Okay - I'm an idiot...

[N40GL]

... which probably everyone already knows.

I see the new forum has an "RSS" feed. I know that stands for "Real Simple Syndication" (or something like that), but can anyone explain, using words of less than one syllable, what that actually means and how to take advantage of it?

If this is in the wrong forum, feel free to move it.

Mark

[Petrograde]

I've been wondering what the hell an RSS feed is too...

[texasvic]

Linky... (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RSS_feed)

:)

[N40GL]

So if I read this right, I need to go to an <b>additional</b> web site to see what's on <b>this</b> web site. Seems like a lot of extra work, particularly since this web site tells me what's new anyway.

Is there a separate program that exists that will search my favorite RSS sites and display what's new? Wikipedia isn't very helpful in that regard.

[blackf0rk]

Actually, having an RSS feed ia great tool. If you have a program called "Konfabulator" (now owned by Yahoo! [but still free]) you can download tons of widgets that do all sorts of handy things for you.

One of the widgets is an RSS Reader. Basically, you can browse the site by this little widget that sits on your desktop. You don't have to use an internet explorer window at all.

[jawz101]

the premise w/ RSS is to scan through a bunch of headlines and websites in a short amount of time.

Many websites are now offering RSS, ATOM, OPML, XML feeds (they all are newsfeeds) of headline summaries of their articles, weblogs, weather updates, etc. On a desktop/web app you can look at 30 sites all at once if you want and skim through the headlines that you normally spend an hour checking every morning.

There are desktop programs and web sites that offer a space to maintain your own collection of news sites.
Outlook Express
feedreader (www.feedreader.com)
amphetadesk (http://www.disobey.com/amphetadesk)
...and many others.

As for online some pppular reader sites are www.bloglines.com, www.google.com/reader, etc

Microsoft is even implementing more RSS reading capabilities in their future release of IE7.

some websites use the feeds as tickers across their mainpages to give you news updates. PDAs use the concept so they can scrunch more headlines on that tiny screen.
ok. i'm done

[jawz101]

Oh yeah... to find them on web pages there will typically be an orange icon that links to the feed labeled RSS or something like that. Copy & paste these into your reader to set them up.... I guess I got into typing on this subject becaues I can't find our forum feed anymore.... ugh. Where is it?