(Up to: Ideas)

First noted in Temporal Web Pages, I guess this may have many uses.

The problem: I can access a single content-source via many different routes, e.g. webpage, RSS, e-mail. I can also access them from different PCs. But these are all separated, such that the state of any one of these is completely indifferent to a state of any of the others. Hence, if I read the same RSS feed from 2 different locations, when I mark an article as read on one, it's still marked as unread on the other.

One Solution: Run the applications used to view content from a central source, e.g. Run my RSS reader from one machine, remotely. User settings, then, are coupled to this, which then get "transferred" (conceptually) over the network too. The problems with this though: * This doesn't solve the cross-application problem, only the cross-location one. * An awful lot of traffic is involved in just running the application, when really all we need transferred is a more abstract idea of "user state".

Alternative Solution: Universal "cookies", or preferences perhaps. This way, you can maintain/manipulate your settings/preferences (including what you've read and what you haven't) across both applications (subject to compatibility) and locations.

How could you implement this currently? The Cross-application aspect of this is hardest, as each application has its own config files. A networked config directory that was remotely accessible would help with the cross-location factor, but still not solve the cross-application problem.