How to Understand RSS Feeds

RSS (Rich Site Summary) is used to syndicate content by news related sites, weblogs and other online publishers. RSS feeds are becoming the norm on many websites and offer a convenience to the user. Use these steps to learn how to understand RSS feeds and utilize them yourself.

Difficulty: Moderate

Instructions

1. Know what RSS means. RSS stands for Rich Site Summary. It is a format used by sites that offer information that is continuously updated. This includes news related sites, weblogs and other information bearing sites.

2. Determine why RSS feed is a good choice for you. If you visit many of the same sites looking for information, then RSS feeds are exactly what you need. It allows you to get the information without visiting the site or signing up for a newsletter, saving you time and security.

3. Set yourself up for RSS feeds. You will need an RSS reader or news aggregator software that works with your computer system, such as the Amphetadesk reader available for Windows, Linux and Mac systems. There also are online RSS readers available; Google Reader is one of the more popular ones.

4. Find the sites that syndicate content. Go to your favorite sites and look for a small icon on the homepage that reads RSS, XML or RDF.

5. Follow the instructions provided on your RSS reader to add the site to your Feed Reader checks. Once you're finished, you will have one central location to check for the daily information you want.

[DirkMcFergus]

on 12/14/2009 RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication, fyi

[louisagholson]

on 6/6/2008 Enjoyed your article, because your steps allowed me to research how to add eHow feeds to Bloglines. I'm drafting an article now on how I did it. I digged and blogged you on my social networks.