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RSS feeds from this site

The following RSS feeds are available from this site

Tales from the Terminal Room URL for your RSS reader: http://www.rba.co.uk/rss/tfttr.xml

Karen Blakeman's Blog - what's new on the web, in search technology and on the RBA web site. URL for your RSS reader: http://www.rba.co.uk/wordpress/feed/

Karen Blakeman's Blog - RSS feed for comments. URL for your RSS reader: http://www.rba.co.uk/wordpress/comments/feed/

What is an RSS feed?

RSS can stand for Rich Site Summary, RDF Site Summary or Really Simple Syndication. It is a way of delivering news and headlines direct to you, the reader.

How is it different from email alerts?

RSS feeds are designed to be read by RSS aware programs or news aggregators, which means that all your news alerts can be gathered together in a single location and they do not clutter up your working email inbox with dozens of separate messages. A good RSS reader will allow you to specify how often your feeds are updated and how long headlines are to be archived.

How can I tell if a news service has an RSS feed?

Look for the XML or RSS icons. Most of the major services, such as the BBC and Yahoo News offer feeds in this format.

Do I get the full story or just the headlines?

You usually receive just the headlines or excerpts, for example the first couple of lines or sentences. It depends on how the author of an RSS feed has set up their feed and also which reader you use. There is normally a link attached to each item so that you can view the whole article, either within the reader or your browser.

What do I need in order to read RSS feeds?

Firefox and Thunderbird

Both Firefox and Thunderbird have "Live Bookmarks" that which enable you to store the URL of the feed and view RSS headlines. In Firefox go to Bookmarks, Manage Bookmarks, File, New Live Bookmark and enter the URL of the feed. On some sites you will see a Live Bookmark icon in the bottom right hand corner of the browser status bar. Click on the icon, select an RSS feed and follow the Add Bookmark dialog.

In Thunderbird go to Tools, Account Settings, Add Account, RSS News & Blogs.

Web based readers

Bloglines a free web based feed reader. It has the advantage that you can access your feeds from any Internet terminal. There is an excellent tutorial on how to set up and use Bloglines at Using Bloglines (or How to keep up with dozens of blogs everyday)

Stand-alone readers

If you prefer headlines to be stored on your desktop there are many stand alone applications for your computer. Try Feedreader (free) or Feeddemon. A list of RSS readers can be found in the Open Directory.

Features to look for PDF File 12KB

How do I get the feed into my reader? When I click on the link in my browser it's unreadable.

If you have the coded version of the feed displayed in your broswer copy the URL in the address box of your browser, go to your reader, choose the option for setting up a new feed and paste the URL into the relevant box. Some services display the URL as ordinary text on the information page so that you can do a straightforward copy and paste rather than having to click and view the xml coded version.

Further information

There is a very useful RSS primer for publishers and content providers by Malcolm Moffat on the EEVL web site. Also take a look at RSS for Non-Techie Librarians by Steven M. Cohen and the article in Wikipedia - RSS (file format)

For a step by step guide on how to produce an RSS feed go to http://www.make-rss-feeds.com/making-an-rss-feed.htm

Developing Feeds with RSS and Atom and Syndicating Web Sites with RSS Feeds for Dummies are two very good books on the subject.