Getting Ready for the Demise of Google Reader: feedly


feedly is one of those alternatives that got a lot of mentions when the news about Google Reader came out. What got my attention is that it was always mentioned as being organized and easy on the eyes.

feedly was much more difficult for me than bloglovin'. I'm a digital immigrant. I'm an SLP, not a techie. I want easy. That being said, I think feedly has some really good points.

At sign-up, feedly will ask to access your Google blogs. The blogs go to feedly *snap* just like that. So easy. What I don't like is that this is the same login every time. I don't have a separate login for feedly. Maybe that's my ignorance. And I'm not ready to unfollow all of my blogs in Google Reader. I like a safety net. I feel like I'm getting duplicate blog readers right now.

But onto feedly... this is the left bar upon login:

Today - all the posts from today.
Saved for later - don't have time to read? Use this handy little icon.

I really like the next section. I grouped my blogs. This way, I can look at just SLP blogs or just creative blogs. Selecting ALL will give me everything. ALL is great if I'm caught up on blog reading and just a few new ones pop up. Categories are wonderful when I am not caught up and want to read later or on the weekend, which I've obviously done this week!

The Index shows me my categories and what blogs have new posts I haven't read:
Here's a closer look at options on the Index:
I have 6 categories coming from 254 blogs and 187 posts to read.

On the top right corner are more tools:
The gear allows filtering of the Index by favorites. There's a refresh button. The arrow will take me to "next", which is the layout of the blogs.

History shows what I've read, so if I scan through a blog and then think, "Hey, I need to know more about that", I can use this section.

Themes is pretty simple. Just choose a color you like. I chose green.
Preferences is where I get to play a little bit. 
Basically, I kept the defaults already set for feedly. These are really the only categories I changed. On my Start Page, I want to see All, not just Today.

The Default View allows viewing choices, which is nice. Select an option and then hit the refresh button in the top right. I didn't do that and wondered why the view wasn't changing. See my second paragraph.

I like the mosaic view because it has nice and even rows and columns, like this:

I like the pictures, the titles, and the start of entries. And even if a blog doesn't have a picture, feedly still allows for the even view, like this row:
Here is the Titles Only View:

The Magazine View:

The Cards view:
And samples from the Full Articles view:



Reading a post gives lots of options. The tools at the top left allow for sharing on social media, saving for later, and tagging. The tools at the top right allow going to the next blog or marking as read by hitting the trashcan. Yes, I know it looks like the trashcan should be deleting the post, but it's not.

The same tools are at the bottom.

What I like about feedly is the +tag button. Just select this, Create Tag, and type in a name. For this post  about language, I just create a tag and now I have a new tag in the left bar!
I can go back and look at posts. I don't have to think about when I could have read the post or even which blog the idea I'm looking for came from! Isn't this handy?!? bloglovin' is much easier, but I really like how I will be able to categorize posts. Kind of like pinning. 

My Summary: feedly takes time to set up. There is a learning curve involved, at least for me. My favorite parts are the views and +tag. I think these two options are useful enough that feedly is worth the time to set up, learn and use.




your photo name

4 comments

  1. SUPER timely for me! I, too, and CRUSHED I'm losing Google Reader. Maybe Feedly is the way to go ...

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hi Laura,
    This is SUCH a helpful blog post! I'm going to bookmark it, so I can utilize while I'm trying to navigate Feedly. Bummer about Google Reader changing, but hopefully this will work out. At least we have your directions to help us figure out the changes--Thank you!
    Stacey
    http://mrscolegrovesfourthgrade.blogspot.com/

    ReplyDelete
  3. Stacey, thanks for the kind comments!

    ReplyDelete

Back to Top