Fixed

• Smaller Bug Fixes

Fixed

• Smaller Bug Fixes

Fixed

• Fixed timer countdown speed
• Optional Get Plus for legacy users

Changed

• Improved clear all button behaviour

Fixed

• Fixed a bug preventing music mode from jumping to the next song

Changes

• Minimum vertical spacing reduced to 0

Fixed

• Fixed potential crash in article view with YouTube videos
• Fixed an issue causing preview images to only appear after full sync
• Fixed potential crash with empty themes
• Fix for potentially empty preview images
• Fixed lag on adding a new account
• Added a couple missing translations

New

• Spanish, French and Chinese localisation

Fixed

• Crash on creating a new timer [macOS]

Changes

• Disabled “Hide Home Indicator” by default [iOS]
• Provisional notifications, instead of asking for notification permission on first launch
• Disabled prefilling in the save/subscribe view [iOS]
• No longer restors settings window on relaunch [macOS]

Fixed

• Initial state of article filter in article list toolbar
• Fixed a possible crash scrolling in the article list
• Fixed an issue with ProMotion on iPhones [iOS]
• Performance improvements with disabled link tooltips [macOS]
• Fixed potentially large quick share button
• Fixed wrongly restoring last open folder [iOS]
• Fixed layout issue in integrated web view
• Fixed clearing articles after marking all above read (if enabled)
• Fixed cleaning list on tapping current article filter

Changed

• Rewrote music mode playback engine from scratch

Fixed

• Fixed repeat in music mode
• Timer now stops at the end of playback in music mode
• Shuffle and repeat are now respected immediately
• Fixed purchase reminder even if already plus

Changed

• Notifications are now marked time sensitive
• Larger Timers on iPads [iOS]

New

• Initial iOS 16 support [iOS]
• Article Lockscreen Widget [iOS]
• Articles Count Lockscreen Widget [iOS]

Changes

• Manage subscriptions now displayed inline
• Confirmation before uploading to the theme directory
• Background colors now ignore alpha, as it looks broken otherwise
• Improved text fields in settings
• Added create tag option (Wallabag)
• Fixed some incorrect menu titles [iOS]
• Improved state restoration

Fixed

• Fixed potential crash on exiting app
• Fixed label in unsubscribe confirmation
• No longer restores a window for settings after relaunch [macOS]
• Fixed scroll size in in-article theme picker
• Fixed unit label colors in settings
• Fixed creating double tags (Wallabag)
• Fixed tags sticking around after being deleted (Wallabag)
• Fixed quick share icon too big in article toolbar
• Potential fix for a crash in the article list
• Articles saved via the share extension now show up without syncing first (iCloud Read Later)
• Fixed way too small titles in share extension
• Updated API usage for Feedly
• Fixed an issue deleting accounts [macOS]
• Fixed not dimming articles on mark above/below read

Changed

• Updated app icon
• Fix flickering during sync

Changed

• Allow playlist view to use the entire height on iPads
• Added list of some installed music apps in external mode

Changed

• Bolder timer titles in timer list
• iCloud sync is now enabled by default
• Reseting sync lets you no choose if you want to replace local or remote data
• Animated scrolling in edit view as hint that it’s scrollable

Fixed

• Improved sync reliability and sync automatically on launch and exit
• Fixed issue with pausing/unpausing while iCloud sync was enabled
• Fixed minor layout issues

Fixed

• Fixed issue unlocking soundscapes

New

• Introducing Dozzzer Plus, an optional subscription for more soundscapes
• Long press the app icon to quickly start one of your recent sounds
• Added music library authorization dialog, if not authorized
• Added two new soundscapes: Woodlands and Jungle Rain

Fixed

• Fixed external mode continuing changing the volume after timer ended
• Improved Thunderstorm, Campfire, Wilderness, Mountain Creek

New

• Plays alerts even when on silent (while the app is open) [iOS]
• Option to keep windows always on top [macOS]
• Allow much smaller window size [macOS]
• Option to manually select dark or light mode

Changed

• Requires iOS 15 and up [iOS]
• Siri support for German [iOS]

Changes

• Feedly accounts can now display saved articles from not-subscribed feeds
• Displays available tags for custom urls and mail actions [iOS]
• Send email actions using the default mail app if possible
• Switched to Feedlys new boards API for tags
• Added Bionic Reading Opacity Parameter
• Improved included fonts

Fixed

• Potential crash in TTRSS sync
• Fixed jumping when zooming in article view
• Fixed VoiceOver labels for article filter and view mode
• Removed Buffer sharing activity as buffer is shutting down the API
• Live update when changing line height in article
• Fixed default blue app icon selection
• Fixed web mode articles sometimes scrolled down on open
• Fixed rendering of some emojis in the article view
• Fixed incorrect found feeds for feedburner.com urls
• Improved adjustments for very large text sizes
• Fixed keyboard dismissal on type in edit feed view [iOS]
• Fixed article counts for sparks (Fever)
• Fixed escaped emojis in article list
• Improved article list article height calculation

Changed

• Improved complications on watchOS [watchOS]
• Fixed complications not showing up for longer timers [watchOS]
• Removed “More” button – since it showed just the same settings anyway
• Only do “Starting” notifications for repeating timers, if there is enough pause between timers
• Cleaned up settings screen

Changes
– Reduced minimum window sizes for 2, 3 pane modes [macOS]
– Improved status icon scaling
– Added option for preview image above title
– Improved system light/dark themes

Fixed
– Fixed a potential crash with missing article titles
– Fixed loggin in to Evernote, while the app is installed [macOS]
– Fixed wrongly showing the “Not siged in status” in Feedly, Inoreader
– Fixed dismissing keyboard on done in edit tag and folder views [iOS]
– Fixed sharing text selection from inline web mode
– Fixed add article/subscribe view getting stuck (Wallabag, TTRSS, NextCloud)
– Fixed folder/tag sort order in share extension and feed detail view
– Improved performance with Bionic Reading enabled
– Improved fallback theme logic

Changed

• Introducing a Tidur Pro subscription
• Fixed settings navigation bar color
• Updated to modern OS versions

Changes

• Mark read up/down directly in article menu [iOS]
• Slightly increased article font while “use system font size is active”
• Added expand/collapse to voiceover actions in feed list
• Removed drag handle setting from article list option (since it’s only available on iOS) [macOS]
• Removed article overlay setting (which only worked correctly on iOS) [macOS]
• Slight changes to the system color theme
• Improved link tooltips on hover

Fixed

• Potential crash on expanding/collapsing folders
• Fixed layout issue with missing title lines
• Fixed reset all app settings button
• Fixed toolbar segements color in some themes
• Fixed switching font in article view
• Improved restoring window size [macOS]
• Fixed quick share icon size in article toolbar
• Removes articles from list immediately after deleting
• Fixed blurry app icon preiews in app icon picker
• Fixed reordering accounts in settings, by drag and drop
• Fixed more cases of back/close button below traffic lights [macOS]
• Fixed first article not being displayed in article list, if it’s set to open in article view mode
• Fixed share extension in Chrome and Tweetbot [macOS]
• Fixed quick share > read later or subscribe action
• Fixed list separators not being visible
• Fixed layout issues in theme editor [macOS]
• Fixed save subscribe view in high contrast theme

Fixed

• Potential crash when syncing with TTRSS
• Fixed Spanish and French Localisation
• Fixed opening new window when clicking the icon in the dock [macOS]
• Fixed minor layout issues in settings
• Re-added searchbar to tag article view
• Tags in tag article view are again sorted alphabetically
• Fixed scroll distance for space bar command
• Fixed saving article to iCloud read later accounts

New

• New Subscribe / Save Link flow
• New save/subscribe share extension
• Rewritten, much faster feed management actions for all services
• New tag detail view instead of separate rename/delete actions
• New feed detail view instead of separate rename/move/unsubscribe options
• New folder detail view instead of separate rename/move/delete options
• New tag article view [macOS]
• Double tap tag in tag article view to immediately apply and dismiss
• Improved potential crash on exiting the app [iOS]
• Possibly improved hangs while reading articles [iOS]
• Interface is now optimized for mac resolution [macOS]
• Sharper text, particularly on non-retina screens [macOS]
• Remembers and restores sidebar widths [macOS]
• Added CMD+CTRL+F shortcut for fullscreen [macOS]
• File > New > Folder | Tag | Article | Subscription Menu [macOS]
• Sidebar height now respects the “Sidebar icon size” system setting [macOS]
• Renamed Fiery Feeds Premium to Fiery Feeds Pro
• Dropped “round” style icons from alternate app icons [iOS]

Fixed

• The common crash while in background [iOS]
• Fixed scaled down web views [macOS]
• Improved general app performance and blurriness [macOS]
• Fixed sidebar button behind traffic light buttons in two pane mode [macOS]
• Possibly improved hangs while reading articles [macOS]

Version 2.6 is the first feature update in 2022, the most visible changes are a new share extension, and some interface modernisations in the app.

But it also includes a very big under the hood change, which fixes the most common crash, which in turn vastly improves how well the app restores it’s state when you return to it. (In technical terms: The user data is moved back to the app sandbox, from a shared container which the share extension, widgets and Siri Shortcuts could access. This required mostly re-writing the widgets and completely rewriting the share extension and Siri Shortcuts support. But at least it’s done now, this has been on my todo list for years.)

It seems the overall theme for this update is small changes, that require way more work than expected.

New share extension

The new share extension gives you the account, feed, folder and tag selection on a single screen, with the default account being configurable simply be reordering the account list in the app. This means saving an article or subscribing to a new feed is now a one tap action, instead of a three step process as it was before.

For most web based services the new article or feed are immediately pushed to the service, but for local accounts – since it can’t access the main data – this now happens when you launch the main app the next time.

Interface update

The same new interface is also available inside the main app, of course. But I didn’t stop there. There are new dialogs for creating new folders, new tags, or editing folders, tags or feeds.

The New Folder screen allows you to create a new folder and simply select all feed feeds you want in this folder right there. It’s also now possible to do this right from the main list, since many users did not find the new folder option in the “move feed screen”. It’s still possible to add new folders when assigning folders to a specific feed too of course.
The new Feed Details screen combines renaming the feed, exposing the feed url and site url – which is also new – and assigning folders, which was the previous move feed screen.
Editing a folder allows the reverse, i.e. assigning feeds to a specific folder or renaming the folder, and the new Edit Tag screen works the same way with articles.

Additionally there are some other UI modernisations, like the inset grouped style in much of settings and edit screens, and the macOS app now uses the “Optimised for Mac” style, that is it no longer scales down an iPad size apps, but renders everything in the correct size, which required adjusting each button, label and other element on screen to be a bit smaller, otherwise the app would look comically large on Macs. But it has the advantage of some AppKit style elements like the checkboxes in settings, and more importantly the text should be much less blurry, especially on non-retina displays.

New feed management sync code

Related to the new feed management UI, there are also many changes to the sync code to each of the now 20 supported sync services. All feed management changes are now applied to the local database after pushing them to the services, without needing the annoying sync after every change. Not a huge change by itself, but I kept putting it off, because doing the change for each service, 20 times in total was quite a bit of work.

This means that applying changes not only takes fewer steps in the UI, but also is simply faster.

Shared subscription

The second big new things, is the shared subscription. As I have already mentioned in my roadmap post, there is now a shared subscription for both iOS and macOS at a new price of €14.99/year.

Because the subscription is aimed at power users and unlocks the pro features, I took this opportunity to rename the subscription to Fiery Feeds Pro. This name change has no impact on existing subscriptions.

So what changes with the new subscription?

• The old paid-up-front app is no longer available for purchase, but I will continue to provide updates to it until, but not including version 3.0.
• If you’re new to Fiery Feeds, you can start a subscription for €14.99/year in either the iOS or macOS app and use it in both of them.
• If you have an existing subscription, you can continue to use it, in both apps, for the price you’re subscribed at.

You can download the new macOS app here, and especially if you already have a subscription on iOS, I’d recommend switching to the new app now, so you don’t have to migrate your data once version 3.0 is released.

Changed

• Updated for the latest operating system

Fixed

• Messages not available as sharing option
• Fixed pull to refresh inside feeds (TTRSS)
• Fixed sometime empty areas when scrolling up in an article
• Changing app or article font size automatically disables “use system font size”
• Fixed pull to show more label at bottom of article list
• Improved article view performance

This is the fourth of my yearly roadmap blog posts. You can find the last year’s post here.

Looking back

The roadmap for 2021 may have been a bit overambitious, and combined with some changes in my day job, I was not as productive as I had hoped. While I did manage to ship 16 updates, including one large feature update, the rest of the planned big features pretty much move to this year.

Design Overhaul

Completely revamped the default themes, and moved more and more to SF Symbols.

Widgets

Full support for the new iOS home screen widgets, with 5 different types in 4 different sizes, including extra large for iPads.

Theme Editor

Added a full editor for custom themes, change the theme directory from a website to a native list, including previews, and added the required server support for users submitting their own themes.

More Settings

In addition to a bunch of new expert settings like opening all folders by default in the feed list, the “expert mode” which enables over 60 additional options in settings, can now easily be enabled/disabled in the general settings. And the searchbar in settings can find them even if expert settings are hidden.

Going forward

Since the last yearly plan changed so much, I’ll try to at least outline the next planned versions, without tying them to 2022 particularly. As always, the following is just a rough plan, and will probably change over the next year, but this is where things stand right now.

One of the biggest changes will be the switch to a combined subscription for iOS + macOS, since this is now supported by Apple. I’ll follow the same playbook, as I did when switching the iOS to subscription. The subscription based Mac app will be a separate download, and the one time purchase will continue to be available for a while, I’ll remove it from sale 3-6 months before the release of 3.0, but it will continue to receive up until 3.0. The subscription price will stay at $9.99 for a while as upgrade pricing before going up to $14.99 since it now includes the macOS app as well. Every subscriber will stay at their subscribed price until cancelled, so you can lock in a good deal before the price goes up.

Version 2.6

I’ve already been working on v2.6 for the past few months, and the planned features just kept growing. Everything up to 3.0 was originally planned for 2.6, but I’ve split it up into multiple releases, so I can get them out faster.

The first thing is a fix for the most common background crash (think >90% of all crashes), which required moving the local database back to the app container, which in turn required completely rewriting Siri Shortcuts and the sharing action for Safari.

Since I’m already re-doing on the new subscribe/save view, I decided to also redo all of the feed management code, which means all feed management operations will be much faster and will no longer require syncing for the changes to show up.

Version 2.6 will be the first version to be available on the shared subscription on macOS, and also finally drop the 70% scaling which is standard for Catalyst apps, but this also required me to go through the entire app, and adjust every view, every button to not be comically large on macOS, but it should lead to crisper text on macOS.

• Fix the most common crash
• Better feed management
• Under the hood changes
• No longer scaled on macOS
• New Shared Subscription + Plan

Version 2.7

Version 2.7 is all about syncing, and especially the new services require the feed management changes from 2.6, to avoid doing too much work twice.

Improvements for TTRSS, FreshRSS, new services like Raindrop, miniflux or feeder. A re-structuring of the local database to improve performance with > 20.000 articles on device.

Better notifications, including an article preview (for individual article notifications), and options to star or mark the for reading later.

I’ll likely drop support for iCloud account settings and app settings sync in favour of json import/export. Since this will work more reliable and can be used as backup as well. The ability to sync feeds/read later will of course continue to exist, but will be limited to one feed and one read later account per iCloud account, since I’ve seen far too many users who set up multiple iCloud feed accounts by accident.

• New Sync Services
• iCloud improvements
• Better notifications
• App Settings json import export

Version 2.8

The advanced users update. Okay, with Fiery Feeds almost every update is for advanced users, but I wanted a tag line.

Ability to set more options on a per feed basis, including sort order, notification settings, number of articles to keep, image caching, and so forth.

Advanced saved searches with multiple parameters, think of iTunes’ smart playlists, but for articles, and based on those saved searches, one search per account, that automatically marks articles as read. For example articles older than a specific time or articles containing a specific keyword.

• Per feed settings
• Advanced searches
• Auto read articles

Version 3.0

I’m already including version 3.0 here, and if all goes well, I might even start working on 3.0 in 2022, but I don’t expect a release this year.

It’s going to be a Mac-first redesign of pretty much the entire app, rewriting feed and article list based on the lastest APIs, system sidebar, system toolbar, multi selection in the article list, dragging articles to tags to tag them and all the other expected behaviours for macOS apps.

• Drag & Drop
• Multiselection
• Browser extension
• Statusbar icon
• Mac First Redesign

New

• When synchronizsing inside a feed or folder list, only the current feed/folder is update (if supported by the account)
• The integrated share/subscribe action can now be triggered from the article share menu

Fixed

• Improved article list scroll performance
• Improved list layout in articles
• Code/preformatted elements now use the same inset as images/videos
• Fixed read later share action when pressing a link in an article
• Fixed pasting urls from safari to the new link/feed text field
• Fixed a potential crash with Newsblur
• Fixed expand button behind traffic lights [macOS]

New

• Setting “unread counts in all articles mode”
• Enabled small widget for single articles
• New setting: scale preview images to fit
• Cleaned up settings, more non-expert settings
• Expert settings can be enabled in general
• Expert setting to change the widget article pool size
• Smart views can now be selected as source in widgets
• Multi article widgets now also have an update interval
• TTRSS now updates existing articles, if News+ is disabled
• Added x-callback-url to synchronize specific accounts

Fixed

• Fixed fiery://openAccount/ url scheme
• Improved scrolling with the space shortcut
• The option “On Demand Image Loading”: “Never” now correctly prevents images in the article list as well
• Correctly update the article meta label in the list on starring an article
• Fixed showing theme directory when only manually toggle theme is enabled
• Larger multi article widget not shows the first 8 articles properly [iOS]
• Trims whitespaces at the beginning of the article title
• Properly dismisses read later dialog after adding
• Improved The Old Reader authorisation logic
• More reliable sync rotation animation

New

• Separate settings for app layout in landscape and portrait [iOS]
• Option to enable/disable manually toggling dark mode by double tapping the navigation bar [iOS]
• Option to have all folders in the feed list open by default
• Theme editor now shows descriptive colors in list

Fixed

• Potential crash when expanding folders in list
• Fixed {content-plain} tag in email action body [iOS]
• Space keyboard shortcut now scrolls a full page
• Article dismiss animation when tapping outside article [iOS]
• Fixed updating hot links by pulling down
• Fixed dismissing article view wrongly on swipe if switch articles is disabled [iOS]
• Improved window resizing performance [macOS]
• Fixed showing wrong label on pull up footer in article list
• Fixed default selected themes [macOS]
• Fixed crash on resetting app settings

New

• Added {text-selection} to url action tags
• Added {text-selection} to mail action tags

Fixed

• Fixed empty cell at the bottom of settings [iOS]
• An issue with date formatting for articles older than 24hrs
• Fixed an issue with mail actions where the subject wouldn’t be set
• Possible fix for missing text in article list

Fixed

• Issue where an active subscription was an recognized [iOS]
• Issue where the app may have wrongly asked for an subscription [macOS]

New

• Added “Email App Setttings” option on the about screen
• Added option to attach the article html as file to email templates

Fixed

• Safari Extensions not recognizing Premium [iOS]
• Tap in the margins no longer activates links spanning two lines [iOS]
• Click in the margins no longer activates links spanning two lines
• Fixed read article/dimmed image alpha in theme editor
• Fixed swiping down on navbar to dismiss article [iOS]
• Improved article list performance
• Clipped articles in article list

New

• Support for extra large widgets (iPad) [iOS]
• Added option to open links from the in-app webview in external browsers [macOS]
• Added {author} to url action tokens
• Added quote text alpha to theme properties
• Added option to always display the published time in articles
• Separate sections for iCloud and local accounts when creating a new account
• Ability to reset the app’s settings (about screen) [iOS]

Fixed

• Fixed sidebar width settings [iOS]
• Fixed disappearing text in article when swiping down [iOS]
• Fixed {url} token when sharing links in an article [iOS]
• Toolbar button hover background [macOS]
• “Preferences” window title [macOS]
• Fixed layout issue with video previews
• Fixed {url} token when sharing links in an article [macOS]
• Fixed search for options in settings
• Fixed wrong font in Hot Links
• No longer opens links while scrolling [iOS]
• Improved pre/code rendering
• Minor theme adjustments

New

• Added preview image/summary text options to single article widget

Fixed

• HTTP Auth in TTRSS
• Fixed duplicate articles in tags group
• Using the correct window titles

Fixed

• Premium check for themes [iOS]

Fixed

• Widgets show actually latest articles
• Fixed opening article from widget on app cold start
• Fixed dimming article header image in dark mode
• Fixed dimming images in article view setting
• Smaller font in single article widgets
• Fixed system light theme
• Fixed downloading texts (Pocket)
• Fixed login while Pocket app is installed
• Fixed video layout in native rendering
• Improved session handling (TTRSS)

New

• Expert setting to enable/disable bold titles in the article list
• Option to disable bold link highlights

Fixed

• Workaround for NextCloud News sync issue
• Fixed double tap navbar to toggle dark mode gesture
• Changing the article text size now disables the “use system font size” setting automatically
• Fixed searches as source for multi article widgets
• Dim Images only in dark mode

Home Screen Widgets

• Single Article Widget
• Multi Articles Widget
• Single Account Widget
• Multi Accounts Widget
• Hotlinks Widget

Updated Color Themes

• Completely rewritten dark/light mode
• Option to dim images in dark themes
• New In-App Theme Directory
• Redesigned Theme Picker
• New integrated Theme Editor (macOS 11 + / iOS 14 +)
• New Default Themes
• Unified Mac & iOS Themes

Updated Font Handling

• Now uses the system text size by default
• Improved font picker in settings
• Added Libertinus Sans and Serif fonts
• Now supports selecting all installed fonts
• Title and subtitle sizes are now relative to the main app font size

Other Changes

• Removed old today widget [iOS]
• Enabled native rendering by default
• Fixed article count in article view
• Improved support for large fonts [iOS]
• Favicon size setting
• Fixed long loading times in web mode

Fiery Feeds 2.5 is the first feature release in 2021. The big one is widgets, but it also includes a complete rewrite of the font and theming system, which was long overdue. And with this version native rendering is now the default render mode for articles.

New Default Themes

The first thing you’ll probably notice are the two new default themes. The retain a slight blue shade and the red accent of the previous default theme, but they are overall much lighter and much darker, respectively. The old default themes haven’t changed much since version 1.0 almost 8 years ago.

New Widgets

The probably most requested feature are home screen widgets. The are widgets for single or multiple articles, single or multiple accounts and Hot Links, in all relevant sizes. You can even add multiple widgets of the same type and configure them individually.

And of course the widgets are fully configurable. You can pick the account/folder/feed you want to have displayed in the articles widget, and decide which articles you want displayed.

I’ve been meaning to do a random article widget for a long time, to suggest articles from my read later list every time I look at my phone. This was a good time to finally do it.

Theme Editor and User Theme Directory

I’ve cleaned the theme file structure up a bit. It is still a JSON file, but comments are no longer allowed inside the file and some of the keys have changed. The macOS version still has a few extra keys, but all other keys have been unified, and the new default themes are the same on both iOS and macOS. There are also no longer default values for each color, so every theme needs to contain a color for

I’m no longer documenting all of the used keys explicitly, but you can still read the file with an text editor (the keys are pretty self explainatory). The reason why, is because Fiery Feeds now finally includes an integrated theme editor, allowing you to modify your themes right inside the app.

In addition to the theme editor there is a new, completely native theme directory, and you can submit your own creations to the directory to share them with other users right from inside the app.

New Font Handling

And finally, even if it sounds like a simple change, but I’ve almost completely rewritten the font handling inside Fiery Feeds. This means that the app respects the default system font size (by default – you can still override it for each part of Fiery Feeds, like previously), and you can select any installed font, including fonts installed by third party apps.

Changes

• Option to disable link tooltips
• Removed Safari Reading Mode Setting (since Safari has it’s own per-site settings now) [iOS]
• Added clear cookies keyboard shortcut [iOS]
• Added update article list keyboard shortcut [iOS]
• Added clear cookies menubar entry [macOS]
• Added update article menubar entry [macOS]

Fixed

• Fixed a layout issue with dynamic sizes disabled
• Fixed possible layout issue after rotating the device
• Fixed seemingly getting stuck during “Loading Hotlinks”
• Fixed squished buttons in navigation bar
• Fixed account status not being visual updated after signing in (Pocket, Inoreader, Feedly)

Changes

• Added counter to fetching changes (iCloud Feeds / Read Later)

Fixed

• Fixed an issue causing empty saved searches
• Fixed potential crash related to bionic reading (native rendering)
• Fixed potential crash during syncing

Changes

• The full width media setting now also applies to videos (Native Rendering)
• Added fetching changes state message to iCloud accounts

Fixed

• Fixed potential layout issue in side preview image article list layout
• Fixed article word counts sometimes not appearing after sync
• Fixed hotlinks not being updated on sync in some situations
• Articles grouped by feed are again sorted by feed title
• Improved Table Layout (Native Rendering)

Changes

• Reduced minimum height in article list

Fixed

• Potential layout issue with title only layout
• Fixed feed title sometime not appearing in article list
• Fixed titles being cut off with large font sizes
• Improved add feed / subscribe button [macOS]
• Fixed save page and subscribe extensions

Fixed

• Fixed settings icon not showing up on iOS 13 [iOS]
• Fixed alternate app icons not showing up in selection screen [iOS]
• Keep all labels available on device, even empty labels (TTRSS)
• Fixed issue reloading feed titles after renaming a feeds (Feedly)
• Fixed today feeds counts

Changes

• Removed default browser setting
• Expanding the today folder works again
• Changes to the article list layout
• Separate show date / show feed title settings
• Option to exclude feeds from Hot Links
• Using more SF Symbols as icons
• New expert setting “article view overlay”
• Option to completely remove header image from text (native rendering)
• Improved article list performance

Fixed

• Expanding the today folder works again
• Fixed screen not turning off after sync has finished (if set to disable screen sleep while syncing) [iOS]
• Fixed saved searches in specific feeds or folder (you may have to re-create those searches)
• Fixed layout issue after rotating while Safari was open
• Fixed no feeds displayed when searching read articles
• Fixed saved searches in specific feeds or folder (you may have to re-create those searches) [macOS]
• Saved searches now also search the author and feed title fields

This is the third of my yearly roadmap blog posts. You can find the last year’s post here.

Looking back

2020 was a complicated year for everyone, but I still managed to release 16 updates for Fiery Feeds iOS and macOS in total.

Mac Trial

It was the first thing on my list for 2020, and you can download it here: Fiery Feeds Trial

Full Text Search

Search everywhere. Full text search for articles. Search for settings, including otherwise hidden expert settings.

Also in version 2.4 a simple implementation of saved searches. It’s not yet the advanced iTunes smart playlist style saved searches, but a lot of things required are now in place for this to happen.

Native Article View

I’m still working on the native article renderer and fixing some edge cases here and there, but it is officially an option, and will become the default renderer in the next major update.

Performance

There were some performance fixes since 2.4 has been released and I am currently working on a few different more, as well as general code cleanup. Those changes will be part of the coming 2.4.x updates, that is, I want all of the known bottlenecks fixed before I start on the next feature release.

Planned 2021

The major features I’m planning to work on this year, roughly sorted by priority. As always, this is just a rough plan, not a guarantee that I’ll actually manage to implement all of them.

New Widget

iOS 14 and Big Sure brought support for new SwiftUI based widgets. Fiery Feeds already has a today widget, but the new widgets, while more limited in features, can be put on the Home Screen, which people seem to enjoy. I have some ideas for different kinds of widgets I want to support, but I do have to learn SwiftUI first, which feels like a big thing (most of Fiery Feeds is still Objective-C). Still, this is something for version 2.5.

New Services

Miniflux, Raindrop, Feeder.io, full FreshRSS (including feed management, i.e. using their Google Reader API) support. There’s a lot to do on the syncing side, even if it doesn’t sound like exciting new features.

Theming Improvements

A better (read native, instead of a website) in-app browser for themes, an in-app theme editor and a user directory of themes where anyone can submit their own creations.

General Design Refresh

While I don’t want to completely redesign Fiery Feeds, I do want to bring it a bit closer to the look of iOS 14 and Big Sur.

Also the new OS versions brought support for a lot of things I want to use. Native sidebar, native 3-pane-mode, the new window toolbar on macOS, more use of SF Symbols,… you get the idea. Some of those do require iOS 14/Big Sur as target, that means I’m going to release this after the next iOS/macOS versions are available so I can keep supporting to my usual current + 1 OS versions.

Drag and Drop / Multi Selection

One of the more macOS centered improvements. Selecting multiple article to mark read or tag at once, or simply dragging feeds / articles to folders / tags to assign them is something I’d expect from a Mac app. I’ve caught myself trying to do this and getting annoyed that it doesn’t work multiple times. Interestingly I’ve never missed those features on iOS – I still plan on supporting it on both platforms.

I think this is going to fit well with the updated design, since I have to completely re-do at least the feeds and folders list anyway.

Advanced Saved Searches

Like I said above, the foundation is already in place, but I still need to build the UI to create more complex saved searches. I like iTunes’ UI for smart playlists, and I hope that Smart Searches will end up looking and working like that.

Per Feed Settings

Over the time people have asked for different settings they want only on a per feed basis, not for the entire app. Showing Preview Images for example, or notifications only for specific feeds. Alongside that I also want to support automatically marked articles read after a certain time (for specific feeds), and some more.
Those will be ‘override’ settings, that is, if you never look into the feed settings view, the app should continue to behave exactly as it does today.

Changes

• Improved log file viewer
• Updated included themes for Big Sur [macOS]
• Send Feedback now uses third party email apps if possible

Fixed

• Fixed alert button colors
• Fixed/removed “Expand section” text from cells that can’t actually be expanded (VoiceOver)
• Expert setting to prevent display sleep while syncing [iOS]
• Fixed unstarring articles (NewsBlur)

Changes

• Added Expert Setting “Force Fullscreen Video” [iOS]

Fixed

• Counts not being updated for feeds in special folders like Today
• Fixed issue syncing with the latest version of NextCloud News
• Fixed possible crash when marking articles read
• Fixed Newsblur sync after an API change
• Fixed open in external app dialog

Changes

• Removed the “prevent incremental web rendering” expert setting
• New App Icon to better fit Big Sur [macOS]
• Native Rendering: Copy/select paragraph context menu entries
• Native Rendering: Copy title context menu entry on article header

Fixed

• Smart searches in iCloud read later accounts
• Fix for read counts not being updated after “mark all read above/below”
• Removed existing accounts sections from account selection if empty
• Fixed animation in article list when switch to next article [iOS]v