Technology News

Technology News: RSS – A New(s) Revolution

By: Hugh A. McCafferty

You may have read about, heard of, or simply noticed the ever-increasing presence of a new of type internet service called RSS. Another acronym to commit to memory, RSS stands for Really Simple Syndication, in reference to its number one function: to syndicate news feeds in the form of headlines and news summaries from all over the web into a single, stand-alone application that runs on your desktop, called an aggregator. Essentially, utilizing RSS feeds is a method of news harvesting that doesn’t require a round-robin tour of the usual news sites: Yahoo, MSN, AOL, etc. Instead, the user simply connects to the internet, opens the aggregator, and lets the application do all the work.

HOW IT WORKS

These RSS feeds call up assorted headlines and news summaries that a user has directed their RSS aggregator to monitor. The RSS feed, provided at no charge, is actually a page in a company's web site that is written purely using a coding language known as Extensible Markup Language (XML) and exists for the sole purpose of communicating with an RSS aggregator. Though it makes perfect sense to your aggregator, if you were to view that same XML webpage in your internet browser, it would appear as mere chunks of indecipherable code.

The aggregator checks the various URLs – non numerical internet addresses – of the RSS feeds that you, the user, has told it to monitor for updates, and synchronizes them with your aggregator. This provides the latest news from dozens, and potentially hundreds, of sources pertaining to a multitude of different topics in a readers-digest version, ready-to-read on your desktop. When any of the news summaries is of interest to the reader, all he or she has to do is click on the hyperlink within the summary in order to access the web page with the full-text version of the story.

WHY BOTHER?

Though nearly identical to email newsletters, RSS feeds provide a cleaner, news-only interface by which a user is able to get the latest news. While newsletters are generated daily at best, many RSS feeds are updated multiple times throughout the day, depending on the RSS feed provider (the web site from which the feed comes). Additionally, the news is delivered right to the desktop in its summarized form so that you have a whole slew of news feed summaries – dating from the last time the aggregator was synchronized – that you can access even when not connected to the internet.

There are RSS feeds for just about every industry and interest you can think of: the tried-and-true news sources offer the regular top headlines in addition to offshoot topics such as Yahoo’s “Oddly Enough” feed about humorous and odd news stories, while a seemingly limitless number of technology feeds provides all the reviews, previews, and underground rumors of upcoming products that heavily addicted technophiles can ingest. There are profession-specific feeds for veterinarians and dentists alike, such as the general topic feed on the veterinary.tradeworlds.com veterinary site or the RSS feed on the dentistrynews.it dental site. Other veterinary and dental feeds, such as those pertaining to supplies, job postings, surgical discussions, blogs, etc., can be sought out using one of the search engines specifically created for RSS, such as Feedster.

We post this article because of the technology's potential to significantly foster professional growth not only for veterinarians and dentists, but for all professionals; the vast range of different companies and interest groups that provide RSS feeds, along with the continual increase of the technology's popularity and abundance of feeds which serve it, will help RSS to become a valuable everyday tool. It is likely, and rumors abound (I know this because of RSS) that Microsoft will even have RSS integration built into their next operating system, Windows Vista.

YOUR PATH TO ADDICTION

The best way to understand RSS is by seeing it at work. FeedDemon is one of the best aggregators around and is available as a 20-day free trial (http://www.feeddemon.com) before having to pay a one-time fee of $29.95 once the trial expires, if you want to continue using it. There are also a large number of 100% free aggregators. One such aggregator is Pluck (http://www.pluck.com), which integrates directly into your web browser instead of acting as a stand-alone application. These 100% free aggregators are hit-or-miss in terms of quality and range from pretty good to awful, but the FeedDemon aggregator is a sure thing and comes pre-loaded with subscriptions to a wide variety of RSS feeds and even has tips and hints to help the newcomer learn how it all works.

Hugh McCafferty


Feedster	FeedDemon	Pluck

[Click on thumbnails to view screenshots]

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