RSS Basics And Beyond: Tips and Tricks for Getting the Most out of Syndicated Content

Slide 1: RSS Basics and Beyond Tips and Tricks for Getting the Most out of Syndicated Content Ken Varnum Web Systems Manager University of Michigan Libraries varnum@umich.edu 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 2: Quick Questionnaire Who has heard of RSS? Who reads RSS feeds? Who creates RSS feeds? 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 3: RSS Working Definition RSS is a combination of: • Data Format • RSS (0.93, 1.0, 2.0…) • RDF • Atom • Data Interchange • Syndication 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 4: Really Simple Syndication Syndication is key element It enables you -- your library -- to make your content available to anyone to use. News • Events • Book lists • Study guides • Etc. • It puts you on par with the AP or Reuters 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 5: RSS is Everywhere QuickTimeﾪ and a TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor are needed to see this picture. 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 6: Where Does RSS Come From? Automatically Generated • Weblog software (Movable Type, TypePad, Bloglines, Wordpress, etc.) • Content management systems (i.e., Wikis) Using Perl, PHP, Ruby, etc. Create feeds from database searches By Hand If you know HTML you can learn RSS 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 7: Finding Feeds Look for icons on page Look for icons in browser location bar If you can find the link, you can use the content. Some conditions apply. See copyright holder for details. 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 8: Consuming RSS All tools have common traits Access RSS Feeds • Track what a user has already read • Reproduce feed content • Link to original source • 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 9: Consuming RSS: Readers PC-Based -- tied to a particular computer Special Applications • FeedDemon • FeedReader • NetNewsWire Web Browsers • Safari • IE7 • Firefox 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 10: Consuming RSS: Aggregators Web-based Access anywhere Examples • Yahoo! • Bloglines • Google Reader Even read off-line 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 11: Consuming RSS: Integration RSS is just a stream of information Easy to integrate into a web page Many tools have ‘hooks’ to hang RSS on: • Weblog software • Content magement • Wiki software, etc., etc., etc. But if you’re using good ol’ HTML • Feed2JS • RSS2HTML 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 12: It’s This Easy Go to http://feed2js.org Click “Build” Paste in a feed URL (www.loc.gov/rss/pao/news.xml) Click “Generate JavaScript” Copy 4 lines of HTML onto the page you want it to appear 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 13: Demonstration 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

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Slide 18: It’s Wednesday Afternoon. Do You Know Where Your Feeds Are? ??? 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond Photo: Chris Moore (http://www.flickr.com/people/ckwmoore/)

Slide 19: What Libraries are Doing Outward-facing Information for patrons Information for community Information for selves 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 20: Create “Live” Subject Guides del.icio.us lets you ‘tag’ web sites Create an account for your library Librarians (or patrons!) tag web pages that make sense • History • Events • People As librarians find web sites that are interesting and fit a subject guide, tag them 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 21: Subscribe to RSS Feed Every del.icio.us tag has an RSS Feed Example: http://del.icio.us/rss/CityPublic_History Put it in a ‘what’s new’ section on a subject guide -- with Feed2JS or other 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 22: del.icio.us result 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 23: New Book Lists Many OPACs can provide RSS feeds • New books • Items on hold • Catalog searches If your OPAC does not • Do it yourself • Talk to your vendor! 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 24: Cambridge (Ontario) 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 25: Books Checked Out Your OPAC might do this on its own But probably not Try LibraryElf 3rd party service • Works with some, but not all, vendors • Patron sets up, not you • Requires borrower info & potential privacy concerns • -- but at patron discretion • No library intervention needed 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 26: LibraryElf 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 27: Ohio Patrons Are There Akron-Summit County Public Library Lane Public Library Ashtabula County District Library Lorain Public Library System Bristol Public Library Mansfield/Richland County Public Library Champaign County Library Mary L Cook Public Library Clark County Public Library McKinley Memorial Library Clermont County Public Library Mentor Public Library Columbus Metropolitan Library New Carlisle Public Library Community Library Newton Falls Public Library Cuyahoga County Public Library Portage County District Library Dayton Metro Library Preble County District Library Delaware County District Library Public Library of Cincinnati & Hamilton County Franklin-Springboro Public Library Rock Creek Public Library Geauga County Public Library Tipp City Public Library Girard Public Library Twinsburg Public Library Grand Valley Library Upper Arlington Public Library Grandview Heights Public Library Washington-Centerville Public Library Greene County Public Library Way Public Library Harbor-Topky Memorial Library Westerville Public Library Henderson Memorial Library Westlake Porter Public Library Hubbard Public Library Worch Memorial Public Library Kingsville Public Library Wright Memorial Public Library Kinsman Free Public Library 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 28: Monitoring the Web How do you know when a web page changes? • New journal issue? • New report from the county board? Monitoring tools check sites for you • Google Alerts watches topics • Page2RSS watches pages 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 29: Page2RSS Enter any web page URL RSS feed is updated as the page changes Page2RSS for the Library 2.0 links page http://page2rss.com/page/rss?url=library.osu.edu/sites/Seminar2-0/links.php Or simply http://tinyurl.com/ysx4kd 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 30: Page2RSS 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 31: Roll Your Own RSS Several ways to get an RSS feed • Write one by hand • Set up a (free) blog • Write a script yourself (if you have a Perl/PHP/Ruby person) • Use a service like FeedXS 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 32: FeedXs http://www.feedxs.com/ Create a feed Add items to it Put them here, there, or everywhere http://kenvarnum.feedxs.com/Library20.rss 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 33: FeedXs Demo 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 34: Beyond the Basics Mostly talked about existing services that you can leverage Now turn to some more advanced topics • Search = Feed • Using RSS to get to your patrons where they “live” 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 35: Database Searching Academic example: Faculty Publications Homegrown database to collect info You may have similar things you track 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 37: Feed = Live Data Every search has an RSS feed User’s reader tracks what’s new RSS puts content on other web pages via Feed2JS 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 38: Knox County (Tennessee) 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 39: Other Ways to Use RSS RSS can put library materials in user’s lives In academic library, course reserve lists • Course pages • Anywhere else 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 40: In a Public Library Book lists for local organizations’ web sites Resource lists (from catalog or other) for predictable school projects Library news for local paper’s web site 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 41: Final Thoughts RSS means simplicity of sharing content Simple to create, simple to use Great tool for putting your library “out there” where your patrons are Flexible Very low barrier to creation or consumption 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond

Slide 42: Thank You Contact Me varnum@umich.edu PowerPoint Slides http://varnum.org/papers/basics-and-beyond.ppt Weblog on RSS in Libraries http://www.rss4lib.com/ 13 June 2007 RSS Basics and Beyond