Library clips

Just saw Robin’s post on Google Mini Search (Google AJAX Search)…have a play.

You can put this widget on your blog or Google startpage and it will allow you to search Google and display the results in the an ajax window…you don’t have to launch to the Google website…pretty nifty, but even though this is more convenient, launching to the Google website displayed ads, actually I think ads will eventually be included (so little space).

Anyway, you can set your mini-search to return results for different sections, like; local, web, blogs, video…and you can have a default search results displaying…so everytime a user comes to your site they will see the search results for your default search.

Another nifty thing is that each hit has a copy link…haven’t tried this out, but from Robin’s post it seems people can copy a hit from a google search and include it in the comments box when they are adding a comment to a blog post.

Only thing missing is to be able to site search a blog, eg. check the box to search the web or check the other box to search this site.

Even though the search results can be displayed within your blog, without a site search it doesn’t cut it (won’t be long hopefully)…so for now I’ll stick with Blogbar.

Hang on, it can site search via the API…hmm, still I want to be able to choose to search my site or search the web…I’ll look into it.

I was looking for a nice and simple web-based RSS Reader for a friend and came across Alesti.

What I like about it, is it’s simple and clear to use…easy to try out as it has OPML import/export.

Another winning feature is that it has the 3 pane email feel, this crosses over well for newbies as the playground feels familiar.

The drawback is you can’t change the 3 pane look (unlike Attensa online)…although, you can read full-text via a preview button in the top pane, but this doesn’t cut it.
There feedback response is very quick, they tell me they are considering a 2 pane option, and also an option to read content in reverse order.

You can keep a post “as read”…you can also ask to only see “unread items”.

When adding a feed you can change the name of the subscription, and choose tags to organise your feeds
…meaning you can read a tag (folder) river of news, or even a general level river of news.

NOTE: A word of warning concerning when you have no unread posts (is that ever the case); “show read items” is a feature in your post panel, but it is also a feature in your subscription panel…if “show read items” is not pressed in, you will not see your feed subscriptions names until new items appear.

What else…you can bookmark items (kind of like flagging)…and the other killer feature is you can turn it into a Public RSS Reader (even keep certain feeds private). The only others I know of that have this feature are Bloglines and Feedshow.

I’m using it as my ego reader…check it out.

Lastly it is also available in Spanish and German.

Some others (criteria is a simple, no frills RSS Reader)

Rocket RSS Reader - just didn’t happen
NewsAlloy - even too much for me…this is for the superpower user
Newsgator Online - this is the best of all
Bloglines - this is great, but lacks a river of news…maybe a bit too powerful
feedexa - not really
Feedlounge - costly
BeanRocket - not quite, but interesting
Rojo - too powerful
RSSMAD - not bad at all…didn’t seem to be a river of news option
Newsburst - excellent…only thing is it is branded
Findory Favourites - not what I’m after
Technorati Favourites - not what I’m after
BloxOr - not browser friendly
aggregato - not invited
Web Feed Reader - a winner, but lacks read/unread
wURLdbook - too advanced
YodPod - maybe too simple
Orijinn - good
Pluck web - just didn’t happen
Attensa Online - excellent, but very moody
FeedBucket - not really
gritwire - too flashy
Google Reader - no way
Feedmarker - too social
FeedShow - very good
Startpages - not applicable

Any others to consider?