DISQUS

kosso · 7 months ago

Wow. I read about this the other day, but I didn't know they were using a proprietary reading list format. Seems very odd when OPML does the trick. What do they use/call it?

It's similar to the way I built the backend of podcast.com where users can create folders with rss feeds in them. Also they can create 'shortcuts' to other people folders of feeds (same as reading lists) - so when the folder owner changes the feeds in their folder, my subscription to that folder reflects that too - and then I can see the latest item (in a river feed) from any folder I like - no matter what feeds are in it. - here the opml from my account http://my.podcast.com/kosso/opml/

Since I left there, it's shame they haven't built on the system to support any old rss/atom feed for blog posts/news etc. - all it would take is a different UI. ;)

mikepk · 7 months ago

Been proselytizing the reading list concept for three+ years now. There is still a conceptual barrier to feeds, and worse yet, packages of feeds. Even people who know feeds and use readers seem to have a mental block to the idea of 'live' reading lists as resources online. I think the abstract nature of feeds and reading lists leads to a basic mental block for most people. When I say 'abstract' I mean that there's no clear _thing_ you can point to online and say *that* is the feed. It requires a mental leap to understand that it is a flow of information that can be represented multiple ways.

My family still describes what I do as "Michael has a software company, I still have *no idea what it does*." I take it as a personal failure, but I've tried everything I can think of, every mental model, analogy, way of describing it, and it still does not 'stick'. Even after going through the exercise of building related reading lists for topics people are passionate about, it still doesn't seem to gel.

I still think it's a hugely powerful concept, but I don't think the use case / mental model has yet emerged for non-technical people to 'get it'. Just my humble opinion. :)

dave · 7 months ago

BTW, don't feel bad -- my father once started to explain podcasting after he
read an article about it. I don't think families were ever meant to
undestand what we do Mike. :-)

arif · 7 months ago

Reading this article above, the Grazr came to mind but without the name, until I checked your website and the name popped up. I recall using/trying Grazr a while back and thinking I would eventually replace this with any other Feed Reader I was using. But somehow Grazr dropped from my radar (perhaps because it is too gadget oriented and not positioned as a feed reader) and ever since, the Google Reader is the only alternative for online feed reading (what a sad state of affairs).

rosskarchner · 7 months ago

The OPML produced by Reader looks, OK, doesn't it?

http://www.google.com/reader/public/subscriptio...

The problem I see (which might be what you mean by "incompatible format") is that that there's no obvious way to subscribe to external reading lists in Reader. It's an OPML producer, but not a consumer.

dave · 7 months ago

Correct.

Alexander · 7 months ago

That's not true. You can import OPML files: just go to the settings page, click on import/export and import the OPML file.

dave · 7 months ago

Can they be "bundles" ?

josswinn · 7 months ago

If I subscribe to a 'bundle' it's just a bunch of feeds that share the same 'tag' or label in Google Reader. If I export my bundle to OPML and then import it, it's just that, too. A bunch of feeds collected under the same tag. Google Reader even refers to importing my 'reading list' when I import the OPML. The result is exactly the same as far as I can see. There's nothing special about a bundle when it's shared or imported. It's just a tag/folder/label with a bunch of given feeds.

rosskarchner · 7 months ago

I think you're missing the fact that *subscribing* to an OPML reading list isn't that same as importing. Subscribing would mean that if something changes in Daves reading list (A feed is added or removed), that change would be reflected in other users Reader's.

Importing OPML is a one time thing, subscription is ongoing.

dave · 7 months ago

Yup.

josswinn · 7 months ago

OK. I get it. The issue here is that importing is possible but subscribing to a dynamic reading list is not. However, there's nothing in the google announcement that suggests that bundles are dynamic subscriptions. Google talks about sharing bundles and sharing your subscriptions but in their announcement, they don't talk about subscribing to a bundle of dynamic feeds where the creator controls the feed subscriptions. When I 'subscribe' to one of Google's bundles, 'Staff Picks', it just imports as a tagged bunch of feeds which act and appear exactly like any other feeds in my reader. I can unsubscribe from one of those feeds in the bundle, too. When I subscribe to one of my own bundles, and then edit the bundle, the bundle of feeds I originally subscribed to doesn't change to reflect my newly edited bundle. Seems to me that all google has done is allow us to create an OPML file and allow others to import it . They've just used terms like 'bundles' and 'subscribe', but not in the sense that you're thinking of.

dave · 7 months ago

You're right about the announcement, but when @kevinmarks was posting about
them, I asked -- and he said they are indeed dynamic.

josswinn · 7 months ago

I guess he was wrong and that his statement has mislead us, because like I said. I've created a bundle, subscribed to it, edited it (all within Google Reader) and there's nothing dynamic about it. Want to share a bundle with me and test it out? josswinn@gmail.com

dave · 7 months ago

Oh that sucks bigtime!

Is Kevin still around...?

Geeez

kevinmarks · 7 months ago

I'm sorry, I got it wrong; when you add a bundle, it imports the feeds that are in it, but doesn't create a dynamic link.

The HTML, OPML and Atom outputs of the bundle are dynamic, and update on editing, others' subscriptions to them in Reader don't. Your comment system ate my links before, so here are my examples via bit.ly - HTML bundle:
http://bit.ly/comics_html
OPML version of that bundle:
http://bit.ly/comics_opml
Atom version of that bundle:
http://bit.ly/comics_atom

If you subscribe to the Atom feed in Reader (or any other feed reader) the it updates dynamically, but if you add the OPML or the bundle link, you get the individual feeds added.

So Reader has a way of creating reading lists in OPML, but only reading them as a unified feed.

rosskarchner · 7 months ago

See my comment to josswinn

kevinmarks · 7 months ago

Dave, the reading list tool in Google Reader outputs OPML. Here's the HTML link for a bundle:

http://www.google.com/reader/bundle/user%2F0347...

And here's the OPML link from that page:

http://www.google.com/reader/public/subscriptio...

Google just shipped an editor that generates OPML in Reader. What I was clumsily saying was that this means people who aren't users of your OPML editor can now generate and edit OPML easily.

Both those links will dynamically update as the bundle is edited (I just added Foxtrot, and they did). What I'm not sure works is that if I subscribe to that bundle in Reader, whether it updates dynamically too. I'll check that with the Reader team.

dave · 7 months ago

I don't see how this changes anything of what I said in this piece, do you?

josswinn · 7 months ago

I think this is the big news here. Google just made Google Reader an OPML editor. Now anyone who uses Google Reader can create their own 'bundled' set of feeds (i.e. an OPML) and let other people know about its existence by email, by Google Reader, by Atom or as a downloadable OPML file they can post elsewhere.

The dynamic bundle of separate feeds would be really cool but I don't see it in the announcement or anywhere in Google Reader. You say you've seen a bundle dynamically update between producer and consumer of the bundle? The web page will dynamically update when you edit your bundle but the OPML file or bundle shared within Reader isn't dynamic. So I guess the dynamic thing is really no more than publishing a read only web page of feeds rather than a portable set of feeds. What is nice (and maybe this is what you're referring to?), is that as well as a static OPML file, you also get an Atom feed from the bundle, so you can aggregate multiple feeds and re-publish them as a single atom feed for others to subscribe to. Until now, I've been using Yahoo Pipes to pull multiple feeds together and re-publish as a single feed. Using Google Reader seems like a better solution.

josswinn · 7 months ago

I think a few of us, myself included, aren't clear on what the problem is. I can create a bundle and output it as an OPML file to share outside Google Reader. I can share my bundles through Google Reader and I can subscribe to other people's bundles through reader. I can email a link to my bundle where someone can preview it and subscribe to it or download the OPML file, too. I can also import an OPML file into Google Reader. What's the 'incompatible format' you refer to?

dave · 7 months ago

The incompatible format is the one we can't see -- the internal format they're using to store the reading lists.

That's not the important issue anyway -- I can distill it even further. Here's a reading list:

http://static.newsjunk.com/tech/main.opml

Your mission, should you decide to accept it, is to subscribe to that in Google Reader.

If you can, then this was just a communication problem, if you can't -- then the headline of this piece is correct. You've only got half the implementation of reading lists, and everything I said about creating reading lists with tools other than Google Reader is correct.

To be clear, I'd rather be incorrect in this case. I'm not trying to prove Google is evil, I don't care if Google is evil. I care about compatible products, and not locking me or any other users in. I like my suite of RSS tools, but I don't see why GR users shouldn't be able to benefit from my curatorship, and that of my colleagues. That's the power of open formats.

josswinn · 7 months ago

From what I can see, Dave. Google haven't implemented 'subscriptions' in the sense you're referring to. It's just OPML import/export by another name. I explain more in my reply to rosskarchner below.

Tim · 7 months ago

Google reader has made "reading lists" possible for a long time already. You just share a single folder/tag.

Dave, I found you through Steve Rubel's ("aggregated", "bundled", "reading list") feed which he calls "thinkers". Note: this is NOT his "shared items" in google reader. It is a share of a single folder/tag which is separate to shared items.

http://www.google.com/reader/public/atom/user/0...

This technique seems to do everything you mentioned up to the point where you started talking about extensions to RSS.

Isn't that what you want?

dave · 7 months ago

It should work with any "feed consumer" app, not just Google Reader. The
whole idea of RSS is that users have choice, any feature like this that only
works in one product is a travesty. It's absolutely wrong. Hopefully a
pretty clear statement. This is what I mean about Google doing whatever they
can get away with as opposed to doing what's right and good design and good
for users.

Tim · 7 months ago

hmmm, i don't get it. You could subscribe to Steve Rubel's "thinkers" with any client. Doesn't have to be reader. I could use reader to subscribe to Steve Rubel's "thinkers" if he had created it with something other than reader.

I think for "reading lists" where you are delegating the content selection to a "curator", the output should be a single feed, not opml. Don't you just want the articles/posts? Why do you even care about what individual feeds comprise it?

On that basis I don't agree with you.

mterenzio · 6 months ago

OPML Camp anyone? ; )

http://bit.ly/11jLLw