RSS

A few weeks ago we looked at blogs, and since most of you have already set up your own blogs, you might have encountered the term “RSS.” Or perhaps you have seen one of these icons during your web travels:

Well, what are they and what will they do for you?

RSS stands for “Really Simple Syndication” It is a file format for delivering regularly updated information over the web. You will also find RSS referred to as “web feeds” or just “feeds.”

A good way to understand RSS feeds is to think about them as magazine subscriptions: rather than having to frequently visit the newsstand to check for a new issue of your favorite magazine, you can just subscribe to it and sit back & wait for the new issues to come to you. If your favorite website publishes an RSS feed, you don’t have to keep visiting it to find fresh content; you can just subscribe to the RSS feed and wait for that fresh content to come to you! And, unlike magazine subscriptions, RSS is free!

One of the advantages of subscribing to an RSS Feed versus signing up for an e-mail newsletter or mailing list is that you do not provide your name, e-mail address, or other personal information to anyone. The content publisher has no way of contacting you, except through the RSS Feeds, as they do not have your e-mail address. Other advantages include getting the information you seek without being bombarded by advertising, without having to search for new information on the page you’d already seen or read before and, without having to consume a lot of time visiting each site individually. For example, rather than clicking on each participant blog in AurThings every day to see what new information everyone has posted (if they have new information posted), you can subscribe to the RSS feed for each blog and you will automatically be updated when new information is added.


RSS aggregators (also known as RSS readers, feed aggregators, or feed readers) are applications that collect all of your subscriptions in one place. If an RSS feed is like a magazine subscription, the aggregator is like the magazine rack. Once you subscribe to few sources, you no longer need to visit each site, you simply open your aggregator to read any new updates.

There are a lot of different aggregators out there, but for this lesson we will describe Outlook (yep, your e-mail account) in some detail and also give brief introduction to Bloglines and Google Reader (free online newsreaders). Outlook may seem simpler at first glance and if you already have an account (all Auraria employees do) then there is no need to create a login as you will need to in Bloglines or Google Reader (you can use your Google account for Google Reader too!). There are also advantages to Bloglines and Google Reader such as the fact that, unlike Outlook, they can be used from any computer as they are web based and not tied to a particular computer. Additionally, it is simpler to use Bloglines or Google Reader to add RSS feeds for blogs. As you will need to set up at least one of these aggregators in order to complete this Thing, we suggest you read through this entire post before making a decision and subscribing to feeds.


RSS feeds in Outlook 2007 is easy, quick and convenient.

If you're using Windows Internet Explorer 7, an RSS button will appear in the toolbar at the top of any web page you are viewing. If the site uses RSS the button will be "lit" in orange, if not, the button will be "dim" in gray. Seeing what the RSS Feed contains is as easy as clicking the RSS button on the Web page. If there is a drop down arrow to the right of the orange RSS button, this means that the site has more than one feed to choose from - clicking on the arrow will show you a few selected feeds. After clicking your choice, if you like what you see and you want to get more, that's easy too: Simply click "Subscribe to this feed". That's it, a few clicks and you're done. What about Outlook? You just did that. Your subscription is good in Outlook 2007 too and should appear under your RSS feed folder found under Mail Folders in Outlook. The number of new/unread items will appear in parenthesis next to the folder.




Using an earlier version of IE or a different browser?
You'll need to take a few extra steps, but they too are easy. You'll start by right-clicking the RSS button or link that you are interested in subscribing to and then clicking "Copy Shortcut". Then you will paste this information into Outlook:

1. On the Tools menu, click Account Settings.
2. On the RSS Feeds tab, click New.
3. In the New RSS Feed dialog box, type in the URL or press CTRL+V to paste the URL of the RSS Feed.
4. Click Add.
5. Click OK.

The RSS feed will appear under your Mail Folders section in Outlook. Be sure to click the + sign next to the RSS folder to display all of your feeds.

Subscribe to a blog
Let's use this method to subscribe to a blog created in Blogger - Library FYI. Unlike Bloglines, you cannot subscribe using the URL for the blog itself. Instead, you will follow the steps above in Outlook and then when you get to the RSS feed dialog box which prompts "Enter location of RSS feed" you will enter the location using the following format:

http://blogname.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default

You will replace "blogname" with the name of the blog located within the URL for that blog. For example, although Library FYI is the title of the blog in our example, the blogname is aurhottop as can be found in the URL: http://aurhottop.blogspot.com/

So, in our example, in the RSS feed dialog box in outlook you will type in:

http://aurhottop.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default

Now you should be able to view the folder for Library FYI under your RSS folder in your Mail Folders.

Deleting Feeds
Tastes and interests change. If the articles that an RSS Feed delivers lose their appeal for you, you'll be glad to know that removing a Feed from Outlook is simple.

The easiest way to remove a Feed is to right-click its folder and click Delete as we have shown in the picture. This method will delete the folder and all of the articles it contains. This method will also end Outlook’s subscription to the RSS Feed.

On the other hand, if your aim is simply to stop getting new items (that is, if you want to keep the folder and its contents but stop any new deliveries), you can use the Account Settings dialog box to stop your subscription.

Web based aggregators
As mentioned earlier, there are advantages to using online aggregators such as Bloglines or Google Reader over Outlook and vice verse. The most notable advantage of using Bloglines or Google Reader is that it is web based and can, therefore be viewed from any computer.

You will have to create a free account to use these services. For Bloglines, start by going to the site: http://www.bloglines.com/ and then view the following tutorial: Using Bloglines Tutorial – This online tutorial walks you through how to setup a Bloglines account and add newsfeeds. Follow Steps 1 to 3 to set up your Bloglines account. Steps 4 – 9 are optional and cover how to subscribe to different types of feeds (blogs, podcasts, Flickr albums, etc)

For Google Reader, start by clicking here to get to the site. Sign in using your Google account. If you used Blogger to create your blog for this program then you already have a Google account and the login for Google Reader is the same as for Blogger. Click on "Help" in the upper-right corner and begin exploring; take note of the "getting started guide" located in the right-hand sidebar.

Blog about your RSS experience
Once you have chosen either Outlook or Bloglines to use as an aggregator for this program, subscribe to Library FYI and at least one fellow participant's blog and then create a blog posting in your personal blog about your experience. Many people feel that RSS is the most difficult Thing in any Learning 2.o program. Would you agree?




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