Talk:News aggregator

Intention to clean up & some thoughts

I've been considering cleaning this article up myself, but I figured rather than take the plunge myself right now, I'd start by posting some thoughts here. If I find time I might do some of the cleanup. I guess we should lay down a plan for how this page can be better refactored.

Anyway here's some thoughts.

The first paragaph says An aggregator is a 'type of software'. I don't particularly like this phrasing. I'd suggest changing it to An aggregator is a 'software application'... I realise that a software application tends to indicate a desktop app, but I feel the distinction should be made later between desktop aggregators, web based etc...

An aggregator need not deal specifically with XML based content feeds though the majority of modern syndication formats are indeed XML based. Several formats for syndication predate the modern formats. See Push technology & Pointcast which were incorporated onto Microsofts failed Active Desktop, I'm not 100% but I doubt they were XML based.

Not all aggregators allow users to subscribe directly to content feeds, as many aggregators are deployed for syndication between sites, without the user necessarily knowing it. Many sites feature links to headlines etc as part of their layout, this is still syndicated content, but the site designers have decided on what to syndicate. This is mentioned at the end of the article as "OEM/Meta news feeds". I think that "OEM/Meta news aggregation would be better".

The different aggregator classifications should be flushed out with their particular benefits. e.g. web based - centralised, accessible from anywhere. desktop - greater protocol support e.g. support for https and private feeds, richer client interface. Bookmarklets should be mentioned as a common mechanism for subscribing to feeds for web based aggregators.

OPML and OML should be mentioned file formats which are commonly used for exporting/importing subscription lists between aggregators.

I would also argue that there is another classification of aggregator, allowing people to use their email as a 'feed reader', the aggregation here tends to occur in the 3rd party system, which manages the subscriptions and bridging to other protocols/formats.

There should also be some discussion (perhaps in the "Meta News aggregation" section about how multiple levels of syndication/filtering and republishing can occur.

Go ahead and make these changes, but I think the cleanup tag is overkill. The article has shortcomings, but not the awful dealbreakers that one normally assoiciates with the cleanup tag. I'm going to remove it. Babajobu 15:18, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

I agree the start is messy. The first paragraph starts with what aggregators do but then there is a section on what aggregators do which in fact is about why they do it. --BozMo|talk 11:13, 5 January 2006 (UTC)

i think the article should start with the definition of 'aggregator' as well. 24.60.66.216 (talk) 03:41, 23 January 2008 (UTC)

Please Pardon Me If I'm Going About This Wrong

Howdy Wiki Folks,

A few months ago I went to this page: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aggregators and at the bottom of the page in the External Links section: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aggregators#External_links I added a link to this page: http://bloggingpoet.squarespace.com/blog-aggregators/

A few weeks later someone removed the link.

I added it again.

A few weeks later someone removed the link again.

So I waited a couple of months.

I guess I could put it back up but rather than going back and forth and risking getting my IP address banned from Wikipedia.org I thought it might be best if I get one of the editors at Wikipedia to decide if the link is the sort of thing Wiki should be linking to.

Some thoughts: The 4 external links that remain are commercial in nature just as I am attempting to earn revenue from my website/blog.

While far from complete my list is the most extensive list of local blog aggregators in the world-- bar none. I admit it includes only English Language aggregators but then I wouldn't know an aggregator in any other language if it bit my leg off and slapped me with its tail.

I've continually added to my list for over 1 year because I really want it to be a valuable reference tool to bloggers who are looking to add their blogs to local aggregators. It's my belief that citizen run aggregators are the most effective tool citizens' media has in its box.

I've spend countless hours building the list and still search for more each week.

So, to make a long story not quite so long, I've decided not to attempt to add a link to my list again. If the editors at Wikipedia agree that my link is up to editorial standards then please add it to the list. If not then please accept my thanks for considering my proposal.

Thanks -Billy Jones August 20, '06

RSS Aggregator Information anybody?

I've been running all over the web looking for RSS creation/aggregator tools over the past few weeks and I've just about driven myself crazy. Making RSS feeds doesn't seem to be the challenge--you simply write up an XML file in a particular format, of which there are thousands of samples available on the web, but everywhere I go this is the only information I find.

The problem is how to display RSS feeds on your website, particularly PHP which seems to be the most common way. This issue is not addressed enough on the web and seems to be a gaping hole. For programmers who know PHP, probably no, but what about the rest of us who can barely get by in HTML?

For being Really Simple Syndication, RSS sure seems pretty complicated. There are sites that exist for getting RSS feeds to display on your website, but they are either buggy, or require knowledge of databases, neither of which I'm able to do. Can anybody out there do a step-by-step write-up with sample PHP code showing the following:

1. How to call (or include) the XML feed 2. Code on how to parse the XML file, where this code is supposed to be put, and can it be kept in a separate file 3. Show us the basic code for options we have to do the following things: headlines only, headlines with description, background/text/link color control, number of items in the feed.

I suppose caching in a database is the best way, but the best solution for programming newbies who don't have a year or even a month to learn PHP is just a simple step-by-step solution that allows us to get a feed displayed, then shows how to control the various options. I welcome commentary. Thanks a lot. Glossika 17:13, 11 January 2006 (UTC)

Making your own reader

I had the same question not long ago. I found a freeware PHP program called MagpieRSS which does all the hard work of parsing the XML info, and delivers it in a form that can easily be placed in any html format you wish. However, you still need to know some basic php in order to generate the final page. If you'd like to see the code for the RSS reader I created, I'd be happy to share it.Kitoba 00:04, 10 January 2007 (UTC)

---

Would be nice to have a Comparison_of_aggregators similar to the Comparison_of_instant_messengers. I am attending vloggercon and find that there are so many services and products available that it gets a little confusing sometimes. I would suggest 2 categrories: desktop software aggregators and website aggregators.

Jozecuervo 22:23, 11 June 2006 (UTC)

---

My apologies for stumbling in -- I have made some style edits to the "Online Version" paragraph to fix grammatical problems. I did try to comment on my changes for the history page, but am not sure how to do that (I did save my comments, but they do not appear on the History page.) I will research proper editorial etiquette before butting in again. Thank you, GrammarGal.

List of aggregators

We need here list of aggregators and comparison between them There is no reason to have link to threz.com and not to have bloglines.com etc. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Larytet (talk • contribs) 08:26, 5 December 2006 (UTC).

Should this be added: social bookmarking aggregators?

• PopUrls.com and TheWebList.net aggregate the top social bookmarking services.

Does this belong here, in the external links, or in some other article, such as Social bookmarking? GeoFan49 05:11, 18 December 2006 (UTC)

'News Feed' redirects here

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_feed redirects here. Would it not be better to redirect to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_feed? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 193.131.176.54 (talk) 16:04, 18 December 2006 (UTC).

External Links

I added a link to my own RSS reader. While I know adding links to your own site is generally frowned upon, it seemed like this is a useful service not readily available. The page is free, non-commercial and does not host advertising. I placed the link here on the advice of the talk page for RSS. Kitoba 00:04, 10 January 2007 (UTC)solci_btz

Categories section

I think this section is trying to make the distinction between conventional web sites that use RSS feeds on the back-end and consumers access in a web browser, vs. RSS feeds that consumers access using a standalone feed reading application that they are running on their desktop. Apparently AJAX-based browsing is more like the latter, but is included in the paragraph about the former? I marked it as confusing. -- Beland 02:26, 1 June 2007 (UTC)

Aggregator?

MediaMonkey is listed as a Media Aggregator. I don't see any mention of this ability in the MediaMonkey article. Does it have some feature that would qualify it as an aggregator? Some googling indicates that it doesn't, but the results were inconclusive. Dr. Zed 15:01, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Feed reader vs. Aggregator

I have been cleaning up the article, but before I continue, I think we have to discuss certain changes that I think need to be made. Most importantly, why does Feed reader redirect here? I know that the terms 'aggregator' and 'feed reader' are not yet well defined, but as far as I know they are not the same thing. A web feed aggregator aggregates feeds and optionally sorts/filters them. A feed reader, on the other hand, is used primarily to view feeds. Those are two very different operations. As an example, the Feedview Firefox extension is a feed reader but not an aggregator because it is used only to view a feed. In the same vein, Google News is an aggregator because it groups together news feeds, but it is not a feed reader because the site cannot be used to view a specific feed. I think a split is in order.--Ѕentry 20:49, 23 June 2007 (UTC)

Disambiguation

I find it problematic that one does not start with a more broad definition. Here one starts the entire entry on Aggregator with what it is in computing. I believe there are disambiguation to the concept, but am a bit unsure of when and how to develop such. For instant there is the five aggregators or Skandhas from the teachings of Buddhahood. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Xact (talk • contribs) 16:34, 16 January 2008 (UTC)