Week 2 RSS

Slide 1: Activity Two RSS

Slide 2: What is a RSS? • RSS stands for Rich Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication. • Put simply, it is a service to allow users to be notified about new content on a blog or website (MJA). • To read RSS content, known as RSS feeds, requires the use of software known as a feed reader, aggregator or RSS reader. This software can be accessed as a free web-application such as Bloglines or Google Reader or it can be downloaded to your computer. Newer web browsers such as Internet Explorer 7 and Firefox are now incorporating RSS readers as a standard feature. • By using RSS feeds you only need to visit the one site, your feed reader to gain updated information from your nominated websites instead of visiting each site individually. • RSS feeds can easily identified by the use of a standardised RSS symbol.

Slide 3: How does RSS work? Information receiver Information provider http://www.slideshare.net/travelinlibrarian/integrating-rss-into-your-web-site-153784

Slide 4: RSS in plain english Watch this short video on RSS produced by the Common Craft Show. (This video can also be found at Blip.tv and TeacherTube.)

Slide 5: Examples of RSS BBC News Ovid SP

Slide 6: Table of contents from ScienceDirect

Slide 7: Examples of RSS feed readers

Slide 8: What a RSS feed looks like? But the good news is you do not have to know about this xml code.

Slide 9: How are libraries using it? Journal table of contents To push content to library users Current awareness services New books lists

Slide 10: Library news Training or events calendars

Slide 11: Dynamic elements to library websites – ability to add content from other sources eg news feeds es s ourc RSS

Slide 12: Professional development – keeping up to date with current trends from various sources

Slide 13: Time to play

Slide 14: Set up your own RSS feed reader account. 1. Go to Bloglines http://www.bloglines.com/ 2. Click on Sign up now it is free to register for an account. 3. Enter your details as requested. 4. Click Register. You will be sent a confirmation email in a few minutes.

Slide 15: 5. When you receive your email, follow the instructions it contains to activate your account. 6. You have now successfully set up an account with an RSS feed reader. Bloglines makes the first step of subscribing to content easy for you with a list of websites to select from.

Slide 16: 7. Each time you log into Bloglines you will see a similar screen which displays your subscribed to feeds on the left hand side of the page with the number of unread items in bold beside the website name.

Slide 17: Adding more RSS feeds to your account. 1. Visit a number of blogs and websites and subscribe to them via your Bloglines account. 2. On your website of choice click on the RSS feed icon. Some websites may have an icon specifically for Bloglines. 3. If so, click on it and you will be taken to the bloglines log in page. 4. Enter you details.

Slide 18: 5. The next page displayed will show all of the available feeds for that website with different options for displaying the feed. In most cases the default options will suffice. 6. Click Subscribe.

Slide 19: 7. This will take you the main screen where your feeds are displayed. The new feed will be listed, with your existing feeds and you will be able to read the last 10 posts. An alternative method for adding feeds is to use the to Add option in your Bloglines Feeds tab. 1. In you Bloglines account, click on Add, located above your list of feeds.

Slide 20: 2. You will be taken to the above screen which allows you to enter the URL of a website that utilises RSS feeds. 3. Find and copy the URL of a website of interest. 4. Paste the URL into the Bloglines screen. 5. Click Subscribe. 6. You are then taken to the available feeds screen.

Slide 21: 7. In most cases the default options will suffice. Therefore just click Subscribe. If there is more than one feed available, select one feed (I usually select the one that has the most subscribers). 8. This will take you the main screen where your feeds are displayed. The new feed will be listed, with your existing feeds and you will be able to read the last 10 posts. You have now learnt two different methods of adding RSS feeds to your feed reader account. Congratulations.

Slide 22: Blog prompts Now it is time to blog about your experiences. You might like to write about: • What you like (or dislike) about RSS and feed readers? • How do you think you might use RSS in your professional or personal life? • Did you find any great sources we should all add to our feed reader?

Slide 23: Other tools to try Bloglines is only one of many RSS feed readers that are available. You may like to try a different feed reader as functionality differs slightly between each reader. Some of the other readers include:

Slide 24: Further reading • 7 Things you should know about RSS http://www.educause.edu/ir/library/pdf/ELI7024.pdf • Tips on using RSS http://librarianinblack.typepad.com/librarianinblack/2008/02/tips-on-using- r.html • RSS Readers: Google Reader vs. Bloglines http://bibliosk8.wordpress.com/2008/04/15/ • 10 Ways Libraries can use RSS http://moxielibrarian.wordpress.com/2008/02/27/10-ways-libraries-can-use- rss/ • What is RSS, and why should you care? http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=3530926