Varieties of news aggregatorsThe variety of software applications and components that are available to collect, format, translate, and republish XML feeds is a testament to the flexibility of the format and has shown the usefulness of presentation-independent data.
Web based aggregators are applications that reside on remote servers and are typically available as Web applications such as Google Reader or Bloglines. Because the application is available via the Web, it can be accessed anywhere by a user with an Internet connection.
More advanced methods of aggregating feeds are provided via AJAX coding techniques and XML components known as Web widgets. Ranging from full-fledged applications to small fragments of code that can be integrated into larger programs, they allow users to aggregate OPML files, email services, documents, or feeds into a single interface. Many customizable homepage/portal implementations such as iGoogle, Live.com, My Yahoo!, and Pageflakes provide such functionality.
In addition to personal aggregators, planet sites are used by online communities to aggregate community blogs in a centralised location. Such sites are named after the Planet aggregator, an application designed for this purpose.
Client software aggregators are installed applications designed to collect Web feed subscriptions and group them together using a user-friendly interface. The graphical user interface of such applications often closely resembles that of popular e-mail clients, using a three-panel composition in which subscriptions are grouped in a frame on the left, and individual entries are browsed, selected, and read in a frames on the right.
Software aggregators can also take the form of news tickers which scroll feeds like ticker tape, alerters that display updates in windows as they are refreshed, or as smaller components (sometimes called plugins or extensions), which can integrate feeds into the Operating System or software applications such as a Web browser.
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