RSS Round-up: FeedReader and SharpReader SharpReader Forrest
SharpReader
First up is SharpReader, an RSS aggregator designed to handle all versions of RSS as well as ATOM (a competing syndication framework) and modules like dublin core, content:encoding, and xhtml:body.
SharpReader sports a familiar e-mail client-like three-pane user interface, with a list of subscribed feeds on the left, a list of headlines in the top-right pane, and the contents of selected headlines at the bottom right. The bottom-right pane toggles between displaying the text lead of the headline and the headline's linked-to URL. In the latter case, SharpReader takes advantage of your web browser to display the linked-to web page.
The RSS reader also offers the user several quick and simple options for subscribing to new feeds, ranging from directly typing either the RSS URL or just the website URL into SharpReader's address bar to dragging and dropping an RSS link from your browser to SharpReader's address bar. Additional subscription options include clicking on FEED links or, if SharpReader is configured to "listen on port 5335," clicking on Radio Userland subscribe icons.
SharpReader's rather extensive feature-set includes advanced threading support (for allowing the user to view related items together in a threaded fashion); the ability to group subscribed feeds into custom categories; a powerful search tool for searching weblogs and news sites for specific keywords;
filtering capabilities (for weeding out headlines that don't match time or text substring criteria); a system traybar icon with systray popups that display when updated headlines become available; proxy server support; HTTP and proxy authentication support; customizable feed settings, including refresh-rate and purge timeout for feeds and categories; and OPML (Outline Processor Mark-up Language) import and export capabilities for sharing and transferring feeds.
In terms of drawbacks, SharpReader takes quite a bit longer to load than FeedReader. It also lacks a built-in list of RSS syndicators for users to pick and choose feeds from, although its help file does recommend a couple of web sites to check out for this purpose (namely, Radio Userland and Syndic8.com).
SharpReader can also be a bit of a hassle to get up and running with. Unlike 99% of software downloads today, SharpReader lacks an installer utility, which means you'll need to extract the files to a directory yourself as well as set up program icons on the desktop, in the start menu, or in the quick launch toolbar. The program also requires Microsoft .NET Framework version 1.1 in order to run, which should help explain the error messages you're likely to receive after installing the program but before realizing .NET v1.1 is needed as well (we speak from experience).
