Sputnik 1.0.5

RSS reader for desktop or laptop computer

Sputnik is a lightweight and efficient RSS reader that aims to deliver an appealing environment for reading daily news, eliminating the need of a web browser.

The modern design, combined with the RSS tagging and management make a decent feature set that can compete with a wide range of similar applications.

Sputnik has the advantage of being a portable utility, which translates into the fact that an installation process is not required, nor does it leave a footprint on the system registry.

It sports a daring and appealing design that attracts the eye, but this is one of its many strengths. The main window is organized in such a way, that most of the space is allocated to the contents of the feed, while the list of URLs is stored on its left side.

When you add a new feed, you are required to enter the URL of the website, as well as to select an existing category to be stored in or to create a new one. Categories can also be managed from within the ‘Organize’ menu, which also allows you to rename or to delete the entries altogether.

Each of the articles can be tagged, opened inside the browser or marked as read (there’s also a global possibility to mark everything as read). Moreover, you can import feeds from an XML file and alternatively, export the ones in your list locally, for later use.

The tagging feature plays a major role, because once you start making associations between various articles and tags, filtering the news will become very convenient.