July 31st, 2006
by NathanVersion 1.2: Speedster edition
Newshutch has been not so quick lately, and by not so quick I mean that even simple queries would peg our database CPU at 100%. Well, that unusable mess should be all over now.
The only thing that still lags is when you pull up a feed with a lot of long unread items, but overall things are much better.
New features
- Independently scrolling panes option: Right now this just uses cookies so you’ll need to set this option for each new computer or browser you use. Someday we’ll make this option persist with your login.
- Collapsible categories: Right now these are just static open/close buttons to help you keep your place while you’re reading. If you close the window everything will open again. Like scrolling panes, we’ll eventually make these persistent.
- Better Printing: Feeds printed decently before, but I made some changes. I also forgot to ever mention it to users. It’s too bad that people expect web pages to print badly unless there is an explicit “printer friendly” page.
- Design changes: I moved some things around and added some things. I’ll leave it as a “Where’s Waldo” exercise for you
Enhancements/Fixes
- SPEED! I’m sitting here watching top report the DB CPU at 97% idle. Sweet. Is it just me or is watching a computer “breathe” via top hypnotic?
Doug worked hard to get those queries (and a ton of other bugs) under control; somebody buy that man a beer! - Mark everything read button is back (finally).
- Fixed favicon downloads. This was broken for a while so when new feeds were added they would be missing favicons. No need to re-add feeds though, if your favicons are available, we’ll get them for you.
- Fixed some parsing bugs. The annoying bug that prevented some feeds from showing their full content is fixed. We also fixed some other bugs related to OPML import/export.
- Better Opera support. It’s not perfect, but at least it renders now.
- Fixed Mac Firefox scrolling/ghosting issue. For anyone who cares, Mac Firefox didn’t like that I had set an overflow CSS property on the feed entries.
- There were other numerous bug fixes and tweaks too mind numbing to discuss here.
Things that aren’t fully baked
- Non latin characters in non-utf-8 feeds still don’t work.
- The keep unread checkbox doesn’t stay checked (woops).
- Flagging didn’t quite make it in this round.
- Various bugs related to parsing or importing troublesome feeds.
As always, thanks to everyone for their support and comments. Keep telling us what we can do better!
July 31st, 2006 at 1:42 am
Wow, its perfect…again. I love the scrolling option. Its a great thing, I really don’t want scrolling, I’m happy with the feeds list at the top there. I noticed the Favicons earlier this morning, Those are really great! I think thats my favourite feature!!
July 31st, 2006 at 3:02 am
Well done! It’s all much faster now - Newshutch is shaping up to be a fantastic service. I just hope you keep to your core belief of keeping it simple, and don’t succumb to feature creep.
I have every confidence in you!
July 31st, 2006 at 4:15 am
The updates are a godsend, and will surely get Newshutch some wider adoption. You guys are doing some excellent work on this wicked free newsreader!
My favorite “feature” of this release is the fixed feed parsing engine, allowing the full feed to properly show. The independently scrolling areas rocks as well.
Congrats on a job well done guys!
July 31st, 2006 at 4:45 am
Great work! It already feels faster! Too bad about the flagging. Hopefully it’ll be ready soon, as I’m certainly looking forward to it.
July 31st, 2006 at 6:35 am
Wow, this is a major improvement! It feels like everything is a little quicker. I used to have a lot of lag when marking an item as read, now it’s instantaneous. Great job!
July 31st, 2006 at 7:22 am
Beautiful update! Thanks for all your hardwork, its very much appreciated.
July 31st, 2006 at 9:23 am
Damn! Just as I bought NewsFire this great update come out, somehow I knew this would happen - lol. I thought it was going to be a while before everything got a nice speed boost and some overall functionality upgrades, but I guess I was wrong. Oh well. Great update guys.
July 31st, 2006 at 9:48 am
Suggestion:
I’d suggest a button on each feed that lets you say you’ve read that feed. I subscribe to a comments feed, and sometimes I just want to skim it and say I’m done with it.
Spiffy otherwise.
July 31st, 2006 at 11:41 am
Individually scrollable panes rocks!
Little bug though…at least in my Firefox 1.5.0.5 brower (haven’t tried outhers). When I scroll done on the right then go over and click another feed to read, the feed opens up on the right as it should. Except, the right hand pane is left scrolled all way down because that is where I was on the last story. Needs to pop you back to the top of your newly selected feed.
July 31st, 2006 at 11:47 am
Scott, I just noticed that. Will add to fix list.
July 31st, 2006 at 1:12 pm
Thank you for the update
Just love it!
Birger
July 31st, 2006 at 2:51 pm
Yess!! Just noticed feeds are fixed…now I can get Gapingvoid cartoons in all their satirical splendor with out having to click through!
Rock on.
July 31st, 2006 at 3:26 pm
Another nit re: article pane. Keep the article header part non scrolling. That way the buttons are always visible.
July 31st, 2006 at 7:22 pm
You fixed Drawn! Hooray for you guys!
Also, it seems like even the animation is faster, so double yay!
July 31st, 2006 at 11:35 pm
I’m not so sure about keeping the header part non scrolling. It does make sense, but since we have keyboard shortcuts I’d rather devote the extra space to the feeds.
August 1st, 2006 at 9:31 am
Nathan…I get it. Cool.
Things are a litte odd this a.m. The options tab isn’t showing up right as is the mark everything read at the bottom of the feeds list on left. And slowwwness came back.
August 1st, 2006 at 10:43 am
Yeah I’m seeing slowdown too. Now it’s not the DB server but the web server. We’re working on it.
August 1st, 2006 at 2:06 pm
Ok, the UI is fixed. Could have been my browser.
Note to self: Shift+Click Refresh (or Shift+F5) to make sure you get the UI from the web and not your messed up cache.
August 2nd, 2006 at 4:17 am
Wow, this really is shaping really nice!
I would like to suggest that the Feed Title/header and its buttons would remain visible when scrolling the div feed or prolly have small teeny button links at the bottom.
I’d might as well switch from bloglines for good!
Good Job guys!
August 2nd, 2006 at 7:03 am
If we’re doing wish lists. Any chance of moving (or having option to move) the “mark as read” to the top of the article box rather than at the bottom. This way you can keep the mouse in the same place and click through large feeds quickly. I like the slide up effect but find I have to move the mouse about “Doom” style to click through large feeds. Love the update BTW and the way the site is going.
August 2nd, 2006 at 9:08 am
Kevin, the keyboard shortcuts might help you out until we come up with something better.
David (and everybody else) what would you think about double clicking anywhere on individual entries to mark them as read? In GTD TiddlyWiki this is how you can quickly open an item for editing. Do you think this would confuse people who aren’t as experienced? I’ve seen people who still double click browser links.
August 3rd, 2006 at 1:34 am
Hehe I see we have some feeds in common Nathan. Did you enjoy reading about the WTF University?
August 3rd, 2006 at 2:09 am
Thanks! Much better now!
August 3rd, 2006 at 6:00 am
“what would you think about double clicking anywhere on individual entries to mark them as read?”
That would be good, and actually far superior to moving the “read it” button. You could get half way down a post, realise it’s irrelevant, click and it’s gone. I like it personally but I see it creating UI problems.
a) It’s not particularly obvious.
b) You suddenly have a lot of real estate doing a single function.
c) There are usually links embedded in the entries, one misdirected click and the article is gone.
Could you have maybe a curled page image in both corners, like a turn of page, as if you were tearing it off. That way you have the readit/removeit functionality at the start and end of every article.
August 3rd, 2006 at 11:51 am
David, If we make double click to mark read a user selectable option, I think it would solve the non-obviousness problem.
August 3rd, 2006 at 3:48 pm
Nate and Doug:
Things are quick, peppy, and swift. Needless to say, FAST!
Keep up the good work!
-MD
August 4th, 2006 at 6:23 am
That would be a very welcome addition for me!
August 9th, 2006 at 12:09 pm
My feed Balance on Rails erro very large post =/
August 9th, 2006 at 1:41 pm
Fabricio, You’re seeing Rails errors when getting a feed with many posts?