d-i-v-o-r-c-e



No, not me and Debbie. Rather, I'm referring to me and the open-source Vienna RSS newsreader. I've left Vienna for NetNewsWire. I've blogged about the wonders of Vienna before, and indeed it's a great newsreader. I'd used NetNewsWire Lite before, but there were more features in Vienna than in the lite version of NNW, and the full version of NNW cost money that I didn't have. So Vienna it was, and it was a great run. Vienna is regularly updated, has smart folders and tabbed Web pages, and runs off of WebKit.

But this past week NNW (the full version) became freely available. It's much faster than Vienna---there was a very long pause every time I'd switch to another feed in Vienna, particularly one with a lot of entries (like The Daily Kos). And if a blog post had an embedded video and I then switched to another blog post in Vienna, the previous one with the video would continue to display. NNW also syncs via NewsGator, and has similar style sheets to Vienna.

So I reluctantly switched after a fling last night in a hotel room in Seattle. Yes, I had an affair with another newsreader in a nice hotel room, and well, you know how those things go. But in this case, it wasn't a one-night stand. The speed difference with NNW was compelling, and as much as I've loved Vienna for all this time, my need for speed trumped everything. The sync ability was the icing on the cake. Now, Vienna does do a better job with searching within articles, plus it keeps old posts until you decide to delete it (NNW archives things, but I haven't played with that feature yet...give me time). But overall, it just felt like the right time to make a switch.

But I'd like this divorce to be amicable. I harbor no ill will towards Vienna---it's a great open-source RSS and Atom newsreader, and I stand by all the praise I've ever showered upon it. But NewNewsWire, now that it's free, is just a bit more adorable. It performed magnificently last night in my hotel room...What can I say. Now that I'm 47, I guess male menopause is setting in and I'm getting fickle about RSS newsreaders. I guess I like my liquor hard and my RSS browsing fast. And boy is NetNewsWire fast. It gives great thread.

Of course, like all geeks who have affairs, if an even better newsreader as compared to NNW comes along...oh well...

Posted: Fri - January 11, 2008 at 07:43 PM          

©