Feed Sidebar Update
Feed Sidebar is an extension for the Mozilla Firefox web browser that displays the items from your newsfeeds in a sidebar. It can be downloaded for free from Mozilla Add-ons.
I just uploaded an update for Feed Sidebar to Mozilla Add-ons. Changes since version 3.0.1 include:
New Features
- Added an option to always have new items open in tabs
- Added a button to the search bar to quickly show all items, both read and unread
- Removed "Mark All as Read" and "Mark All as Unread" from feed and item context menus
Bug Fixes
- Sidebar now shows the name you gave the feed, not the feed's default title.
- Marking a feed (or all items) as read is now much faster. In my tests, it only took about 5% of the time it used to.
- Clicking on a feed name in the preview pane now opens the homepage, not a useless blank page.
The update can be installed from Mozilla Add-ons, or you can wait for Firefox to notify you of the available update. If you're not using Feed Sidebar, give it a try; it has seen a lot of improvements in the past few months.
Christopher Finke is a software engineer at Mahalo. He is available for birthday parties and bar mitzvahs. 
August 4th, 2008 at 9:20 am
Why did you remove mark all as read? That was a great feature, please bring it back.
August 4th, 2008 at 2:28 pm
I second what Kevin said, why have you removed the mark all as read/unread ? That was a great feature indeed. Another point, I have issue with the color of the preview tab in the feeds. Under linux, when using a dark theme, the preview pane is using a white background and a white font, resulting in a non-vieweable area. What I had to do to make it work is to edit the xpi file to change the background color of the preview pane, quite annoying if you ask me ! Other than that, great extension and a must have for any rss reader ! Congrats !
August 4th, 2008 at 4:24 pm
Kevin and Pat: You can still Mark All as Read using the second toolbar button in the sidebar, or by right-clicking in the blank area below the feed items and choosing "Mark All as Read." The option was removed from the other context menus due to a large number of complaints that it was too easy to accidentally click, or that it was confusing.
August 4th, 2008 at 10:13 pm
I just installed 3.1... well-- THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU!!! for the addition of the "Always open in new tab" option! :) Thanks for leaving the toolbar button for "Mark All as Read", although it took a minute for me to realize it was there. Finally, yes, it is MUCH FASTER now when marking feeds as read, so again-- THANK YOU!
It's great to find a plugin developer who is both active AND listens to user feedback... I hope you keep it up! :)
August 5th, 2008 at 7:55 am
Found it !! It was a bit confusing at first but now I understand why you did those changes. Were you aware about the bug under linux vs dark themes for the preview pane ?
August 6th, 2008 at 8:08 am
hey thanks, I found it too. I love this reader btw.
August 11th, 2008 at 4:45 pm
Cool, I think I'm going to try this out!
August 15th, 2008 at 2:29 pm
First of all, thanks for producing such a great add-on. It is my primary source for getting updates for feeds, and I enjoy the good integration with Firefox and its simplicity.
One problem that nags me is the top few icons. As the reader updates, the "update" icon disappears. In addition, the quick icons are not in line; some are higher or lower then others.
Thanks again for developing such a great piece of software.
August 15th, 2008 at 6:59 pm
Hi there, same Pat that posted before ! ;)
I realized that a simple, yet useful feature is missing from this wonderful extension. How about a "sort feeds by name" when right-clicking in an empty space ?? I like to set the feeds by name and when adding new feeds, it doesn't get reordered automatically.
Thanks and continue your good work !
August 20th, 2008 at 9:24 pm
This is exactly what I've been looking for - a notifier that lets me open them in their home windows with one click - but I'm having problems with this sidebar. When I select open all in Tabs, it just marks them as read and doesn't open them- all I want is all the unread items to be opened in a tab each. I also cannot figure out to only have it show the unread items. Also is there a way (other then manually) to sort the feeds into alphabetical order? HELP please.
Thanks
September 1st, 2008 at 9:19 am
I agree, this is really a helpful extension. Many thanks! I would like to add two feature requests for one of the following releases:
1. Grouping of feeds (by using the groups of the firefox favorites or adding folders manually)
2. Individual settings for feeds (e.g. some feed should be updated each 15 minutes, maybe anotherone once per day).
btw: all the best for your collaboration project ;-)
Best regards
Holger