Hi there

 

*NUMPTY ALERT*

 

I'm a bit behind whan it comes to things like RSS feeds etc - I blame it on my age and maybe being a bit too busy to bother to find out. What exactly is RSS?

 

Can I use it to my advantage and for what purpose?

 

I know that what I'm asking is probably making a lot of you smack your foreheads and go 'Oh My God Eskymo! Where have you been?' but I'm willing to admit my ignorance in the vain hope someone can explain RSS to me in plain english!

 

I'll slump off into the darkness of my embarrassment now...

 

E

lol, I have no idea what it is either,

 

Makes two of us, would you like to join the club?

 

Seriously:

 

I have a faint idea, I think its like a feed of a websites latest content, I don't know where to put it or anything like that.

 

I'm sad and view every single page a website has to offer.

 

I THINK that it is coded in XML also.

Haha.. don't believe what they say - old dogs never stop learning new tricks

 

RSS (or Really Simple Syndication) is a standard mechanism for offering syndicated information from a website. Typically RSS is used by blogging systems to enable readers to keep up to date without having to visit the website or wade through email alerts.

 

For personal use, the general idea is that you get yourself an RSS reader, and subscribe yourself to the feeds you are interested in. RSS readers can (and do) come in any form:

• Google's web based reader
  
• FeedDaemon - a commercial Windows reader
  
• SharpReader - a free Windows RSS reader
  

(more listed here)

 

Or websites can use feeds from other websites to share information. For example, I built a simple (and as yet incomplete) RSS reader into a StarFinder application I've been working on which simply aggregates space and astronomy related feeds into a single place. You'll need Flash Player 9 to view, but it's not that important so only bother if you're too curious not too Link is here.

 

More information on RSS from Wikipedia here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_(file_format)

Incidentally, Wikipedia also offers RSS feeds

 

HTH

Thanks for that

 

Am I right in saying it is coded in XML? and can it be coded in anything, like HTML, CSS etc.?

So are you saying that I need to download some RSS software onto my PC and install it? How do I then get the RSS feeds from the sites I want to be updated on?

@Oliver

RSS is just XML. There are a few pitfalls to watch out for - namely that there are slightly differing standards with RSS and Atom (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atom_(standard)), but if you stick to using a good RSS reader if you are reading it, or using a good RSS library if you are coding with it then you can't really go wrong. If you want to see what RSS "looks" like, just request a feed directly in your browser (some browsers, namely FireFox will 'pretty it up' a little - but you'll get the jist). Try this one for size: http://cliffrowley.com/feed/

 

@Eskymo

That depends entirely on how you want to use RSS. If you just want to keep a collection of feeds to read, then yes you need to install an RSS reader - or use a web service such as google. As the reader runs, it will periodically update its feed list and present you with any new content. The same applies to a web service such as google's reader, but you'll obviously need to visit the page manually.

 

I hope I understood what you're asking

 

Incidentally, if FireFox (or your chosen inferior browser ) does pretty up the feeds, just view the page source and you'll see the XML.

If I see an RSS button on someone's site do I just click on it to add it to my reader?

 

What you've said does make a lot more sense now, thanks, but not sure how to put it into practice and so I still think I'm going to leave RSS on the shelf and gather dust for a while to be honest.

 

Thanks for explaining it all.

If I see an RSS button on someone's site do I just click on it to add it to my reader?

Precisely

 

What you've said does make a lot more sense now, thanks, but not sure how to put it into practice and so I still think I'm going to leave RSS on the shelf and gather dust for a while to be honest.

To be honest, RSS is one of those things. If you need it, you'll know. Otherwise it'll just be something someone else uses. I don't use an RSS reader personally, but I do strive to provide RSS feeds on the websites I develop.

 

Thanks for explaining it all.

No wookies

Ah! the force is strong with this one...

Hi Esky!

 

Try this link I had a lot of help from TT / PP, managed to set mine up thou..

 

http://www.webdesignerforum.co.uk/index.php?showtopic=2494

If I see an RSS button on someone's site do I just click on it to add it to my reader?

 

What you've said does make a lot more sense now, thanks, but not sure how to put it into practice and so I still think I'm going to leave RSS on the shelf and gather dust for a while to be honest.

 

Thanks for explaining it all.

It's easiest to maintain if you have server side scripting. Then you use that to generate the RSS feed from the same source you generate the HTML version of the content. Otherwise, if you code it by hand you end up doing it multiple times.

Then you need to choose what RSS formats to support.

More and more email programs these days let you import your RSS into the same window (as RSS readers are very similar to most email programs, and rss feeds very similar to most html emails!)

Firebird and Mac Mail (Leopard) both do

 

For mac my preference is Shrook, for PC Sharpreader

 

RSS Feeds are VERY useful when it comes to online promotion, you can also generate advertising revenue from RSS feeds and track statistics of your subscribers through http://www.feedburner.com

The browser that I use (Flock) is basically Firefox with stuff like a Feed Reader built in. (There are FF extensions tho)

If you use iGoogle, you can have feeds on your google page and Google Reader is quite nice as well.

 

Most of the time when you press the feed button it will take you to a page asking how you want to subscribe to the feed. In Flock it allows you to add it to the side bar.

 

When I'm browsing if I'm interested in reading some news/new articles I open my side bar. It's currently telling me there are 20 new posts on WDF, 2 on Veerle's blog, etc. It's just a nice easy way to keep a list of all your favourite sites with an indication of any new content.

 

Many good CMS's, including WordPress automatically add new content to the feed.

 

Why would you need RSS? Only if you get lost in the myriad of design websites, cool blogs, youtube channels, news sites etc and actually like to keep up to date!

 

- Eris

Eskymo, there's a video on YouTube that does an brilliant job of explaining what RSS is plain English -

.

The guy who makes those videos is great, you should check out the one about Zombies when you've covered RSS

thank guy... Now I know.. lol

http://whatisrss.com/

 

Brave girl, Eskymo - what I've always wanted to know and been too afraid to ask. (Rather, I asked Google, but came away with only a fuzzy understanding.)

 

Cliffstah - excellent explanation, that.

RSS (or Really Simple Syndication) is a standard mechanism for offering syndicated information from a website. Typically RSS is used by blogging systems to enable readers to keep up to date without having to visit the website or wade through email alerts.

 

Thanks for bringing it up Eskymo.

 

Another ignorant here I must say I don't know anything about it. When you say without having to visit website when they already subscribe to you does that mean there will be no traffic to your site. That is not good right?

When you say without having to visit website when they already subscribe to you does that mean there will be no traffic to your site. That is not good right?

There were people who blogged about seeing decreased traffic as their subscriber rate increased a few years ago but I don't know if that trend held through. Still, as long as people are reading your content - assuming you're running a blog or whatever - surely that's all that matters?

 

Of course, there'll always be people like me who don't use RSS and prefer to browse the old fashioned way

Another ignorant here I must say I don't know anything about it. When you say without having to visit website when they already subscribe to you does that mean there will be no traffic to your site. That is not good right?

 

Each item in the feed can include a permalink or just an ordinary link so that people can click through to reach the full page on the site. So if you wanted to force people to go to your site you could just put an introductory bit in the feed item and if people were interested they could click through to a full article.

I see. You need to have a rich content every now and then to draw audience to your site. Ooh I wonder how much is wizely's fee? So if my site is not a blogger site can I still put an RSS feed?

So if you wanted to force people to go to your site you could just put an introductory bit in the feed item and if people were interested they could click through to a full article.

Most people I know refuse to subscribe to feeds that don't offer the full article...

I'm so glad I know now.

 

I thought it had something to do with repetative strain syndrome and couldn't work out what that had to do with websites (yes I know, very stupid)