Filed under: Internet Tools, iPhone
Apple readying iPhone only RSS web app
It would seem that Apple is eating their own dogfood in regards to Web 2.0 applications for the iPhone. Go visit reader.mac.com, I'll wait. At the time of posting you'll get a splash page like the one shown above (assuming you aren't using an iPhone to visit it). The iPhone in that graphic clearly shows a web based RSS reader designed just for the iPhone (perhaps it syncs with your Safari RSS feeds). It is hosted on .Mac, so does this mean we'll be seeing some useful additions to .Mac very soon? I hope so!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Leonard Nimrod said 12:48AM on 6-28-2007
Why would we need a web-based RSS reader when Safari has one built in?
I think there is something else going on here. Or not; it could just be an example of an iPhone-centric app for web developers.
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abes said 1:07AM on 6-28-2007
If Apple is really going forward with this whole AJAX thing (lame), then they have the issue of people who want to develop apps will need a server. Maybe Apple is planning on providing such a service through .Mac? In which case, would you have to pay for it still? Are they partnering up with Google for this? And what language would they use? I'd guess GWT, except Apple has a huge dislike of Java (for reasons I agree with). Which would leave the most likely contenders: RoR and PHP.
Of course they *could* always just provide a scripting language for the iPhone... (*cough* Python *cough* Applescript *cough* F-Script)
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michael said 1:09AM on 6-28-2007
If you use the iphoney application from Marketcircle and visit the reader.mac.com webpage with the "iphone user agent" option enabled the page re-directs you to http://apple.com/iphone
Just to save the next person some time that thinks of doing the same thing.
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duscrom said 2:14AM on 6-28-2007
Wait... so.. for RSS feeds, you have to spend MORE money and get a $99 a year subscription to .mac?
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jrd said 2:06AM on 6-28-2007
It looks to me that the .mac has had a revamping since I left a month ago. Is this true or has it had this new look for awhile?
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Mike Feldstein said 2:22AM on 6-28-2007
"Wait... so.. for RSS feeds, you have to spend MORE money and get a $99 a year subscription to .mac?"
No.
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schlomo said 10:52AM on 6-28-2007
It seems to make perfect sense to me that they would put an RSS reader in Safari in the iPhone - they've been touting it as being the exact same as the Mac version. the only question this really begs is: what RSS feed would Apple possibly only want iPhone users to see?
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Julian Schrader said 5:46AM on 6-28-2007
I think this service doesn't sync with Safari RSS, but with Leopard's new Mail.app—Steve told us before it'd handle RSS as well.
http://julianschrader.de/20070628-iphone-mac-rss-reader-to-go/
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ross said 4:38AM on 6-28-2007
Hey Check Out iWidgetGallery!
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Browse on your Computer or iPhone with the widget! Preview and Use the Widgets Now!
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Alex Mills said 5:32AM on 6-28-2007
They have changed the iPhone image to the locked and clocked screen. Still cool though, wonder how long its gonna take to get to aus.
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artifex said 6:37AM on 6-28-2007
What's the user agent the iPhone reports when it's requested?
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pkn said 7:22AM on 6-28-2007
@artifex
Good thought. I just changed Firefox's user agent to "Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU like Mac OS X; en) AppleWebKit/420+ (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.0 Mobile/1A538a Safari/419" but then reader.mac.com just redirected me to http://www.apple.com/iphone/
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Matt said 8:56AM on 6-28-2007
Dumb, semi-related question: does .Mac synchronize the read/unread status of its RSS feeds when it syncs between two computers? If yes, then would it sync the read status when it syncs bookmarks with an iPhone? That would be a nice, built-in RSS alternative to using something like a mobile version of Google Reader, or waiting for a dedicated reader on the phone.
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Chris Coleman said 9:05AM on 6-28-2007
iPhone's Safari doesn't do RSS, that's why this is necessary.
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creativefreelance said 12:19PM on 6-28-2007
buzmob.com does RSS feeds fast & easy...cheerz!
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creativefreelance said 1:11PM on 6-28-2007
buzmob.com does RSS feeds fast & easy...cheerz!
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Greg G said 4:19PM on 6-28-2007
The question is, is this iPhone only because of hardware and software on the Phone, or is it because they have a nice little line in the script requiring an iPhone to continue?
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jordan said 11:36PM on 6-28-2007
Via user agent spoofing:
http://img241.imageshack.us/img241/180/picture2rq9.png
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leobolin said 2:30PM on 6-29-2007
Now it says this when I go there with the iPhone user agent:
"If you'd like to view an RSS feed, just enter the feed URL directly into Safari's address bar."
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