How To Use RSS Feeds
RSS feeds is a way to check for updates to your favourite websites, without having to visit each site individually. We'll show you how to use this great timesaver. How to use RSS Feeds effectively!
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How to use RSS feeds
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Step 1:
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You will need
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Step 2:
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Choose a RSS program
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To use RSS, you will need to use a RSS Aggregator, a single program that gathers information from all your favourite sites. If you use a lot of different computers during your day, a web-based RSS aggregator is a good choice. An RSS website like newsgator, or the RSS features found in internet portals such as yahoo and msn, puts your RSS feeds onto your own web page, accessible from any computer with an internet connection. If you use the same computer all day, an RSS aggregator built into your web browser, such as Internet Explorer 7 or Mozilla Firefox, or a separate RSS aggregator program downloaded onto your computer, such as bitscast, would be a good solution.
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Step 3:
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Find a RSS feed
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You can tell if a website has a RSS feed if it displays one of these three orange symbols. These are the link to the address of the website's RSS feed. RSS symbols are usually found at the top of a website's front page. Larger sites such as the BBC's website, may have multiple RSS feeds for each section, such as separate news feeds for England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales. Some browsers with RSS built in, such as Internet Explorer 7 or Firefox, will detect RSS feeds automatically.
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Step 4:
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Subscribe
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To subscribe to a RSS feed, you need to copy its web address into your RSS aggregator. Some aggregators will automatically subscribe to a feed by simply left clicking on the orange RSS symbol or the aggregator's own logo, which can often be found close by. Alternatively, right click on the orange RSS logo and left click on the ‘copy shortcut' option, and then paste the address straight into your RSS aggregator.
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Step 5:
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View your RSS feeds
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Now your RSS aggregator has the RSS feed's web address, it will automatically check for new updates at regular intervals, you don't have to do a thing. Depending on your program, you may receive the entire article, or the first few lines with a link to see the whole article online.
