NewsFire, a Versatile RSS Reader
For a while now I’ve been searching for a great RSS reader. In the time since Safari RSS was introduced, I’ve jumped on the RSS bandwagon and have collected feeds using Safari’s talents and clippings feature. Though with Safari RSS, the more feeds I collected, the harder and more of a pain it was to read them all. Then I stumbled on NewsFire.
NewsFire is built on the solid principle of being invisible, yet letting the core features and abilities shine through. All you have to focus on is the content and let NewsFire do the rest.
In the Beginning
When you first open NewsFire, you’ll get a small greeting and a yellow register slip at the bottom of the window. NewsFire is shareware, however, you can use it in all of it’s extent without registering. You’ll just have to deal with the annoying, yellow strip at the bottom which forces you to increase the window size to view more of your content…oh and there’s a limit to how many feeds you can have. To jump the gun, NewsFire is definitely worth the small $20 – but let’s backtrack and look at why.
NewsFire automatically comes with a few popular feeds in it’s collection. What you do with these feeds is up to you. If you want to start fresh, feel free to select and delete them; however, I think you’ll want to keep the one located at the top. This one’s a Smart Feed (more on them in a bit). What it does is compile a list of all the unread articles so that you can view them easily.
After a few seconds of NewsFire refreshing, it will show you how many new articles there are per feed, and display that number beside the feed title. The dock icon also displays how many unread articles there are in total. Feel free to click on a feed and browse a few articles.
How to Add a Feed
When you want to add a feed, simply click on the big “+” button located in the bottom left hand corner of NewsFire’s main window. Either type in the main url of the site you want a feed from, or paste in a direct link to the file. A great feature of NewsFire is that it when you copy a feed URL, it is automatically added to the address field when you click the “+.” An “Add feed to NewsFire” service is also installed in the Services menu for quickly adding feeds.
NewsFire automatically detects the title and author of the feed. Click “Add” or hit “Return” on your keyboard to add the feed to your collection. NewsFire will go out and find all of the latest articles from that feed and bring them to your attention. If you’ve already read these articles, you can hit the “Mark All Read” button at the top to….well…..mark all of those articles from that particular feed as read.
Organization
Now that you have your feeds, a good idea is to organizing them into groups so that you can access your feeds and articles quickly and efficiently. To make a group, click the “+” button again but this time, choose “Group” at the top. Then, give your group a name and click add. Now, all you have to do is drag the feeds into the group to organize them. To change the color of a group, click it and got to the “Feeds” menu, then “Edit Selected Feed,” or hit Cmd + “I”. Then click on the color box to change the color.
Now that you’ve created a group, you might want to make a Smart Feed or two. Much like Mac OS X’s Smart Folders, a Smart Feed does exactly the same thing. Simply add rules that the Smart Feed looks at, and it will only show articles that meet that criteria. To make a Smart Feed, once again click the “+” button and click “Smart Feed” at the top. For example, if I want to make a feed that shows all of the captured iPhone news, I’ll call my Smart Feed “iPhone News” and say “Item Content” “Contains” then enter “iPhone”. You can make as many conditions and requirements as you want. Then click “Add”. NewsFire automatically searches and shows all of the iPhone related articles in my collection, in my new Smart Feed.
Other Features
NewsFire also has a bunch of other tools as well. Features like del.icio.us integration, Blog forwarding, as well as a built-in download manager for podcast episodes and appcast files are just some of the gems you’ll find.
In the End
NewsFire is an amazing RSS reader. It’s got many great features built-in, and has an extremely sleek and streamlined interface that blends in with the rest of the OS. You can find NewsFire at newsfirex.com. There’s a free demo but the full app is $20 (US). $20 (US) is a small price to pay for this great app. It’s well worth it.
Wow. You really have sold your souls. Nothing but Delicious applications at Macapper for the moment. How much are they paying you?
I can certainly agree that NewsFire is both good-looking as well as easy to use, but that’s about it. Calling it a versatile rss reader when switching from Safari is also pretty easy. You could have switched to anything and called it versatile in comparison.
I used NewsFire myself for a few months when I was new to RSS, but then I changed to NetNewsWire. NNW looks just as good, has the same feature set more or less, but there are two things that put them apart for me: NewsFire crashed a LOT for me in the end, NNW is solid as a rock. Also, NNW has a built-in browser (webkit) so you don’t need to open up articles or links in a separate browser.
Whichever you choose is up to you, but I say this: try both NewsFire and NetNewsWire for a week each, and I think I know which one you will pick in the end.
NewsFire is just Vienna with some new paint.
Newsfire is a great app but I stopped using it after I had a bad experience trying to get support from the author. Development on it also seems to have been halted for the moment.
Please don’t take this as bad mouthing, cause that’s not what I’m trying to do. I just wanted to relate my experience.
NetNewsWire also has a major advantage in that it has syncing between multiple computers.
How much did you get paid for this review?
Try putting over 100 feeds in newsfire…watch it melt.
I’ve also personally faced some problems with NewsFire, particularly with its poor recovery from errors when parsing RSS feeds. I’ve also emailed the author of NewsFire before on this, with no reply.
Any software from this developer should be avoided. There are plenty of alternatives.
The developer does have a reputation for being rude and arbitrary. I can’t attest to that though since he’s never actually replied to any support queries that I’ve made.
@James and E.T Cook: All reviews are based on the authors experiences. No one was paid to do this review, just as all other reviews on MacApper are done for free. I myself have been using NewsFire for well over a year and have never had a problem with it.
Well, if that is the case, I am going to remove your subscription then. These reviews are disingenuous at best. Any amount of research would have brought to surface the support problems, as well as functional issues with the software, yet those were both glaring ommissions. In fact, I was giving macapper the benefit of the doubt by assuming they were paid for the review…at least then you would be paid…and not just inept at reviewing a product.
Be honest with your reviews, even if they are scathing…if you aren’t going to be…just quit.
@E.T Cook Thank you for bringing that to our attention. In the future, we will try to do a little more research on each app as to bring you the most informed review.
@Greg H
It isn’t just that. Every single one of your reviews is glowing…every product you have reviewed can’t be absolutely perfect. I just ask for a bit of journalistic integrity, that is all.
@E.T.Cook
I agree that every single product usually can’t be perfect. And in fact, I think if MacApper *did* get paid, more products would get the thumbs down. But if a review isn’t paid for, then why is it reviewed? Most likely because the author of the review has this in his mind “Oh I wonder what I can review today… hmm, let me see what piece of software I use that I really am happy with, and would like to tell others about”.
I think that any review on MacApper should be seen more as a recommendation than a review (if there is a difference). Then it will up to you and me to decide whether or not we agree with the recommendation.
I too was very happy with NewsFire for the first weeks, and even months. It took some time before the problems got to me, and I realized I was not the only customer who did not get any replies to the emails I sent.
I’m not sure if what I just said made any sense, but I think we should cut the guys some slack here
@Andreas
Don’t be an apologist. Unless the review is genuine, I don’t want to read it. Not every app can be perfect, and I have yet to see even a neutral app review flow through macapper…everything is God’s gift to a Mac user.
Think about those individuals that based on this review, purchased the product…trusting MacApper to give trustworthy reviews…what do you say to that individual that feels they were deceived? Same thing…cut them some slack?
@E.T. Cook
Thanks for all your feedback, you are right that many reviews on MacApper are pretty positive. Also though, Andreas is right in regards to the reason for such reviews. We are pretty casual in our writing assignments, we choose our own topics – so generally we write about software we like. There are some (justifiably) negative reviews though, I know because I truly disliked WebcamTweaker which I wrote about…
Anyways, we’re always working to improve so I hope you’ll continue to give us a chance.
NetNewsWire is completely overrated. I was anticipating the 3.0 release, but all it really added was screen clutter (do we really need a little thumbnail of the website in the bottom corner? — whats that for, anyway?). NewsFire’s interface is much better organized and responsive.
As for David Watanabe, he’s a software developer, not my neighbour. I own every one of his applications because they are each best-in-class. I could not imagine using Safari without Inquisitor, for example. I dont need to be able to have a drink with him and talk about sports, he just needs to make quality software, and he does.
[...] Kiro’s NewsFire Notes [...]
I’ve used Newsfire for about 8 months and generally have found it acceptable. Two major annoyances are the lack of a built-in browser and tabs. I understand that the developer is pretty much a one-man shop, but I can’t remember the last time there’s been an update. He’s apparently focused on XTorrent and Inquisitor these days. Very disappointing.
Overall, I prefer NewsFire to NetNewsWire because the later just feels so much more bloated and version 3.0 still crashes too often to be used as my everyday browser.
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