Testing the Particls RSS tool

After write-ups from Daniela Barbosa and Ross Dawson I thought I had better give this Particls product a whirl. Anything that asks

Q: got an RSS overload? on the front page has immediately got my attention

(A: Yes!!)

First off I had a little trouble working out what Particls actually is. This makes sense as I had the very same problem with RSS when I first started out with feeds. So at Daniela's suggestion I imported my OPML file from google reader to get me going, there are some how-to steps at the end of this post.

From a first glance Particls does the following;

- a nifty rolling news ticker made from all your RSS feeds that sits on your desktop
- alerts me when a story that really needs my attention comes in via email or SMS
- sifting through my 100's of feeds and monitors my attention on authors and topics,  alerting me when an important new story arrives in my inbox.

That has got to be really useful going forward the number of feeds in my inbox are steadily climbing.

So this wont replace google reader as my feed reader of choice but looks like a useful supplementary tool, especially the news ticker.

Getting started with the OPML file

First go into the 'manage subscriptions' page and select  'Import /Export', then you need to select  'Export  your subscriptions as an OPML file'. Finally go to the Particls 'Manage my feeds' page and add your OPML file there.

Then import the OPML file on the Particls 'common tasks' menu.

Comments

[Chris Saad]

Hi Pier,

Thanks for taking the time to write up a walkthrough - much appreciated! It's interesting that your blog tag line is about how many unread items you have. We've talked many times on our blog about the guilty feeling a feed reader gives you by always giving you the sense you have items to action.

Of course for information junkies like ourselves, we will always love the feeling of marketing things as read and getting a sense that we read everything. But hopefully Particls can just keep us in touch when we don't have time for the feed reader.

Thanks mate!

Chris