Could anybody use a Reader app for Flyertalk?
 

Dear fellow Flyertalk members

For a while I've been looking for a way to read Flyertalk when I don't have high speed internet (or when I'm offline, like flying). I tried products that download websites to disk but they download way too much (which pisses off the admins) or too little (which is useless). RSS readers just see "feeds", not forums, sub-forums and topics and I cannot manage so many subscriptions.

The ideal solution would run on my notebook and download my new topics/messages in the background. Then let me organize/view them the way I want, read them (online or offline), and compose/upload posts.

I'm thinking about hiring someone to write such software. And I'm wondering: could this be a commercial product? (Obviously it would work with any vBulletin forum, not only Flyertalk.)

Some ideas for features:

• set rules on how to handle new forums, subforums, and topics. for each one I could
• subscribe (automatically download anything new that appears)
• unsubscribe (don't download new items)
• download only the first X messages (to review and decide whether to subscribe for future posts).

I would not buy such a product.

I think it would be a very cool product but my concern would be how it affects the website. It would take a tremendous amount of bandwidth to do. It sounds like it would be very similar to spidering and/or wget and both really tax the site.

That's exactly what I don't want-- to download anything more than necessary and waste bandwidth.

My first attempt to accomplish this was with a few different products that essentially downloaded the site. Even if I restricted it to a few forums and tried to filter only for threads with new messages, such products downloaded way more than necessary. I can understand why admins would hate such things. I gave up on such a solution.

So now my idea is an app that would download only the threads that I want to download, only in the forums that I'm interested in (like the starwood forum, for example). When a thread would appear, it would download only the first few messages, and it would only download more if I choose to subscribe to that thread.

My idea is that such a product should not use any more bandwidth than I would use if I were personally reading the forums online.

I would certainly be interested in it. I think it would be a great utility as long as it doesn't adversely affect the site. What happens when a user is subscribed to 30 threads and several of those threads are very active? It's far different to download several threads all at once then it is to actually click and read those same threads. While it may use the same bandwidth, it spreads the use out over time.

I think it would take a large amount of users using it at the same moment before it would even be a blip on flyertalk's bandwidth. Again, the idea is to minimize downloading, not to download the whole site.

I think you need to approach this from the Flyertalk owners side of things. Tell them what you are thinking of making and see if they are interested in offering it.

Well its not really a flyertalk issue, as I understand it its a vbulletin issue so it would work with any vbulletin forum. In any event I think it's a very good idea if it doesnt affect the performance of the forums.

while technically the app should not need the explicit approval of the admins/owners, I recognize it would be better to have that. I already considered a few features that would help ensure that admins are comfortable with it, including:

* ability to download & show banner ads offline, and remember clicks on them to open later when online.
* limits on the amount a user could download, to avoid people downloading the whole board

I will be happy if the admins support the reader. But it would work without their support or offering it to the users, just as a user can decide to browse flyertalk with IE, Firefox, Opera or other browsers, and they can even block the banners if they want. (technically blocking the banners might be against the Terms of Service that in theory all users accept in using the forum, but I didnt check.)

funny, I got more interest in this type of offline reader on other bulletinboards like bodybuilding.com that I thought would not be interested at all.

I assumed many FTers were like me and would like to catch up on FT while on the airplane, so I expected more interest here than on other sites. I guess I misread the situation...

You killed most interest here when you added a price tag. People here are all about getting it for free or at a discount. Now if you had a vbulletin forum reader for $45 but secret code for a $15 discount that we could share here, you might sell thousands!!!

I think the approach that would be desirable wouldn't be a reader at all, but rather an NNTP interface for vBulletin. There are perfectly good NNTP-based readers on the market already, simply make a way to use them.

It would have to run on the server side, however--it's something you would sell to the board operators, not to the users.


Bandwidth-wise, it would probably download a lot more messages than someone reading on-line would because you're probably not going to pick and choose threads. However, any given message is only downloaded once, whereas with normal reading it's often downloaded more than once. (If you come back to the thread later you redownload every message on that page that you had already seen. Post a message and you redisplay a page worth of messages.) You also don't download all the java etc. I'm not sure which factor would dominate.

Interesting idea, but instead of writing a new piece of software I think you should talk to a programmer. I mean, the concept of offline browsing etc. seems great - but I'm sure you could do something around RSS instead of writing something from scratch that will only work with vBulletin... It would be interesting to hear a programmers view on the subject. :)

To answer the OP's question, "Yes," I would be interested in this type of product. There are many times I would love to read FT on my MDA from T-Mobile and can't get an internet connection (i.e. plane, certain confernce rooms at work, toilet stall, etc.)

Count me in!

you've got it wrong. I need to offer 5000 free miles with purchase for $30! (now all the points/$ analysis will start... ;) )

That's the problem... I expect most admins on the biggest boards (the ones I am most interested in reading offline) would never install such a thing. So I think the solution should not rely on the admins installing anything.

We've done a fair bit of analysis, and it is clear that RSS on vBulletin is extremely limited. I think it was implemented with limitations purposely in order not to cannibalize native traffic/visits to the board.

Thanks! That's the kind of response I was hoping for... :D although probably the first version will not support reading on a handheld, the second version would.