What is RSS?
In a world where thousands of web pages are created every day, keeping up to date with all the information you want can be difficult. Wouldn't it be better to have the latest news and features delivered directly to you, rather than clicking from site to site? Well now you can thanks to a very easy service called RSS.There is some debate as to what RSS really stands for. The most popular phrase, as well as most recognized is "Really Simple Syndication". Put plainly, it allows you to identify the content you like and have it delivered directly to you. It takes the hassle out of staying up-to-date, by showing you the very latest information that you are interested in.
Not all websites currently provide RSS, but it is growing rapidly in popularity and many others, including Gmail, The New York Times and CNN do provide it. We have a RSS feed for all the major news and updates to this site.
How do I start using RSS feeds?
In general, the first thing you need is something called a news reader or aggregator. There are many different versions, some of which are accessed using a browser, and some of which are downloadable applications. All allow you to display and subscribe to the RSS feeds you want. Some web browsers, such as Mozilla Firefox, Apple Safari, and Internet Explorer 7 beta have RSS readers built in which automatically pick up RSS feeds for you. For more details on these, please click here.Once you have chosen a news reader, all you have to do is to decide what content you want. For example, if you would like the latest Delta Sigma Phi news, simply visit the home page and you will notice an orange RSS button on the left hand side. If you click on the button you can subscribe to the feed in various ways, including by dragging the URL of the RSS feed into your news reader or by cutting and pasting the same URL into a new feed in your news reader.
How do I get a News reader?
There is a variety of different news readers available and new versions are appearing all the time. Different news readers work on differently on each operating systems, so you will need to take this into account when you make your choice. Or you may prefer to have the aggregator built into your browser. The choice is up to you. Goolge has compiled a list of news readers that are available for you here.
How do I use the RSS feature in my browser?
Mozilla Firefox
The easiest way to use the live bookmark feature in Firefox, is to view a page that has the RSS data included in the page's source. When a website has RSS included in its source, the live bookmark icon appears in the address bar. To add that website as a live bookmark, simply click on the icon and choose where you want the bookmark to be in your favorites.
After the live bookmark is added to your favorites, the bookmark appears as a folder with the name of the website as the folder's name. The pages inside that folder are created with every update and the title of those coincide with the update as well.
If the RSS feed is not included in in the page source, but is included in a sepaerate link, then the live bookmark needs to be added manually. You can do this by copuing the url for the Web feed and going to the bookmark manager and add a new live bookmark through the file menu.
Internet Explorer 7 Beta
The easiest way to use the live bookmark feature in Internet Explorer 7, is to view a page that has the RSS data included in the page's source. When a website has RSS included in its source, the live bookmark icon tuens orange in the standard buttons bar, if it's a new feed, a little orange star also appears. To add that website as a live bookmark, simply click on the icon to view the feed and then choose the Add to favorites link that is un the upper right corner of the page.