Google Reader service loads only 100 most recent stories
I use the Reader service to sync my RSS feeds and am already aware that the content limitation setting (and the wish for its removal) has been mentioned here. My question is somewhat related:
Why does every feed with over 100 stories stop syncing when that 100-count is hit? No feed ever syncs over 100 news stories at a time. What makes this problem far worse (and more frustrating) is that if I "Mark All As Read" in Socialite, it marks every feed as read (including those over 100 that don't show up in Socialite). E.g., if I have a feed with 500+ stories and mark the 100 showing up in Socialite as read, all 500+ stories in Google Reader are marked as read.
Obviously, Socialite is properly communicating with the Google Reader account, if it can mark all those unseen stories as read. Why can't it then show all those in Socialite, so I'm not marking stories I've never seen as read? (All of these stories fall within the content limitation setting). Thanks in advance for your assistance.
Chris Elsee
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Support Staff 2 Posted by Nik Fletcher on 29 Jul, 2010 04:09 PM
Hi Chris
Thanks for your message. I've got to check with our developers about the items that we retrieve from Google Reader as it may be there is a limit to the number of items we download from Google. I'm sorry you've experienced the issue - I'll chat with our developer in the morning, and get back to you!
Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance.
Kind regards,
Nik
-- Nik Fletcher
Support & QA Manager, Realmac Software
Our support team are in the office between 9am and 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday, and we aim to answer all requests within one business day.
3 Posted by celsee on 29 Jul, 2010 04:38 PM
Hi Nik:
Great. I look forward to hearing from you.
As for a limit on the number of items downloaded from Google, that shouldn't be an issue. I used to use NetNewsWire, and it always synced all feeds, even those in excess of 2000 stories. I switched over to Socialite because, aside from the convenience of bundling Twitter and FB with my RSS into one app, NNW has become increasingly unstable—and therefore unreliable—as of late. (The main thing going on is that it will sync all your feeds, and resync them as "unread" after having already been marked as read.)
Assuming I can get Socialite to reliably display all of my RSS feeds, I will abandon NNW entirely.
Cheers,
Chris Elsee
4 Posted by jonhughes on 03 Aug, 2010 01:34 AM
Hi Nik,
Would be awesome if you guys could fix this - I've been bitten by it too but never got round to reporting it. I have one particular feed that doesn't update in real time and can drop up to 100 items at once, every few hours. I also need to (at least scan) all the entries, so if I should happen to miss one update, I've resorted to manage that one particular feed in an iPhone client or the website, which kinda defeats the purpose of Socialite in the first place...
Support Staff 5 Posted by Nik Fletcher on 03 Aug, 2010 07:53 AM
Hi Guys
Because of the way the Google API is setup, to retrieve greater than 100 unread items would actually be highly resource intensive, and likely hugely increase the number of API requests we make to Google (something Google may take issue with). We'll look into ways to offer an increased limit in the future, but I can't say when we might offer this.
Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance.
Kind regards,
Nik
-- Nik Fletcher
Support & QA Manager, Realmac Software
Our support team are in the office between 9am and 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday, and we aim to answer all requests within one business day.
6 Posted by celsee on 03 Aug, 2010 03:34 PM
Hi Nik:
As I stated in my earlier post, I don't think this would be a problem for Google. NetNewsWire syncs all of my Reader feeds all of the time (thousands of them), and I've never received any "over limit" errors. In my research, the only thing I found was a limit of 1000 starred items, though Reader API documentation seems sparse.
As for being resource intensive, the program would only spike system use during an active sync. After that, resource use would drop back down to near nothing. I think most users would prefer this trade, in order to have an accurate Google Reader count.
While I think other users will agree, I only speak for myself when I request that the team look for a definitive answer (perhaps direct from Google), rather than assuming Google "may take issue" with a higher API call-count.
Considering that the Google Reader service sync is one of Realmacsoftware's selling points for Socialite—"Socialite syncs beautifully with Google Reader. . . allows you to stay in sync with the service. . ."—one hopes that this is higher on the priority list than "can't say when we might offer this." As it works now, Socialite actually doesn't stay in sync with the service, but rather stays in partial sync. To paraphrase @jonhughes above, this defeats one of the central purposes of the application.
To be clear, I really like the concept of Socialite, which is why I am so interested in this shortcoming; I appreciate the work you do, but hope you can bring the Reader integration to parity with other RSS readers.
Chris Elsee
Support Staff 7 Posted by Nik Fletcher on 03 Aug, 2010 04:01 PM
Hi Chris
Thanks for your message. As I understand it, NetNewsWire uses a slightly different (Google-blessed) Reader API. Now. We're in contact with Google, however as Socialite is one of the larger clients (in terms of requests per day) it's something we do have to bear in mind. I've asked our developers to check into this further, however as we don't offer ETAs for fixes / changes it's hard to say when it might arrive. We don't offer ETAs as our release schedule is liable to change and it's possible that any offered timeframe can't be met.
In terms of the syncing, we've had Socialite out since October last year, and this is actually just the second request we've had in that time for this to be changed.
We're working on this, however I can't when this might appear.
Please let me know if I can be of any further assistance.
Kind regards,
Nik
-- Nik Fletcher
Support & QA Manager, Realmac Software
Our support team are in the office between 9am and 5pm UK time, Monday to Friday, and we aim to answer all requests within one business day.
8 Posted by celsee on 03 Aug, 2010 04:10 PM
Hi Nik:
Thanks, glad to hear it. And of course, I understand that you do not offer up ETAs, as it can lead to many complaints if you don't hit the mark!
Interesting that this is only the second request. . . maybe other users haven't noticed? Or perhaps they put individual feeds into Socialite, rather than using Reader. Or they just don't care. . .
At any rate, thanks again for looking into it.
Chris Elsee
Support Staff 9 Posted by Nik Fletcher on 04 Aug, 2010 02:03 PM
Hi Chris
Our userbase typically uses Twitter, Facebook and Google Reader. It's likely that folks run it all day (and so, mark as read frequently), hence why this doesn't appear that often :)
Cheers
-N
Nik Fletcher closed this discussion on 09 Aug, 2010 08:06 AM.