If you are reading this, you certainly understand what a Blog is. Well, if you read multiple blogs or even news sites without utilizing RSS, you are spending a lot of time jumping from site to site to find out what is new on a site. At some point in time you must have asked the question, "Why can't I just get all the updates to the sites I read sent to my desktop?"... Well RSS (Really Simple Syndication or Rich Site Summary) is the technology that makes this possible. So how does this all work you may be wondering? I like to think about it like this: (Note: This is a description for the everyday internet user, so I have left out all the details of rdf, xml, etc.)
- Every time a site updates it's content, an application will create a "RSS feed" for the site. Think of this feed as all the new information from the site without all the HTML and other presentation information.
- People looking to access RSS feeds will download a "News Reader"; whose purpose is to go out and check all the RSS Feeds you are interested in and to bring down the new content from those feeds. Now a person that reads Blogs you don't need to waste your time checking many sites to see if there is any new information, you can just go to your News Reader and see what has been updated and read it there. I have tried numerous News Readers and here are the thoughts on the ones I have used:
- News Gator: News Gator is a news reader plugin for Outlook. Pros: The application is great for users of Outlook that like to use Outlook as their information hub. Cons: News Gator is not free and you will need to pay $29 for the application after a 30 day trial
- RSS Bandit: Pros: RSS Bandit is my current news reader simply because it gets the job done and is free. Cons: It has some annoying aspects such as letting me know every time it checks my feeds even if nothing has changed on any of them.
Here is a good RSS FAQ you should check out: Voidstar - RSS FAQ
NOTE: I currently don't have a public RSS feed, but if you are interested in one let me know through the comments on this post.
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