Too Much Information! - RSS

“What does RSS do?” is a more useful question for most Internet users than what it is!

RSS 2.0 (Really Simple Syndication) is a technology that allows you to subscribe to a web page or blog with an RSS formatted ‘feed’. It is used particularly by news websites, blogs and podcasts but it is potentially a very powerful method of filtering information and getting a personalised view of the Internet.

There are other formats but RSS is the most common. You have probably already spotted the RSS or XML buttons on some web pages e.g. BBC.

Clicking one of these buttons will most likely take you to a page of horrible looking xml code but we only need to copy the address in the address bar to get it to work!


Along with the RSS feed you will need a ‘feed reader’ or ‘aggregator’. As the name suggests an aggregator pulls information together into one place. It will also track subsequent changes to a website or other information source automatically. A web-based feed reader or aggregator such as Bloglines requires no software to be downloaded or installed on the user’s computer and gives access to a personal selection of feeds from the Internet. These feeds can then be read as summaries from within the aggregator or provide links to the full content.

Why not try it out? The attached PDF might help..

Using Bloglines

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