2015-11-17 Update
I am approaching 2 years of using newsbeuter as my RSS reader. I use the app every day and it is generally open in mrxvt tab all day long. I’ve found a few bugs and/or quirks here and there but definitely nothing that would change my mind. It is a great reader; quick, light and easy to use.
Background
I was looking for a RSS reader; however, unlike many, I was not looking for a Google Reader replacement. I wanted a stand-a-lone app that didn’t take a lot of system resources to run and was not screen intrusive.
Requirements
- stand-a-lone app (not web-based)
- light on system resources (RAM and CPU) and footprint
- powerful (search, tags, etc.) yet simple
- easy to setup/import feeds
Test Methodology
My testing methodology for comparing the apps are as follows:
- Start application
- Load up the following feeds
- Close application
- Launch application and top (with timer/filter):
$ appname & top -d 3.0 -n 21 -p $(pgrep -d',' -f appname) && fg - Use application
- update all feeds
- view first 3 articles in each feed
- mark all articles as read
- view subsequent articles until time expires
- Capture the CPU and RES for comparison
Test Results
The results are as follows of running the Test Methodology are as follows:
| App | Score | Type | Size | CPU | RAM | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| canto | 6 | ncurses | 660kb | 2.0% | 24204 | Nice, fairly widely used but has charset issues with mrxvt. I also do not prefer its layout, somewhat of an expanded list view. Have to collapse (C) to switch between feed lists and then expand (V) to show items again. |
| liferea | 6 | GUI (gtk) | 47.4mb | 7.0 | 50472 | Very popular but 47mb?? A nice app but takes entirely too much realty for my taste. |
| blam | 0 | GUI (mono) | 57.6mb | Skipped, uses mono. | ||
| straw | 0 | Skipped, not in repo. | ||||
| raggle | 0 | console | Skipped, not in repo. Ruby based. Does not appear to be active (last source modified dates appear to be in 2004 or 2005) | |||
| snownews | 0 | ncurses | 164k | Not in repo, skipped. Uses libxml2. Does not appear to be active (last source modified dates appear to be in 2009) | ||
| quiterss | 7 | qt | 31.4m | 11.3 | 54636 | Standard feed list/category with feed items/article layout. Simple yet nice, well done for a GUI. |
| newsbeuter | 9 | console | 2485kb | 0.3 | 16088 | Truly the mutt of RSS. A great, light reader that is ready to go in seconds. *Note: I actually had several hundred feeds loaded in newsbeuter when I ran the test so RAM may be higher than should be. |
| nrss | 6 | ncurses | 98.3k | 0.0 | 1992 | Similar to canto but slightly better looking and working. |
| olive | 6 | console | 11.7m | 3.0 | 32508 | Wow, it pulls in a lot for a console reader! Uses a combined view (feeds from all sources are together) with split view, article list on top and article (contents) below. Not the easiest to use. |
| yarssr | 4 | notification | 16.7m | 0.7 | 42052 | Notification area RSS reader, interesting concept. No way to see article (only shows headlines) without launching separate app (browser). |
| yocto-reader | 0 | 1454k | Unable to compare, not sure what the UI is, no app to launch upon install. | |||
| xul-ext-sage | 0 | 708k | Skipped, this is a browser (Firefox/xul) extension. | |||
| RSSOwl | 0 | 24.9m | Skipped, not in repo. Eclipse (RCP) based, looks fine but will be a heavy java app. | |||
| rawdog | 0 | 381k | Skipped. Many people have this listed as a reader, it is not. It is self-described as an RSS aggregator. What it does is periodically (via cron) read RSS feeds and format/output the results to a flat file, say HTML. It is nice for what it does, but not a RSS reader. |
Conclusion
newsbeuter is now my reader of choice. It combines simplicity and power, yet remains very light. It has an intuitive UI that gets you up and going very quickly and stays out of the way so you can quickly read articles. QuiteRSS would be my choice if I need a full GUI as it did the job quite well.
Notes
- I did not review every app out there; however, I tried to get all common apps that fit the requirements. If you know of something better that you would like thrown in the mix please contact me
- the following sections provide some basic usage info on the apps tested
Canto
Start with the -u param to update all feeds (note: this takes a very long time for some reason, much longer than other readers).
- h: show the help (also use ‘man canto’)
- space: open item
- C/V: collapse/uncollapse
- m: toggle mark of an item
- ,: go to next unread item
- R: mark all read
- Ctrl+R: Refresh all feeds
- l: show links
- g: goto link
nrss
Create ~/.nrss/config, the man page has an example config file.
- h: help
- C: toggle collapse all feeds
- Space: toggle open/collapse of article
- x: show all items in a feed
- R: refresh all feeds
- M: mark all read
- q: quit
olive
Start olive.
- h: help
- c-a: add feed
- M: mark all read
- Enter: read article
- p: refresh news list
- Q: quit
