Getting started with RSS
RSS is probably the biggest and latest buzzword among the
techies, just after blogs.
But what is RSS anyway and how
can you start taking advantage of it?
RSS is a format to provide headlines and summaries of
information in a simple and standardized way. Think of it as a
distributable “What’s New” for websites.
RSS is great for users because it saves users from having to
repeatedly visit favorite websites to check for new content or
be notified of updates via email. It can give a glimpse of a
site’s latest concrete contents (no design) in a second.
RSS is also great for site owners because:
the web, which gets new links and visits to the site.
get more returning visitors, since users can suscribe to the
feed to keep up with the site’s updates.
feeds can contain ads, such as Google Adsense.
RSS feeds can be used for:
discounts / specials
An “RSS feed” it’s the actual RSS file with headlines. To have a
glimpse of how it looks like and what it can contain, we’ll
examine the feed from SelfHelpCommunity.com
step by step:
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1" ?>
<rss version="2.0">
<channel>
<title>Self-Help
Community</title>
<link>http://www.SelfHelpCommun
ity.com</link>
<description>Self-Help Community is the absolute online
reference on Self-Help …</description>
<language>en-us</language>
<copyright>Copyright
2005 Self-Help Community. All Rights Reserved.</copyright>
<lastBuildDate>Tue,
19 Jul 2005 07:33:57 GMT</lastBuildDate>
<item>
<title>Engaging in the Moment for More Effective
Living.</title>
<link>http://www.SelfHelpCo
mmunity.com/Articles_3092_Engaging-in-the-Moment-for-More-Effecti
ve-Living-.aspx</link>
<description>Want to learn how being engaged in the moment
can enhance your life experience as well as your business? Here,
Adam Eason shows how anybody can learn how to engage in the
present more to enrich your life more and more
wonderfully.</description>
<pubDate>Fri, 15 Jul 2005 00:00:00 GMT</pubDate>
</item>
(… more <items>
here, up to 15 … )
</channel>
</rss>
First we declare it as an XML file (RSS is an XML standard),
then the RSS tag and version (at this time, 2.0 is the latest).
Then we start with the channel which contains some general
description of the feed and provider like title, link,
description, and finally the actual items. Each item contains a
title, a brief description, a publication date and a link to the
rest of the item. To see all the information you can display,
check out the official RSS 2.0
specification.
There are several ways to read an RSS feed:
browser or even notepad –since it’s just an XML file (formatted
flat text).
FeedDemon, SharpReader, RssReader, and others.
e-mail client –NewsGator Email Edition plugs into Outlook
Express, Eudora, Entourage, Apple Mail, or other POP3 e-mail
clients and lets you receive RSS feeds right in your e-mail
window. The same company’s Outlook Edition integrates RSS with
Microsoft Outlook. And Mozilla’s Thunderbird e-mail client comes
with RSS-reading capabilities built in.
device –using a service such as FeedBeep, NewsGator Mobile
Edition, Yahoo Mobile, or Elfinland.
To create an RSS for your own site, there is the option to
create it by hand, or using a software like FeedForAll, or an online
service like RSS
creator.
Finally, to search for established RSS feeds you can use our
very own RSS search
engine, and to quickly submit your RSS feed to several
directories, you can use our RSS submit
tool.