I have to admit it. FeedDemon totally rocked my RSS reading world. I like it even better than NewsGator. The interface(I'm a GUI guy) is very very slick and intuitive, and I really like the browser oane being positioned to the right(like outlook 2003).
I think this is the one reader I would consider actually paying for. It’s almost mature enough as a product for me to consider it as good payable.
Things I really like:
· It’s separate from Outlook, which is a plus. The task of reading RSS should be, to me, separate from using my email at work. It allows me to set it aside and leave it alone while I go about doing my business.
· Its fast and, compared to the others, consumes very little resources
· It does not make me feel stupid sometimes when I do something wrong or don’t know how to operate something. Its interface is much more self-describing than the others, allowing me to quickly figure out what I’m doing. All this is on top of the fact that in actuality, it is a much more diverse and complex product than the other aggregators out there. It just feels simple. That’s what its all about.
Now for the things I like a little less, and stuff I’d like to see added:
· I’d like to know when new posts arrive even when its minimized to tray(NewzCrawler does this nicely with a popup balloon, much like ZoneAlarm does to alert you of important stuff). This ability should be allowed to be turned off, for less interference with the “flow” when needed.
· This ability should be allowed to be enabled only for select channels(I only want to know when Scoble posts something, for example)
· I’d like to be able to hide the channel selector to the left just like I make the message selector disappear when I full-size the browser window. Sometimes it just takes up too much space. Hey , not all of us use twin 19” dual monitors you know?
· An ability, like NewsGator, to right click an RSS link in IE and register it as a feed in FeedDemon
· Plug-in support and SDK – so we can integrate all kinds of cool stuff in there
· Help
· Searching and indexing abilities
· Add a hierarchical view of the Channel listings, allowing drag& Drop between channels and categories
· Customizable shortcuts for everything
· Ability to set special icons for individual feeds(+ Forecolor,font…)
· Add “author” column in the messages listing