The NotQuiteRSS project develops a fork from the RSS/Atom aggregator QuiteRSS, created to modernize the application while maintaining the familiar interface. The project is aimed at users who need a stand-alone desktop tool for reading news feeds and storing news locally. The code is written in C++ using Qt Widgets and is distributed under the GPLv3 license. AI tools are used during development. Assemblies are generated for Linux (AppImage), Windows and macOS.
The main architectural difference from QuiteRSS is the complete abandonment of the built-in browser engine QtWebKit without replacing it with QtWebEngine.
Articles are displayed using QTextBrowser and QTextDocument. Instead of Qt Multimedia, the miniaudio library is used to play sound notifications with built-in support for WAV, MP3 and FLAC, which does not require the installation of GStreamer plugins.
Before displaying, HTML is processed according to the list of allowed elements and attributes: scripts, frames, forms and other unsupported structures are removed. JavaScript is not executed, and links to sites are opened in an external browser. HTTPS requires TLS 1.2 or later and certificate verification. Response and redirect sizes are limited, and redirection from HTTPS to HTTP is prohibited. Article images are loaded separately from feeds, without transferring their credentials and Cookies. The animation of images in hidden parts of the page is paused.
The application is not turned into a list of links. It supports reading articles with formatting and images, newspaper mode, feed and category tabs, searching within an article, zooming, printing and exporting. The limitation is the lack of a full-fledged built-in HTML/CSS layout (an external browser can be called to view the source page).
Among the capabilities and improvements of NotQuiteRSS:
- It supports working with the SQLite database in RAM, saving to disk at a specified interval and upon normal completion. Fixed unwanted saves when minimized to tray and handling of write errors.
- Backups can be created manually, on a schedule, when changing subscriptions and exiting the application. The number of saved sets is configured. Abridged copies are provided, containing only selected or flagged articles, as well as full safety copies before updating the database structure.
- Fixed unlimited accumulation of service records about deleted publications when using cleaning by publication date.
Removal of old articles, detection of duplicates and handling of database errors have been improved.