Week Eight: RSS

RSS 1 Week 8

(See link below for PDF of images.
PDF on News also linked below.)

RSS in Plain English:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0klgLsSxGsU


Through it began in 19999, a 2006 Yahoo study reported that four percent of Internet users had jumped on the RSS bandwagon and begun subscribing to syndicated feeds.

Considering the number of ways that web publishers showed their readers they offer feeds, it's only logical that a standardized logo evolved:

Image One

In an effort to make the concept of syndication easier for mainstream users, the next versions of the Internet Explorer and Opera browsers identified RSS and Atom feeds with the same icon used in Mozilla Firefox. Since the market share of these browsers tops 95 percent, the icon became the de facto standard for syndication overnight in 2006.

Image two

The RSS Advisory Board should officially support the common feed icon, adopting the symbol on its own site and encouraging its use on web sites, browsers, and syndication software.

1. It conveys the important attributes of feeds: newness, activity, subscription, and continual information.

2. It builds on the most consistent and identifiable element used to represent feeds today: the orange rectangle.

3. It avoids the use of text. Icons that have text do not generally work well for a global audience. For example, an icon with the text "FEED" may be cryptic to users whose primary language is non-Latin based. Text is very important to support an icon (in tool-tips or accompanying text). In English, we will be using the verb "subscribe" fairly widely whenever text is appropriate.

RSS is a Web content syndication format.

Its name is an acronym for Really Simple Syndication.

RSS is a dialect of XML. All RSS files must conform to the XML 1.0 specification, as published on the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) website.

A summary of RSS version history.

At the top level, a RSS document is a element, with a mandatory attribute called version, that specifies the version of RSS that the document conforms to. If it conforms to this specification, the version attribute must be 2.0.

Subordinate to the element is a single element, which contains information about the channel (metadata) and its contents.

Sample files *

Here are sample files for:
RSS 0.91,
0.92
and 2.0.

Requried Channel Elements

Here's a list of the required channel elements, each with a brief description, an example, and where available, a pointer to a more complete description.

Element Description
title The name of the channel. It's how people refer to your service. If you have an HTML website that contains the same information as your RSS file, the title of your channel should be the same as the title of your website.

Example
GoUpstate.com News Headlines


link The URL to the HTML website corresponding to the channel.

Example
http://www.goupstate.com/


description Phrase or sentence describing the channel.


Example
The latest news from GoUpstate.com, a Spartanburg Herald-Journal Web site.


Top Three News feed readers as ranked by Cnet:

1. NewzCrawler ($24.95)is a rss/atom reader, news aggregator, browser and blog client for Windows which provides access to news content from various sources:

* Syndicated news given in XML-based formats (Atom, RSS, RDF, BackSlash etc.);
* Usenet (NNTP) newsgroups;
* Web pages (HTTP).

It gathers news content from each source channel and displays them in a number of views: News List, News Balloon and News Ticker. NewzCrawler's user interface is similar to an ordinary MS Outlook Express-like user interface. It supports many back-end headline syndication file formats and embeds web browser for extra fast news surfing.

The main difference from other rss readers is that NewzCrawler rapidly retrieves news from various web sources in background and displays them in comfortable customizable views. It is the only solution available that combines RSS, Atom, Newsgroups and Web pages in one application.

2. Feed demon 2.6 free RSS new feed reader
The Bottom Line
FeedDemon is a clean and well thought-out approach to reading RSS feeds. Easy to configure and use, FeedDemon still has a very comprehensive feature set and hardly any weak spots.
Visit Their Web Site
Pros

* FeedDemon is friendly, easy to use and convenient
* "Watches" search news for keywords automatically and "News Bins" let you collect items manually
* FeedDemon integrates and synchronizes with Bloglines and NewsGator Online accounts

Cons

* FeedDemon lacks advanced and statistics-based filters
* Searching could be faster in FeedDemon
* FeedDemon does not thread related blog posts

Description

* FeedDemon is a news aggregator for RSS and Atom feeds.
* Individual RSS channels can be organized easily in customizable per-topic listings in FeedDemon.
* "News Bins" let you collect individual items. Subscriptions can be ranked by the attention given.
* "Watches" are FeedDemon's virtual folders, searching current news for keywords automatically.
* Additionally, individual items can be flagged or emailed easily from inside FeedDemon.
* FeedDemon suppoprts OPML and APML (attention profiling) files and synchronizes seamlessly with Bloglines or NewsGator Online.
* Support for Podcasting lets FeedDemon download and copy media files to any player automatically.
* FeedDemon keeps news for offline reading and includes a cleanup wizard that trashes old news easily.
* Integrating with bloogging tools, FeedDemon lets you blog about a news/blog item instantly.
• FeedDemon supports Windows 98/ME/2000/3/XP/Vista.

3. Google Reader: Free RSS News Feed Reader
The Bottom Line
Google Reader is a decidedly simple yet very usable and, thanks to a flexible labeling system, quite comprehensive web-based RSS feed reader. You can even share items easily right from within Google Reader. More automatic help with organizing would be nice.
Visit Their Web Site
Pros

* Google Reader provides a slick, universally accessible and uncomplicated way to read RSS news feeds
* Sensible keyboard shortcuts make navigating Google Reader a snap
* Lets you label feeds and items freely and for comprehensive grouping and organization

Cons

* Google Reader cannot label items automatically based on past choices
* You cannot annotate items
* Google Reader not identify related posts and news to put items in context

Description

* Google Reader is a web-based reader for RSS and Atom news feeds.
* You can group and read your subscriptions using free labels.
* Google Reader lets you tag, sort and organize individual items using labels, too.
* Keyboard shortcuts make navigating Google Reader a pleasurable snap.
* You can easily share items on a public web page that has an RSS feed itself, send them by email, or use tags for blogrolls.
* A blog and news search engine makes it easy to find and subscribe to feeds.
* Google Reader is accessible in screen readers and navigable using WAI-ARIA.
* Using Google Gears, you can access up to 2000 items offline (in the normal Google Reader interface).
• You can import and export your subscriptions using OPML.


http://www.newsonfeeds.com/faq/aggregators

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