What is RSS?
That is a very good question, and one which I have seen plastered all over the web for years.Many nerds, tekkies, journos and blogheads have tried to explain what an RSS feed is - in my opinion, most have failed.
So here's my attempt to clarify for IRC members!
RSS - Inverness Rowing Club Style
The boring stuff
RSS stands for "Really Simple Syndication", and if that tickles your fancy, you could do worse than read Wikipedia's RSS page.
This symbol is the widely accepted logo/icon for RSS.
The practical implications
For all practical purposes, all you need to know is that many websites now have an embedded xml file, and webmasters ensure that this file is updated whenever their site (or blog or newspage etc..) is updated.Regulars to the Inverness Site will know that I have done something similar by updating our front page whenever I post new news items or pictures. However, this page is frequently stored (or cached) by your browser for several weeks. Unless you hit "Refresh", all my good work is wasted.
Here is where RSS feeds are great, browsers/ISPs and newsreaders alike all know that these files need to be checked frequently. Furthermore, there are many types of software which will flag up whenever feed you have stored as a favourite (or bookmark, subscription or similar jargon) changes. Our feed can be found at http://www.invernessrowingclub.co.uk/feed.xml.
If you haven't subscribed to an RSS feed before, please note that both Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox have build in functionality. It is not the best way of getting feeds, but it is a very good place to start.
RSS really does make the web much more interactive. I do hope you join in.
Neil Wallace 29 August 2007
The picture below shows Liferea (a dedicated feed reader) displaying our RSS Feed.
