Awhile ago, I wrote a post about how Flock has become my new default browser. It was a pretty tame post, as it was just an overview.

However, since I am known as the girl who can break anything1 I thought I’d take an in depth look at the things I use most in the browser, what I like about it, and what I think needs to be changed.

First up is the Newsreader. This is probably the one feature I use more than any other in the Flock browser. I spend most of my time in the Newsreader, reading my feeds, marking posts for later, and just catching up with my corner of the world in general.

The Newsreader has some really great features, which makes it indispensable for me. At the same time, however, a few additional features would make it kick so much ass that I might never close the browser window. Or, if everyone would use full feeds, I’d be able to never leave the reader, unless I need to comment.2

Flock screenshot.First off, I love the default news page. You can see a recent post for the the category at hand, and then a few links to to other recent posts. While this is a great feature, something needs to be changed about the way posts are shown, or my install is somehow borked.

Each folder tends to show up differently for me. With some, the displayed post is the latest and newest. On others, it’s the last post I marked to save within that folder, and others have no rhyme or reason to why a certain post is picked as the one to display.

The only constant seems to be if it’s the latest unviewed post. That always gets preference over what other hierarchy system is in place. I think that it would be great if the individual was able to customize their view hierarchy for themselves. For example, I’d rather “saved” posts have priority over just “viewed” posts, but maybe someone else would rather it be the other way around.

Flock screenshot.Also, the way “saved” posts are treated is brilliant. Just by clicking the star, I bookmark the post in del.icio.us (or whatever bookmarking site you’re using, I assume). However, unlike when I bookmark the post in the traditional sense, I am unable to set tags and a description for what I’m linking. I don’t mind that it doesn’t show up right that minute–as often times I’m marking something to think about it, or am in a hurry, and want to remember to take my time with it later.

However, I think that there should be a way to bring up the bookmarking window really easily from within the newsreader, so that when I go back over it later, it’s easy to update, and I don’t have to go into the del.icio.us interface to do it. If this functionality is here now, I can’t find it for the life of me.

Another change I would make for the “saved” posts would be the ability to organize them amongst themselves. Such as a way to create folders for them to be sorted in. After all, I mark posts for three things: tutorials not to loose, posts to write about, and posts I like but don’t know what to do with yet. It would be nice if I could set up folders for these, so when I’m ready to write about something, I don’t have to dig through all of my saved posts to find it.

I’d also love to be able to tag the saved posts, or just have the del.icio.us tags for the saved posts able to be searchable within the feed reader. That way if I’m looking for a marked post on socks, I can just plug in that tag, and find everything I marked with it.

Overall, though, I like Flock’s newsreader better than all the others I’ve tried. I like that it’s browser-based and not web-based. I like that it’s integrated with the browser and not a stand-alone desktop program. I think the “saved” option is brilliant. I like that I can organize my feeds the way in a way that makes sense to me.

While I do wish I could get everything I wanted in a program3 I do think that adding in some of this functionality would make everyone love the reader the way I do.

After all, the newsreader is the number one reason I switched to Flock as my main browser. I’m to lazy to look for new sites, and I want the content I like delivered to me with as little work as possible. And if I open the browser for just a minute or two, the newsreader will pull all the feeds for me, and save them so I can read them later when I’m offline. Like when I’m in class without a wi-fi connection.4

Yay! for the Flock newsreader, making me more productive in my quest to waste time. I really don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t of found it. Or used it. Or fallen in love with it. Oh, one last thing: I’d love to be able to change that blue color, because sometimes I’m not in a blue mood.

  1. If you have something you need tested, throw it my way and I’ll break/find something it absolutly needs it in less than ten minutes. It’s a freakish skill.[back]
  2. And I do feel the need to comment a lot, so it’s not like full feeds would keep me away from the site.[back]
  3. We wondered in IRC today how many Flock programers I’d have to sleep with to get what I want. The consensus is 10 to 12.[back]
  4. Another reason why I’m an advocate of the full post. There is nothing more annoying than being offline, and reading an excerpt that really makes me want to read more. In two hours, I’ll forget that I even saw the excerpt at all, and not get around to reading the full post.[back]