Archive for the ‘6 - Subscribing to feeds’ Category

Thing 6 - Subscribing to feeds

Friday, October 24th, 2008

Week 2, 27 - 31 October 2008… delivered by Rosita and Joanne

Have information delivered to you without having to worry that you will miss out on something important, interesting or even maybe entertaining. This ‘thing’ will show you a few different ways to make your life easier!

We will also show you how to subscribe to RSS feeds. Once you have feeds set up you can do a bit of exploring and find out how to sort feeds into folders, add a star, and mark all feeds as read, among other things.

There will not always be an RSS button to click on so we have provided different options for you to try adding a feed to your reader. For this session we are using Google Reader, but there are other readers available. For information about these see the library’s RSS Feeds page

Have a look at this YouTube video RSS in Plain English, which briefly describes RSS feeds and Google Reader.

WHAT YOU HAVE TO DO BEFORE YOU CAN TICK OFF THING 6 :

  • Subscribe to an RSS feed via Google Reader. You need to use your gmail account to create a Google Reader account. From any Google product (e.g. Gmail) go to More > Reader. The first time you use it you will need to log in. When you have done this go to ABC News RSS Feeds page http://www.abc.net.au/services/rss/subject_NewsAnalysis.htm and we will subscribe to the Breaking Stories, News feed. The three ways you may be able to subscribe are:
  1. Subscribe using the feed button: Left click on the orange feed icon , select Google Reader in the dropdown menu and click “Subscribe Now”.
  2. Copy and Paste the feed link: Right click on the feed icon and select “Copy Link Location”. Copy the link and then click on the “Add Subscription” in your Google Reader. Paste the link and click on Add.
  3. Copy and paste the URL for the page: Copy the URL from the address bar in you browser window, go to “Add Subscription” and paste in the link.
  • Find 2 other feeds and add them to the Reader. Write a post in your blog describing one of your feeds and why you subscribed to it.

If you like you can now organise your feed in folders by going to “Manage Subscriptions”, check the box next to the feed that you want to put in a folder and go to the dropdown menu after the feeds name and either select an existing folder or create a new one.

Other Options for RSS Feeds

Listed below are other options for RSS feeds other than web based readers like Google Reader and Bloglines. You may prefer to use these methods described below:

  • Add the RSS feed directly onto Internet Explorer or Firefox. Go to http://librariesinteract.info/ In IE left click on the feed icon. Click on “Subscribe to this feed”. The feed will be added to your Favorites Center. In Firefox left click on the icon and select “Live Bookmarks” from the dropdown list. It will be added to you Bookmarks Toolbar.

  • Add RSS feeds into your Microsoft Outlook Express. Go to http://wwwlib.murdoch.edu.au/find/books/RSSbooks.html and select a new book feed. Right click on the feed icon and select “Copy Link Location”. Go to Outlook, right click on the RSS Feed folder and then click on “Add a New RSS Feed…” Paste and click Add.

Some web sites provide information about blogs that are available. Two that could be of interest are The Australian Blog Index, Some Examples of Good Postgraduate and Academic Blogging and Australian Library Blogs

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