What Do I Need to Know About RSS? What is RSS?
RSS is a fairly new technology for automatically delivering information to you on subjects you decide you want to know about. Instead of signing up for TOCs [Tables of Contents] from all the journals you want to read and receiving a notice in your email, you “subscribe” [sign up] for the “RSS feed” [automatic updates] from those journals. Each time the TOC changes, your RSS reader will snag that information and hold it for you in your RSS reader. You don’t have to go to each site yourself each time. You go once to the site and sign up and then you only have to go to your reader and sign in. You are in complete control of what you see and when you see it and you aren’t cluttering up your email box with things you want to see sometime, but perhaps not when you’re reading your email. And yes, this means another user name and password to remember. Another way to think of this is that RSS is the Tivo TM of the internet.1 When you have the time, or feel like reading the latest journals, you log into your reader and all the TOCs that have become available since the last time you logged in are there for you to read. Depending on the source, there may be a link to the abstract of the articles listed or a link to the full text of the article. This automatic delivery of information can come from other sources as well. Are you a news junkie? There are several sites that will deliver data feeds from different news sources tailored to your specific interests. Do you have some subjects of ongoing interest to you? The results of database searches can also be available by RSS technology. For instance, Pub Med has a feature new to its “Send To” drop down menu that includes “RSS feed.” After you’ve finished searching, you pull down the “Send to” box and one of your choices is “RSS feed.” You can send the results to your printer or to email or to an RSS feed. When you click on the “Create Feed” button, you are presented with an orange XML button, which provides you with the URL for your reader. Pub Med will then send daily updates to your reader for this subject. This feature is in addition to their MyNCBI feature where your recurrent search is sent to your email. Like to read blogs [web logs]? RSS feeds from blogs are what make blogs really work for you. How about podcasts? These are audio or video broadcasts sent via the Internet. For instance, you can receive a weekly broadcast from the New England Journal of Medicine giving you a summary for that week. Or you can receive podcasts from any or all of the journals on Pub Med Central or the PLoS. If you have a mobile device that can accept them, such as a cell phone or a PDA, you can receive them as you walk from building to building or wait in line for your morning coffee. RSS can stand for several things, such as “Rich Site Summary” or RDF Site Summary”, but usually stands for “Really Simple Syndication”. Since everyone just says “RSS”, it doesn’t really matter. It is becoming very popular; one poll from the RSS Weblogsinc.com shows that 12% of its readers track more than 390 feeds!2 When the New York Times or the National Library of Medicine’s Pub Med offers RSS feeds, it’s time to find out about RSS technology. RSS comes in different versions: .09, 1.0, 2.0; “Atom” is another syndication format. Most sites will have icons on them that say “RSS or “XML” . When you see these icons,
you know you can sign up for a feed.
How Do I Subscribe to a RSS Feed?
First, you have to get a RSS reader. There are lists of readers in several places. One example is the RSS Compendium - RSS Readers web site: http://allrss.com/rssreaders.html . Another would be the list on the USA.gov site: http://www.dmoz.org/Computers/Software/Internet/Clients/WWW/Feed_Readers/ Readers come in three types: Web-based aggregators: The most common type; everything is on a web server and its all free. A common example is Bloglines http://bloglines.com. Web portals such as MyYahoo http://my.yahoo.com or Google Reader http://reader.google.com offer RSS readers as a part of their service. Web- based readers are usually easy to use and you don’t have to download any software so you can use them anywhere you have web access. Desktop-based aggregators: For these you have to download software onto your computer, but they may have more powerful features that allow you to customize things just the way you want them. If you have a laptop, you always have your desktop with you. An example here would be FeedDemon http://feeddemon.com. Web browsers may contain built-in feed readers. Mozilla Firefox http://firefox.com is one example. These may come with built-in feeds set up already. You just add more to the existing list. Internet Explorer has some add-in software called Onfolio http://www.onfolio.com that you use by clicking on the Onfolio button on the IE toolbar. RSS feeds can also be read on mobile devices such as PDAs or smart cell phones using a service such as AvantGo. You must register as an AvantGo user and download the connection software. Each time AvantGo is synchronized, RSS feeds are downloaded to the device and can be read anytime. Instructions to set up an account with Google and add feeds: Go to Google. Look for the list of services at the very top of the page and click on “more”. Click on “Reader”. Login to your Google Account with the user id and password you created when you created the account or go to the link for “Create an Account”. Click on the “Add Subscription” tab located on the upper left frame. Type or paste a RSS feed URL into the box and click “Add.” To read your feed just click on the name of the feed.
Finding RSS Feeds
You can add RSS feeds to your reader from almost any website you happen to find. If you’re searching with a browser, add the term RSS to your search string and you should find
sites of interest that contain RSS feeds. But perhaps you want to peruse a list of feeds. Most have a subject arrangement to help you find good sites. Some reliable directories are: RSSfeeds.com http://www.rssfeeds.com arranges things by subjects and allows you to search by keywords. Syndic8 http://www.syndic8.com has a similar arrangement and allows browsing. Feedfinder http://feedfinder.feedster.com Technorati http://www.technorati.com NewsIsFree http://www.newsisfree.com has news arranged by category, date, and top source. Other news sources might be: Reuters Health News http://feeds.feedburner.com/reuters/healthNews/ New York Times RSS feeds http://www.nytimes.com/services/xml/rss/index.html National Guideline Clearinghouse http://www.guideline.gov/rss Sample Journal Publishers Feeds: JAMA and Archives journals for awareness services http://pubs.ama-assn.org/misc/rssfeed.dtl New England Journal of Medicine feeds http://content.mejm.org/rss/current.xml BioMed Central http://www.biomedcentral.com/rss/ PloS Medicine http://journals.plos.org/plosmedicine/rss_feeds.php
Evaluating RSS Feeds
Any website must be evaluated. Does the site tell you what its source is? Is this a credible source? Does the site have certificates from any of the groups evaluating websites, such as HON? Is the information current? You can always subscribe for a time, evaluate it and unsubscribe if needed.
Setting up an RSS feed for OVID SP journal titles
The new OVID SP has a built in capability for RSS feeds for OVID journal titles. If you have IE 7.0 or higher, the set up process will be quick and seamless. If you have IE 6.0, the process is a bit more complicated, but workable. In either case, the beginning steps in OVID SP are: 1. go to Journals Database 2. Browse Contents: your Journals@ OVID Journals IF you have IE version 7.0 or higher, then just click on the RSS feed. IE 7.0 comes with a built in RSS reader 3. IF you don’t have IE version 7.0 or higher or if you prefer to use a different RSS feed reader-follow these steps: For Bloglines : you won’t be able to copy and paste in the URL for the RSS feed. Instead-if you hold your mouse over the RSS feed button, you will see the url for this feed on the bottom left hand side of your screen. You will need to manually copy this url and then ADD it to your feed reader.
OVID has developed some instructions dealing with RSS readers that are especially compatible with OVID. Here are their instructions:
The main programs for RSS are: 1) Google Home Page Google allows you to create a virtual desktop called a google home page. With that, you can add your own rss viewer there. Pros - Free - No install required - Access from any computer - Integrates with other Google Services like Gmail - Good chance you will see clinicians and students using Google Cons - Some learning curve - Adding an RSS feed requires a manual copy/paste of the URL to the RSS feed -- (in IE or Mozilla you don't have to do that) - The RSS "Layout" is not as easy to look at compared to Firefox and IE. Keeping track of which article you have read is not a supported feature If you have no idea how to setup Google Home Pages or what they are: http://www.wikihow.com/Set-Up-a-Google-Personalized-Homepage If you have a Google Home Page, but don't know how to add RSS: http://www.wikihow.com/Add-RSS-Feeds-to-Your-Google-Personalized-Homepage 2) Firefox Firefox is a very popular alternative to Internet Explorer. For a long time, Mozilla has supported free and easy to install plugins to allow RSS. A popular one is Sage. You can get firefox here: www.firefox.com Pros - Free, Mature, Open Source - Takes about 30 seconds to install and you can port all your existing bookmarks from IE - Adding extensions like Sage is simple --- Tools->AddOns -- lots of RSS readers supported - Sage Add on is here: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/77 - Simple to add an RSS Feed - Starting with 2.0 at least, Firefox also supports 'Live Bookmarks', which are essentially RSS feeds Con - None at this time 3) Internet Explorer IE 7 Supports RSS "natively" - you don't have to add a plugin. Pros - IE 7 has built in support for RSS reading - Basically one click adding of RSS feeds Cons - Most likely need to upgrade
- May not play well with Citrix - Some people have had problems after upgrading - Many clinicians and librarians have not upgraded to IE 7 4) Stand Alone RSS reader There are RSS feed readers on the net today. Search your favorite web browser for them. Con -Many users find Google, Mozilla or IE 7 more convenient 5) Don't use RSS -- Use e-mail
Interested in Setting Up a RSS Feed?
If you’re interested in this technology, just call the library. We’ll be happy to make an appointment with you so we can help you set up a web based RSS reader and get you started finding feeds that you’ll want to read.
References: 1. Holvoet, Katherine. “What is RSS and How Can Libraries Use It to Improve Patron Service?” Library Hi Tech News Number 8, 2006 pp.32-33. 2. Wu, WG and Li, Jie. “RSS Made Easy” Medical References Quarterly vol.26 (1) Spring, 2007. pgs 37-50.