The Google Reader Blog announced several new features for Google Reader. The big feature is search. You can now search your subscriptions, including subscriptions to shared items. Google Reader also enhanced the unread count numbers to show up to 1,000, as opposed to up to 100 unread subscriptions. Plus, you can now hide the left hand pane and use your back and forward browser buttons.

Now for more on the Google Reader search feature. Next time you login to Google Reader, you will see this search box at the top:

As you can see, you can enter in your search phrase, and then select “all items” or a specific folder or type of folder you would like to search for. In my search below, I selected “all items” and searched for “google reader.”

Google Reader sorts the searches by date and places them in a green tab named “search results.” As you can see, Google Reader shows you search results for both read and unread items. Any feed items that have come in over time are stored. The search engine also searches against some of the meta data like the name of the blog or author name. As explained above, you can filter your search by folder or even by particular feed.

There is one bug in Apple Safari; the “all items” drop down menu doesn’t stay opened.

In the past, Google Reader showed the count of unread items. But Google Reader only showed 100+ when you had a hundred or more items unread. Now, Google Reader will show up to 1,000 unread items in that count number. Google Operating System has more information about this upgrade over here. Here is an example:

Finally, you can click on the right side of the left pane. There is an arrow pointing leftwards, if you click on that bar, the left pane will collapse.

Bloglines has many of these features already, and with the new Bloglines Beta, I am going to have a tough choice deciding on which one to make my primary RSS reader.

More coverage on this Google Reader announcement at Techmeme.

Related Topics: Google: Reader

About The Author: Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry's personal blog is named Cartoon Barry and he can be followed on Twitter here. For more background information on Barry, see his full bio over here. See more articles by Barry Schwartz

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