Rss

Moving RSS Forward with an XRSS Namespace

The Really Simple Syndication format contains only five required elements -- rss, channel, title, link and description -- and either a title or description in each item. Everything else is optional. One way to tackle confusing aspects of RSS is by defining a new namespace, XRSS, with replacements for all of the optional elements. The XRSS spec could document the namespaced elements and also offer advice for the required RSS elements. To show how this would work in practice, I've created an XRSS ... (read more)

2006/03/07

Support the Common Feed Icon

A recent Yahoo study reported that four percent of Internet users have jumped on the RSS bandwagon and begun subscribing to syndicated feeds. Considering the number of ways that web publishers show their readers they offer feeds, it's amazing we've gotten that many: In an effort to make the concept of syndication easier for mainstream users, the next versions of the Internet Explorer and Opera browsers will identify RSS and Atom feeds with the same icon used in Mozilla Firefox. Since the market ... (read more)

2006/03/03

Looking for Détente in Really Simple Syndication

Just how many types of anxiety are there, anyway? I got to thinking about this as I read a blog that mentioned "RSS Anxiety." For those of you who have not yet come face-to-face with this little acronym, it stands for Real Simple Syndication and it spreads whatever you want all over the internet, virtually creating an immortal life all its own. Can you kill an idea once it is out on the internet? No. Can you try to correct it? Yes, but you'll never accomplish this goal. -- Patricia Farrell, ... (read more)

2006/03/01

Response to Brad Feld

Brad Feld of Mobius Venture Capital recently made public an e-mail he sent me with suggestions for the RSS Advisory Board. Here's my response, which I also e-mailed to Feld, with some relevant hyperlinks added: From my perspective, the purpose of the RSS Advisory Board is always open to reconsideration. This is a three-year-old organization that has been operating in public for one month. We've just begun hearing from RSS developers, publishers and executives in significant number. I think the ... (read more)

2006/02/26

Really Simple Syndication: The Joy of Specs

The ongoing Canterbury tale about the efforts of the RSS Advisory Board must be utterly incomprehensible to people who have enthusiastically adopted Really Simple Syndication without knowing the history of the format. Syndication is like sausage, major Congressional legislation and Bruce Jenner. You might be better off not knowing how it's made. Dave Winer, the co-creator of RSS and the person most responsible for its widespread adoption, argues that the current version of the RSS specification ... (read more)

2006/02/23

RSS Board Recommends the Feed Validator

The RSS Advisory Board proposal to recommend the Feed Validator has passed 8-0, with members Meg Hourihan, Jenny Levine, Eric Lunt, Ross Mayfield, Randy Charles Morin, Greg Reinacker, Dave Sifry and myself voting in favor. The Feed Validator tests syndicated documents for adherence to the specification and provides other warnings that are helpful when publishing a feed for the first time. It supports the three formats in wide use today -- Really Simple Syndication, RDF Site Summary and Atom -- ... (read more)

2006/02/21

New Tool Lets You Play Around with RSS

I've added a new tool to the RSS Advisory Board site that makes it easier to test different Really Simple Syndication element and attribute values in the Feed Validator. RSS Playground uses a sample RSS document as a starting point, letting you change the values and create a new document that will remain online for 72 hours. I used the tool this afternoon to see what the Feed Validator does when it encounters a feed containing RFC 2822 date-time values. Because this tool's being used to support ... (read more)

2006/02/19

RSS Means Never Being Board

John Palfrey: We've heard from a number of people about an uneasy (and unfounded) sense that something is happening with respect to the RSS 2.0 spec. Just by way of clarification, nothing has changed from the perspective of Harvard, which is the owner and trustee of the RSS 2.0 spec. ... While we are delighted to know that many members of the RSS community continue to work on relevant issues to move the industry along in various ways, including related to the spec itself, Harvard has no ... (read more)

2006/02/17

Opera Subscribes to Common Syndication Icon

Subscribe Opera has embraced the common syndication icon adopted by Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Internet Explorer, lead developer Trond Hansen announced Thursday: Yes, we're adopting it too, and it will be in the next weekly build. Thanks to www.feedicons.com for making it so easy! Oh, and in case you haven't seen it before (what are the odds). I've attached a large version to this post which you can make love to. The icon, which makes it easier to find syndicated content in software and web ... (read more)

2006/02/17

Mark Pilgrim's Not on Board

Mark Pilgrim offers his long bet on the newly public RSS Advisory Board: I assume the group won't actually accomplish anything; they'll just stumble around like small children running with scissors to catch the short bus until they quietly disband, and we can look forward to doing all of this over again in 2 years. But in the meantime, I regard it as inevitable that the group will eventually try (and fail) to tackle every single one of these issues. (I believe Rogers once called this "the most ... (read more)

2006/02/03

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