I am wondering how others read the forum. Do you read it directly or do you read it through some kind of newsreader or other software?

I have been looking for a better way to read the forum. I'd like a good way of seeing what I've already read and saving off information. I've tried RSS feeds through Thunderbird and Google Reader and have been disappointed that it won't group by topic heading and that I can't get messages that are "log-in" only. (Maybe I'm missing something?)

I guess I'm kind of looking for something that works like the old offline newsreaders used to do.

Any suggestions from the gods of geekdom?

I log in and then use the "View posts since last visit" link on the upper right side of the main index.

That gets you to
http://www.twincitiescarry.com/forum/se ... d=newposts

Of course, if you sign out without reading things ... you get the idea.

That's what I do now too. You mention one of the problems but I don't like that I have to remember which page I'd last read under a particular heading.

Google Reader wouldn't be a bad solution except it just shows them in temporal order, not grouped by subject; and as far as I can tell, there is no way to have the reader link with my ID and password, so that all the posts show up.

I guess I want to be even lazier than I am now!

ironbear,
I'm with you. I was using google reader until I got access to some non-public areas. I could deal with the lack of threaded-ness...this encouraged me to actually read everything.

Now, I generally use the "posts since last visit" link, but I've found that if I get distracted or if I simply leave the browser up for long periods of time, that the forums software decides I'm done "visiting" after some too-short period of inactivity and marks what I haven't yet read as read.

I would like it if it doesn't auto mark as read leaving me to freely come and go without losing my read status, i.e. "posts I haven't actually read"

I can't believe I never saw that button before, that's going to be a timesaver!

I think that if you do that and occasionally hit "refresh" you will get new ones that sneak in while you were reading others....................

.