What is RSS?RSS is a document format for reading frequently updated websites in the internet. Similar to other document format like the MS Word documents or the PDF documents, the RSS also needs an interpreter called the "RSS Reader" as the MS Word Application for your MS Word documents and acrobat reader for your PDF documents. Each RSS document is called a "feed" or commonly as RSS Feed. RSS feeds are seen with the icon having an orange background with arcs usually found on the side bar of a blog.
How can RSS feed help me?
RSS are designed to help us read frequently updated websites in just one neat and simple application called the "RSS Reader". I use these programs at home to read my favorite blogs or forum and at work to read the messages from my projects. With this, i do not need to go to each of the websites i often visit just to check for any update but instead the RSS Reader does this for me. RSS Readers really made my life more easier as RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication
How do i get RSS?
You will need an RSS Reader, there are lots of applications that enables you to read RSS documents. Personally, I use the Google Reader but you might prefer some other applications. Lets just use it because it the only reader use for now. If you have a Google account then you can use it to read RSS feeds from there. Just click on the "add subscription" link and paste in your RSS feed. Now on the blogs that you read look for the RSS Logo, copy and paste the URL to your favorite RSS Reader in my case its Google Reader. Some feeds are marked private meaning you will need a password before we could read the contents. Some readers accepts authentication, at the office is use Sharp Reader Software.
How do I know the link I got is RSS?The RSS reader is written in plain text, if you will try to open an RSS document with a text editor, you can actually read it but you might have a little more time understanding because of the way its written. The format the RSS document is written is called XML. XML is like an older brother of the other common technical word called HTML. XML and HTML are not the topic here so lets just ignore them for now. You will know its RSS because every RSS feed has this somewhere at the beginning of the document: and it has an orange icon with a arcs in it. You can try using Tildemark Blogs RSS feed to use is as a sample or maybe subscribe to it.
; "Mostly Harmless")
; "Dragonball Evolution Movie")
; "Life the Universe and Everything")
; "The Restaurant at the End of the Universe")
; "the-ultimate-hitchhikers-guide-to-the-galaxy.jpg")
; "Angels And Demons")
; "StarCraft: Brood War")
; "Eagle Eye")
; "Linksys Compact Wireless G USB")
; "We Sing, We Dance, We Steal Things")
RSS has always been a stumbling block for me because I simply have a hard time understanding what it is. This article has helped a bit but I really need to do more homework on it.
It's a great things to know about RSSing in the near future.It's a big hint in SEO Skills.