Need help w/ RSS readers

krimsonidol · 11-19-05, 02:36 PM

I'll admit it - i'm a bit of a n00b to PocketPCs. And i've never messed around much with RSS. So bear with me here, if you can.

Here's what I want:
Get feeds from almost any site that offers RSS (ie, I don't want to just choose from a list ala avantgo)
Automatically download feeds when synced or connected to internet via wifi

And here's the big one:
I want to be able to cache more than just the single-line headline: if it's available with that website, I want the whole article to be cached for offline viewing. Preferably, I would like this to be automatic (ie, I don't have to select each article individually and say 'cache now' or whatever).

I have so far tried NewsReader (I think that is what it's called, memory is pulling a blank right now) and FeederReader, and Egress. I have spent the most time with Egress because it seems to have intuitive caching, but the program freezes on me all the time and does not reliably download feeds or cache anything. It is frustrating.

I know the FeederReader guy frequents these forums, so maybe he can correct me if i'm wrong here, but from what I can tell from using that program, there is no easy or automatic way to cache full articles for offline viewing.

Can anyone here offer me any advice, or suggest any good readers? I don't mind paying for the software, I just want something that is powerful yet easy-ish to use (or has a good help file).

Thanks!
-Kat

edit: i'm using WM5 on a x51v

AKAJohnDoe · 11-19-05, 02:50 PM

You may find some time/storage constraints come into play with fully caching RSS feeds.

There is a link to the RSS reader I went with in MYPDA. I have not yet gone to WM5. You might also want to see if AvantGo fits your needs.

11-19-05, 06:40 PM

FeederReader currently caches only the text that is in the feed itself. It does not do an *additional* request to get the Web Pages pointed to by the RSS feed. In many cases, this is enough to get the entire feed (or enough to be satisfying, anyway). For example (off the top of my head), infoworld, techinfo, wwdn, yahoo news (which is a few-sentence summary) are very decent feeds for those not wanting to cache the entire web pages.

FeederReader does (optionally) cache the embedded images within the feed, which works well with those feeds that include images.

I've been told by several of my users that FeederReader works with WM5.

Let me know if you have any other questions! I come around here every once in a while, but if you want an answer from me for sure, visit and post in the FeederReader Forums (www.FeederReader.com sidebar "Forums").

Greg Smith
Author, FeederReader - Pocket PC *direct* RSS text, audio, video, podcasts
www.FeederReader.com - Download on the Road

krimsonidol · 11-19-05, 07:48 PM

Thanks! I think I will have spend some more time with FeederReader. For instance, the sites I follow most closely (Gizmodo, Engadget, Joystiq, and Kotaku) do not have long posts anyway, and probably include the whole thing in the feed since it's just a few sentences. Pictures are a big part of the posts though, so i'm glad to hear that FeederReader can include these.

I appreciate the helpful responses i've gotten on here - aximsite has some great forums from what I can tell so far :approve:

-Kat