by Mike Disher Many of us have seen icons such as this picture to the left on websites, blogs (such as this one), and in countless articles and news sites. It seems to be everywhere once you start looking for it. On our blog, its just a small little thing on the right-hand side of the page that has the words "RSS Feed" after it. So what is RSS and why do I care? Let's say you are someone who's job is education, but as a hobby you really like woodworking. You found this really great website where someone is keeping a log of the projects they are doing, sharing patterns, maybe giving helpful tips...but they aren't real regular about when they have new content. You could, if you had time, just make a habit of going to visit that site every day to see if there is anything new. If you are like me, however, you're way too busy for that. So wouldn't it be cool if you could just be told when there is something new, rather than have to check every day? This is where RSS can save you a ton of time, and keep you focused on the things that really need your attention. RSS, which commonly is translated "Really Simple Syndication", has a long history actually going back to the late 1990's. It started out as RSS (RDF Site Summary), then it became RSS (Rich Site Summary). Today, most people just call it RSS and if you ask what it is, they say it stands for "Really Simple Syndication". Like the proverbial rose, however, whatever you call it, it still performs the same function. If you hover over the little "RSS Feed" I mentioned in my first paragraph above, you'll see that it "links" to http://dishtech.weebly.com/1/feed. That is the "location" of the RSS feed. This is very important to know if you want to take advantage of this. Why? Well, although you can be INTERESTED in keeping track, you need some type of RSS reader (sometimes called a "feed reader" or "aggregator") that will go get these updates for you and let you know they are there. We could literally spend days talking about the various applications that can do this for you. Some web browsers have RSS reader technology built in to them. Some email programs also come equipped to handle your RSS feeds, too. For example, I use Microsoft Outlook at the office for my email program. If I look at my Mail Folders list, I can see there is a folder called RSS Feeds. All I had to do, for THIS blogs RSS Feed, was right-click on the "RSS Feed" link on the right side of this page and chose to "Copy link address". (Note: If you are using Internet Explorer, when you right click..chose the option to "Copy shortcut") Then, I right-clicked on the RSS Feeds folder in Outlook, clicked on "Add a new RSS feed..." and then pasted (you might have to use ctrl-v to paste if you right-click and don't get any options) the address I just copied and clicked Add! Then a new folder was created just for "THE DISH on Technology - Blog", and all the unread articles automatically populated the folder and were there for me to read at my leisure. Of course, you aren't limited to your desktop computer for this. There are RSS Feed Readers for your smartphones, tablets, laptops...nearly every device on every platform. Most of them are very simple to get started with. Here are some examples, (with NO endorsements or reviews) most of which are FREE!: iPhone: Feedly Reeder 2 Digg (RSS is just a part of this news reader app) iPad: Feedly NewsBlur Newsify Android: Feedly EasyRSS Simple RSS "Wintel" PC's: FeedDemon Omea Reader Apple/Mac PC's: Shrook Happy Reading! - - - - - - - - - Check back with http://dishtech.weebly.com weekly as we present “THE DISH” on topics of interest for the technology curious! |