Using @netnewswire and @sod’s “conversation on micro.blog” version of feeds is by far the best way to read “the timeline”.

Don’t lose my place. Don’t check too often because I know it will be there waiting for me when I am ready. Can quickly go to the right spot to reply.

@toddgrotenhuis I like that idea. I think I’ll try it.

@toddgrotenhuis another bonus I forgot to mention:

I read these feeds as a group, so it’s all in chronological order.

@toddgrotenhuis Thanks, I'm glad you find it useful!

@sod @toddgrotenhuis Wait, what is this alternate feed about? That sounds awesome, as I’m also viewing my timeline in RSS.

@pimoore I'm hosting a handful of experimental feeds over at micro.blog.via.dahlstrand.net. They add a Conversation on Micro.blog link to each entry like this:

@sod Oh this is some serious wizardry! 😎 🧙‍♂️ Will this become a default option or have a plug-in at some point?

@pimoore Those feeds are for subscribing to discovery, emoji, and user timelines, so it doesn't really make sense as a plug-in to your blog. But it could be a default option for the official feeds. That's something for @manton to meditate over. 😊

@pimoore So good to see you back on the timeline, by the way. You've been missed!

@sod This is really great.

@sod @manton I’d love to see this as an official option. Getting into the conversations is the only sticking point to using RSS for the timeline.

@sod Thanks Sven, I’ve missed everyone myself so I’m glad to join in here again!

@toddgrotenhuis I didn’t even know that this was an option. Thank you @sod for making this available. I’m going to play around with @netnewswire and set this up later. Gratitude 🙏🏻

@sod @toddgrotenhuis How often are these feeds refreshed - if I am asking the correct question?! I have just added it to Feedbin (via NetNewsWire) and with my impatience in trying something new, the feed is about 45 minutes behind the timeline despite refreshing.

@sod Just to update. The RSS feed for my timeline does update, but it appears to be almost 2 hours behind the actual timeline, maybe more (just going by what I see as I type this). Is this expected behavior?

@crossingthethreshold To avoid overloading Micro.blog's servers, I cache my version of the feeds for 120 seconds, but that means they shouldn't lag behind the official feed for much more than a couple of minutes or so. I'm looking at my version of your feed right now, and it's identical to the official one. The latest post is from 30 minutes ago.

@sod Thank you for checking on my feed. I have been keeping an eye on it for the last hour or so. The last post the feed is showing is from an hour ago. Since then there have been 7 posts to the timeline, with the last being 8 minutes ago.

@toddgrotenhuis @sod This is great, thank you!

@sod I think that it might have something to do with how Feedbin works. If I put my micro.blog feed onto the iPhone account of @netnewswire, ie no third party feed reader, the feed is up to date with the timeline.

@crossingthethreshold Yeah, your provider can cache the files for however long they want: minutes, hours, or days. That's outside my control, unfortunately. 😢

@toddgrotenhuis I like this idea. @sod

@sod Is there a way to have this link open in the Micro.blog app, as opposed to the web?

@pimoore @sod It makes sense to have a special version of the official feeds to provide this. We can't actually make it the default because the web interface uses the feeds internally.

@pimoore Hmm, good question, I don't know. Is there support for opening conversation links in the Micro.blog app, @manton? Something like microblog://conversation/12345678 or similar?

@pimoore YES! That would be a better solution than an in-app browser. @sod @manton

@sod @pratik @pimoore Yep! It's microblog://open/12345. Should work on Mac and iOS.

@manton @pimoore Awesome. Does that mean @sod has to edit his Discover feeds and change the link to the Conversation for this to work?

@toddgrotenhuis Awesome!! @sod 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼

@pratik @pimoore @manton Yes, and I've made the necessary changes now. Next time the feeds are updated, you should see two links instead of one:

@sod @pratik @manton Oh this is so full of win. Thanks, Sven!

@sod Fantastisk!

@sod I guess I'm missing the fine print... but I don't see that on my blog... will check if there is an updated version of your plugin.

@numericcitizen This is not a plug-in or something that will change the behavior of your blog, it's about the experimental Micro.blog feeds I provide for use in a feed reader.

@sod got it! Is this for the long run or it's really experimental?

@sod You are so awesome.

@sod This is super cool! I've already tried adding the feeds to NetNewsWire and I see the link that should open the conversation in app. Is this supposed to work on iOS? I tap the link but nothing happens.

@sherif Some services might decide to block the microblog URI scheme that is needed to open the Micro.blog app. I know for sure that Feedbin does, maybe you're using them to sync your NetNewsWire subscriptions? If so, try adding the feeds directly to NetNewsWire instead.

@sod Ah interesting. I'm using iCloud to sync the feeds in NNW. If I tap and hold the link I can see the microblog:// url prefix, but tapping still has no effect. Sounds like it's an issue on my end though (?)

@numericcitizen It's definitely experimental and might go away at any time. That said, I'm subscribing to some of these feeds myself and have no immediate plans to shut them down. But again, it's a random free service on the web (just like MySpace, Google Reader, or Twitter) and will cease to exist someday. So don't depend on it. 😅

@sod Cool! 👍

@sherif Interesting indeed! Maybe @netnewswire can bring some clarity: is NNW on iOS okay with links using URI schemes other than http and https? microblog, for example.

@sod I’m having the same problem on iOS and the Mac. If I copy the link on the Mac and paste it into Safari it then works.

@tomselmes Yeah, some app developers might choose to block certain links and other elements from the feeds. Unless there's a setting that toggles this behavior, there is not much you can do, I'm afraid, other than making a feature request to the developer or switching to a feed reader that allows links to open other apps.

@sod maybe this is something that could be built in MB ? Cc @manton

@sod @sherif This must be something with NNW blocking the URI scheme. I tried adding the feed in the local iPhone account, but the in-app link still didn’t work.

@sod 🙏🏼

@sod @netnewswire it works for me on Mac but not iOS 🤷‍♂️

Love the idea though!

@manton I experience a couple of oddities with this URI scheme. Opening, for example, microblog://open/17620435 works as expected on macOS if the Micro.blog app is already running in the background. If not, the app is opened with the timeline showing instead of the conversation thread.

On iOS, the app is opened on the timeline, regardless of the app running in the background or not. Is this just me, or can you confirm this behavior? 🤔

@sod yes, I confirm the same behavior on my experience.

@sod I do think there's an assumption that the app is already running. Although I can't reproduce what you're seeing on iOS... It seems to work correctly for me. (Testing in the TestFlight beta app, though.)

@toddgrotenhuis This looks very cool. I’m definitely gonna have to play with this some

@manton @sod Confirm regular release iOS version only opens to the timeline for me as well.

@sod @manton Speaking of these feeds, is there one for a user’s mentions? That might be my favorite if it were to exist!

@jarrod I was going to say I kind of do something to filter down to reply’s but it would miss if it was just mentioned in a short post I think so might have to check.

@ericmwalk I thought about filtering, but Reeder Classic doesn't let me set up filters with feeds followed using its native iCloud syncing. I'd have to go another route in that case.

@jarrod @sod There’s JSON Feed of your mentions but it requires authorization right now, so it can’t be used in most feed readers.

@jarrod ah yes that makes sense. I am using a FreshRSS instance to just pull in things and connected that to Reeder Classic.

@manton Ah, interesting. That might be fun to play around with. How would I find that feed?

@jarrod You'll find it at https://micro.blog/posts/mentions.