Prof. Burks Oakley IIAssociate Vice President for Academic AffairsDirector, University of Illinois OnlineProfessor of Electrical and Computer Engineering

University of IllinoisJanuary 2006

The What, Why, and How of RSS

Really Simple Syndication RSS - Really Simple Syndication An RSS file is a small text file that provides a

concise summary of the content of a web page

The RSS file is revised every time the web page is updated

RSS is used for information dissemination - requires very little bandwidth

RSS written in XML (eXtensible Markup Language)

Definition of RSS [More than you want to know] RSS is

a family of XML file formats for Web syndication used by news websites and weblogs. The abbreviation is used to refer to the following standards:– Rich Site Summary (RSS 0.91) – Really Simple Syndication (RSS 2.0)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_%28file_format%29

Definition of RSS The technology of RSS allows Internet

users to subscribe to websites that have provided RSS feeds; these are typically sites that change or add content regularly.

Unlike subscriptions to many printed newspapers and magazines, most RSS subscriptions are free.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_%28file_format%29

RSS – The Essentials Essential elements of an RSS file

– Title – Link (hyperlink)– Description

RSS enables users to create customized sources of information

Users “subscribe” to an RSS “feed” (The transmission or conveyance of a local radio or television program, as by satellite, on the Internet, or by broadcast over a network of stations.)

Example of RSS Feeds

NY Times Homepage - RSS<rss version="2.0"><title> NYT > Home Page </title><link> http://www.nytimes.com/index.html

</link><description>New York Times > Breaking News, World News

& Multimedia</description><lastBuildDate> Mon, 12 Dec 2005 05:05:00

EST </lastBuildDate><copyright> Copyright 2005 The New York

Times Company </copyright><language> en-us </language>

…

RSS News Feeds – Health NY Times, Washington Post, USA

Today, Miami Herald, BBC News

http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/nyt/Health.xml http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/rss/health/index.xml http://www.usatoday.com/repurposing/HealthRss.xml http://www.miami.com/mld/miamiherald/living/health/rss.xml http://newsrss.bbc.co.uk/rss/newsonline_world_edition/health/

rss.xml

RSS Feed Aggregators Desktop software (stand-alone)

– SharpReader– FeedReader– Wikipedia listing

Web-based – My Yahoo! – NewsIsFree.com– Wikipedia listing

RSS Feeds for Health

Refresh Rate

Distribution via RSS Other information can be distributed by

RSS– Web logs – “blogs”– Digital photo collections, such as Flickr– Audio blogs – “podcasts”– Social bookmarking sites, such as

Del.icio.us

Podcast: http://burkso2.blogspot.com/http://burkso2.blogspot.com/2005/11/delicious-social-bookmarking.html

Subscribe to RSS Feed RSS feed for a blog

Subscribe to RSS Feed RSS feed for a digital photo collection http://www.flickr.com/

Subscribe to RSS Feed RSS feed for a social bookmarking site http://del.icio.us/judell/

Blogs

Digital Photo Collections

Audio Blogs - Podcasts

RSS – Del.icio.us bookmarks

Things you can do with RSS News syndication Search for information via RSS Aggregate your feeds Display news on your website Display news on your mobile device Collect all your email in RSS Get RSS content through your email Track Fedex packages discount air fares Bargains at Ebay Get stock updates Get the weather reports What people are saying about you, your c

ompany, your products

Music, radio shows, TV clips Stay updated on someone's schedule Get cinema schedule updates Read your favourite comics What other people are surfing Automatically backup your weblog posts Get software updates Get the latest bittorrent files and p*** Shopping deals at Amazon.com

and others

What your friends and family would like for Christmas

Be notified of traffic conditions Be notified of updates in police and fire d

epartment logs

Web metrics Virus and security alerts Events and happenings in your city Gaming statistics Search for jobs Easing government bureaucracy Create your own news aggregator page Keep track of your notes Find recent photos taken near you Build maps Make Tag Clouds All those sites without RSS Become a comment blogger Patent Searching Keep your acquaintances updated with y

our latest contact details

Ditch Your Girlfriend Print Your Feeds

http://www.timyang.com/wiki/doku.php?id=lists:thingsyoucandowithrss

http://www.rsscalendar.com/rss/

Web Display of RSS Feeds Web display of syndicated content via

RSS Online Learning Update

– Portland Community College – Academic Commons– U of I Online

Web Display of RSS Feeds

Web Display of RSS Feeds

Web Display of RSS Feeds

RSS to JavaScript Dynamic Pages

– http://www.rss-to-javascript.com

RSS 2.0 and Atom 1.0 [More than you want to know] People

who generate syndication feeds have a choice of feed formats. As of mid-2005, the two most popular formats are RSS 2.0 and Atom 1.0.

Blogger.com (owned by Google) uses Atom 1.0.

Feedburner.com can convert Atom 1.0 feeds to RSS 2.0 feeds (this is a free service).

RSS 2.0 and Atom 1.0 Many “RSS” feed aggregators, such as

SharpReader and MyYahoo!, can “read” both RSS 2.0 and Atom 1.0.

My Yahoo! supports RSS 0.90, 0.91, 0.92, 1.0, and 2.0 and Atom 1.0.

An (Optional) Assignment Create an account at Yahoo! (if you

don’t have one already). Download and install a free, stand-alone

feed aggregator, such as SharpReader. Subscribe to at least one news feed

and one blog feed using MyYahoo! (web-based) and the stand-alone feed reader.

The What, Why, and How of RSS

Burks Oakley IIweb: http://www.online.uillinois.edu/oakley/e-mail: oakley@uillinois.edu

Submit questions to Rob Reilly: reilly@media.mit.edu

This work is licensed under a Creative CommonsAttribution – NonCommercial - ShareAlike 2.5 License.