Top 5 Atom Syndicators for Android
Mar 11, 2011 android apps
Atom is a great way of keeping track of the latest news and content published by your favourite websites as it allows individuals to control news updates, blogs, articles, forums etc., they to keep up to date with. The XML based feed format can easily be written using a set of predefined tags on any XML editor as well as a generic editor such as Notepad. Content such as the headlines, images as well as a brief summary of the articles are stored within XML and extracted by the Atom reader as and when required.
If you own a phone running an Android operating system, you’ll be pleased to see more and more Atom readers for Androids available. The difficulty is choosing the right one to suit you. Here are our top 5 to help you decide:
NewRob
NewsRob is one of the most popular feed syndicators on the Android system and after using it for half an hour, it is easy to understand why, as it is easy to use whilst also being very customisable. It gives the option to read an article online but it downloads articles onto the phone’s memory card allowing you to view your articles without the need of an internet connection which would be particularly beneficial at areas where 3G signal is poor and no Wi-fi hotspots are to be found.
NewsRob can also sync with popular socialising websites such as Facebook and Twidroid enabling it to send updates straight to your phones as soon as they happen. Another nice feature of this app is that it displays a green line next to article titles which have not been viewed and once viewed, the green line is removed. If I was forced to provide a complaint with this program, it would be that at £3.40 it is a little pricey compared to some other feed syndicators within this list especially since there are free options available in the market.
Pulse News Reader
Pulse News Reader is a highly graphical, beautiful Atom reader which, if the feed supports it, displays photo based Atom feeds. This makes the user interface very attractive. It is also user friendly with each individual feed swiping sideways for easy scanning. It syncs with Google reader or you can manually input your own feeds. Pulse News Reader is good for social networking sites, particularly Facebook. One problem with this app is that the number of articles is limited to twenty articles per feed and I guess this is due to the high graphical interface as it would most likely become too laggy if more feeds were added. However, I can live with only twenty articles per feed when the app is this fast and pretty. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that the best thing about this beautiful app is that it is absolutely free!
FeedR
FeedR is a good, basic Atom reader. It’s not great for social networking sites but is very fast, so perfect for getting information quickly and efficiently. You can view feeds by category and also colour code categories to rapidly find the news you want. You can also control when and how often it syncs and it also notifies you when new Atom feeds are available. FeedR is not free but at £1.23, it is much cheaper than many other paid Atom syndicating apps.
BuzzBox
BuzzBox allows a widget to be added which shows the latest articles published. This is a valuable tool which Android is really going out of their way to promote since Apple have not implemented this feature into their IPhones. The widget comes in a number of sizes, smaller sizes available for those short on space and larger sizes are able to display more articles. BuzzBox comes in the following sizes:
- 4×4
- 3×3
- 2×2
- 4×1
A nice customisation feature on this is that you can choose between a white background and a grey background. BuzzBox allows feeds to be placed in categories and it groups similar
news stories from different Atom feeds, so you don’t get repeat news. Best of all, just like Pulse news reader it is free of charge.
BeyondPod
BeyondPod is more than just a basic Atom reader since it supports podcasts and videocasts and has an integrated media player that tracks the played status for each pod/videocast. Downloads can be scheduled to occur at a specific time, only when connected to Wi-Fi, or only when the phone is on charge. For Atom feeds you can categorise topics for easy filtering. BeyondPod also integrates with Google reader so you can keep track of what you have read on your PC and android device. Beyond Pod is the most expensive feed syndicator in this list at £4.31 and I would recommend downloading the free 7 day trial before committing to purchase this one.
Posted by Guest Blogger Liquid Technologies
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Tags: atom syndicators, readers
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