NYPC Web Notes
Introduction to RSS

Really Simple Syndication - Rich Site Summary

RSS is set of standards
a web site can use to syndicate its content.

The content comes to the user as a list of articles.

The RSS information from the website
is used by an RSS aware program
to display the syndicated articles.

There are many dedicated RSS programs, like FeedDemon

There are online RSS readers, like The Rocket Reader

Other programs are "RSS aware":

Programs websites and service that help you access RSS feeds
are called a news aggregators.

For the rest of this discussion, we will refer to
whatever website or software you use to access RSS feeds as an RSS reader.

An RSS file is a list,
each item in the list has

If you click on an RSS link with your web browser
you will see the XML code displayed.

In order to access an RSS feed you must add a link to it to your RSS reader.
Generally you copy and past the information from a web page you visit.

The link may be text,
or you may find this marker on a web page.
or

When you find a link on a web page you right click and choose:
Internet Explorer users: Copy Shortcut
Firefox users: Copy Link Location

You then paste this link into your RSS reader.
It becomes an RSS feed or channel.

RSS is an evolving standard.
There several versions in use.

Atom, an alternative to RSS
is being developed by the open source community.

Many RSS readers will also read Atom feeds.

RSS Resources

The Atom Project a Wiki about RSS

Syndic8.com a directory of RSS feeds

RSS Dev Working Group a Yahoo Group used to devleope RSS standards

O'Reilly Network's RSS DevCenter feature articles, tools, audio roundtables with RSS developers, and more.