RSS FAQ

An RSS FAQ
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What is it?

Websites that publish new content regularly usually provide a list of news headline style links to their latest content. In addition to displaying these headlines on their own websites, it is very common for publishers to make them available for syndication, so that other websites or applications can also include their headlines.

Headline syndication does not deal with the full text of articles, it is simply about syndicating an automatically updating list of headlines, with each headline being a link to the item that it refers to on the publishers website.

RSS is the name given to a simple and well-established XML format used to syndicate headlines. Once a website creates an RSS file they have created a means to allow others to syndicate their headlines.

The first version of RSS (RSS 0.9) was released by Netscape in March 1999 as a format for adding news channels to their My.Netscape.Com portal. Then in July 1999 Netscape released RSS 0.91, incorporating most of the features of a format called <scriptingNews>, which was created by UserLand. Shortly thereafter Netscape discontinued developing the RSS format, however UserLand persisted and RSS continued to grow in strength. In December 2000, the separate RSS-DEV Working Group released RSS 1.0 and Userland announced RSS 0.92. As of April 2001, Userland is now planning RSS 0.93.

The lack of clarity in what RSS stands for or which version is the correct one to use can seem confusing to beginners. However these issues don't need to be addressed by a website wanting to create an RSS file. RSS is a very well recognised format, in fact it is often referred to as the most successful XML format to date. Some websites have a preference for one version, others create more than one RSS file and support multiple versions and a recent survey suggests that the first two versions of RSS (0.9 and 0.91) are still by far the most popular.

Acronyms - What does RSS mean?

According to UserLand, "There is no consensus on what RSS stands for, so it's not an acronym, it's a name." I've seen the following:-
  • Really Simple Syndication
  • Rich Site Summary
  • R(DF) Site Summary
  • Rich Site Syndication
  • Rich Syndication Standard
    And no doubt many others. I like the first of these, but the others have merit too.

    Since the split in the community between the 0.9 development and the 1.0 development, there has been talk of giving new names for each fork but retaining RSS for 0.91 and earlier. But there hasn't been consensus on this, so for the moment, everyone continues to use "RSS" for all of it.

    • Reading RSS

    Why should I read it?

    RSS provides an easy to manage way of collecting headlines, links and abstracts to current and up to date web pages. Here's some things you might use it for:-
  • Creating a "Daily Me" newspaper of articles, from sources you find interesting
  • Putting a news feed of related news headlines on your niche web site
  • Collating competitive analysis about your competitors
  • Tracking what other people are saying about your company
    And I'm sure there are many others.

    • What can read it?

    Readers and Viewers
  • Headline Viewer. A Windows application that lets you see news headlines from a configurable list of Headline Providers (news sources and weblogs).
  • Radio. Among other things, Radio is a powerful XML-based news aggregator that runs as a local MS Windows or Mac application. It's closely tied into a weblogging system.
  • Amphetadesk AmphetaDesk is a news aggregator - it sits on your desktop, downloads the latest news that interests you, and displays them in a quick and easy to use (and customizable!) webpage.
  • Wytheville Community College News Center A site that generates JavaScript for webmasters to include an RSS feed in their pages.
  • Proggle, Novobot A smart headline viewer which reads RSS files as well as HTML pages.
  • Reptile. A Java based OCS/RSS reader/writer.
  • FeedReader A windows desktop/tray app to read and display headlines.
  • Figby
  • ForumZilla
  • RSS to Javascript
  • HotSheet An extensible Java reader.
  • NewzCrawler MS Windows web news reader & browser.
  • SlashDock MS Windows tray reader

    Web Aggregators
  • Meerkat (Instructions here)
  • My UserLand
  • News Is Free

    Toolkits
  • RSS2rssA perl script to take a group of rss feeds and combine them into one rss feed.
  • RSS2BloggerA perl link to take a group of rss feeds and push them to a Blogger blog.
  • RSS Monkey RSS Monkey is a simple, stand-alone script that allows you to add RSS feeds from other sites to your personal site.
  • Orchard/RSS Orchard RSS is a cross-language Groves-based parser for RSS. It currently works in Perl, Python and C.
  • RDF::RSS A Perl-based RSS parser for RDF. Uses the Redland RDF Application Framework
  • Slashwatch A PHP newsgrabber that reads RSS files and stuffs them in a MySQL database for later use.
  • Jetspeed An open source, Java and XML-based implementation of a Web portal. Reads RSS files and ouputs them in many formats.
  • XML::RSS A Perl module to read and write RSS files.
  • GrabNews. An Open source MS ASP solution to collecting and displaying RSS news feeds.
  • Cocoon
  • WebMacro
  • Velocity

    Open-Source Code
  • mod_index_rss: http://tangent.org/mod_index_rss/
  • Peerkat: http://www.oreillynet.com/~rael/lang/python/peerkat/
  • Reptile: http://reptile.openprivacy.org/
  • AmphetaDesk: http://www.disobey.com/amphetadesk/

  • Hotscripts search: http://www.hotscripts.com/search/?query=rss&category=all&bool=AND
  • Sourceforge search: http://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_search=soft&words=rss

    • How do I find RSS feeds?

    See also Distributing lists of feeds and Slash Style Sites.

    Lists of RSS sources
  • NewsIsFree A large site that collects RSS and publishes feeds it finds.
  • My.UserLand New Channels
  • My.UserLand Channels that have been updated in the last 7 days
  • Newsfeeds A blog that specializes in promoting new feeds. Linked to the "Headline Viewer" RSS Reader.
  • Meerkat An aggregator. Browse around 'til you find what you like, and add &_fl=rss&t=ALL to the URL. Instructions here.
  • Moreover A typical moreover feed looks like this.
    http://p.moreover.com/cgi-local/page?c=Vertical%20portals%20news&o=rss
  • The Amphetadesk list of known sources in XML format.
  • XMltree. A directory of XML sources (not just RSS)
  • The Headline Viewer core list
  • 10.am. Similar to Moreover.
  • Network 54 Browse to a page on the site and add ;xml=rss to the end.
  • Syndic8 An RSS evangelism project with lots of feeds.

    Most popular channels
  • Our Favorite Songs This page lists the most recently changed RSS files managed by the cloud that connects all Radio users together.

    Search Engines
  • Google search for PHP-Nuke style Portals
  • Another Google search for PHP-Nuke style Portals

    Unusual Sources and queries
  • Any Yahoogroups mailing list. Create a URL like http://groups.yahoo.com/group/the_group/messages?rss=1 where "the_group" is the name of the mailing list.
  • Moreover Query. Create a URL like http://p.moreover.com/cgi-local/page?o=rss&query=p2p where the query parameter is a properly escaped search string.

    Major RSS Generators
    Here's the likely location of the RSS file. Add it onto the main URL and see if it works.
  • Manila based blogs - /rss/rss.xml
  • Slashcode based sites - /articles.rdf
  • Scoop based sites - /backend.rdf
  • php-nuke based sites - /backend.php

    • What's an aggregator?

    An aggregator is a web site or system that collects RSS feeds from multiple sources and then does something with them. Usually this will involve collating and displaying the contents of each feed and perhaps creating new composite feeds from them.

    Many of the aggregators are also major sources of feeds which they create by scraping the html from sites that don't produce their own.

    The most well known aggregators can be found in "How do I find RSS Feeds?"

    Producing RSS

    Why should I produce it?

    Syndicating headlines is an excellent and cost-effective way of driving traffic to, and increasing brand awareness of, any website that publishes new content regularly.

    Once a website produces an RSS file, they are enabling others to syndicate their headlines, without any further work on their part.

    The main benefits of creating an RSS file:

  • RSS content can be included in customisable online news portals that aggregate RSS headlines like My.Userland.Com.

  • Websites that display news headlines can use an RSS file to incorporate another websites headlines into their own.

  • RSS content can be added to personal desktop news reading applications like Headline Viewer or Radio Userland.

  • Email newsletter providers could allow users to subscribe to RSS channels. XML.com and XMLTree.com previously offered such a service called Newsboy.

    One positive side effect of producing an RSS file is that it can also be used by headline aggregation services like Moreover.com, who power news portals, specialist news search engines, business intelligence services or provide newsfeeds to websites. Most such companies use crawler-based technologies to aggregate and do not insist upon content being available in RSS, however they do have some requirements which having an RSS file addresses, sparing the need for any work on the part of a website that already publishes its headlines in RSS.

    • How can I produce it?

    Tools
  • BlogifyYourPage, makes it easy to produce an RSS 1.0 file for any page.
  • RSSify your web page, produce an RSS 0.92 file for any page.
  • RSS Channel Editor is a simple Perl CGI script that makes it easy to maintain an RSS channel. It can be used online at Webreference and you can also download the source.

    RSS Tutorials - The Basics:
  • A step-by-step guide to building an RSS 1.0 document from the O'Reilly Network.
  • An easy to understand introduction to RSS 0.91 from About.com.
  • A comprehensive guide to creating RSS 0.91 files from Webreference.

    RSS Tutorials - Generating RSS:
  • Active Server Pages (ASP) An article explaining how RSS files can be generated using ASP.
  • Perl Jonathan Eisenzopf explains how his XML::RSS module can be used to create an RSS file.
  • PHP phpChannel, a set of two PHP class files to write rss files. RSS Tools

    Validators
  • http://rssxpress.ukoln.ac.uk/
  • http://aggregator.userland.com/validator
  • http://soapclient.com/rss/rss.html

    RSS Examples:
  • Newsfeeds reviews sources of RSS files, good examples and ideas you can use in putting together your own feed.
  • OurFavoriteSongs.Com is a source of popular syndicated files, the top picks of Radio Userland users.

    Miscellaneous tools
  • ASPrss. Sample code and tutorial on producing RSS from an MS ASP driven web site.
  • Squish An SQL-like RDF query language. RSS is used as a demo application to show its uses.
  • Squishdot RSS Support A DTML method file for Zope-based Squishdot to allow it to produce RSS files.
  • mod_index_rss An Apache module to display directories as RSS feeds.

    • Which standard should I use for my feed?

    Actually it really doesn't matter much. Virtually all readers can cope with all the standards. See "Which standard is most widely used?"

    How can I check that my new RSS feed is valid?

    RSS Validators:
  • http://aggregator.userland.com/validator (RSS 0.91, RSS 0.92)
  • http://www.bath.ac.uk/~ccslrd/rss_validator/1.0/ (RSS 1.0)
  • http://www.bath.ac.uk/~ccslrd/rss_validator/ (RSS 0.9)
  • 0.9x infoSchematron Validator for RSS An RSS schema written in Schematron. It supports 0.9x and 1.0.
  • Redland RSS 1.0 Viewer (RSS 1.0) is RSS->HTML converter, but acts as validator also.

    • How do I promote my RSS feed?

    If you don't let people know that you create RSS, you can't expect them to read it. Websites should create an information page, about syndicating their headlines. This will make existing users aware that the website has an RSS file so they can add it to their news reading applications or even include it on their own websites. You should provide an obvious link to this on your home page (in the footer say).

    One standard that was created by UserLand and is being used increasingly is to include this image somewhere on your site and link it to the RSS XML for that page. Feel free to copy the image and use it yourself.

    This information page will be indexed by regular search engines and can also be submitted to various niche directories, eg:

  • My.Userland.Com An Aggregator.
  • NewsIsFree.com An Aggregator.
  • Syndic8 The Syndic8 project is maintaining a directory of RSS feeds.
  • XMLTree.com A Directory
  • Newsfeeds A blog that specializes in promoting new feeds. Linked to the "Headline Viewer" RSS Reader.

  • 4FreeContent
  • FindSticky
  • FreeSticky
  • Purple Pages
  • WooDoggy

    These websites also aggregate headline content commercially and distribute it. They may be interested in your feed if it's appropriate, although you may have to pay them.:
  • LinkYourNews.com
  • MagPortal.com
  • Moreover.com
  • NewsNow.co.uk
  • 10 am

    • Hints and Tips

    Producing RSS in Blogger.com

    With many thanks to Aaron Swartz and http://logicerror.com/blogifyYourPage for the service.

    This is now also available from http://www.voidstar.com/rssify.php. Usage: http://www.voidstar.com/rssify.php?url=your_web_page_url

    1. Go to your template in blogger.
    Change
    <$BlogItemBody$>
    to
    <span class="rss:item"><$BlogItemBody$></span>

    2. Publish something to re-create the page with the new template

    3. Check,
    http://blogspace.com/rss/feeds/blogify?url=http://YourDomain.com/Yourblog.html
    in your browser with the url field changed to your blog home page. eg
    http://blogspace.com/rss/feeds/blogify?url=http://voidstar.com/blog/blogger.html

    You should see an RSS file.

    4. Tell everyone about it by adding the XML gif This gif is freely copyable. Just right click, save to the bottom of your template. And registering your feed with http://my.userland.com, http://www.newsisfree.com,
    http://newsfeeds.manilasites.com and others.

    That's it.

    [1]http://logicerror.com/blogifyYourPage

    RSSify your plain web page

    There are a couple of services that allow you to create RSS with minimal changes to your web page. Just add
    <span class="rss:item">...</span> round everything that looks like an RSS item.

    Then go to either:-
  • http://logicerror.com/blogifyYourPage
  • http://www.voidstar.com/rssify.php

    to turn it into an RSS feed.

    • Escape all html

    If you're creating a feed, don't forget to character encode all html. this means for instance, turning & into "& amp;"

    This also applies to URLs in the <link> field. If you're creating a feed by hand it's easy to forget this.

    You should also convert all "<" into "& lt;"

    RSS from GreyMatter

    RSS is not built into GreyMatter, but there's a description and files here
    http://www.domesticat.net/gm/functionality/rss_syndication/

    Specifications

    Where are the specifications?

  • RSS 0.93 (Planning stage, April 2000) http://backend.userland.com/rss093 (Userland)
  • RSS 1.0 (December 2000) http://groups.yahoo.com/group/rss-dev/files/specification.html (RSS-DEV Working Group)
  • RSS 0.92 (December 2000) http://backend.userland.com/rss092 (Userland)
  • RSS 0.91 (July 1999) http://backend.userland.com/rss091 (Userland)
    http://www.purplepages.ie/RSS/netscape/rss0.91.html (Netscape)
    http://my.netscape.com/publish/formats/rss-spec-0.91.html (Netscape, Revision 3)
  • RSS 0.90 (March 1999) http://www.purplepages.ie/RSS/netscape/rss0.90.html (Netscape)

    By far the most successful of these and most widely implemented is 0.91 but with a couple of changes which were incorporated into 0.92. That is to remove all length limits and to allow character encoded html in the item.description sub-element.

    • Which standard is most widely used

    Some analysis has been done of feeds, and by far the most widely implemented is 0.91

    But having said that, there are a couple of ways in which a large majority of these feeds break the 0.91 spec and use features that were included in 0.92.
  • Removing all limits. It's common for feeds to contain more than 15 items and descriptions longer than 500 characters
  • HTML in description. It's also common for the description field to include html but with character encoding so that it is still valid XML.
  • Since the Netscape DTD disappeared temporarily, it's becoming common to just leave out the <!DOCTYPE>. Very few RSS parsers and readers were using it anyway, relying on the <version> tag to identify the version.
  • A lot of feeds are missing the required <image> element. This is no big deal as it is primarily a bit of advertising.

    So the most common format is really 0.91 and a half.

    • Can I get the specifications changed?

    Be very careful about what you wish for. Part of the reason for the success of RSS is that it is a very simple but also stable specification. However, it's not completely static and there are initiatives to evolve it and move it forward.

    The main forums for discussion and evolution of the specifications are:-
  • YahooGroups Syndication List The main meeting place for developers.
  • YahooGroups ReallySimpleSyndication List A Userland initiative to create an 0.93 spec.
  • YahooGroups RSS 1.0 development List The RSS 1.0 RDF development group.

    • Can I put html in the title or description?

    Morbus Iff wrote:
    > Should HTML in RSS *always* be encoded to its entity? (<, etc.)?

    No, not always.

    I looked up HTML support in the different specs [1-3], since I was curious about this FAQ. It's, of course, different for the different RSS versions:

    RSS 0.9 : no
    RSS 0.91: no (by spec)
    RSS 0.92: yes, entity-escaped
    RSS 1.0 : no; maybe, with content module

    All the "no"s are assumed: none of those specs mention HTML. Since 0.92 claims entity-escaped HTML as a new feature, 0.9 and 0.91 must allow no HTML however, 0.92 claims to be a description of then-current use of 0.91, so there are/were feeds with entity-escaped HTML claiming to be 0.91). 1.0 is presumably derived from 0.9 enough to allow no HTML, and its examples contain no HTML (though in the version I looked at, the examples had some unescaped 'es).

    If an RSS 1.0 document makes use of the content module [4], it will have a that may specify XHTML, and may have a . If the format is XHTML and the encoding is not given, character encoding (like 0.92) is assumed. The other encoding option the spec names by name is well-formed XML, which is the only case in all of the RSS specs in which there's HTML that isn't encoded in character data.

    So for 0.9, vanilla 1.0, and 0.91, all character data is for display to the user. In 0.92, the character data is for interpretation by an HTML-aware user-agent. Some 0.92 files may claim to be 0.91. In 1.0 with the content module, and tell what to do.

    Anyone who knows better (such as anyone involved in RSS 1.0 development, on RSS 1.0) should feel free to correct me. Anyone compiling a FAQ should feel free to swipe from this post.

    [1] http://backend.userland.com/rss091
    [2] http://backend.userland.com/rss092
    [3] http://purl.org/rss/1.0/spec
    [4] http://purl.org/rss/1.0/modules/content/

    Mark Paschal
    markpasc@mindspring.com


    but then this from Karl Ove Hufthammer

    IMO, it should *never* be encoded this way. I see it as abuse of the SGML/XML[1] language(s). The best solution would be to use namespaces[2].

    > Or, is it only recommended?

    [1] Yes, I know says it's OK to do this.

    [2] This isn't possible in the current version of RSS 1.0, as 'description' can only contain PCDATA.


    And this from
    Aaron Swartz

    Well, it's doable (since transmitting non-XML HTML is going to be a big requirement of the folks we hoped would use the module) but namespaces are certainly recommended.

    My Take?

    1. no HTML in the <title>
    2. Character encoded HTML is allowed in the description and is in fact common. Anyone building a reader or aggregator should expect it. And if you are writing 0.91 or 0.92 RSS feel free to go on doing this.




    What about the DTDs and XML Schemas?

  • Schemas for RSS XML Schemas for RSS.
  • Netscape 0.91 DTD.

    • Community and information sources

    Other FAQs
  • Aaron's RSS site An excellent collection of links and detail.
  • Alis Marsden. RSS FAQ site

    Websites
  • O'Reilly DevCenter RSS - Articles about RSS from the O'Reilly Network.
  • RSS Info - News and information on the RSS format
  • RSS Why?s - A site that aims to objectively and concisely explore all the points surrounding the creation, maintenance, and history of RSS.
  • WebReference RSS Articles - A collection of RSS articles and resources from Webreference.
  • Internet Alchemy the home of OCS.

    Discussion lists
  • YahooGroups Syndication List The main meeting place for developers.
  • YahooGroups ReallySimpleSyndication List A Userland initiative to create an 0.93 spec.
  • YahooGroups RSS 1.0 development List The RSS 1.0 RDF development group.

    Search Engines
  • RSS 1.0 at DMOZ
  • My Netscape at DMOZ

    • Documents about RSS

  • Writing RSS 1.0 Author: Rael Dornfest
    A step-by-step tutorial to creating an RSS 1.0 document by hand.
  • RSS Category at Dmoz.org Author: Editors of the Open Directory Project
    A collection of RSS-related links, including tutorials, background and more.
  • O'Reilly RSS Dev-Center Articles on the O'Reilly Network about RSS and syndication.
  • RSSWhy?s Author: Ken MacLeod
    An attempt to concisely explore and discuss the issues surrounding RSS. Tracks the various RSS mailing lists and keeps summaries of important issues. Also provides the RSS 1.0 issues list.
  • Developers Explain: Why RSS 1.0? (audio) O'Reilly Network publisher Dale Dougherty talks with some of the core developers behind the new spec for RDF Site Summary (RSS 1.0) about the background behind RDF, the need for a standard, and what RSS enables.
  • The Evolution of RSS Author: Andy King
    We look at how RSS has evolved from its humble beginnings through present day and beyond. We survey all versions of RSS, including a feature comparison, a new RSS usage survey, plus format and validation information. Learn how the newest versions of RSS will move us towards a more Semantic Web.
  • A Historical Debt Author: Dan Brickley
    A detailed survey of RSS history, going all the way back to Apple's MCF format, Microsoft's CDF, UserLand's scriptingNews and of course, RSS.
  • Introduction to RSS 0.91 Author: Dave Winer
    Dave's introduction to his work on cleaning up the RSS 0.91 spec and a starting point for further discussion on RSS progress.
  • RDF - why we should care - and RSS Author: Edd Dumbill
    Edd Dumbill presents a brief outline of why he believes RDF is important and the reasons for the next version of RSS to use it.
  • RSS 1.0: The New Syndication Format Author: Jonathan Eisenzopf
    The history and background of the RSS format and information on the introduction of RSS 1.0.
  • RSS Modularization Author: Leigh Dodds
    A look at the original proposal to develop RSS using namespaces.
  • RSS Moves Forward Author: Edd Dumbill
    Edd Dumbill explains the creation of the RSS working group and takes a look at the RSS 1.0 spec.
  • What to do about RSS? Author: Dave Winer
    A description of the problems RSS has faced and a proposed solution.

    • Projects

    Syndic8

    Jeff Barr <jeff@vertexdev.com> writes

    We've been talking about a way to organize our plan to evangelize the concept of syndication.

    I registered the domain www.syndic8.com today (I know it's too cute, but I really like it).

    After I return from vacation, I will put up a site that will allow us to coordinate our efforts.

    I plan to keep several interesting things on this site:

    1. A database of sites that are currently the targets of our evangelization efforts. Each entry will be "owned" by some user, who will be responsible for talking to the site, getting them to syndicate, and (if that fails) arranging for some scraping.

    2. A master list of syndicated sites. I want to have my own list and I want to have a dynamic monitoring facility so that I can measure things like site availability, site productivity (articles per day), etc. I also want to track contact info. The list itself will be available in XML, and I am thinking about a cool XSLT-driven feature to allow users to create their own variants of it. I am also thinking about a way to allow users to extend the basic site list schema on a per-user basis. That way, if I want to keep some information for my purposes, I can do so without necessarily polluting anyone else's space. I should also be able to import OCS into this list.

    3. A strong mission statement, and some articles on why it is good to syndicate, and on how to do so.

    Clearly, all of this is going to take some time to get going. I want to play the role of "infrastructure provider" -- I will set up the framework and deposit the data that I have, and then I want the community to supply lots of energy and data. I'll do my best to keep things running if everyone else is keeping the data pipeline full.

    I'm going to need lots of help. I've got a brand new machine all set up and ready to go, and I should be able to do the PHP and XML without too much trouble. Beyond that, there will be more than enough room for you to contribute. I do want to have some mirror sites for the master list, since I do have to pay for bandwidth.

    Certain parts of the site will be available to the public; much of it will be available only to registered users. Registration will be free in exchange for your commitment to help out in some way. There will be a set of user roles that will grant read or read-write permissions on a per- user basis.

    I won't be able to do anything besides thinking about this until late in the month, but I am already starting to think that this is going to be pretty cool. I will be traveling and almost certainly unable to respond to email for the next couple of weeks. I'll catch up when I return, and then things will start to move!

    In the meantime, think about the features that you would like, and how you are willing and able to contribute.

    Issues

    Evangelism

    The more news sources that produce RSS, the more useful RSS is to everyone. If you decide you want to collect RSS from a site and you can't find their feed, email the webmaster. You might want to point them at this FAQ as well. I've got a standard email now that I send out.

    Dear Webmaster,
    Do you syndicate your headlines with RSS?
    If so where is the feed?
    If not, why not?
    If you don't know what RSS is, look at http://www.voidstar.com/rssfaq
    yours, etc

    When this doesn't work (sadly, all to frequently) the next stage is to get the site scraped by one of the aggregators. If this happens, make sure you go back to the webmaster and tell them it's being done. Keep on at them!

    As is often the case, the amateur journalism world has embraced RSS and many of your favourite sites produce a feed even if they're not very good at promoting it. But the professional world doesn't really get it. Even though there are >5000 feeds out there, we need plenty more.

    On this topic, it's going to be worth keeping up with Jeff Barr's Syndic8 initiative.

    Distributing lists of feeds

    There is a need for a simple standard for sites and aggregators to produce XML lists of the RSS feeds they know about.

    There is an RDF standard called OCS which is already being used by several aggregators.
    OCS files of known RSS feeds can be found at (says Kevin Burton):-
    http://www.xmltree.com/ocs.ocs?aID=burtonator&urlCount=100&keys=*5271
    http://www.xmltree.com/ocs.ocs?aID=burtonator&urlCount=100&keys=*5272
    The above links work fine except they can only serve up 100 documents :(. It seems XMLTree breaks when I request more than 100.

    http://www.xmltree.com/ocs.ocs?aID=burtonator&urlCount=1000&keys=*5273
    http://www.xmltree.com/ocs.ocs?aID=burtonator&urlCount=1000&keys=*255864
    http://www.moreover.com/categories/ocs/ocsdirectory.rdf
    http://www.newsisfree.com/HPE/xml/external-feeds.ocs
    http://10.am/extra/ocsdirectory.xml

    Newsglut
    RSS published by Slashcode based sites
    Slashcode Vv2 based sites publish this feed of the news sources they subscribe to /sites.pl?content_type=ocs"

    Several people are experimenting with alternatives to OCS.

    Permalinks

    There's some dispute about what the <item>.<link> should point at. Most news style feeds tend to use it to point at the html of the story to which the item refers. So if the headline is for a Slashdot story, the link points at the story. This lends itself to a display of headlines as a list where each one is linked to the source. This makes the headlines the equivalent of a banner ad, driving traffic to the source of the information. Ideally this link stays valid for some long time and is more or less permanent. Hence it's a "Permalink".

    Long time Bloggers feel that links in the blogs that they write are more important than the words they write about them. When this is turned into a feed, they tend to put the URL of the site they're pointing to in the <link> element. This means that a reader is going to click through to the site they're referring to, not the site containing their own words. This gets further confused because many of the blogs that do this, don't ever put a permalink into the feed that points at the words in the headline title or description.

    This second point of view is understandable but I have to say I don't like it. There's some discussion about this on the ReallySimpleSyndication mailing list about 0.93. It may be that this ends up introducing an optional <item>.<permalink> element to allow both styles of working in one feed.

    Coping with 0.92

    Version 0.92 made all the elements of <item> optional. Some sites use this fact to produce feeds that have a <description>, but no <title> or <link>. This is quite awkward for aggregators that may want to provide a combination of <title> and <link> as a cut down display with a link through to the full description text. The usual approach is to synthesize the title from the first 30 characters (say) of the description. And then to use the channel.link element on all the items. It's not perfect, but it more or less works.

    RSS 0.91 - 0.92 - 1.0 cross conversion

    Convertors
  • Online RSS Converter An online converter between RSS 0.9, 0.91 and 1.0. However, it does not yet support the latest version of 1.0.
  • RSS2RDF A converter from 0.9 or 0.91 to 1.0.
  • RSSmanip An ASP script to convert an RSS 1.0 file into WML, HDML or HTML.
  • RSSup An ASP script to convert an RSS 0.91 file into 1.0.
  • Stylesheets for RSS 1.0 XSLT stylesheets to convert 0.9, 0.91 and specially formatted XHTML and text into 1.0.

    • Miscellaneous

    History

    This is a somewhat political issue, so rather than write another one, here's some pointers:-
  • Introduction to RSS 0.91 Author: Dave Winer
  • A Historical Debt Author: Dan Brickley
  • RSS 1.0: The New Syndication Format Author: Jonathan Eisenzopf

    • Related Technologies

  • XML. All variations of RSS are based on XML and must be valid XML before they are anything else.
  • scriptingNews. One of the pre-cursors of RSS.

    • Parameters for the big producers

    Moreover
  • An overview of the layout.
  • A description of the layout of the different XML types.
  • A list of their feeds by category.
  • You can also turn a query into a feed by constructing it like this. http://p.moreover.com/cgi-local/page?o=rss&query=p2p where p2p is an example of what you would type into the search box. Remember to replace spaces by "+" signs.

    How to get a feed from an O'Reilly page.
    How to get a feed from a search engine query.
    Where is the feed on a slashcode site, scoop site, PHP-Nuke site. etc

    • O'Reilly Networks

    O'Reilly Network Headlines

    Instructions

  • Apache DevCenter http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=1111
  • Apache FAQs http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=2344
  • BSD DevCenter + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=2384
  • Javascript and CS + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5564
  • Linux DevCenter + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=1112
  • Linux FAQs http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=2366
  • Mac DevCenter + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5119
  • Mozilla DevCenter http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=2387
  • NET DevCenter + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5559
  • NET Weblogs + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5574
  • onJava.comhttp://meerkat.oreillynet.com/?&p=8161&_fl=rss
  • Open P2P.com http://meerkat.oreillynet.com/?&p=8160&_fl=rss
  • Patents DevCenter http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=2382
  • PHP DevCenter http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5135
  • Python DevCenter + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=2386
  • RSS DevCenter http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=2383
  • Weblogs + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5209
  • Weblogs: Java + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5565
  • Weblogs: LAMP http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5567
  • Weblogs: Mac + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5566
  • Weblogs: P2P + http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=5526
  • Wireless DevCenter http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=2385
  • XML FAQs http://www.oreillynet.com/meerkat/?_fl=rss&t=ALL&c=2365
  • XML.comhttp://meerkat.oreillynet.com/&p=6304&_fl=rss

    • Slash Style Sites

    Slash style sites are a rich source of RSS as almost all of them publish RSS somewhere.

    Slashcode Sites:
  • http://slashcode.com/sites.shtml
  • http://slashcode.com/search.pl?section=yass

    Scoop code sites:
  • http://scoop.kuro5hin.org/?op=special&page=sites
  • http://scoop.kuro5hin.org/?op=section;section=yass

    PHP-Nuke based sites:
  • http://the420club.net/Top100/list.php
  • http://www.leodano.com/phptopsites/list.php3

    Other Slash Clones:
  • Drupal http://www.drop.org
  • PHPslash http://phplib.netuse.de/download/index.php3
  • Squishdot http://squishdot.org/
  • ThatPHPware http://atthat.com/
  • scoop http://scoop.kuro5hin.org/
  • SlashJ http://www.slashj.org/
  • sips http://sips.sourceforge.net/
  • localecho http://aurore.net/source/localecho.html
  • twig http://twig.screwdriver.net/
  • ASPslash http://www.aspslash.com/
  • phpweblog http://phpweblog.org/
  • Geeklog http://sourceforge.net/projects/geeklog
  • Glasscode http://glasscode.half-empty.org/servlet/LoadPage?pageID=idea&ideaid=2#idea
  • greymatter http://noahgrey.com/greysoft/
  • More Like This http://www.whump.com/moreLikeThis/how.html
  • pslash http://www.hotscripts.com/Detailed/10541.html
  • Soma http://www.hotscripts.com/Detailed/6427.html
  • doins http://www.hotscripts.com/Detailed/5070.html
  • Squash http://www.hotscripts.com/Detailed/4977.html
  • PHP First Post! http://www.hotscripts.com/Detailed/7831.html

    Lists of sites
  • http://www.lights.com/pickalink/weblogs/
  • http://www.sitereview.org/ posts reviews of weblogs and other sites.
  • http://www.larkfarm.com/wlm/roll_your_own.htm
  • http://dmoz.org/Computers/Internet/On_the_Web/Web_Logs/Tools/
  • http://www.hotscripts.com/PHP/Scripts_and_Programs/Portal_Systems/
  • http://www.hotscripts.com/Perl/Scripts_and_Programs/Portal_Systems/
  • http://www.hotscripts.com/search/?query=slashdot&category=all&bool=AND

    • Acknowledgements & Copyright

    Acknowledgements
  • Alis Marsden for getting the RSS FAQ off the ground and letting me build on her work.
  • Aaron Schwartz for his site, that I used frequently in the past to explain RSS to people.

    Copyright
    Like everything on this site, the RSS FAQ is is Kopyleft, All Rights Reversed. Feel free to copy, re-use, distribute it, or whatever. Of course, references are always welcome.

    But most of all, get involved. I can't do all this on my own.

    • About this FAQ

    This FAQ about RSS is loosely based on all the other FAQs but has an important difference. Anyone can help add to it, make changes or comment on the contents.

    If you want to update an entry, you first need to get a login using the Register link on the left.

    Once you have successfully logged in, go to the page of the FAQ that you want to update and choose "add node" or "update node" as appropriate. Once you've entered your suggestion press submit and the entry will be moved to the submission queue. I'll give it the once over and then promote it to the book.

    If you just want to make a comment about a page, then every page has an "Add Comment" button at the bottom.

    But most of all, get involved. I can't do all this on my own.

    The FAQ has a complex URL, but I have set up a redirect at: http://www.voidstar.com/rssfaq
    I will attempt to make sure that this URL has a long life even if the FAQ moves.

    A static html version is also available at http://www.voidstar.com/module.php?id=129&mod=book&op=feed