Really Slick Secrets of RSS
What is RSS?
It’s sometimes called Really Simple Syndication or Rich Site Summary.
RSS is an XML structure (and you know XML is a markup language right?) to summarize Web site content.
Certain programs can interpret that XML language in different ways. One way of interpreting RSS is built right into our Firefox Web browser.
How can I use RSS with Firefox?
Here’s the magic symbol to look for. (it looks a bit fuzzy because I blew it up.) This will appear at the far right side of the address bar when you are on a Web page that offers some kinds of RSS feeds.
When you click on the symbol, Firefox will show a little pop-up box that says, “Subscribe to [Web site name]” Click the box. A dialogue box pops up.
You can change the name if you like, and you can also change the folder as you can for any bookmark. This is a “Live Bookmark.” When you look at the bookmark, you can see all the latest additions to the Web sites you bookmarked.
No “orange wave?” You can still make a Live Bookmark:
Add Live Bookmarks manually
Some sites don't tell Firefox that they support Live Bookmarks, even though they actually do. If you know the URL of a site's RSS feed (url ends with .rdf or .xml), you can manually create a Live Bookmark for the site. Go to the Bookmarks menu and select 'Manage Bookmarks'. Under the 'File Menu', select 'New Live Bookmark'. Create a name for the Live Bookmark and add the URL. New articles from that site will appear as Live Bookmarks in Firefox.
http://www.mozilla.org/products/firefox/live-bookmarks
On Beyond Firefox
If you’re afraid of getting an unmanageable list of bookmarks, you may want to sign up for a service that can put them all on one Web page for you. Many of these services also do a Web search to find a term or set of terms in an RSS feed. Some sites will have buttons specifically for adding their feeds to this service.
NOTE: Keep in mind that signing up for Web services may increase your junk email. Watch carefully for any “opt-out” buttons that give you a chance to stay off mailing lists or refuse advertising or tracking. Also, unlike Mozilla, these outside services aren’t supported by Systems, and your liaison may not be able to help if something goes awry.
http://my.yahoo.com Yahoo lists feeds by topic and will add other feeds if you have a correct URL for the feed.
http://www.bloglines.com Searches blogs and feeds for topics; lets you save searches; you can even create and share your own feeds.
http://www.feedster.com Another popular service to find feeds. You can create a Web account or have the feeds sent to you by email.
Indexed: RSS
Prepared by: Naomi Young
Updated: March 16, 2006
