{"id":4427,"date":"2011-09-20T09:00:20","date_gmt":"2011-09-20T16:00:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/?p=4427"},"modified":"2011-09-02T10:34:20","modified_gmt":"2011-09-02T17:34:20","slug":"tech-tuesday-what-is-an-rss-feed","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/2011\/09\/20\/tech-tuesday-what-is-an-rss-feed\/","title":{"rendered":"Tech Tuesday – What is an RSS feed?"},"content":{"rendered":"

What is RSS<\/strong> and how can it help you organize all the genealogy blogs you like to read? Let’s find out.<\/p>\n

RSS is a web syndication platform.\u00c2\u00a0 Simply put, it “feeds” information to you that you wish to see.\u00c2\u00a0 You may have heard “RSS feed” or “web feeds” when looking at some of the blog content.\u00c2\u00a0 The most popular RSS readers are Google Reader<\/a><\/strong> and Feedburner<\/a><\/strong>.\u00c2\u00a0 Both of them are now owned by Google.\u00c2\u00a0 I use Google Reader and it works perfectly.<\/p>\n

\"Google<\/a>

Google Reader Categories<\/p><\/div>\n

Let’s say I want to “subscribe” to your blog (or any website, for that matter).\u00c2\u00a0 I simply paste in the URL to the website I want to get “fed” content from.\u00c2\u00a0 For example, the URL for my website is https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress<\/strong><\/a>.<\/p>\n

If you “subscribe” to that URL in your feed, anytime I post new content here it will show up in your reader program for you to enjoy.\u00c2\u00a0 This includes text, pictures, audio, video and any other type of content that is posted.\u00c2\u00a0 The RSS reader will standardize the format (sometimes in a good way, sometimes it can mess things up!) and present it to you in an easy to review stream of posts, kind of like reading through your email.\u00c2\u00a0 If you’d like to visit the site, simply click on the title in your RSS reader and it will take you there in your browser.<\/p>\n

Google Reader<\/a><\/strong> allows you to group your feeds together into categories which makes it easy to organize your content. I have groups for many of my favorite topics that I enjoy reading about, such as Baking, Crafting, Photography and Travel.<\/p>\n

You can also take bundles of feeds that other people have shared and add them to your reader.\u00c2\u00a0 As an example, I have a category called “Geneabloggers.”\u00c2\u00a0 That category has a whole bunch of feeds in it that automatically show me all of the Geneabloggers<\/strong><\/a> topics that I am interested in, such as Tombstone Tuesday <\/em>and Sentimental Sunday<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0 I don’t have to go to those blogs individually to see the content – it is “fed” to me via RSS.<\/p>\n

To get started, simply create an account on Google Reader<\/strong><\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 If you already have a Gmail<\/strong><\/a> account, then look up at the top of your inbox and you will see a link to Reader in the top menu bar.\u00c2\u00a0 Then, you can subscribe to my dear friend Sarah’s Genealogy News and Blogs<\/strong><\/a> bundle which she has kindly shared with the world. You may also wish to subscribe to my bundle of Geneabloggers Prompts<\/a><\/strong>.\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0\u00c2\u00a0 There are just a few in this bundle; dozens more are also available on the Geneabloggers website<\/strong><\/a>.\u00c2\u00a0 Don’t forget to add their website to your feeds as well!<\/p>\n

\"Google<\/a>

Google Reader's "More like this" feature<\/p><\/div>\n

Once you have subscribed to the websites or bundles you would like to receive content from, reviewing them is very similar to perusing your email inbox.\u00c2\u00a0 Once you read an item it will be marked as read.\u00c2\u00a0 You can use your up and down arrow keys to move from one item to the next, or the keyboard shortcuts (use “J” to go to next, “K” to go to previous).<\/p>\n

I’ve attached a few screenshots of how my Google Reader is set up so you can see an example.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s really excellent for reviewing massive amounts of online content quickly.<\/p>\n

Did you know you can get lists of “Recommended Sites” based on what you read every day?\u00c2\u00a0 You can also choose a particular website feed click on it to read all of the content from that website.\u00c2\u00a0 Select “Feed settings” and show “More like this” and it will give you links to other sites that are similar to that one.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s amazing!<\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/a> <\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

<\/a>\"Geneabloggers<\/a>

Geneabloggers Prompts<\/p><\/div>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/strong><\/p>\n

If you’re already accustomed to using RSS feeds to review your favorite blog content, then you know Geneabloggers<\/strong><\/a> is an absolutely incredible resource for the blogging community.\u00c2\u00a0 If you aren’t a member, you’re seriously missing out!\u00c2\u00a0 Their site makes using RSS feeds incredibly easy, because they have done all the work for us already, and deserve many thanks!<\/em> You can send your thanks via any amount of monetary Donation<\/a><\/strong> right from their website using Paypal.<\/p>\n

With that in mind, do you know how to take full advantage of the Geneablogger<\/strong> <\/a>prompt roll-up widgets?<\/p>\n

Let’s say you want to automatically get “fed” in your reader every blog post for Funeral Card Friday<\/em>.\u00c2\u00a0 In the prompt post, there is a button at the bottom of the feed that says “View all” that you click on.\u00c2\u00a0 The URL that it takes you to will be the one you put in your RSS reader to “subscribe” to (for example: http:\/\/www.google.com\/reader\/shared\/user\/16209268016599136195\/label\/Funeral%20Card%20Friday<\/a><\/strong>).\u00c2\u00a0 Now, anything that shows up in the Geneablogger “roll-up widget” will show up in your feed.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s that simple!\u00c2\u00a0 Once you add all the feeds you want to see, everything will be delivered in a nice little organized package right to your RSS reader.\u00c2\u00a0 You can spend more time reading all the wonderful content put out there by all of our fellow bloggers, and less time searching for it.<\/p>\n

I hope that helps you understand a little more about what RSS is.\u00c2\u00a0 It’s a tool that no genealogist who enjoys reading other genealogy blogs should be without.<\/p>\n

I’d also like to thank fellow Geneablogger Patti who prompted me to write this post.\u00c2\u00a0 Visit her lovely blog, Fill My Cup…with Beauty<\/strong><\/a> to read about her genealogical journey.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

What is RSS and how can it help you organize all the genealogy blogs you like to read? Let’s find out. RSS is a web syndication platform.\u00c2\u00a0 Simply put, it “feeds” information to you that you wish to see.\u00c2\u00a0 You may have heard “RSS feed” or “web feeds” when looking at some of the blog […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,33],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-genealogy","category-tech-tuesday"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4427"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4427\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4432,"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4427\/revisions\/4432"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/jessicagreen.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}