David Berlind wrote “What’s wrong with RSS is also what’s right with it for his ZDNet commentary this morning. He takes the time to skip past the tumultuous (to developers) history, without papering over the differences. Well done. More important, though, he doesn’t get caught in that rat-hole of an argument.
The most interesting part, to me, was his description of using the internal Wiki to program a mini-RSS aggregator, with all the choices and exceptions that required. David was kind enough to show me the internal tool he wrote about here, so I could see some of the specific challenges he describes. I use the same type of Wiki at work, although I hadn’t thought about using it this way, as I’d rather use a reader application.
Parsing XML isn’t the hard part; it’s delivering an experience that works for people, who all have different styles and needs, that lets developers show their stuff. I actually think writing an RSS reader has become a sort of “Hello world” application, with the exception that it’s not so binary about whether you are successful. In the case of RSS readers, you can make an application (with various open-source components) that reads and displays a perfectly-formed feed with little effort. The challenge comes when you decide that you need more than one feed. Diversity is a bitch. But it’s also reality. So developers who smooth out the rough spots — in a sense, hiding some of the diversity for the benefit of the person reading — are doing their customers a favor. Thanks again, Brent Simmons. There are other applications which probably approach (surpass?) NetNewsWire, but even waiting for 2.0, I haven’t felt a need to switch.
Two notes. First, XML parsing may not be hard… if you get perfect XML. It’s not so simple in the real world. I’m glossing over that minor detail! Second, as a disclaimer, I work at CNET News.com, which, like ZDNet, is published by CNET Networks. Like so many other bloggers, I don’t represent my company on this blog. These are my own opinions. I’ll eventually get around to putting something like that on my blog website, but wanted this in there for those who only read via RSS. Know my biases, if you haven’t figured them out for yourself!