Review: Rhythm News Reader 33
While webOS certainly has its share of news reader apps, currently at well over one hundred, we welcome more, especially if they are as innovative and as well executed as Rhythm News Reader. So, news junkies take note, here is an early review of what could possibly be your next webOS news reader.
The app name itself, Rhythm News Reader, is the first indication that this isn't your standard rss feed reader. The association of "rhythm" and news isn't an obvious one, but after using the app the name is actually more than fitting, as information (news) moves fluidly in concert with images. My first impression of Rhythm News Reader was how reminiscent it is of other news apps like NewsRoom, Engadget for webOS, and TED for webOS. Comparing Rhythm News to these well-known apps is setting the bar high. While not yet as fully polished as these apps, the potential is there, making it worthy of comparison.
Rhythm News has many well-designed and well executed features. Most notably, it combines an impressive mix of images and headlines with a user-friendly UI. Unlike many news reader apps, which tend to be either news-heavy with a boring interface or graphically stunning but news-lite, Rhythm News is neither. "Rhythm" is a surprisingly good combination of news and information with an eye-popping graphical interface.
In addition to information, eye-candy and intuitive UI, Rhythm is also highly customizable. Within minutes of first opening the app, I not only had ten or so of my favorite news feeds loaded in order of importance, I also had the app visually tweaked and updating just to my liking. Other features include caching for off-line viewing, multiple viewing modes (portrait scrolling, landscape scrolling, notifications ticker and so on) and a literal plethora of preferences like "night mode" and number of feeds loading per site. Simply put, there is no shortage of customizable features here whatsoever.
Rhythm News Reader also features a few niceties that are uncommon and deserving of special note. First, is how well thought out the UI is. There is logic in Rhythm's ability to deliver a lot of at-a-glance news from many different sources at the same time. At any given time, a screen glance will give you no less than nine stories from three sites, which without changing screens, scrolls horizontally or vertically to quickly scroll more stories or more sites respectively. This is just the main screen view. From there you can branch out in equally logical fashion going directly into specific site views or specific story views. Next in line of niceties, Rhythm's gestures work not only in portrait mode but in landscape mode as well. The app juggles lots of images and info, so, having the gesture area always active is a very nice bonus. (I often won't use landscape in other apps specifically because of the lack of gesture support in landscape mode.) Final note in the niceties department is the special attention that has obviously been given to the graphical feel of Rhythm. Like webOS itself, the UI in Rhythm has a physicality to it. The images within Rhythm interact so well with the touchscreen interface that they seem to exist outside of the virtual world. Nice touches indeed and kudos to the developer for the extra effort on all counts.
For an app this robust it does have a very few functionality issues and minor bugs to work out. Below is a description of what is lacking or in need of improvement in this early iteration of Rhythm News to make it as polished as some the webOS app allstars.
First are the functionality issues. While basic, but an improvement we'd like to see, is a type of back button with memory recalling where you last were as you navigate backwards through the news feeds. Unlike the back button of any internet browser, the back gesture in Rhythm takes you to the top of the main page vs. the point where you left off. If you have a lot of feeds, the back button memory issue will cause you to do more scrolling than a Windows Phone 7 smartphone (dig intended). Lack of functionality in the notifications is another early version weakness. Notifications do work but when compared to the feature-rich feel of the full app, they feel more like an afterthought, as there is little interaction with the full app via the notifications.
Finally, there appear to be some very minor bugs that while they are noticeable with heavy use, they don't affect the app's overall experience. First, tapping the icon from the launcher menu when the app is already open should navigate the app into active card view (normal for a webOS app). For now, tapping the Rhythm News icon under these circumstances does nothing. Then there is an occasional glitch in smooth horizontal scrolling and loading of stories from the site-specific stage of the app.
The list of improvements we'd like to see are minor and could easily go unnoticed by many users. More importantly, any currently needed improvements don't outweigh what is unique and well done overall. Considering how well executed Rhythm News already is for an app just out of the gate, there is little doubt, minor debugging and feature enhancements are on the way.
In summary, Rhythm News Reader makes your news feeds easy to find, easy to manage and good-looking to boot. In a general sense, Rhythm feels like a virtual "news magazine" vs. a virtual "news paper." For the hard-core news junkies the lack of clearly tracking feeds (i.e. new stories, stories read, and so on) may make Rhythm not enough of a nuts and bolts reader. On the other hand, if you're an avid magazine-website kind of reader (eye-candy with your news), then there is no better reader available. Rhythm News Reader is a solid 4-star app in current form with 5-star potential written all over it. It is now available in the Palm App Catalog for the price of $3.99.
Developer note: Earlier this year, PreCentral featured a dev spotlight with the developer of Rhythm News Reader, 15 yr-old Andrew Munsell (aka WizardApps). Andrew is fast making a name for himself within the webOS community with apps like Pixi Dust, a Hot Apps winner ($50,000 third place), and the well-known Stickyman and Weatherman 2.0 apps.
Pros
Great balance of news/information and graphical aesthetics Gestures work in landscape and portraitCons
Back gesture lacks last position memory Notifications limit interaction with full appScore
4.0
33 Comments
I'm not using a WebOS phone yet, though I intend to check it out whenever the newer phones arrive from HP Palm. Seeing this app reminds me of one I just started using on my Droid 2 called Pulse. For anyone who likes this app but has switched to Android or, like me, is waiting to switch to Palm, check out Pulse in the Android Market. Very neat style of news reader.
hey, you won't have to wait long. Hp Palm is planning to release phone in June!
http://www.webosroundup.com/2010/12/rumors-galore-why-isnt-hp-at-ces-whe...
Hmm, this really looks good. I like the feel of the UI (it really does remind me of the Engadget and TED apps). Probably worth the purchase to try out. I wonder if there are any YouTube vids of it.
PS: I just now noticed the improved commenting system. How long has this been in?? It's pretty badass, guys! I was gonna suggest that you integrate Disqus, but this works, too. Awesome!
Since this morning it would appear.
if you like the UI, i think you will be really satisfied with the UI of Pulse.
I just noticed it too.
A YouTube video is now available:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCE-v-vvgrI
This looks great, but when I tried to download it, it says "This is not a valid WebOS application"
This message usually appears when the app isn't entirely published yet. It looks like it should be available now, however.
Wow, what a shameless ripoff of Pulse.. right down to the color scheme, left-justified tabs, and even the lower case blue logo.
Who cares! Rip-off or not webOS needed an app like this and I'm guessing the coding (which is the proprietary part of an app) is from scratch. So happy to have it.
if you have that kind of attitude, app innovation for webos will be non-existent and you will most likely reap the benefits later when webos is twitching.
their fault for not bringing the pulse app to webos.
Haha win! I love when people say it's just a ripoff, but the guys don't choose to bring their app to our OS. Nobody would be ripping it off if it already existed here. Get with it.
Too funny... or not funny at all... Just bought the app (which I love) but the PreCentral feed is broken of all things. PreCentral, please get this fixed so I can have my fix! Sure, there are other sites but PC is at the top of my Rhythm News feeds and right now it's a whole bunch of darkness.
Looks exactly like pulse on my iPad. I like pulse on the big iPad, but I still prefer to use newsroom on the pre (when my iPad isn't handy) instead of this pulse ripoff.
Newsroom looks better on a smaller screen, IMO.
What the freak is up with the comments? You have to comment to read comments?
good grief! what monkey decided it was best to put 'rhythm' on the top part of each screen. that's valuable space on a screen of limited size.
Well, Pulse did it so naturally "Rhythm" has to do it too.
let's ask the 15-year-old...you get these hotshot developers who are making things in the crib, but these logical solutions regarding UI just don't seem to matter. they see that they can make it work, so they do, and they collect on it. its great that the apps are there, but they are certainly not refined.
The apps have to be there, and there has to be competition to encourage refinement.
To clarify.... if the app is never made, a competitor is never made, there is never a need for an app to be refined if it is the only player. (BTW, I currently use Newsroom and love it) Any app in an area that has user specific features (not everyone will like every reader apps design) the more competition the better it is for the end user.
An option for toggling this is in the next update.
Ya got me hooked on News Room, and now ya want me to try something else? No thanks. I didn't think News Room would be that great, but I was wrong. But I ain't takin' the bait for this one. If it ain't broke, don't fix it, my old Pappy says. (Don't ask me why I'm talking this way. Could be the eggnog talkin'... )
They've priced it at £3.18 in the UK store when it should be £2.59, plus the fact that they've 'borrowed' someone else's idea I don't know how they have the gaul to charge that much for it. 99p is the most I'd pay for this.
How well does it integrate with Google Reader? I'd like to use it, but I'll stick with Feeds if Rhythm doesn't integrate well with Google Reader.
I found another bug- no pixi support.
I'm testing it on the Pixi as we speak. It looks like everything should be ok and I will probably make it available for the Pixi when I submit the next update.
News Room has me spoiled despite its performance issues. Icon splash screen with gesture to view ONLY unread articles is untouched in any other news app. I will not stop using news room unless somebody does an equal or better job than this.
$4? No. I'll wait until I get a tablet first, where an app like this will work best.
Just bought it for my Palm Pre 2. Seems like a great app overall but my feed list keeps getting reset every now and then, making the app unusable :/ Could it be a webOS 2.0 specific issue ? @TIWizard: let me know if there's anything I can do. Cheers.
Could you email support [at] wizardapps.net? I haven't done testing on WebOS 2.0 because I don't have a Pre 2, but I would love to get this solved and determine if this is a problem with the newer OS.
I'm having the same issue where my feeds essentially get deleted. I have version 1.4.5 of webOs.
Thus, in my opinion this app is a POS. I also have an issue where it takes all the resources of the phone to update the feeds. When it does complete, which could take hours, you literally have to reboot the phone. I'm guessing there is a very bad memory leak. I would not recommend buying this app at all. It doesn't even look that great. Newsroom is better, at least I can see all my feeds without getting out my magnifying glass.
I love Newsroom too, but it has not been updated in MONTHS! Maybe this app needs an update or two, so does Newsroom. The difference here is that they will actually come in this app. I can't wait to see where this app is in a couple months! And @TIWIZARD, if you need a Pre 2, message @Adora on twitter and see how to get a free/discounted developer phone. Thanks for the great app!