RSS Feeds. What are they?

In my previous post, I talked about adding RSS feeds to your www.live.com home page, and how you can get the latest updates instantaneously from your favorite web sites.

I received some feedback, asking me what exactly is a RSS feed. Well, not knowing how RSS feeds work would make you completely clueless about my last post isn't it? So. Here's my attempt to explain what RSS is to the tech newbie.

A simple analogy is the subscription to a magazine. After you have subscribed to a magazine, when a new issue is available, it will be delivered straight to your door step. If you did not subscribe, you'll need to visit the news agent now and then, just to check if the latest issue is published.

Now, apply that analogy to the subscription of a RSS feed. If you subscribe to say, CNN.com, whenever CNN has a news update, the headline will appear “automatically”on your RSS reader (such as Mozilla's Thunderbird) or service (such as the reviewed www.live.com). But, if you did not subscribe to the RSS feed, you will have to log on to CNN.com, and hit F5 periodically just to check if there are any updates. Obviously, the first method of subscription is much more convenient.

So how exactly do you subscribe to a RSS feed? To keep things really simple, first, go download and install Mozilla's Firefox. I wanted to recommend Microsoft's new Internet Explorer 7, but it's in beta, and it screwed up my system's security settings. Install it at your own risk.

Anyway, after you've installed Firefox, just pay attention to right side of the address bar and look out for an orange symbol. I've highlight it in red, in the screenshot below.



If you see this symbol, it means that the website has a RSS feed that you can subscribe to. As you can see from the screenshot, my blog provides a RSS feed. In fact, this service comes automatic for all blogs generated by blogger.com. Click the symbol, and click “OK” on the ensuing dialog box.



Next, open Firefox's bookmarks by pressing CTRL-B, look for Tech Miser, right-click it and select properties.



The RSS feed is shown in “Feed Location”. Copy this, then go to www.live.com.



Assuming you have a page set up (if not, do read my previous post about setting up your own www.live.com page), click Add Stuff, followed by Advanced Options. Then, paste the RSS feed into the text box, highlighted below. Finally, click Subscribe to complete the process.



After you have subscribed to my blog, whenever I have a new post, you'll be the first to know. You can also catch my previous posts here.



Most websites would have RSS feeds by now. So when you see the orange RSS symbol, simply repeat my aforementioned instructions to subscribe to the content. Have fun!

And by the way, if you want a more detailed and technical article of what RSS is all about, do check out its wikipedia entry.

CE

www.live.com

Microsoft has always been made fun of, especially for the frequent crashes and virus attacks on their Windows OS. And partly due to Apple's influence and emergence over the past few years, Microsoft product's “user experience” is also often scrutinized and laughed at by both industry experts and casual tech consumers alike.

However, I feel that Bill Gates and his team has been trying really hard to dispel the notion that Microsoft only has difficult to use and unreliable products. It is evident in the upcoming Vista OS as well the new version of Office. Even as Apple and Linux are gathering momentum in terms of market share, they will find it extremely difficult to bring down the juggernaut that is Microsoft.

A new Microsoft “service” that impressed me quite a bit is www.live.com. With this, gone are the days when I had to open multiple instances of Internet Explorer, and log into each and every single website just to check if there are any new blog entries or news update.

www.live.com updates everything, and best of all, displays all the content neatly in one page.

Here's how you can get started:

1. Go to www.live.com, and click on the “Get Started” button.

2. To keep things simple, make sure all the check boxes are selected, and click “Next”

You'll be brought to your personal Live home page.

Each tab represents a main category, with the relevant contents in it. So, in the “News” tab, you have the head lines from MSNBC, BBC, NYT and so on. Click on any headline, and you'll be directed to the full story either in a separate browser or tab (if you use Firefox or IE7). If you don't like any preloaded “gadget”, just click the “X” button to remove them.

You can also add your own content by entering the RSS feed address of your favorite blog or news site. Click Add Stuff > Advanced Options.

Compelling features
New content will appear without the hassle of pressing F5, which in my opinion, is one compelling feature of this service. Another nice feature is its portability.

By logging in your hotmail or MSN or any Microsoft based account from any computer, all your settings and content will be loaded accordingly. So it doesn't matter if you are in some obscure Internet Cafe in Inner Mongolia, you'll still get to experience the same www.live.com service you enjoy back in the comforts of your home.

Conclusion
With live.com, Nearly everything that matters to you on the Internet can be conveniently accessed from one, single page.

Although the service is still in beta, I found it relatively stable, no big problems yet.

I think this is a great service and I log on to it everyday. Well, do try it out. You have nothing to lose as it's free of charge!

CE