I could use some advice on RSS feed syncing options. Usually I would just use Feeder on my phone to grab my RSS feeds, then if I’m consuming content another device I would just check it on my phone and then open the content on anther device. Cross device sync would have been nice, but I got along fine without it. Recently though I’ve been in a reoccurring situation where the only way to to get internet is to place my phone in an odd location to get enough reception, then use the hotspot form a distance, so I’m at a point where I can’t have both my phone in my hand and internet at the same time. The Feeder app does support sync, but it only seems to sync the feeds I have subscribed to and not what I’ve marked as read (and doesn’t support anything other than android but waydroid would have offered a work around if it synced what I read).

I’d really prefer avoiding anything privacy invasive, and don’t have Google Play services on my phone so anything that requires that won’t work. I would also prefer avoiding self hosting if possible, although I have a VPS that I could spin something up on if I absolutely had to. Even if that was my only option though, I’m not sure what would be best. I don’t know of any apps on Fdroid that sync with FreshRSS, though it’s not like I’m entirely limited to it if there are apps elsewhere that fit what I need. I’ve also tried Nexcloud News, but the web interface seemed really unreliable marking things as read that I scrolled past and did not read, and not marking things as read that I had opened. Maybe it would be better on a local app on PC? But when I gave it a go before it led to me only using the app my phone like before and just searching things out on PC after checking my feeds on my phone, and since I preferred Feeder anyway it pretty quickly ended that experiment when cross device sync was less of an issue.

Is there decent privacy respecting way to sync RSS feeds across Android and Linux devices (or just Android using WayDroid as makeshift fix)? If not, and I had to self host, is there a decent good service setup that would have a good app experience on my phone and a good app or web experience on my computer?

  • Hexarei@programming.devEnglish
    3·
    1 year ago

    I used newsboat and synced the files for it for a long time, but lately I’ve used a selfhosted instance of MiniFlux. It has a super simple UI, and importantly to me, has keyboard shortcuts for all of the most common actions.

  • exu@feditown.comEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Re Nexcloud News: in the bottom left there’s a cog. Click that and disable the mark as read when scrolled by. Idk why this is the default but at least you can turn it off.

  • MiddledAgedGuy@beehaw.orgEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    I use newsboat (console based reader) and sync it’s config and database with syncthing. I don’t do this on my phone, though I’ve considered setting it up. It is available in termux. I don’t think it’ll make for a very pleasant mobile experience though. But, it’s a solution that meets your criteria.

  • toketin@feddit.itEnglish
    1·
    1 year ago

    Hi, I’m using Freshrss on a VPS too. What it’s missing to me it’s, like you, a foss app client. Because there a’re FeedMe or FocusReader that work pretty well, but they’re closed source and IIRC Chinese too.

    A few weeks ago I was thinking that maybe it should be possible to sync Feeder rss across different hosts through Syncthing, but I haven’t found experiences about online, neither I’ve given a try.