Using Google Reader
Lately I’ve become enamoured with Google Reader. There are several reasons for this, and I suspect a few of them apply to many web-based offerings - Google Reader just happened to be the first I tried. Let’s take a look :
Speed of loading
A standalone application draws attention to itself when loading - even via as simple an action as taking the window focus for itself. Google Reader (or any web-based feed reader) silently loads in the background, so the perceived loading time of the feeds is minimal.
On top of this, Reader’s homepage contains a few of the most recently updated feed items, and is ready to go. No splash page, no system messages. Just dive in.
Keyboard shortcuts
If you’ve been using gmail for a while you probably have a few keyboard shortcuts permanently in mind. Happily, not only does Reader have a similar interface to gmail, it has a similar set of shortcuts.
You can get a long way with j, k and v (next message, previous message and open message in new tab/window), but for a more complete look see this post on Smallwire .
Sharing
Yet another dose of public bookmarking. It works well, I use it quite a lot (there’s a sample of it in the sidebar); however I’m a little disappointed. There are a couple of other services in the Google stable that have a similar bookmarking capability (search results, Google Toolbar), yet the bookmarks provided by Reader don’t appear to be compatible with any of them. Yet.
The only aspect of sharing that I’m still pondering is the fact that public bookmarks are displayed in the order they were found, rather than sorted by the date of the article. Not sure if this is a good thing (I suspect it is) - only time will tell.
NB: if you’re looking to customise the display of the web clips, this post on Google Operating System will show you how.
Firefox integration
Firefox’s Live Bookmarks system works well, and is almost seamless in 2.0. Google Reader appears in the dropdown list of available readers, and its selection can easily be made the default. Overall a very good integration; except for the fact that during the process a page always appears asking whether the feed is to be added to the Google Homepage (not a Google service I use) or the Google Reader. If there is a way to bypass this through Reader’s settings it’s very well hidden.
Expectation
Perhaps the greatest ability of any software product is to do exactly what the user expects to happen. Google Reader does that. Navigation is simple, new windows open in new tabs (or new browser windows if that is your default) and moving through a long list of news items using keyboard shortcuts clears each one and moves up the next in the way you expect it to. Very nice.
Summary
The couple of shortcomings the offering currently has are easily outweighed by the usefulness of the service. As someone who relies heavily on information from RSS feeds, I’ve certainly never looked back after making the switch to Google Reader.
Further Reading
If you’re already using a web-based feed reader (such as Bloglines or NetNewswire), the following articles provide possible reasons for making the jump to Reader :
Switching from NetNewsWire to Google Reader
From Bloglines to Google Reader
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I have yet to make the jump to an online feed reader but google reader keeps coming up for me and this seems to support it again. I use a google desktop widgit for all my feeds, but again, once it gets past about 10 or 15, I have to look at other options. The advantage of the google desktop widgit is that it's on my screen and scrolls to update when a new post is discovered on one of the feeds and I can go look immediately. Does google reader somehow interface with the desktop to alert of new blog posts?
Posted by: Rob | July 31, 2007 2:57 AM
Quite possibly, but it's not something I'd ever use. I treat feed-reading the same as email; set time aside and check it thoroughly twice a day or so.
This saves an incredible amount of time compared to the 'always open' approach.
Where Google Reader excels - for me, at least - is in the ease of use. There's no problem in having several hundred feeds, as they're so quick to scan through.
Posted by: Scott | August 4, 2007 10:20 AM
Quite possibly, but it's not something I'd ever use. I treat feed-reading the same as email; set time aside and check it thoroughly twice a day or so.
This saves an incredible amount of time compared to the 'always open' approach.
Where Google Reader excels - for me, at least - is in the ease of use. There's no problem in having several hundred feeds, as they're so quick to scan through.
Posted by: Scott | August 4, 2007 11:18 AM