NewsFox

Originally this was the Overview document which is the offline help file for NewsFox. It is meant to be modified, updated and polished so that it would be ready to replace the present one if such a decision should be made one day. However, even until then this English only version should be useful for a number of people. It is meant to remain concise and compact. No internal or external links on this page, please.

Overview of features

Adding feeds (Subscribing)

• Add new feeds using the Add feed button.
• New feeds can also be imported from an OPML file on the Options menu.
• NewsFox can also read Firefox Live Bookmarks. You can choose which Live Bookmarks to read with NewsFox using the Live Bookmarks button.

• NewsFox works with the 1-click subscribe function of the URL bar icon in Firefox. It is listed among the choices automatically and you can make it the default choice.

• Storage feeds are also added with the Add feed button. They contain copies of the articles you drag onto them. Changes like deleting or tagging made to the original article or the copy does not change the other one.

• The Feed Options menu is available when a feed is selected.

Deleting feeds (Removing)

• Remove a feed permanently using the Delete feed button. This will delete all its articles. The feed is removed from all groups.

Refreshing (Checking for/downloading new articles)

• Download new articles using the Refresh button.
• Options for automatically downloading new articles can be set on the Options menu.

Managing articles

• Articles are marked as read when selected. Read/unread and flagged/unflagged status of an article can be toggled by clicking the appropriate icon.
• Articles can be deleted using the Delete selected icon.
• Articles can be re-sorted by clicking on the column headers. The default is to have the newest articles at the top. To reverse the order click on the read/unread column header.

Groups

• There is a group named 'FEEDS' that contains all your feeds. Feeds can belong to as many other groups as you wish. There is only one copy of a feed: when you mark an article as read, it is marked read in all groups. When you delete a feed, it is deleted from all groups.
• Groups are added with the Add group button.

• Regular groups are used to organize feeds. When a group is added you have to choose which feeds should show up in it.
• There are groups formed by searching among feeds. Search results are highlighted in the article.

• Tag groups contain all the articles that have that tag.
• All types of groups are deleted with the Delete group button. Deleting a tag group does not delete the tag.
• The Group Options menu is available when a group is selected.

Feature comforts

• Feeds can be reordered within groups and groups can be reordered using drag and drop.

• Tooltips explain the button meanings.
• Context menus are available when a group, a feed or articles are selected.
• Keyboard shortcuts can be set on the Options menu, and a list of shortcuts is available on the Help menu.

• The Statusbar button serves to start NewsFox and to autosubscribe to feeds.

• The toolbars can be removed.

• In the unlikely event that all your feeds disappear, there is a recovery option on the Options menu.

Advanced features
(Advanced features should simply be listed to awaken interest.)

• Keywords in the articles and the titles of the articles which contain them are highlighted.

• Articles can be tagged.

• The Interest (Pr) value of an article is the user's probable (pr) interest based on a Bayesian filter.

• Articles in groups can be exported to a local file in RSS 2.0 format.

• The Filtered Web function controls downloading extended articles.

• NewsFox can be customized editing CSS files.