SYNDICATING WEB SITES WITH RSS FEEDS
Introduction 1 About This Book 1 How to Use This Book 2 Foolish Assumptions 2 Conventions Used in This Book 2 How This Book Is Organized 3 Part I: Controlling the Information Explosion 3 Part II: Developing Great RSS Content 4 Part III: Launching Your RSS Feed 4 Part IV: Getting the Most Out of RSS Feeds 4 Part V: The Part of Tens 5 About the Companion Web Site 5 Icons Used in This Book 5 Where to Go from Here 6 Part I: Controlling the Information Explosion 7 Chapter 1: RSS in the Communication Revolution 9 Everywhere an Information 9 News on every conceivable subject 11 The problem of delivery 12 Aggregating news 12 Keeping up with endless changes 14 Getting an Overview of RSS 14 Examining the RSS infrastructure 15 Who is using RSS? 16 Exploring the Friendship of Blogging and RSS 20 Going from universal to personal 20 Anyone can be a publisher 20 Peeping in on millions of diaries with RSS 21 Envisioning Where RSS Is Today and Tomorrow 21 Understanding the Advantages of RSS for Subscribers 22 Exploring the Advantages of RSS for Publishers 23 Using RSS at Your Company 24 How RSS facilitates online business 24 Providing instant gratification on your Web site 25 Being noticed amidst the buzz 26 Controlling information flow 26 Using RSS on an intranet or extranet 28 Managing documents with RSS 28 Chapter 2: Choosing an RSS Feed Reader 31 Deciding on the Type of Reader 31 Web-based readers 32 Software readers 36 Simple or full-featured? 38 Choosing a Web-Based Service 40 Choosing Software 41 Chapter 3: Subscribing to RSS Feeds 45 Finding News Feeds 45 Looking for the orange or blue button 46 Using RSS directories 48 Using the list in your reader 49 Creating a new feed from a search 49 Importing an OPML file 51 Getting the Feed into Your Reader 51 Using the URL 52 Choosing from a list 56 Using Your RSS Reader 56 Choosing the feed 56 Reading the headlines 57 Getting the rest of the story 58 Making sure that you have the latest news 59 Getting alerts — or not 59 Mark as read or important 60 Using search and bookmarks 60 Sending a feed as e-mail 61 Configuring the view 61 Unsubscribing to RSS Feeds 63 Getting RSS on Your PDA or Mobile Phone 63 Part II: Developing Great RSS Content 65 Chapter 4: Using RSS to Spread Your Blog 67 Bloggers Unite! 68 Creating a Blog 70 Choosing a blogging service 71 Getting started 84 Creating a Blog with Your HTML Editor 85 Maintaining Your Blog 86 Archive this! 87 Getting input for your blog 87 Adding ads 88 Finding other ways to make money 89 Publicizing Your Blog with RSS 89 Chapter 5:Writing for Results 91 Picking an Audience 92 Using Full Text or Links? 92 Deciding What You Want to Say 95 Attracting new customers 95 Keeping current customers happy 96 Communicating with employees or colleagues 97 Providing news 98 Holding forth on your opinions 99 Offering your expertise 99 Finding Content Resources 100 Using blogs and RSS feeds 101 Using e-zines and discussion groups 102 Using the news 102 Scouring Web sites one by one 103 Making news personal 104 Using nonelectronic sources 105 Adding Value 105 Using RSS to Market Your Site 106 Coordinating with your e-mail newsletter 106 Delivering promotions and other marketing content 107 Sending out press releases 107 Creating a Web Site Based on RSS Feeds 107 Part III: Launching Your RSS Feed 111 Chapter 6: Creating Your First Feed 113 Understanding the Formats 113 From 091 to 20 and Atom, too 114 Picking the format that’s right for you 114 Optimizing Your Site for RSS 115 Deciding on the Web page structure 116 Maintaining relations between your feed and your site 117 The feed stands alone 122 Creating an RSS Feed the Easy Way 123 Filling in the blanks with UKOLN 123 Using NewzAlert Composer 127 Using FeedForAll 131 Editing Your Feed — Again and Again 132 Editing feeds and items in UKOLN 133 Editing feeds and items in NewzAlert Composer or FeedForAll 133 Reading Your First Feed — Finally! 134 Uploading your RSS feed 134 Validating your RSS feed 134 Subscribe! 136 Chapter 7: Creating RSS Feeds from Scratch 137 First, What is XML? 137 Understanding the RSS File Structure 138 Declaring the XML version and encoding 138 Dealing with illegal characters 139 Choosing a file type 140 Staying simple with RSS version 091 140 Graduating to RSS version 10 144 Getting current with RSS version 20 146 Splitting the Atom 149 What difference does it make? 152 Creating Your Own RSS File 152 Starting from a template 153 Using existing feeds as an example 154 Taking Your Feed for a Test Drive 155 Uploading your RSS file 155 Validating your feed 156 Troubleshooting feed problems 157 Subscribing to your feed 157 Chapter 8: Automating RSS Creation 159 Choosing an Automated RSS Tool 159 Using Blogging Software 160 Using Content Management Tools and Databases 160 Scraping from HTML 161 Using FeedFire’s online service 162 Using W3C’s online service 165 Converting E-Mail to RSS 171 NewslettersByRSS 171 iUplog 172 Using Advanced Tools 174 Chapter 9: Podcasting: Adding Multimedia to RSS Feeds 177 Understanding Podcasting 178 How podcasting works 179 How podcasting is being used today 180 The endless possibilities of podcasting 181 Receiving a Podcast 183 Finding the reader meant for you 183 Finding the podcast for you 187 Downloading a podcast 188 Listening to a Podcast 189 Listening on your computer 189 Listening on an MP3 player 191 Creating a Podcast 192 Creating the audio file yourself 192 Creating the feed 193 Creating audio Web content with a service 195 Finding Out More about Podcasting 196 Part IV: Getting the Most Out of RSS Feeds 199 Chapter 10: Incorporating Best Practices 201 Validating All Feeds 201 Supporting the Technology 203 Caching your feed 204 Publishing without losing Web-site traffic 205 Providing compelling content 205 Just how many people read your feed? 208 Getting attention 209 Signing on, now or later 210 Keeping Up to Date on Formats 210 Understanding the encoding 210 Using the format properly 211 Staying informed 212 Staying on Topic 213 Using the Structure to Your Advantage 213 Deciding on description length 214 Deciding how many entries to include 217 Being Timely 218 Chapter 11: Promoting Your Feed 219 Registering Your Feed with Directories 219 Linking to Your Feed 221 Getting Auto-Discovered 223 Explaining Just What RSS Is 224 Telling Others All about Your Feed 225 RSS feed links in your e-mail signature 226 Writing articles for other sites 226 Touting your feed in discussion groups 226 Telling everyone you know 228 Keeping Your E-mail Newsletter 228 Branding Your Feed 228 Chapter 12: Placing News Feeds on Your Web Site 231 Republishing RSS Feeds on Your Site 231 Choosing a Technology to Convert RSS to a Web Page 234 Using RSS-to-Web-Site Tools 234 Web-based services step-by-step 235 Software tools 240 Part V: The Part of Tens 245 Chapter 13: Ten Best RSS Readers 247 AmphetaDesk 248 Bloglines 249 FeedDemon 250 Feedster 251 NewsGator 252 NewzCrawler 253 Plucky Pluck 254 RssReader 255 Simple Subscribing with SharpReader 256 Yahoo! 257 More and Ever More 258 Chapter 14: Ten Ways to Market Your Web Site 259 Optimizing for Search Engines 260 Registering Your Site 262 Getting Traffic Statistics 263 Placing Ads 265 Getting Affiliated 266 Getting Links to Your Site 268 Telling People about Your Site 269 Creating an Online Community 270 Publishing E-Zines and Blogs 271 Writing Articles 272 Chapter 15: Ten Best RSS Resources 273 Working with Tutorials 274 Understanding Technical Specifications 275 Using Directories 275 Reading Articles and Feeds 276 Articles 276 RSS feeds on RSS 278 Finding Sites with RSS Feeds 279 Marketing with RSS 282 Using Feed-Creation Tools 283 Software tools 283 Building your feed online 283 Ferreting out feeds from searches 285 Finding Podcasting Resources 287 Using Discussion Groups 288 Using Auxiliary RSS Tools 289