Feeder Review and Give Away

Posted by Kiro on 04/14/07 in Applications, Giveaways, Internet, Utilities

Feeder Icon Feeder is an RSS composer. Just like writing messages in Mail, Feeder uploads messages to your RSS feed. Feeder is really one of a kind. You make a new feed, write a few articles, and publish. Feeder can even make podcasts and appcasts as well.

Making a feed is easy. First, enter the name, URL, and description of your feed. Once you do that, choose from 6 different templates or a default one. Please note that all templates have a body field for your content.

News: Use this one for standard news feeds. Includes title, article link, date, time, and author fields.

Minimal: This template just has the title and description fields.

iTunes Podcasting: Use this one to make your own podcast. All of the fields from the new template are there however there are a few new ones such as iTunes Duration. This one shows how long your podcast episode is. In the â€œEnclosureâ€ section, you will find a source box for entering a URL or dragging an episode. Once youâ€™ve added your sources, add a description and a summary.

iTunes Podcast Item Entry Window

Podcasting: Just like the iTunes Podcasting template youâ€™ll get the same fields without the iTunes ones.

Sparkle Appcasting: Sparkle is used in many applications to use an â€œautomatic updatesâ€ feature. This requires you to hand type an RSS feed, also known as an appcast. Feeder has a built in appcaster template to take a huge load off of your hands. Simply enter in all of the normal fields including the version of the update. Then, drag your zip file or enter the URL into the field.

All: This oneâ€™s the easiest. The All template takes all of the fields and adds them into one feed.

List of two feeds When you are finished with the next item, hit the publish button. Feeder includes a very powerful publisher. It has a built in FTP client and a quick .Mac setting. All you have to do is hit publish and Feeder does the rest. If you have an RSS feed already, simply

Over all, Feeder is the best in the business for creating, editing, and publishing RSS feeds.

Steve Harris from Reinvented Software has generously donated a licence for us to give away. Simply comment answering the question:

Q: What are some creative ways you use RSS besides just for reading feeds?

…or:

Q: Have you tried Feeder? What are its best/worst features?

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17 Comment(s)

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Brian Waldo said on

April 14th, 2007 at 9:09 am

#1: A common misconception is that RSS is only for news. Well in this comment I am proving that wrong. In this example I will be using our beloved website, MacApper. By using a RSS reader, you may briefly glance at the RSS window and know if your favorite site, MacApper, has posted new content. If you enjoy this content you can make your way to http://www.MacApper.com/ and post a comment. Another way RSS is used is on forums. Whenever I ask a question on a forum, the question is probably something that is very urgent, meaning I need to know the answer to right away. If the forum is RSS capable, I subscribe to the RSS and use the RSS to know when my question is answered. With that said, I would very much appreciate a Feeder License!

Daniel said on

April 14th, 2007 at 9:17 am

Q: Have you tried Feeder? What are its best/worst features?
A: Its best features are the ability to drag-and-drop files onto the program to create a new podcast/appcast, a great Aqua interface (that really blew me away, its ability to appcast (which I thought was really cool), and pretty much everything else. I couldn’t find any bad features, but I have no basis of comparison.

Zachary N said on

April 14th, 2007 at 9:43 am

Q: What are some creative ways you use RSS besides just for reading feeds?
A: Delivering pictures to friends and family.

John Baker said on

April 14th, 2007 at 10:28 am

The most creative way I’ve ever used RSS is a bit of a complex one… As many of you may know, I’m obsessed with pzizz. Well, once when I was going on a long trip, I wanted to have pzizz at my disposal, but I didn’t want to have to generate a pzizz nap every night (which can take up to a couple hours for a long nap). In order to solve this problem, I wrote a script that would generate a pzizz nap every day, post it to my web server, and add the MP3 entry in an RSS feed that I would access via iTunes while I was on the road. There were many more aspects to that creativity than just RSS, but RSS was the integral part that made the whole thing automatic for me.

And yes, I have used Feeder before. I really liked just the simplicity of it and how easy it was to get something up and running in no time at all. The icon is neat, too!

Jonathan Bloom said on

April 14th, 2007 at 10:45 am

The most creative way I’ve used RSS:

Delivering video podcasts in different feeds per file format. So you get a feed for QuickTime, Windows Media, Flash, 3GP, etc. Those feeds can then be added to iTunes or a video podcast downloader like Democracy Player.

FBinDC said on

April 14th, 2007 at 11:20 am

What are some creative ways you use RSS besides just for reading feeds?

I use RSS feeds to search for jobs on Craigslist, Washington Post, Indeed, etc. Setting up an RSS feed to a specific search term, such as “SEO” or “web design” will allow you to immediately know whenever there is a new job listing that matches your search term.

1. Type in a search term using “quotation marks”. Click search.
2. Add the RSS feed of the search results to your favorite RSS reader. I use Safari’s built in RSS, so this makes RSS management a snap!
3. Keep your RSS job search feeds in your “Bookmarks Bar” so you can see the number of new job listings for different search terms.

This really saves me a lot of time and makes the online job search a lot less stressful.

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Henry Hickok said on

April 14th, 2007 at 12:40 pm

Q: What are some creative ways you use RSS besides just for reading feeds?
A: In my little company, we use RSS feeds in place of memos and staff-wide emails. Feeder looks like a program that could enrich that process.

PhoeniX42 said on

April 14th, 2007 at 1:24 pm

Q: What are some creative ways you use RSS besides just for reading feeds?

A: I love using “appcasts”, or RSS feeds that notify me when new versions of software comes out.

Steven said on

April 14th, 2007 at 9:06 pm

Q: What are some creative ways you use RSS besides just for reading feeds?

Answer: To me a creative use for an RSS feed is a feed that delivers information that is important at the time your reading it. Examples might be for weather, traffic, or even package tracking. I think a good use for an rss feed would be an online/traditional magazine publisher releasing a username/password protected feed that would automatically download the .pdf or whatever file. I also think rss feeds will be replacing the traditional newsletter.

I also hope that rss feed makers will make a specialized cell phone feed that would look decent on a small phone screen.

I think it would be cool if there was some sort of community aspect to feeds, whether its making a comment on a post or even leaving a video/audio comment.

I also like the idea of a virtual newspaper/magazine reader or creator… that would be cool.

Of course Apple’s iPhotos photocasts are cool, and I always use it to create private photo feeds for my family.

Lastly (is that a word?) it would be interesting to see a static page that the content is just updating regularly (no refresh needed).

Damn… I typed to much.

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Michael Mistretta said on

April 14th, 2007 at 9:24 pm

Q: Have you tried Feeder? What are its best/worst features?
A: I love the slick UI of Feeder and its ability to drag-and-drop from other podcasts. I also love the ability to use one app to publish RSS feeds for my blog AND podcast. I like the ability to create a master feed, and also like less subtle features like feed validation, publishing and pinging. This feels like a really polished app, and it’s a joy to use. As much as I try, I cannot think of any cons to this wonderful app. It “just works” in my workflow. I am looking forward to what the next version will have in store.

alej744 said on

April 14th, 2007 at 11:06 pm

OMG I WANT THIS SO BAD.

-3

Richard said on

April 15th, 2007 at 1:23 am

Q: What are some creative ways you use RSS besides just for reading feeds?

Getting movie times as they are released for local theaters.

Justin said on

April 15th, 2007 at 10:28 am

You can use RSS for todo’s or events you want to share.

I have not used it.

Dee said on

April 15th, 2007 at 6:08 pm

Q: What are some creative ways you use RSS besides just for reading feeds?
1. research - create a specific google search and then subcribe to it.
2. attend a conference and blog it and have the feeds of others blogging the same conference coming to me through a technorati search as they are being posted.
3. have my appointments in my feed via google calendar
4. view comments as they are posted to my blog so I can respond quickly

SWGS said on

April 16th, 2007 at 11:26 am

am i crazy or is there no link to the Feeder product page on this page?

http://reinventedsoftware.com/feeder/

Logan C said on

January 25th, 2008 at 5:21 pm

Q: Have you tried Feeder? What are its best/worst features?

I have tried feeder and it is a very good application with many features. It makes appcasting a breeze! I do wish that it had better ftp support and also support for http:// servers.

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