An Introduction to RSS Feeds

Have you ever found yourself surfing the Internet and thinking that you are just spending too much time on all of the sites you visit regularly? What if there were a way to visit several sites at the same time? Well there is a way, sort of. Instead of you going to every site, you can have them to come to you. How is this possible? This introduction to RSS feeds will show you how.

RSS, short for Really Simple Syndication or Rich Site Summary, is a term used for Internet information feeds. These feeds are delivered automatically to the end user's computer through a reader, sometimes called an 'aggregator'. Readers (such as Google reader) are free and you may already have an RSS reader as part of your browser. Alternatively you can download a reader to use on your desktop. Once you have your RSS reader set up you simply find websites that offer a feed and subscribe to those you are interested in.

A feed is delivered whenever the site you are subscribed to makes a notification that an update has been made. In other words you can 'read' the 'feed' after it is sent out. These feeds make it easy to gather information from many different sources and have them automatically sent to one place - your feed reader. Once you have subscribed, the rest is automatic, which means you do not have to go to numerous sites to see if they have made any updates.

However, not all feeds are created equal. Some will only give you a summary of the update, forcing you to visit the site if you want to read the item in full. But, this still saves time as you can decide which updates merit a visit. Full-length feeds are also available. Neither is necessarily better than the other, but it is good to be aware of the differences. Also, feed readers may have settings that allow you to set how many characters you wish to read from any feed - summary or full-length.

Look for an RSS, or "Subscribe to our feed" button on the sites you tend to visit regularly. Click the button and enter any information asked for to start getting updates. Imagine being able to get updates from your favorite news sites, blogs, forums and other sites all in one place; and once installed each feed's subscription updates automatically.

Once you start using RSS feeds you will wonder why you wasted so much time trying to keep up. It's not visiting all of those separate sites that was a complete waste of time, but rather checking them only to find no updates had been made. RSS solves that problem and does it in a simple-to-use way. Now, instead of visiting every site, you can decide which ones you want to visit based on their feed. Unfortunately, not every site offers feeds, but as they keep gaining in popularity, more and more will offer them.

As you can see there are many benefits to using RSS feeds and if you are interested in finding out more you can visit: Web Business Architecture.