or an assistant, who goes out in real time and finds the most up to date information for you based on the information that you said you wanted to see. This is by setting up RSS Feeds. Then they bring it all back to you and put it in front of your face by populating it into their, easy to use, user interface.

A quick Google search yields a huge number of these services, such as bloglines, netvibes and newsgator to name a few. So the question is which is the best one? Well it depends on your personal preferences. Each one has its own unique layout and personality. So whichever one you like, that is the best one for you. However my purpose is to give you more information to assist you in your choice. If you are like me you like to try things out but you do not want to have to download a bunch of programs to find out what you like. You also may not want to have a bunch of internet logins, with passwords that you have to remember. That is where I come in. So check back to see which reader I am reviewing.

So what will the criteria be? For me I want things that are easy to setup and easy to use. I want them to do what they promise and work every time. Since there are literally millions of feeds out there, for simplicity sake, here is a list of the ones that I will be using to test each service:

1. ESPN - http://sports.espn.go.com/espn/rss/news
2. MSNBC - http://feeds.feedburner.com/msntop
3. BBC - http://newsrss.bbc.co.uk/rss/newsonline_uk_edition/world/rss.xml
4. Wired - http://feeds.wired.com/wired/index
5. Discovery - http://dsc.discovery.com/news/xml/top-stories.xml
6. Dilbert - http://feeds.feedburner.com/DilbertDailyStrip
7. NY Times - http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/HomePage.xml
8. Engadget - http://feeds.engadget.com/weblogsinc/engadget

I am not endorsing any of these, I am simply utilizing feeds from different sources in order to gauge how well a reader works. Let the testing begin!